Another victory at Orlando City Stadium edged the Lions atop Soccer America's MLS Power Rankings with their league-high sixth win of the season.
Previous leader FC Dallas dropped a notch
despite rallying twice to tie Portland, 2-2, at home. The Portland Timbers and Sporting Kansas City, a 3-0 winner over Real Salt Lake, retained their places in the top four.
Toronto FC,
the New York teams, and D.C. United moved up by winning impressively. Sliding in the other direction were Houston, Atlanta, and Columbus, and near the bottom, the Galaxy and Union played out a dour
0-0 tie that neatly encapsulated their current situations.
MLS Results, Week 9
April 28 Toronto
FC 2, Houston 0.
Highlights April 29 Orlando City 2, Colorado.
Highlights FC Dallas 2, Portland 2.
Highlights Sporting KC 3,
Real Salt Lake 0.
Highlights NY Red Bulls 2, Chicago 1.
Highlights Columbus 2, New York City FC 3.
Highlights Montreal 1, Vancouver
2.
Highlights Minnesota United 0, San Jose 1.
Highlights LA Galaxy 0,
Philadelphia 0.
Highlights Seattle 3, New England 3.
Highlights April 30 Atlanta United 1, D.C. United 3.
Highlights Only MLS results are factored into the Power
Rankings, which includes the team’s record in parentheses and rank last week.
1. ORLANDO CITY (6-1-0), 2. They may not be the best in MLS but with four straight
wins the Lions could be the sharpest.
Kaka scored in stoppage time to mark his return after sitting out nearly two months, but a searing strike by
Carlos Rivas punctuated the decision by
head coach
Jason Kreis to use both of them as subs near the hour mark. (Rivas had started the first six games, you see.) For once, OCSC didn’t need heroics from keeper
Joe Bendik
as it outshot the feeble Rapids, 14-3.
2. FC DALLAS (4-0-3), 1. With his first goal since last August,
Tesho Akindele scored FCD’s second equalizer of the game and
preserved the unbeaten mark. FCD needed his goal since it had fallen behind again 10 minutes after
Max Urruti scored against his former team. Those are the first two goals conceded at home by
FCD this season, but of more concern to head coach
Oscar Pareja is a flat first half and defensive breakdowns with the score, 1-1.
3. SPORTING KC (4-1-3), 3. A strike of
great quality by
Benny Feilhaber highlighted another solid victory by SKC, which is 3-0-1 at home and may have rectified the proclivity for defensive hiccups that have plagued it the past few
seasons. It has conceded three goals in eight games. Goals by
Dom Dwyer and newcomer
Gerso Fernandes were just reward for a night of sharp finishing: the goalscoring trio put
seven of their nine combined shots on target.
4. PORTLAND (5-2-2), 4. Stepping in for the injured
Diego Valeri,
Sebastian Blanco scored his first Timbers goal and
Fanendo Adi also netted as Portland got its first road tie of the season against a very good team. At 2-1-1 away from home, memories of last season’s 0-11-6 debacle are beginning to fade.
(For perspective, the 2015 MLS Cup winners were 7-8-2 on the road.)
5. TORONTO FC (3-1-4), 7. The beast that
Jozy Altidore can be broke loose at BMO Field. He finished off a
low feed from
Raheem Edwards, who is steadily moving into the top tier of MLS left backs, at the end of a sweeping move, and chested down a return ball from
Sebastian Giovinco to smash
home his fifth goal of 2017. Props to the back line, which nailed down its first shutout since stalwart defender
Drew Moor left the team due to an irregular heartbeat.
6. NEW
YORK RED BULLS (4-3-1), 10. A nice finish by left back
Kemar Lawrence earned the Red Bulls a win and three-game sweep of home games. Rather than going high and skying his shot, which
he’d done previously, Lawrence fired low inside the far post to regain a lead NYRB had lost after
Bradley Wright-Phillips tapped in a feed from
Daniel Royer for his 73rd
MLS regular season goal.
7. NEW YORK CITY FC (4-3-1), 12. Two goals by
Jack Harrison and the first MLS score by
Yangel Herrera brought NYCFC a see-saw victory in
Columbus after it frittered away Harrison’s early opener. A dozen minutes after Herrera had headed home an equalizer in the 64th, he forced a turnover near the Crew SC penalty area and fed
Harrison for the winner.
David Villa sat out with an illness and sub
Andrea Pirlo stayed on the bench.
8. SEATTLE (2-2-4), 8. After a big win in L.A., who’d
have expected the Sounders to come out flat at home and be lit up for three goals – the first one a real howler from
Stefan Frei -- by the Revs? Kudos for the comeback and goals by
Nicolas Lodeiro,
Will Bruin and
Osvaldo Alonso -- and the quality assists on the first two by
Joevin Jones -- yet they need consistent efforts at home like the one that
dispatched the Red Bulls, 3-1, in Week 3.
9. HOUSTON (4-3-1), 5. A third straight road loss pegs the Dynamo as a team that will contend for a playoff spot but may be desperately
dependent on home results. Its vaunted attack seldom threatened, despite a 19-10 shot advantage, and only a one-v-one opportunity that
Alex couldn’t put away truly threatened the TFC
goal.
10. D.C. UNITED (3-3-2), 14. Big games from
Luciano Acosta and
Bill Hamid enabled the Original United to show the new kids how it’s done. Acosta and
veteran
Sebastian Le Toux tacked on goals that separated the teams after an own goal tied the score, and Hamid – aided by seven blocks and 26 clearances -– nailed down a win that
included six saves. Another good game by
Jared Jeffrey included a steal in his own half he released to Acosta for a killer ball to Le Toux and goal No. 3.
11. ATLANTA UNITED
(3-3-2), 6. A dream start, i.e.,
Kenwyne Jones powering home a header in the ninth minute, ended in frustrating fashion. A team that can conjure up 26 shots is occasionally going to get
dinged on the counter and as experience seeps in AUSC should be less prone to such lapses. Still, the finishing must be better, especially after scoring early.
12. CHICAGO (3-3-2), 11.
As scripted perhaps, the return to Red Bull Arena of
Dax McCarty presented a nifty dribble and pass that set up the Fire’s goal by
Nemanja Nikolic. Chicago was in the game most
of the way, but
Bastian Schweinsteiger misfired on all three of his shots and the Red Bulls were just better defensively.
13. COLUMBUS (4-4-1), 9. Blowing leads at home is
no way to get back into the playoff picture and after winning three in a row Crew SC has lost three of the last four.
Federico Higuain blasted home an equalizer and
Ola Kamara exploited
an error to open up a 2-1 lead early in the second half, but rather than manage the lead, Crew SC could not hold the ball and conceded twice. A couple of late flurries did not produce a tying goal.
14. SAN JOSE (3-3-3), 17. The Quakes snapped a six-game winless run with a goal by defender
Florian Jungwirth, whose energy and leadership have not wavered though his play has
been up-and-down.
Cordell Cato rattled a shot off the crossbar early in the match and a goal-line clearance by defender
Kofi Sarkodie, making his first start for San Jose since last
October, preserved a vital three-pointer.
15. VANCOUVER (3-4-1), 18. The veteran known as A.J. empowered the Whitecaps to their first road win of 2017 following three straight away
defeats.
Andrew Jacobson volleyed a partial clearance in the 29th minute to tie the game, and his diagonal ball set up
Cristian Techera to cut past a defender and drill home the winner.
‘Caps have nine points in the last five games.
16. NEW ENGLAND (2-3-4), 15. It’s a sign of the struggles in New England when the Revs can’t win on a great
night for
Juan Agudelo, scorer of two goals that apparently had built an insurmountable 3-0 lead. He’s scored 12 goals in the last 17 games for New England. The verdict from head coach
Jay Heaps? “We stopped playing in the last 20 minutes, and it cost us,” he said.
17. MONTREAL (1-3-4), 13. As brilliant as he can be,
Ignacio Piatti is
also prone to the occasional clunker, and the Impact could not overcome one of his off nights as well as an early injury that knocked
Mateo Mancosu out of action. Montreal lost the momentum
generated when a deflected shot by
Marco Donadel hit the net in the ninth minute. It plays three of the next four at home, so by the end of the month it could be in the playoff tier.
18. MINNESOTA UNITED (2-5-2), 16. The Loons held a fair share of possession (48.1 percent) but managed just eight shots
and keeper
Bobby Shuttleworth (five saves) was much
busier than his counterpart. In his seventh appearance as a sub, No. 1 draft pick
Abu Danladi looked lively and led the team with two shots in his 26 minutes.
19. REAL SALT LAKE
(2-5-2), 19. RSL worked hard but after falling behind early just didn’t produce enough quality to crack open the SKC defense; only of its 14 shots came from inside the penalty area. After
winning its first two games under head coach
Mike Petke, RSL has lost to Atlanta United and SKC by combined scores of 6-1, and up next is FC Dallas.
20. PHILADELPHIA (0-4-4),
21. Well, half of its points this season have been accrued from 0-0 ties, and the Union has scored fewer goals (eight) than any team except Colorado.
Haris Medunjanin forced a good save
with a nice slalom and low shot,
and
Andre Blake came up big a few times.
21. L.A. GALAXY (2-5-1), 20. The tough times continued at StubHub Center, where
Joao
Pedro hit both posts with the same shot and the few bright moments for
Giovani dos Santos produced little of consequence. The Galaxy has scored one goal in the last three games and the home
record has dipped to 1-3-1.
22. COLORADO (1-5-1), 22. Three shots, two of them launched by subs, was all the Rapids could muster as they were blanked for the second consecutive
game. Four saves by
Zac MacMath, who probably goes back to the bench next weekend with
Tim Howard coming off a three-game suspension, kept the game closer than it really was.
Can't stand when DC is on FS1, having to listen to Alexi is agony. Last year during a DC United game on FS1 he said, "The MLS has passed DC United by." Sunday he announced in his pregame analysis "DC United is a mediocre team." I am a DC United fan, but in a league where parity rules, DC while not at the top has been in the playoffs 3 out of 4 seasons under Been Olsen. If DC is mediocre then there are a few other mediocre teams in the league.
Score of the game: DC United 3 Atlanta 1
Screw you Alexi
He doesn't like D.C. because Jaimie Moreno use to toy with him.