Yes, it’s Matchday 3, not 2 — Inter Miami and Real Salt Lake was Matchday 1. But who’s counting? Here’s The Feed:
Around MLS
-Toronto FC wrapped up the weekend with a 1-0 win at the New England Revolution. It’s obviously too early to tell what this edition of TFC will look like in Year 1 of the John Herdman era, but 4 points from your first 2 matches seems like progress for a team that picked up just 22 points in 2023.
For the Revs, 0 points through 2 matches isn’t cause to throw the rest of the season away, and they were fortunate that Carles Gil and Henry Kessler were able to go the full 90 on Sunday, but this will be a side looking to get on track against Atlanta United on Saturday.
-I’m not sure how Eric Ramsay will fare, but Minnesota United is such a gritty team.
The Loons outplayed Austin FC at Q2 Stadium in their season opener and, when it looked as if they’d succumb to defending MLS Cup champion Columbus Crew at Allianz Field, they came up with a late, late equalizer from Tani Oluwaseyi and an unlikely point. This from a team that saw Adrian Heath sacked before the end of the 2023 season, then appointed Sean McAuley interim head coach for 2024, only to see him leave for the head coaching role at Indy Eleven weeks before preseason. They turned to Minnesota United 2 head coach Cameron Knowles, who’s done more than well under the circumstances.
-Steve Cherundolo isn’t a big fan of snow games:
To be fair, it’s not easy to play in conditions like that. On the other hand, RSL did score 3 on LAFC in the same conditions. You be the judge.
-Big trade! DeAndre Yedlin’s reportedly headed to FC Cincinnati. Inter Miami will have a little more wiggle room under the cap while FCC bolsters its backline.
-I still can’t believe Inter Miami scored 5 against Orlando City.
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Who’s your player of the week from Matchday 3?
Let us know in the comments. Here’s who stood out to me:
–Luis Suarez, Inter Miami. The knees looked OK against Orlando City: 2 goals, 2 assists.
–Lionel Messi, Inter Miami. His brace made it 3 goals in the last 2 games. He’s pretty good.
–Andrés Gomez, Real Salt Lake. Gomez had 1 goal in 30 league appearances for RSL last season. He scored twice in the 1st half against LAFC.
–Sean Johnson, Toronto FC. Second time in as many weeks that I’m mentioning Johnson as he stopped all 6 New England shots he faced — meanwhile, the Revs had a 2.2 xG but were shut out. Caleb Porter’s side comes to Mercedes-Benz on Saturday looking for their first point of the season.
Goal of the Matchday
Let’s go with this from Lewis Morgan:
Surprising that NE dropped the first two games.. Hopefully they’re worn out from their mid-week CCC matchup so we can make it 3.
I can say that Orlando’s poor performance can’t be blamed on rotation. The entire lineup was arguably a first choice one as there are a small number of positions that right now are being rotated until someone establishes themselves at them. I was pretty shocked at how poorly they played. They somehow got a Tuesday night match in CCC so they will have to do a quick turnaround and put the blowout loss behind them.
Tata also played a first choice lineup against Orlando, so will there be tired legs against Nashville in their CCC match this week? Will Tata do a “USOC special” against Nashville and play a bunch of his lower quality backups? Will he take CCC seriously? Who knows.