He covers the team for massive report Pat the Columbus Crew are in the M.L.S. final they play the Portland Timbers Sunday at four.
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Columbus, a charter franchise of MLS who clinched their first championship in 2008, earned a shot at winning a second title with a hard-fought 2-1 aggregate win over the Eastern Conference’s top-seeded New York Red Bulls.
The Portland Timbers and Columbus Crew face off for an MLS title on Sunday.
Portland coach Caleb Porter shrugged off criticism of his team’s style. “All I could think about was sharing the moment with my players”.
Diego Valeri scored 27 seconds after the opening whistle for the fastest goal in MLS Cup history to stun Columbus Crew SC and their home fans. Midfielder Rodney Wallace made it 2-0 with a low, sliding header in the box that zipped past Clark. Columbus Crew SC got a scare this week when Kei Kamara turned his ankle in training, but he’s expected to be fit to start. You’re playing against Obafemi Martins.
Home Field Advantage- The Crew looked lackadaisical for the first fifteen minutes which resulted in two early goals for Portland. We’d have to regroup, come up with another idea, another plan and try to execute it within, how many hours do we got guys? So, we tried to press to be aggressive and it was unusual, but it was about the aggressiveness and the pressure that we put on their backline.. The striker from Sierra Leone tied for the MLS goals lead with 22 in the regular season.
While the Argentine playmaker returned from injury in May, he didn’t hit his stride until August.
“He was ready to go”, Berhalter said. The Timbers defeated the Crew 2-1.
“I’m looking forward to it and hopefully I can add another big achievement to my career”, he said. I saw it. But that’s part of the game; what can we do? The ball deflected off the crossbar, struck crew defender Michael Parkhurst in the captain’s armband without a handball call, and then deflected off the right post before Parkhurst cleared it off the line. Instead of a stoppage for a throw-in, Portland’s Darlington Nagbe kept going with the ball and sent a pass wide to Lucas Melano, who found Wallace for the header. I dont think it has fully sunk in completely yet..
Matchup to watch: Kamara against Portland’s defense.
But that was the only shot on target among the nine Columbus took in the match – a stat Berhalter would not hold against his valiant side. That says everything about our team: “We’ve suffered a little bit, we’ve had pressure, it was fair”, Porter said. This kind of. You know learning experience for a very young team and they’ve kind of built on all of that this year. Columbus take on Portland for the MLS Cup, and it promises to be a belter.
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Portland finished third in the Western Conference and beat Sporting Kansas City in a dramatic shootout in a straight knockout game in the first round of the playoffs. Portland’s 2-1 victory in Columbus on September 26 was its first in three trips to Mapfre Stadium…. They recently changed the rules at Mapfre to ban both chainsaws and “logs of any wooden variety”.
