Vancouver's rebound, Austin's flashiness & more from Matchday 27 | OneFootball

By Matthew Doyle

We’re streamlining the format this week since Leagues Cup is coming up fast – this thing starts Tuesday night and folks, we’re churning out the preview content. That includes my Tiers piece, which I am spending most of Sunday revising (hence the early pub on this bad boy).

So this is a good time to just take a quick tour through the weekend and hit each game in brief before we turn our sights on the tournament.

So… in we go!

New England Revolution 1-3 CF Montréal

The Revs have hit desperate hours for the second time this season. The first time, way back on Matchday 7, Caleb Porter flipped his team out of the 4-2-3-1 they’d been playing and into a 3-4-1-2. They then ran off nine unbeaten.

That nine-game unbeaten run was followed immediately by an eight-game winless skid, which the Revs brought with them to Friday night’s date with their northern neighbors. Desperate once again, Porter pressed the “undo” button and flipped his team back into their original 4-2-3-1.

This time it didn’t work. Montréal weren’t massively better – this could easily have ended 2-2 – but the goals the Revs conceded were almost exact replicas of the types they were shipping every week back in March. This one in particular…

I mean, I thought I’d stumbled into a time machine that dropped me off in late winter.

The issue is (well, one of the issues is) the Revs have not been able to win individual battles in high-leverage spots all year. Part of the reason the 3-4-2-1 worked (for a time, anyway) is they simply had more numbers in the box defensively. Without that extra bit of padding against a team determined to make the game a collection of moments – on the break, via the press, on set pieces, etc. – it was always a good bet Aljaž Ivačič was going to be picking the ball out of his net multiple times.

New England are 10 points back with 10 games left. The window is just about closed.

Montréal’s window is all the way closed, but this was well done from a team whose front office put out a statement promising better to the fans this past week. For one matchday, at least, they delivered.

FC Dallas 3-4 New York City FC

Alonso Martínez got out of his slump – officially busted the hell out of it – with a hat trick. That’s the top headline from this game, because Martínez is the type of goalscorer who can get hot and just carry a team down the stretch and into the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs. It’s been a promising year for him (he’s still finding chances at an elite rate, as reflected by his xG number) and not so promising (he’s been significantly underperforming that number) after his 2024 breakout, but you know the drill, folks: in this house we always expect regression to the mean. That means we haven’t been worried about Martínez even when he couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn.

On Friday night in Frisco, regression finally hit. Bet the goals come in bunches now.

The bigger story, I think, is NYCFC’s new DP, Nicolás Fernández Mercau, walked onto the field at right wing with 29 minutes left and immediately started dealing (after one bad breakaway that I snarked about on social media, but still). This was one of two completed through-balls from the Argie attacker:

To put it into perspective: Maxi Moralez leads the Pigeons with four completed through-balls on the year.

That’s not a knock on Maxi, who’s still one of the better 10s in the league. But he’s more of an orchestrator than a pure attacker, while Mercau looked like much more of a downhill player, operating in the right half-space and trying to get into the attack on every touch rather than rearranging pieces on the chess board.

It’s early days, so I'm not sure if that's inclination or in-the-moment function (not much need for a winger to come inside and orchestrate when Maxi's the 10 and the right back is not overlapping). But Mercau easily created dynamic superiority from a spot where the Pigeons haven’t gotten much production all year long.

Long-term, I do think he’s Maxi’s replacement at the 10. Short term, I expect him to be in the XI on that right wing every week.

Dallas, at least, got a great performance from Logan Farrington. But it feels very much like they’re headed for an offseason overhaul, and my guess is they’ll be in the market for a new No. 10 of their own along the way.

Columbus Crew 1-3 Orlando City

I have written in this column, in each of the past two weeks, that Oscar Pareja needs to drop Luis Muriel and get Ramiro Enrique onto the field. And then I wrote the same thing again in Orlando’s blurb for the summer transfer window guide.

As a rule of thumb I am not a “personnel fixes everything” guy, but with Orlando, they have been so clearly a good team that’s one piece – a goal dangerous No. 9 piece – away from being very good, or possibly even great.

But Muriel, who has not scored in two-and-a-half months, started again. And when he left the field after 67 minutes, Orlando were down 1-0, had been outshot 14-6 and had generated just 0.83 xG to the Crew’s 1.84. Business as usual.

Then Enrique replaced him and did this:

Orlando played maybe their finest 30 minutes (I’m including stoppage here) of the season. Enrique was obviously the biggest part of that – not just his two goals, but the work he was constantly doing off-ball to push the Crew backline deeper, creating space for the likes of Martín Ojeda and Marco Pašalić. His energy and the danger he creates off the ball makes it easier for everyone else working on the ball, and because of that he’s a purely additive player for this lineup. And it showed.

It also showed that Muriel’s the one who should be coming off the bench here. It’s beyond time to make that switch.

The Crew were obviously complicit in the above; they fell apart over the game’s final 20 minutes and now need quite a push to factor into the Supporters’ Shield race. But they got the good news that Palestine international attacker Wessam Abou Ali has officially been signed as a DP, so the week wasn't a total waste.

LAFC 0-1 Portland Timbers

I’m going to give the mic to Timbers coach Phil Neville, who got to see his team post their first clean sheet in two months, and first clean sheet on the road in four months.

"I thought we just played to our level. What you saw tonight was a game that was a playoff-level game. We controlled the game with the ball in the first half and without the ball in the second half,” Neville said in the postgame. "I thought we played with courage. I feel the two games against LAFC have produced our two best performances of the season."

I’d argue that last point – that 3-0 in Commerce City still stands out to me – but this was, nonetheless, a better, more controlled version of the Timbers than we’ve been seeing recently. Cristhian Paredes scored the game’s only goal with a well-placed header off a corner kick just before halftime. Maxime Crépeau, who seems to have won the No. 1 kit back from James Pantemis, was excellent in goal.

"I feel like he won us the game tonight,” Neville said of Crépeau, who had three saves, including a spectacular, sprawling one in the 56th minute.

Portland snapped a little, three-game winless skid. LAFC, meanwhile, are suddenly a team in flux – no more Aaron Long, two open DP slots, lots of rumors about who could be coming to town next.

San Diego FC 1-0 Nashville SC

Jeppe Tverskov produced our Pass of the Week on what I promise was the only goal from San Diego’s much-needed 1-0 win over visiting Nashville:

To give you an idea of how this game played out: Tverskov’s 95 pass attempts were more than Nashville’s central midfield trio of Patrick Yazbek (45), Eddy Tagseth (29) and Gastón Brugman (18) combined (for clarity, only two of those guys were playing at once – Brugman replaced Tagseth with 20 minutes left). Which is to say things very much unfolded on los Niños’ terms: they got on the ball a lot, they used it well, and when they lost it, they did so in spots where the ‘Yotes couldn’t get out in transition and inflict pain.

It was a reassuring overall performance after a month spent in the doldrums.

For Nashville, this was their worst outing in months. There’s probably something to be learned from it (Tverskov is one of the few true single pivots left; this performance could be a valuable data point), but I don’t think they should dwell.

Inter Miami 0-0 FC Cincinnati

I think this game is better served via analysis by my colleague Andrew Wiebe on Instant Replay than by anything I can write here. Looking forward to that one.

Good point from the Garys, to be clear. And good-ish point from Miami without, uh, let’s just say “two starters.”

“We had many absences, had to adapt, and did well — we deserved the win. Our top scorer was out, and it showed, we missed him,” Miami head coach Javier Mascherano said in the postgame.

“Curiously, we’ve played 22 league games and we’re the only team that hasn’t been awarded a single penalty.”

Wooo boy.

Philadelphia Union 3-1 Colorado Rapids

This is one of my favorite Union goals of the season:

Let me walk you through why:

Mikael Uhre scored that goal from one of those seams. It was a great goal in the sense Uhre placed it perfectly – Zack Steffen had been magnificent all night, but there was nothing he could do there. More illustratively, it was a textbook goal in that it came exactly from how the Union want to play, and who they are philosophically.

And so they ended the night not just atop the East, but atop the Shield race.

Ninth consecutive away game in which the Rapids have conceded two or more goals. Not gonna get many road results doing that.

“It frustrates me that we stopped playing in the second half,” Cole Bassett said afterward, as per our good friends at Burgundy Wave. “[We’ve had] four or five results [like] this game. We stop doing the things that get us the lead.

“It's like playing prevent defense. It's really annoying me.”

Charlotte FC 2-0 Toronto FC

The Crown took care of business with a very comfortable 2-0 win over the visiting Reds, who did well to keep it scoreless until the hour mark.

That’s when Idan Toklomati finally broke through:

This is so good. He’s one of the primary guys attacking the original service, but when the set piece is recycled he reads the play, realizes TFC’s defenders aren’t actually tracking him (he’s only one of the hottest 9s in the league right now, guys; might want to rethink that), and very purposefully drifts to the back post because that’s where most goals are scored from in these situations.

Open header. 1-0. Five minutes later Kerwin Vargas – another U22 playing very, very well for Charlotte – made it 2-0, and that was that.

D.C. United 2-4 Austin FC

I’ve spent all year long chiding Austin’s front office for putting together a team full of guys who don’t pass – or maybe haven’t passed? – the ball very well. So it’s only fair we shine a spotlight on this, which is probably the nicest team goal Austin have scored this season:

That’s beautiful stuff, starting with Brad Stuver’s daring pass out of the back and then continuing with both the vision and patience of Danny Pereira and Owen Wolff. Neither guy hits “oh man, where did that come from?” passes that cut five defenders out of the play; instead, it’s the ability to take extra touches that draw defenders in on one line while compressing them on another that defines this play.

Doing that made the entire D.C. shape theirs to manipulate, and it ended with Osman Bukari going five-hole from eight yards out.

Stuver, Pereira and Wolff have been my favorite players on this roster since the team was inaugurated, and I still think a winning side can be built around them (I’d love, at some point, to see Wolff as a pressing 10 in a 4-2-3-1 with Pereira a line deeper in a double pivot). And point of fact, their little, two-game winning streak has them with a 9W-8L-6D mark in league, play, which is indeed a winning record.

They’re up to seventh in the West, have two games in hand on most of the teams chasing them, and their next six are against teams below the playoff line. This should be a playoff team.

D.C. will not be.

Atlanta United 2-2 Seattle Sounders

Aleksey Miranchuk hit the Sounders with a late screamer, then hit us all with the Face of the Week:

That’s an expression of true joy.

These were points dropped by the Sounders, who’d taken a 2-1 lead just moments before the above when Osaze De Rosario (!!) headed home an inch-perfect Nouhou cross (!!!) from point blank range. Seattle hadn’t played well – they have looked a little bit gassed the past few outings – but had, seemingly, done enough.

They are still technically fourth in the West, a point ahead of Portland. But they are fractionally fifth in the West on PPG, just behind LAFC (who have two games in hand and an easier remaining schedule). And boy would homefield advantage matter a lot in that one.

Atlanta are starting their rebuild, by the way. And other than that goal, Miranchuk mostly played like a guy who would be happier elsewhere.

St. Louis City 1-2 Minnesota United

The Loons flipped the usual script, this time coming from behind in the final 20 minutes to steal all three points on the road at St. Louis behind a pair of late penalties and a pair of Kelvin Yeboah conversions.

Minnesota, who were down 1-0 thanks to a 36th-minute Eduard Löwen penalty, ended up being forced to have the ball in the second half – nearly 60 percent of it – and used it fairly well. I’m not going to read too much into that since 1) St. Louis are one of the worst teams in the league, and 2) the Loons didn’t break through until they were down to 10 men after Chris Durkin was sent off for a DOGSO red in the box. And certainly head coach Eric Ramsay was not particularly happy with the overall performance.

“To come away with a win and three points, I'm very pleased,” Ramsay said afterward. “But I’ve said to the players that the performance is so far below the level that is acceptable or that has come to be acceptable that we'll also go home with a sense of bitterness around that for sure and we've got some real work to do.”

It’s the mark of a good team to be able to get a result out of that anyway (which I think is Ramsay’s point). They’ve got work to do to be a great team, though.

St. Louis are now just 2W-6L-1D since replacing Olof Mellberg.

Chicago Fire 1-0 New York Red Bulls

Chicago leapfrogged RBNY into ninth place in the East thanks to a Hugo Cuypers penalty conversion just before halftime, and in spite of a strong allergy to finishing anything off from open play. Carlos Coronel – quietly having a very good season for the Red Bulls – had something to do with that, but c’mon… one of these has got to find the back of the net if you’re the Fire:

The good news, though, is this is the Fire’s second straight shutout, and their second straight win.

“Two clean sheets and I feel like I don’t know this team anymore, right? My goodness,” head coach Gregg Berhalter quipped in the postgame, and he was even able to spin the lack of a second goal into a positive.

“No, it feels good, especially 1-0 wins. They go so far for confidence, because when you’re pushed – and you normally are when you’re winning 1-0 – to be able to bend but not break is a good quality of any strong team. Their xG was something like 0.5. So that’s strong; they have some good attacking players.”

He also shouted out Dje D’Avilla, the U22 d-mid signing who I’ve been critical of here, calling him “a monster in the midfield” for his ability to compete in duels and win second balls, and honestly, I agree with him. This was D’Avilla’s best performance – by a mile – since coming to MLS (though he did get sloppy with a couple of cheap giveaways in the final 10 minutes before being subbed off).

Now here’s some perspective on the Fire’s season overall:

RBNY have won just once since May, a span of eight games. They’re now 10th place in the East – below the playoff line – and if they stay there, that’d snap a league-record 15-year playoff streak.

They have, I think, a slightly easier remaining schedule than the Fire. But the Fire have a two-point cushion and a game in hand.

RSL 2-1 San Jose Earthquakes

I’d have lost my mind if this had turned into a goal:

It was good to see Emeka Eneli back in the XI for RSL. After a breakout 2024 he’s had a tough 2025, with some underperformance and then an injury – this was his first start in more than two months. And while I don’t think he was particularly sharp, he reminded everyone in that moment why he was one of the most exciting midfielders in the league last year, and how he played himself into the USMNT picture.

With him back, and attacking additions made, and Diego Luna still around, and the defense now somewhat sorted out, the xDAWG’s barking again. RSL got fortunate in this one – Braian Ojeda’s winner came via a colossal error from San Jose ‘keeper Daniel – but teams that try this hard tend to make their own luck.

“I think the biggest takeaway for me was the ability to find the three points in a game that wasn’t as controlled as we’d like,” head coach Pablo Mastroeni said afterwards, and that’s something I’m going to have to unpack in upcoming games, because what Eneli actually provides is that midfield control. It was his calling card last season.

The Quakes once again played well enough to get a result, and once again let themselves down. They’re now winless in six, have fallen to 10th and have a pretty brutal remaining schedule.

Their path to the postseason has narrowed considerably after a promising first half of the year.

Vancouver Whitecaps 3-0 Sporting KC

Are the ‘Caps somehow back? In spite of another weekend without Ryan Gauld? In spite of Pedro Vite making his debut for Pumas UNAM and his replacement not yet in town? In spite of the first game of what will be many without Ranko Veselinović, who tore his ACL in last weekend’s 1-1 draw at San Diego?

They feel kind of back. They absolutely smoked Sporting – granted, not a very good team right now – to push their unbeaten run to three, and to stay just a point behind first-place SDFC with a game in hand.

The story in this one was the midfield control they exerted, which compressed Sporting’s shape and thus allowed Vancouver to constantly find Jayden Nelson in isolation out wide on the left:

Nelson played a part in each of the first two goals, and so did J.C. Ngando – he scored that one above, and had a clever secondary assist on the opener.

Both these guys were afterthoughts heading into the season. Both have become high-level starters for what has been one of the very best teams in the league, and man, does head coach Jesper Sørensen deserve all the praise for that.

“[It’s about] believing in myself. I feel like that’s something that was lacking, I had a hard time understanding that I belong,” Ngando said afterward. “I just have to understand that I’ve been here for a long time and I’m a good player and I just have to be myself.”

That’s on top of the more widely acknowledged breakouts of Seb Berhalter and Tristan Blackmon, as well as the excellent play of young fullbacks Tate Johnson and Édier Ocampo.

Getting young players or unfinished products to improve and play with confidence is the secret sauce in MLS. It’s how you build a foundation that stays in place even when there are injuries or absences or mid-season sales. And it’s how you set yourself up to, potentially, make the biggest splash in club history:

We’ll see if this gets done, but I love the ambition here from the ‘Caps. They’ve shown, under Sørensen, that they can compete with the best. Maybe with Müller in town they don’t just compete; maybe they’re the last ones standing when the final whistle blows.