CHESTER – After days of interminable heat and stifling humidity, the skies opened up and released a torrent Wednesday night in Chester.
The team getting rained on understood the feeling and, however fleeting it may prove to be, the feeling of deliverance.
The Union broke the dam with a deluge of goals, three in the first half on the way to a 5-1 win over New England that ended a drought of just one win since the start of May.
Tai Baribo scored a hat trick, Kai Wagner dished three assists and Quinn Sullivan scored a beauty of a goal late.
The game marked the debut of Cavan Sullivan, the 14-year-old who became the youngest player in MLS history and the youngest in American major pro sports at the age of 14 years and 293 days. He’s 13 days younger than Freddy Adu when he made his debut in 2004.
For the last-place Union (5-10-9, 24 points), the win was a salve that ended a 10-game winless streak. Their victory in New England is the only other one in the last 17 games before Wednesday.
Baribo was at the center of it. He broke through in the 29th minute, on the receiving end of set-piece service from Wagner as he was last week in Toronto. This time, it was Jack Elliott who scampered to the end line to keep the ball in, looping it into the mixer for Baribo to head home.
Wagner supplied another assist in the 39th, a corner kick that went straight to the head of Jakob Glesnes’ glancing header. After an Elliott own goal cost the Union in Toronto last week, both center backs contributed into the correct net this time around.
Elliott also struck the crossbar in the 3rd minute, and Glesnes assisted on Quinn Sullivan’s late goal.
Baribo made it 3-0 just on the stroke of halftime, a counterattacking goal the likes of which the Union used to stitch together with regularity but that hasn’t been seen around these parts very often.
A stretch pass from Alejandro Bedoya down the right win played Mikael Uhre into space. The defenders dropped toward the goal line, Baribo cut back toward the edge of the six and Uhre found him, his right footed shot getting a touch from goalie Aljaz Ivacic before it went into the net.
The hat trick is Baribo’s first with the Union, the 12th in team history in all competitions and the 10th in MLS play.
The performance wasn’t perfect, with a momentary lapse in the 50th minute allowing Ian Harkes to score from 20 yards out. That is the 13th goal conceded from outside the box this season.
But Baribo answered two minutes later, Wagner supplying his third assist in transition on a move started by Elliott.
The game marked the return of Andre Blake, who hadn’t played since late April with a knee injury. He did not make a save, but he collected a few dangerous crosses, and he watched Harkes hit the post in the first half. Without him, the Union were 1-9-5 without him.
With attention on Cavan Sullivan warming up with the subs, Quinn Sullivan reminded everyone of his place in the team, blistering a goal from outside the box in the 84th minute.
Cavan entered at the restart and got several touches on the ball, all to rousing ovations. He had a shot on target in stoppage time that was saved.
Source: Berkshire mont