It’s two games, an 180-minute sandbar in the vast ocean of an MLS campaign.
But the Philadelphia Union rammed into it hard this week. And the scramble is on to stop the water streaming in and prevent the loss of the precious cargo they’ve accumulated this season.
The Union were humbled again Tuesday night, not just losing 3-1 at Nashville in the U.S. Open Cup semifinal at GEODIS Park but playing poorly. On the heels of a 7-0 dismantling by Vancouver on the weekend, the Union have gone from vying for trophies in two competitions to on the back foot in one and eliminated from the other.
More than that, for arguably the first time all season, a high-flying team has seen what happens when things don’t go right. They’re coping not just with the effort to get back in form but the self-doubt that anything that can go wrong just might.
“It’s been a tough week for the guys to overcome, a lot of adversity,” coach Bradley Carnell said. “And I thought the way they responded and actually gave the game a go in the second half, it’s not an easy thing to do. A little bit of light at the end of the tunnel, but we have to do a lot better on our personal details, with the set pieces and tracking runners and markers. Just a little bit of a bad day at the office with that.”
It hasn’t been good. Tuesday wasn’t as disastrous as Saturday, but then nothing in 16 seasons of Union soccer has been. But it was by some measures perhaps more dispiriting. The Union didn’t have a shot on target for 60 minutes, against a goalie who came to Nashville after time in the Scottish second division. They were undone once on a long throw and once on a corner kick, after two corner kicks resulted in goals (one via the penalty spot) against Vancouver.
Most damning, there wasn’t a response from the thrashing meted out by Vancouver, the out-of-the-gates intensity needed anyway in a cup competition away from home, in any department save for fouling. And there wasn’t much of an explanation for it afterward.
“You don’t shake off a trip to Vancouver and come here and think that you can be this immortal team, right?,” Carnell said. “So you have to now go through phases in the game and work your way into it. I thought we got to that moment, and then, unfortunately, we just switched off on a detail, on a set piece, on a long throw, and then all of a sudden, you fall down that spiral again. And doubt creeps in, and you’re just like, oh, man, is this another roller coaster ride?”
Sam Surridge hit the Union for a hat trick, the second allowed in four days after none in nearly three years. It sends Nashville, led by former Union assistant BJ Callaghan, into its first U.S. Open Cup final. The Union, in the semifinals for a sixth time, still have never won the competition.
The repetition of mistakes is concerning. Surridge slipped his marker on a long throw in the 36th minute, then was in the right place at the right time on a deflected shot off a corner in the 50th minute. The third was another goal conceded on a low-percentage cross from distance, Germantown Academy grad Daniel Lovitz doing the honors.
The Union were short on attacking ideas early, their five shots on target all in the second half. Bruno Damiani was ghostly, save for twice being lucky not to be sent off, with a studs-up tackle in the first half and his best Luis Suarez impression from the 2010 World Cup to reach his hand toward Surridge’s second goal, spared only by handling it after the goal line.
Once Quinn Sullivan brought the Union to life in the 70th, Mikael Uhre spurned a chance to get another one, with a first-time shot that was easy for goalie Brian Schwake.
Sullivan, who didn’t start in the rotation of No. 10s, was about the only bright spot.
“Quinn came in and showed a lot of life, showed a little spark,” Carnell said. “And sometimes to regain confidence, you know, you need to have a look at the positions outside, and maybe to see it from a little distance. And I think he came in and created the spark exactly what we needed. I was really happy with the way Quinn came in and turned the game on its head a little bit. And you could see the belief, and almost like this pressure valve burst, and then all of a sudden, we looked like us again, a little bit.”
All is not lost for the Union. They remain in first place in the Shield race with 57 points and first in points per game. They need to come close to winning out in their last four games. They can max out at 69 points, while Miami and Vancouver can each reach 70 if they win all their games in hand. But the Union have the high ground.
The message after the Vancouver evisceration was to make one loss be just one loss. Well, it’s now two, though losing in Nashville was possible no matter what preceded it.
The Union return home Saturday against New England. Their last four games include three teams placed eighth or worse in the East, with a Revolution side that just fired Caleb Porter as coach up first. It’s three points they simply must have.
“These guys are not machines. We are not machines,” Carnell said. “And I’m proud of the way they responded in the second half a and to show that there’s a lot of life and a lot of quality left in this group. So again, it’s two matches. It’s one in the cup and one in the league, and now we have four days to recover and four days to massage the brains a little bit.”
Source: Berkshire mont
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