The Philadelphia Union traveled west hoping to solidify their position in two competitions this week.
They’ll fly to Nashville Sunday in tatters, after a 7-0 immolation meted out by the Vancouver Whitecaps, tied for the worst loss in MLS history, with barely 72 hours to pick up the pieces ahead of Tuesday’s U.S. Open Cup semifinal.
The only consolation in the seven-goal embarrassment is that the Union (17-7-6, 57 points) didn’t lose much ground. They remain atop the Supporters’ Shield standings at week’s end, thanks to an unusual (and unusually thrilling) level of parity in the league.
San Diego was dealt a 3-1 loss at home by Minnesota, meaning it remains on 56 points, though the Union’s clubbing means that San Diego has a better goal differential at plus-18 to the Union’s plus-16. Cincinnati beat Nashville to move to 55 points and push Nashville out of the race. Minnesota has 54. Charlotte, off a ninth straight win in effectively eliminating Inter Miami from the Shield race, has 53. The top five have played 30 games each. Vancouver has 52 points from 28, their 1.86 ppg currently third.
That’s the good news. The bad was everything inflicted on the Union by Thomas Muller, who recorded a hat trick in this third MLS game to mark his 36th birthday, and his fellow Whitecaps.
“We thought we put out a team there that could be very competitive and we had enough on the field to win the game,” coach Bradley Carnell said. “From a personal standpoint, I thought we did exactly what we needed to do, just unfortunately, the application on my behalf, we couldn’t get it right. I think over 30 match days, 29 we’ve proven to find the right recipe. Today we didn’t, and they exposed us and exploited us.”
Let’s get the housekeeping items out the way, the opposite-of-superlatives. The Union’s worst loss in nearly 16 season of MLS play had been by four goals, done six times, last in 2022. This nearly doubled it.
It surpassed the Union’s worst defeat in any competition, the 6-0 elimination from CONCACAF Champions Cup by Pachuca in the second leg last year. That result derailed the rest of the season, the Union winning only four times in the next 21 games.
It’s the job of Carnell and company to make sure that one loss – however catastrophic in margin – remains just one loss.
“I think the players are really angry about this performance as we should be,” Carnell said. “I think the biggest thing is now we don’t want to be blaming and shaming. We want to grow together as a group and show that we are really strong.”
On the historical measure, this ties the MLS record for the largest defeat in league history. The Union were on the right end of one of the other six, dispatching D.C. United 7-0 on July 8, 2022. It’s the second instance this year, New York Red Bulls thrashing LA Galaxy 7-0 on May 10. As of Saturday night, the Union are first in the table and the Galaxy, last year’s MLS Cup champions, are last, because MLS.
Only one team that has lost by seven goals in a season has ever finished in the top half of the league (NYCFC in 2016, after its 7-0 Hudson River Derby). D.C. in 2022 finished last.
Want to pile on? Vancouver sure did, so … only two teams that have won MLS Cup in the last 25 years have even lost by five goals in a game that season (Portland in 2015, LA Galaxy in 2002). The Union were at that point by the 61st minute.
Only two teams to win the Shield have ever conceded even six goals in a game, including Miami last year. There’s been only five five-goal losses by Shield teams in the last quarter-century, two by FC Dallas in 2016. Don’t need to check if any of the teams getting pierced for seven entered the game with the best defensive record in MLS at that point because uh, no.
All of which is to say that teams that achieve what the Union aspire to this year don’t get round house kicked like the Union did Saturday night.
Carnell opted for a somewhat rotated lineup, which included the absence of Olwethu Makhanya for the first of a two-game suspension. Everything that could’ve gone wrong did.
“I just apologize,” Carnell said of his interactions with his team. “I just apologize to the staff, the players. I put them in a position that they didn’t feel ultra comfortable. Sometimes going out of our comfort zones is a good thing, and we’ll learn from this.”
Nate Harriel, in at center back, was outjumped by Mathias Laborda on a corner kick in the 18th minute for the opener. Alejandro Bedoya, drafted in at right back, was toasted on a run leading to Emmanuel Sabbi’s first. Jesus Bueno, selected in midfield, was called for a handball on a corner kick, leading to Muller’s first goal from the spot. Bedoya was judged offside in the 40th minute in a goal he set up for Mikael Uhre that would’ve made it 3-1. Then Bedoya clattered into Ali Ahmed to send Muller to the spot again to make it 4-0 at half.
Things were so bad that Carnell made a triple sub in the second minute of first-half stoppage time. Bedoya, the team’s long-tenured captain, took to social media to apologize postgame.
“I’ll be the first to apologize for my personal performance and accept responsibility for the result tonight,” he wrote on his Instagram account. “Simply not good enough or anywhere near our standards and expectations.
“One thing is for sure. One result/game will NOT define us this season. On to the next one!”
That’s the Union’s task, laid bare, this week. They are two wins away from the Open Cup. Nashville has lost five of six and, it has beaten the Union twice this year, looks prime to be upset. Austin and Minnesota loom in the western half of the bracket. Three wins in their final four MLS games – they host all-but-eliminated New England next Saturday, then visit doornail-dead D.C. United the next week – might yet get them the Shield.
Carnell was adamant – as adamant as one can be after getting seven goals rammed down one’s throat, at least – that Saturday was an unrepresentative outlier. As a group, they have a month to show it, starting Tuesday night.
“Only time will tell,” Carnell said. “But I don’t see that anybody should feel any worse than a 1-nil loss. Sometimes you have to go through these moments to get whacked in the face and just to get that feeling of what it actually feels like.”
Source: Berkshire mont