THe Union lost 1-0 against Club America last night. Philly might be the defending Supporter's Shield winners, but their roster turnover in the off-season was significant. They're still figuring things out. Anyway, Cavan Sullivan and Andrew Rick got the start. Frankie Westfield came on as a sub for the second half (for Sullivan). Kudos to Philly for playing the kids against one of the strongest organizations in the Western Hemisphere. Of interest to the USMNT may be that Zendejas started for America. With guys like Luna not playing, he might be able to sneak onto that March USMNT roster.
I watched it and is was a CCL classic. The MLS team had the best of the chances and the Liga Mx giant pulled a goal out of a moment of quality. Cavan was rough to start but was looking pretty good by the middle of half. Westfield looked dangerous going forward.
Cavan was a bit of hit and miss... I didn't necessarily think he should have been pulled at the half given that he did create the only good first half chance w/ his non-dominant right foot (cross) and was showing some dynamic ability.... but bringing in Westfield was certainly a good call as I think he was a legit positive for the Union in the 2nd half. I would have liked to see them play this one together. AAR, the Union have a problem finishing right now. 0 shots on target the whole game. One goal in their first 3 MLS games. Hard to win games when you can't score. They should get better but I am dubious that they will be able to compete in the East bracket with the loss of Baribo up front and Glesnes in the back. I also worry that Iloski's scoring output might be regressing back to the mean. For a long period of time last season it seemed like every shot he took was finding the net.
Better results last night in the CCC for MLS teams. San Diego 3 Toluca 2 LAG 3 Harbor View 0 Miami 0 Nashville 9 Young USYNT midfielder David Vasquez scored a brace for San Diego. Bombino and Verhoeven, 19-year-old fullbacks, also started. Duran Ferree in goal. The bad news, really bad news, for San Diego is that important CB Duah was send off in the 88th minute. We know about Harbor View's problems with visas. That was always going to be a Galaxy win. Still, the continue to start an American midfielder of Elijah Wynder and Justin Haak. Teenagers Harbor Miller and Ruben Ramos came off the bench.
More on my team SDFC.... I think they got jobbed early on by that red card/PK combo. Should have been a yellow. Despite being down a man... they outplayed Toluca for the majority of the game. Some of the attacking sequences were impressive indeed. But you play a man down for 75' it's difficult to keep the opponent at bay down the stretch. Duah puts out so many fires for this team and allows them to play out of the back and play a high line... Not confident at all going back to Toluca with a 1-goal lead.... especially considering Duah's absence and the 2 away goals (both PKs). More on the young guns.... SDFC has been starting Bombino at RB to make space for Sargeant at LB but Bombino goes from being a role player on O to a weapon when he is on the left. Two assists last night to go along with his stellar D. Hopefully
More on my team SDFC.... I think they got jobbed early on by that red card/PK combo. Should have been a yellow. Despite being down a man... they outplayed Toluca for the majority of the game. Some of the attacking sequences were impressive indeed. But you play a man down for 75' it's difficult to keep the opponent at bay down the stretch. Duah puts out so many fires for this team and allows them to play out of the back and play a high line... Not confident at all going back to Toluca with a 1-goal lead.... especially considering Duah's absence and the 2 away goals (both PKs). More on the young guns.... SDFC has been starting Bombino at RB to make space for Sargeant at LB but Bombino goes from being a role player on O to a weapon when he is on the left. Two assists last night to go along with his stellar D. I hope Verhoeven can play well enough to move Sargeant to the bench. Not because Sargeant isn't good... but because Bombino is that much better when playing LB. And Vazquez has game for sure. Very impressed.
There were two very similar plays in the América-Philly game. The Philly played got a yellow and the América player got merely a foul (shocker). Red was harsh, and the ref spent the entire rest of the game with zero control or consistency. Anyone who has watched CONCACAF before knows Walter Lopez is shit at his job. I've said it before, I'd rather have a LigaMX ref than refs from others countries that have absolutely no standards and generally allow jungle ball. It's already going to be biased; I'd rather it not be shit and biased. Though it ended up not mattering, the worst was allowing a player to shoulder Duah in the back in his own box, then hitting him with a yellow for dissent after about 2 seconds. One minute later, a Toluca played ran up to him, got in his face and shouted at him for about a minutes straight and ... nothing. They did. Playing at Toluca is a nightmare -- 8,500 ft. But SDFC had much better legs for most of the game despite being down a man. There's a lot of people saying this is over; I don't think so. It'll come down to finishing.
-------------------------------------------White (Duke) ----Jones (Mich St) --------------------------------------------------------------- Rienzi (UW) ---------------------------Bartlow (UW)--------------Robinson (Syracuse) 5 played college ball
Pretty big shocker, Seattle goes to Vancouver and wins 3-0 in champions league with Alex Roldan as a CB. Snyder Brunell starts and looks very good, Paul Arriola gets a brace and Paul Rothrock scores the 3rd. Incredible match.
Also, Cincinnati beating Tigres comfortably 3-0 was nice to see. The scoreline ended up being comfortable, but the game wasn't. [MLS teams beat the top 2 in the Clausura standings. Toluca and Tigres.] Goal by Tom Barlow, He's not in the USMNT frame. Just a really astute signing for depth that good MLS organizations make. The winner of that Cincinnati/Tigres series plays the winner of the Seattle/Vancouver series. A Cincinnati victory over Tigres would guarantee MLS at least one semifinal participant. And it would put Club America as the only Liga MX team left on that side of the entire bracket (If they overcome Philly, which I think they will. Philly is still figuring things out. We're also guaranteed the winner of Miami and Nashville to go thru on that side. The other side of the bracket is more precarious for MLS.
CCC Rnd-16 First-Legs Team of the Week * = 23-and-under ** = 20-and-under Player of the Week: Cuevas(9.1) Arriola(9.0) Bombino(8.9) 23-and-under: Cuevas(9.1) Bombino(8.9) Vazquez(8.7) 20-and-under: Bombino(8.9) Vazquez(8.7) Ferree(7.3)
Strong showing by the veteran MLSers Quality American keepers are starting to make a return FCD are a great producer of talent for other mls teams, in addition to being an exporter abroad of good talent. Vancouver were perhaps a bit over-confident Miles continues to post strong numbers to start the season
Jesus was all over the goals. Look at this combination with Roldan and Rothrock. This is a good summary and has videos of all three goals. TUDN’s YouTube has extended highlights too. https://aftn.ca/report-and-reaction...seattle-sounders-concacaf-champions-cup-2026/ Rothrock turns the chance into Seattle’s third! 3️⃣ pic.twitter.com/iYKEEpQzZt— Concacaf Champions Cup (@TheChampions) March 13, 2026
FCD just doesn't create players for themselves any more. So kind and considerate to others. If both Ferreira and Arriola are healthy that's to major pickups for them basically. If the King of the Caribbean has returned watch out. He was kind of mocked for it but if it was that easy others would have done it also.
Exactly right, I’m holding all other attackers to that standard. Give me back to back hat tricks in the Gold Cup, since it’s a joke.
I agree in general, though I do think there's a profile of a player that translates upwards worse than other players and Ferreira fits that. He's not the only one, though, and it's not some unique, terrible thing. I think quite a few guys fit that profile. And it's just generally guys who lack the physical tools to create advantage at higher levels but can be very effective due to skill sets at lower levels. It's not just Jesus; guys like Sargent or Zendejas both qualify. It works the other way as well: guys who can hang at higher levels like Scally or Musah or whomever wouldn't necessarily drop down and dominate at a second tier league. Scally wouldn't be the 4th best player in MLS like Freeman was and Musah wouldn't suddenly be a 10g/10a guy and be an MVP candidate. Even someone like Weah wouldn't put up Denny Bouanga or Christian Espinoza numbers in MLS. In a vague, general sense: Physical Tools + Skills + Soccer IQ = highest level impact player Physical Tools = can play at highest level but not necessarily impact even at times, at lower levels Skills + Soccer IQ = struggle at higher levels but be much more impactful at lower levels Of course, it's all a sliding scale and there are exceptions. But let's not pretend guys in Bucket 2 above can do what guys in Bucket 3 can do all the time. People who are judging just on club often confuse Buckets 1 and 2.
They sold those players and got good money in return. Ferreira was what? 2.3 million plus a percentage of a future fee? Obviously that's not Pepi money, but its still good. Cerrillo was also in that team of the week posted above. They sold him. I suspect he reached his performance milestones, so that sale will probably be around 600k plus incentives. Selling players for assets is also the name of the game. Dallas had a plan. It just didn't work. They sold Ferreira and traded for Lucho Acosta. [The problem wasn't really the sale of those players. Its that a next generation wasn't there to take their place. To be fair, there are three former FCD academy players currently starting for them. More than most teams. Michael Collodi has quite a lot of potential. And of course the demise of Pomykal hurts.] As far as Ferreira goes, for some reason this board needs to be reminded from time to time that he's a damn good player. Imagine winning the Golden Boot at a Gold Cup and then never being called up again!!!!!!! That's currently the situation.
FCD are the Brighton of MLS. And Ferreira is only 25. If he makes right-wing his own, he could absolutely get another run with the team.
There are worse things in the world to be...................... If people have a date in mind for when they think the academy downturn happened, I'd bet good money that it coincides (without them knowing it) to when the Zanotta front office came in. Its weird. They do SIGN a ton of kids to homegrown contracts. Both NTSC and FCD. But the quality of those players isn't what it once was. So the problem is what's coming out of the academy and not whether the first team coach is playing them or not. At least in my view. Its not like USYNT squads are full of FCD players like they once were. As an aside, I was shocked to see that Pareja was let go by Orlando. That seemed like a fast trigger after a poor start to the season. Orlando City mutually part ways with Oscar Pareja | MLSSoccer.com If Oscar wants to keep coaching in MLS, a bunch of teams should be considering him. There should be some coaches on hot seats looking at Pareja on the market with concern. Olsen in Houston, Mastroeni at RSL, Venney at LAG, etc. missed the playoffs last year. Neville in Portland should be feeling the heat soon.
That wasn't meant as any kind of criticism. Brighton develop and sell players and do solidly in league. But it sounds like changes are needed in the youth setup.
The thing about Ferreira is he's actually really fast but doesn't seem like it. His nickname is cheetah. He also was able to play hard for 90. So those injuries struck the two athletic things he did and so over the last few years he's been subpar because of injuries. I wasn't sure he'd eve be the same ala Pomykal, Reyna and a host of others but maybe he's fully healthy again?