A special Friday night of MLS soccer with game 2 of the series with Colorado. A win (either in regulation or the PK shootout) puts the series to bed and moves us on to the semi's. Colorado is gonna play hard and try to get under our skin and get players carded and ejected and make the game ugly. Hopefully the players will be prepared and we will see another disciplined defense and smart counter-attacks that don't leave us too exposed. Barring any injuries, you would think it'll be the same starting XI as the first game in the series.... Let's Go Galaxy!!
I'd like to win on Friday, but I also don't think its good for this team to not play a game for two weeks. This playoff format sucks.
Should just move to 2 games and have both be at the higher seeded home stadium. Might be unfair to the lower seeded team, but that's the price you pay for not being as good. Go with the aggregate score with no away goal rule then have a shootout if still tied at the end of the 2nd game.
Whats weird is this series is 3 but the next are single elimination? Why not just have this series and the next be 2 game series?
At this stage, just go World Cup tournament style, with higher seeds getting home games. Would be fun
There are no good playoff formats. That’s the honest answer and we’ve tried them all and no matter what mls does A huge chunk of people would complain. It’s obvious to me that the reason why we have this format in the first round is to ensure that every team gets a home games and also that the entire playoffs aren’t over in the blink of an eye. Your mileage may vary on if that is a good reason or not.
Yeah, this format is meant to: 1. give every team a home game 2. give Apple TV a decent number of games to air 3. preserve an advantage for the higher seeded team The biggest issue with MLS playoffs is that they currently run through 2 international breaks that kill all the momentum for the players and the fans. If they could solve that (and there are rumors they are discussing moving to the international calendar for the regular season) then it would make whatever format they decide on to work a lot better.
As mbar points out all the playoff formats have issues. But of the many we’ve tried I think I may like this one the best.
This. It’s a problem with the regular season too, the long breaks in the action for the cash grab tournament, international breaks, etc., are a problem. It’s too bad MLS can’t be more aligned with the schedule followed by the top leagues.
The obvious solution is abolishing the playoffs altogether, moving to a single table format where the league champ is the SS winner, and instituting Pro/Reg
Unfortunately MLS has taken making the SS winner the champion off the table by expanding so much. Can't have a balanced schedule and over my dead body can some team in the east claim to be MLS champion when they only play a few teams in the west (maybe SJ, Dallas, Colorado, Vancouver). Same applies to a west team that plays nobody good in the east.
They could alleviate that a bit by having the reg season winner of the West play the winner of the East in a home and away or best of 3 series for the Cup.(Glad that isn’t the format this year though!)
I'll just take being the last team to win the balanced Shield as a badge of honor. The Last True Champion
Are they moving to a European style calendar or a Mexican style with 2 seasons and playoffs after the spring season? I recall seeing comments about the latter.
They haven't even approved the concept yet, let alone ironed out all the details, but I've heard reference to a break in-between for the holidays (and the worst weather), but that doesn't necessarily mean the standings would have to reset like in LigaMX.
MLS Playoff Status Report is out for tomorrow's game https://www.mlssoccer.com/news/player-status-report-round-one-best-of-3-series-game-2 LA Galaxy Martín Cáceres - Knee (Out) Colorado Rapids Michael Edwards - Back (Out) Cole Bassett - Quad (Questionable) Djordje Mihailovic - Ankle (Questionable)
I took a 23&me test and it says I have a previously-unknown-to-me half-brother named Michael Edwards. Think he is the Colorado player? My Dad died 20 years ago so ….?
Beating a dead horse, but I think this format is horrible. Yes, there are always flaws with any format, but I think the best-of-3, particularly the way it's scheduled, just steals all the momentum from the playoffs. We're committing up to 3 weeks and 3 matches to the on-paper least competitive match-ups in the playoffs. Does anyone really want to see more Galaxy v. Rapids matches, especially after we creamed them 5-0? And how absurd is it that we'd be on equal footing if they manage to beat us on penalties today? I'd rather have 2-leg ties in the semis and conf final. But anyway -- let's get em!
Ok, guys, i am going to stick with my prediction: becoming the 2nd is bthe best thing which could happen to us and we will play only home games. Conference finals Galaxy -Seattle 3:2; Finals Galaxy - Cincinnati 1:1 = penalties = Johnny will be a Hero = the 6th !!!
Or if MLS wants to give all teams at least 1 home game, switch back to 2 leg round, but give higher seeded team the home goal advantage as a reward for finishing as the higher seed.