Sunday, August 24, 2014

The Wild, Wild West - MLS Weekly Recap

Quite a race out west as Dallas, Seattle and Real Salt Lake all found themselves deadlocked atop the powerful conference following Dallas's win over Real Salt Lake on Friday night. While Seattle pulled back in front after their win in Portland on Sunday night, Sporting Kansas City wasn't so lucky over in the East as they lost big to DC United and fell behind them into second place. Meanwhile, Landon Donovan found the back of the net twice this week with a pair of game winners as the Galaxy slowly creep back into contention. In other news, Jermaine Jones is finally coming to MLS having inked a deal with the New England Revolution as the Revs make their playoff push. Jones is just the latest current or former U.S. National Teamer to sign an MLS contract in the past year joining Clint Dempsey, Michael Bradley, DaMarcus Beasley and Maurice Edu. Here's a look at the entire week in MLS:

LA Galaxy 4 Colorado 3

Landon Donovan and company rallied from deficits of 2-0 and 3-1 to pull off an improbable victory over the struggling Colorado Rapids. Omar Gonzalez, substitute Alan Gordon and Donovan all scored in the second half for the Galaxy while Robbie Keane, who assisted on Donovan's game winner, scored his 13th goal of the year in the first. Former U.S. National teamer Edson Buddle scored his 100th career MLS goal in a losing effort. Buddle had been sitting at 99 goals since early April.

Seattle 1 San Jose 1

Seattle missed a golden opportunity this week as they couldn't put away the struggling Quakes and settled for a 1-1 draw. Chad Barrett gave the Sounders the lead, but Chris Wondolowski's 9th goal of the season bought a point for San Jose.

Dallas 2 Real Salt Lake 1

FC Dallas stayed red hot defeating Real Salt Lake despite playing the entire second half a man down. After Blas Perez was sent off, Dallas found the net twice thanks to Je-Vaughn Watson and Fabian Castillo, and hung on for a 2-1 win. The 22 year old Castillo has 4 goals in his last 3 matches, all of them Dallas wins. Dallas is now unbeaten in 10 straight going 7-0-3 during that stretch and outscoring their opponents 22-9.

New York 4 Montreal 2

Thierry Henry and Bradley Wright-Phillips each scored twice in the second half as the Red Bulls doubled up the Impact 4-2. Wright-Phillips now has 20 goals on the season breaking a Red Bulls club record previously held by Juan Pablo Angel who finished with 19 back in 2007. Dilly Duka and Andres Romero scored for the Impact in a losing effort.

Chicago 2 Toronto 2

Quincy Amarikwa scored in the 90th minute to force a draw between the Fire and Toronto FC. Toronto took leads of 1-0 and 2-1, but was unable to hold on thanks to Amarikwa's 7th goal of the season. Amarikwa now has as many goals this season as he did in his first five MLS seasons combined. Robert Earnshaw, who scored 8 goals for Toronto FC a year ago, made his Fire debut with a goal as a substitute in the 70th minute against his former club.

Columbus 3 Houston 0

Justin Meram, Adam Bedell and Aaron Schoenfeld all scored for the Crew as they cruised to a 3-0 win over the Houston Dynamo in Columbus. Meram has now scored in 3 straight matches and the Crew have won two straight outscoring their opponents 7-1. Steve Clark made a pair of saves for the Crew to earn his 5th shutout in this, his first MLS season. Clark spent the previous four seasons playing for Honefoss BK in Norway.

New England 1 Chivas USA 0

Lee Nguyen and Bobby Shuttleworth led the way for the Revs as they narrowly defeated Chivas USA 1-0 on Saturday in Foxborough. Nguyen delivered a long range strike for his 9th goal of the year and Shuttleworth outdueled Dan Kennedy finishing with four saves en route to his sixth shutout of the season. Chivas USA has now been shutout in five straight matches and is winless in their last six.

DC United 3 Sporting Kansas City 0

DC United stayed hot scoring three goals during an 8 minute stretch in the first half as they routed Sporting 3-0 to take over first place in the Eastern Conference. Fabian Espindola opened the scoring in the 24th minute to give him four straight seasons having scored at least 9 goals. His goal was followed rapidly by goals by Chris Rolfe and Perry Kitchen. Luis Silva added two assists to help the attack and Bill Hamid made three saves to earn his sixth shutout of the year.

Los Angeles 2 Vancouver 0

Landon Donovan and Marcelo Sarvas both scored in the first half as the Galaxy continued their dominance over the Whitecaps at home. Robbie Keane added a pair of assists to give him 11 on the season while Jaime Penedo took care of things on the other end as the Panamanian keeper logged his career-high 5th shutout. Vancouver's Johnny Leveron was sent off late in the match following a bad tackle of LA's Alan Gordon. Born in Honduras, Leveron is in his second season with the Caps. Donovan's goal was his 6th of the season and the 140th of his 14 year MLS career.

Seattle 4 Portland 2

Clint Dempsey scored against the Timbers for the 5th time this season and Obafemi Martins notched a pair of goals and an assist as the Sounders rolled over their rivals 4-2. Fanendo Adi came on as a second half substitute and scored a pair of late goals to bring Portland back within a goal, but Martins late insurance goal put the game out of reach. Chad Barrett also scored for Seattle giving him goals in three straight matches for the Sounders. With the win, Seattle moved back atop the Western Conference Standings.

Philadelphia 4 San Jose 2

Sebastien Le Toux had a monster game for the Union scoring 1 goal and assisting on 3 others as the Union blew a 2-goal lead, but still recovered for a 4-2 win.  Chris Wondolowski was instrumental in bringing the Quakes back into the match as his 70th minute tally tied the game at 2, but Sheanon Williams put Philadelphia back ahead just minutes later and Andrew Wenger's second goal of the match sealed the deal ensuring three points for the Union. This marked the first 2-goal game of Wenger's young career.

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