Reds Return to Earth While Impact Get Big Road Win

There were mixed fortunes for Canada’s Major League Soccer (MLS) teams on Sunday. Toronto FC’s unbeaten run came to an emphatic end in Philadelphia while Montreal recorded their first come from behind win in MLS play. Al Dannity looks back on all the action.

Adu dominates for Union
That was not pretty viewing for fans in Toronto. The Reds went to PPL Park confident of closing the gap on the Union and inching closer to getting off the bottom of the MLS ladder. Instead they were bullied all day as Freddy Adu tormented the visitors from the start. The well-travelled Adu, who won the MLS Cup in 2006 with D.C. United, gave an indication of what was to come as he danced through the Toronto defense in the 13th minute.

The Union were forced to wait for the breakthrough but once they found the net, there was no looking back for Philadelphia. Gabriel Gomez opened the scoring on 34 minutes as he neatly finished into the right corner of the net, albeit aided slightly by a deflecting. Adu, who was a menace to the Reds all day, got his reward two minutes later as he scored following good build up play by Gabriel Farfan and Jack McInerney. Despite not adding more to the score-sheet, Adu showed why the Union brought him back to MLS throughout the rest of the game as he routinely put his team-mates in position to score. As it was the third goal would not come until 74 minutes when Michael Farfan put Antoine Hoppenot through to finish.

Despite the defeat coming at the hands of some individual mastery from Adu, the Reds will still be disgusted at their display. This Toronto team showed the same lack of fight that blighted them through the start of the season. That attitude problem appeared to have gone following Aron Winter’s dismissal and Paul Mariner knows he will have his work cut out to get this team back on the right track.

No Nesta, no problem
The Impact had only one of their two Italian superstars on display on Sunday but that was enough as they rallied to win a home test against Columbus. With Alessandro Nesta yet to make his debut for the Impact, his countryman Marco Di Vaio was left to spearhead the Impact’s challenge. Di Vaio showed some clever touches and had a role in Zarek Valentin’s equalizer, after Milovan Mirosevic had given the Crew the lead. History was made a minute from the end as Patrice Bernier converted a penalty to give the Impact their first ever come-from-behind win in MLS. That win leaves Montreal a point behind the Crew and just four points outside the playoffs. A trip to the post-season in their rookie season is likely beyond this Montreal team but their staying competitive at this point of the year is a positive sign for the future.

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