SoccerWise - Weekend Recap CWC Final, MLS MVP Race & Mia Fishel Heading To SEA

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

David coming right out of Metlife at the CWC final to bring you all the biggest storylines from the weekend. We hit it all the Hell Is Real delivers again, Rossi/Hany/Dreyer/Messi MVP race, CTL's post Agyemang plans, and more. To finish David talks about how big a signing Mia Fishel can be for the Reign as Laura Harvey gets her crown jewel in Seattle's attack.  Soccerwise Live 2pm ET Every Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday on Youtube/Twitch/Twitter

Hey everybody, David Haas here with your Weekend Recap. We are going into a big week here at Soccerwise. A lot of big news for us to talk about. Of course, myself, Tommy Scoops, and Jordan Angeley will be on all week covering MLS, NWSL, the world of soccer, and everything else in between. For the weekend recap, obviously MLS focused with a bunch of the other leagues on break, but we did have a Club World Cup final that happened here in the United States. I was actually in the building for the game at MetLife Stadium. 3-0 win for Chelsea over PSG. Pretty dominant performance overall in the high heat at a 3 p.m. Eastern time kickoff in a non-closed stadium, which always makes sense. And it was a huge event. It felt

like a big event. And then of course, it finishes. And about 45 minutes later, the trophy is handed out because Donald Trump had to be a part of it had to be involved took forever and then had to be front and center to the whole experience. It was a bizarre circumstance to be a part of I can tell you as being in the crowd while it happened and then leaving It really changed the tenor and shift in the atmosphere walking out of the stadium. This is the third game I've been to at MetLife Stadium And I don't know that I've felt it that quiet and sort of like uneasy Leaving rather than the pure excitement you'd expect which the Chelsea fans were exhibiting

For the 40 minutes before the trophy lift happened, even as they kept waiting and waiting, dancing to the music, singing to the music, interacting with the players and all of that. It was just a reminder that soccer is being used in many different ways by many different parties. And I don't know how I feel about that. But I will say that I am, I guess the word I would use is hopeful and excited about the big news that we're going to be announcing this week at SoccerWise because I think we are going to try and continue to find the game for the reason we love it and the reason it connects all of us.

And we are working on some stuff that is going to help us do that in a bigger and even better way than what we've done over the last year. I'm really, really excited. So we've got some big news dropping on Wednesday. And that will be stuff that will be rolling forward here on out. And a reminder that you will if you are in Austin, we are having an event on Tuesday evening at Haymaker. It is going to be around the skills challenge. Or if you don't have tickets or don't want to go to that, instead of the skills challenge, it's going to be a lot of our good friends in soccer talking, hanging out, we've got some cool segment ideas, and then we will watch the skills challenge altogether as well.

So if you're in Austin, please come out, it is free. If you are not in Austin, but you have friends who live in Austin, please tell them about it and tell them to come down. That's Haymaker Bar in Austin, Texas. We do not have NWSL to cover. We are going to have another NWSL interview. This week we had Izzy Rodriguez last week coming off her debut for the US women's national team scored in her debut playing right now for the first place Kansas City current. It was an awesome interview. She is charming, impressive. I mean, you're talking about a

25 year old who is stepping in now to two of the best teams in the world between national team and club and just has a ton of confidence and belief about it. But it was really interesting to hear her talk about her experiences. So we've got another interview coming up for you this week there. We have an interview with Bowler Roo that will be coming out on our show tomorrow. So that's something to look forward to. He talked about his unorthodox pathway as a San Jose native through college to the San Jose earthquakes. A couple of nuggets in there about his history with the San Jose earthquakes that I think are really interesting, charming, a little bit surprising as well. So that's something for you to look forward to. And then myself and Tom, of course, will have

all of your weekend recap action, midweek MLS coming up this week as well. So we'll be talking all about that. And of course, the transfers continue to roll on one piece of news I think is worth touching on coming out of the Club World Cup is there is a little bit of confusion around what it felt like was an agreement between FIFA and the global players union about require time off and rest for players but it is sounding like the main players union of players globally feels like they didn't actually have a seat at the table. And this was something that was sort of dictated to them. The final I would say agreement but it didn't seem like from what I read that there's actual firm language around this is you could never play a game three days within three days of each other always had to be at least 72 hours

apart and required at minimum 21 days off at some point between seasons. Obviously, it's tough globally to put set rules around this because you have closer or aperture as you have full seasons you have in Brazil you have you know your state championship then you've got multiple tournaments you've got playoffs you have Copa Libertadores, like all these other things. So it becomes hard, I think to have like set rules globally for some of this. But it would be nice for the players to at least have some protections that they can fight from and at least some organization to be able to do it through. In Major League Soccer, the players on the field for some reason, Sunday night soccer was St. Louis, Portland, again for the second time

in like six weeks and no offense to St. Louis and Portland, but don't think it's the biggest rivalry in Major League Soccer. And at the same time, you had Hell is Real on Saturday night, delayed for an hour because of weather. So no one tell Enzo Maresca that because he'll lose his mind clearly. That is his least favorite thing in the world. And then it fully delivered. FC Cincinnati two goals in four minutes to open up the game. It was a opening goal 40 seconds in by Pavel Bukka set up by Engel from the end line. Then

a Vander a second goal three minutes later. And it was amazing because they score these two goals and you're like, wow, this is the explosion offensively. We've been waiting for from Cincinnati. Hell is real always delivers. This is an unbelievable start. And now they can manage the rest of this game. And there's that piece in the back of your head that you're like, Hmm, if anyone's going to do this and come back, it's going to be a Wilford nonce team. But this Columbus team has not been goal scoring wise explosive this year. They have created a number of chances. The finishing has not really been there. And then you watch the

first half and it's what you'd expect, right? Columbus is not going to change their game model. They're not going to change the way they play. And they continue to knock the ball around, create chances, and then they start to come back. So Diego Rossi, great goal in tight space, but a huge amount of credit goes to Aliou for helping set that up. And Aliou has been a nice addition to this team. He was part of these stopgap moves they sort of made in the absence of Cucho without making a huge DP signing that they weren't ready for. Obviously Daniel Gosdok part of that, the finishing hasn't come from him. But what I like about Aliou and what you see, which is very Columbus is like, he's able to attack defenders with speed and he's able to sort of push back lines or take up space.

But at this point, and you see it on this goal, he's doing so while still understanding where his teammates are around him and he's able to pass out of it instantly. So instead of putting his head down, charging to the end line and then deciding to make a pass, you see in this moment, like he's attacking defenders think we're okay, we're all dropping. We're scrambling. We're going to try and figure this out. And immediately the ball slid over to Diego Rossi for a chance to finish. Max Arvstein gets a deflected goal. Shout out to all my haters out there, especially you Sam Stachkal for hating on my Max Arvstein for USM and T-take. Taylor Rockwell, you could suck that one as well. Love you both. And then

you end up getting a Columbus lead in the second half. So an own goal first, it's across from the right back position. Diego Rossi making the run down the middle puts pressure on at Miles Robinson forced to slide his clearance goes up off Yedlin and in and I think I think it was Maurice to do on the call for the game made the point that like Diego Rossi is run causes this and Diego Rossi's pressure that he puts on causes this from being a simple situation for Cincinnati and Miles Robinson to deal with to a dangerous one. That makes it three to Columbus gets the lead and from there they are cruising. Diego Rossi doesn't get the goal there. But I think we are now on MVP watch for Rosie. Like this is a Columbus team that's going to compete at the top of the Eastern

Conference. This is a Columbus team that's going to compete for for a supporter shield run. And if that's the case, he's he's the best player on the team by far. He has carried them through some big moments this season. Right now sitting two points off the Shield race, Miami kind of throws a whole wrench in this because they played way less games. And we still have to figure it out. And I'll talk about them in a moment. But this is a Columbus team that's put the league on watch with this. We talked last week about the rumors connecting them to Wesam Abu Ali, the Palestine International Center forward for Al-Hali who came to the US and scored a number of goals in the Club World Cup.

So it feels like a Columbus group that's aware of how competitive they are and the opportunity in front of them and the chance to push it. Miami keeping pace. They got a 2-1 win over Nashville. It was a dominant first half. Nashville literally were not in this game. Their pressure was poor, So they had to sit deep. They weren't that clean in their lines. They were probably fortunate to only be down 1-0 at halftime. Messi scores from a free kick, puts it around the wall. It's one of those moments that everyone's

tuned in because you're like, Messi is going to score and then he scores. And it's just like, oh, okay, cool. So it's just gonna keep happening. And he's just capable of this. And he's shown it his whole career. But a really cool moment, I think, to sort of be around. And then all of a sudden, the second half Nashville comes out and not all of a sudden, right? Clearly the halftime message, they were able to focus in they were able to, I think, play a little bit higher.

Alex and we all coming on for Shafalberg midway through the second half or early in the second half, excuse me, I think it was a big move for them. Andy Nahar starts pushing forward, gets a little bit higher. That's an outlet for them in possession. It also the way that where he picks up the ball. So sometimes it's in the channel, which allows Qasim to go wide and get space. Other times he goes wide, it pulls defensive support. And then Hany and Qasim can be inside in the pocket and they can get a little bit more space to operate. It really changes everything for them. And Nashville was just too far on their heels in the first half. But Andy Nahara, gorgeous weighted like curled pass out of the channel. So not a full cross for a Hany Mukhtar header. And then Hany respecting the

moment shines Andy Nahara's cleat as the celebration, even though Hany scored the goal to say like you are the one who created that. And you're the one who delivered. Bruegman and Zimmerman came on as well to help steady things for this team. And then Joe Willis with a brutal mistake out of the back, turns it over directly to Lionel freaking Messi, who puts it away to make it two ones. So that's five straight games with multi goals for Messi. Four was the MLS record. So now he's just doing a thing no one else can do. And I don't think we're surprised, right? When Messi leaves, his team will have the points record, I'm sure they will finish on some sort of goals per season record, he will finish with a number of these types of records first

player to ever do this. He is an Ironman. It's absolutely unbelievable. His ability to just put 90 minutes together back to back to back to back. And he's going to have a number of these best goals per game goals plus assists, all these types of things. And that's what you were hoping for when he came into the league. But I thought this second half performance alongside Diego Rossi, Hani Mukhtar improving an MVP conversation as well. Messi will be in there as Miami continues to push and it will probably be the one he is deserved if he ends up getting it. Some other big results at the top of the Eastern Conference, Philadelphia 2-0 win over New

York Red Bulls. So their open cup game got rained out this week. They will play now in August. The same week they'll play in league play as well because everything you know time is flat and nothing matters. And Philadelphia just came out and blitz the Red Bulls off the field in the first half. They get a goal off a corner kick for Indy Vasilev. Darmianni scores a goal which is big for this team. Philadelphia fairly healthy right now so they have a little bit of depth that they haven't had. Most of the last month, two months with international call ups and injuries and everything else

going on with them. I still love that Philadelphia Union midfield their center back pairing has played fantastic even with a little bit of rotation. And this was two teams that did not look like they were on the same level. Philadelphia just looked miles better than the Red Bulls and the Red Bulls were fairly complete for this game. They had Schubert-Moteng in the starting lineup. They had Emil Forsberg in the starting lineup. That young, domestic central midfield is the go-to central midfield right now for this team. I don't love the three at the back. I think a lot of that is on the individual performances of Hack. And if he's not going to play up to a certain level, then I'd rather just have the sort of like muscle and skill of Isla and Neal as the pairing. But I think for

the Red Bulls, they are fairly confident that if they get in the playoffs, they can make a run. So they have some time to sort of figure out who they are and what they look like going forward. And of course, we're going to get a rematch coming up in the Open Cup. Andres Dreier continuing his MVP push with two goals to help San Diego win 2-1 at Chicago. So he has been sort of this unbelievable piece and he is the leader right now. And while I add all these other players to the conversation, if you keep scoring like that, you're gonna stay in there as well. TFC a heartbreaker, they conceded a 90 plus 10 minute penalty to Atlanta United and Atlanta gets the one one tie. I don't know if we talked about this on this show because I don't remember the timing. But Atlanta United has announced

that Garth Lagerway is stepping away from the club as he undergoes treatment for cancer. Garth is one of the greats in the game, both for what he's done on the field, on the field being the teams he's created and the work he's done, but also the person that he is. He was a huge part of me getting involved in covering Major League Soccer. He was sort of one of the first in his position to spend the time talking to me and helping me understand the league and helping me understand how I can talk about it at a higher level and how I can bring fans behind the scenes into the conversations around roster building and around the growth of the game. Garth Lagerway has always wanted the game to grow, even if it

was at times at the expense of maybe him being able to perform his job at the highest level or his team. He wants all of it to grow. He wants soccer in the United States to be better than it was. He wants it to be big. He wants MLS to be big and he wants all of it to grow. He wants soccer in the United States to be better than it was. He wants it to be big. He wants MLS to be big and he wants all of it to grow. And so he huge appreciation for everything he's done. And of course, we're sending our best wishes to him from soccer wise and from everyone that we know. I reached out to him to tell him that as well. And we cannot wait to see him back on, you know, in a suite soon at a game when he is feeling 100% better. A big result Charlotte winners over NYCFC. So big result on the field but also off the field no Patrick Ojamong in the lineup. It feels like that move is done. Eden Toklamati got the start.

I like Toklamati. He's obviously not the same level of player yet as Ajaman, but I think he does a lot at that center forward position. And if Charlotte told me, okay, we're going to use the money to improve the squad, maybe in central midfield, maybe another fullback, but we're not going to use it on a pure center forward. I wouldn't be that mad about that. I think between Toklamati or moving Abbada around, or using the other pieces that they have that they could fill that center forward position for the rest of this season and maybe it all fits a little

better for Zaha and Pep Biel and everyone else playing behind that center forward spot a player they can connect with a little bit more. RSL gets a victory a final finally Will Willie Agada goal his second goal at RSL his first since May 28. So that's a big goal. Houston poured on a ton of pressure late. And there's a lot to like about this Houston attack. opens up space. Then Franco Escobar, the left back can come inside. He can push high but get a little bit more isolated. He can be a finisher. Gives you a little bit more of what you're getting from Griffin Dorsey on the other side because there's more pressure on teams. And I think Ponce is lurking in the right areas. There are goals there already. I think there'll be even more coming up. The LA Galaxy got a victory at home over DC United. DC made them sweat for it, but the Galaxy were able to see it out. Gabriel Peck showing a little bit of fight in this one, which I think Galaxy fans will be happy about. Pirani made it 2-1 in the 78th minute. I really liked

the play between him and Peglo and I like Peglo in general and the way I've watched him play and what he's done. And Colorado smoked. Vancouver 3-0. And I think we all expected a dip from Vancouver. The question was always how bad would it be? You know, and how far they would fall. So they are on 38 points now with 21 games played. San Diego is first in the West on 42 points with 22 games played in Minnesota who knocked off San Jose, Yaboa and Oluweshe scored a goal this weekend. They are currently in second on 40 points. So two ahead of Vancouver, but Vancouver has the game in hand. And I think for Vancouver, a shield race maybe will be a bit too much this year, having gone

to a Champions League or a CONCACAF final. But I still think they can battle at the top of the Western Conference. I think they're good enough. Last note to leave on not MLS related NWSL related. It is that me official is headed to Seattle on one of the biggest contracts in women's soccer history and the biggest contract in NWSL history. The estimate is that it's at two and a half million dollars. So you have a US women's national team rising superstar leaving Chelsea to come play in the US and it is exactly what Seattle needs. Defensively, they are very strong. They have that defensive core, that defensive base, they have some transition play, but they do not have the straw that stirs the drink that offensive impact player who can make the game a little

bit easier, who can create chances for the Jordan Hyamans of the world and the Linby and Dolos of the world. And Fischl can be all of that and more. It's a massive moment for NWSL. It's a huge signing for Seattle, who in their ownership shift, as they moved from originally owned by Leon to now the Seattle Sounders ownership group, a local ownership group, they were not able to really make big moves and they weren't really able to make any signings. Now this year, they've been able to bring some big signings out of college in Dalyan. They've been able to find Sam Meza, who they developed over the last year, who has stepped into the women's national team in central midfield, gives them a force there.

They trade for Lin Biendolo as well, who has been a difference maker for them up top. And now it feels like they have that final connecting piece. So a huge moment for this Seattle team. All right. As I mentioned, Bolaroo coming up tomorrow. We're going to have an NWSL interview as well this week that myself and Jordan Angeley will be on. We will have all of your coverage around all of the games. We are dropping some huge news for SoccerWise overall on Wednesday morning, and we will be in Austin, Texas next week for the MLS All-Star game and hopefully get to see a lot of you there. If you can, come by to Haymaker. If you're in Austin, shoot me a message on Blue Sky or shoot soccer wise a message.

Let us know where we should be, what we should do as well. Thank you to all of you for listening and we'll talk to you again very, very soon. You