SoccerWise - Weekend Recap/Mailbag Edition: US-CAN Reaction, Goodbye Alex Morgan + GK Chaos In Columbus

Episode Date: September 9, 2024

What a weekend across North America. Gass sits down to celebrate Canada, try and find a pulse on the USMNT, give Alex Morgan her flowers and try to decipher what happened in Columbus on Saturday. Plus every Monday means mailbag. Some great questions about US-CAN Best XI, field players in goal, mistakes playing out of the back and much more. 2:37 Oh Canada Celebration 14:11 USMNT Reaction 19:08 Mail Setting A Combined CAN-USMNT Best XI 24: 48 NWSL Recap Alex Morgan’s Goodbye & Big Wins Around The Playoff Line 37:38 MLS Recap Columbus GK Fiasco & Rev’s Referee Complaints 53:48 Mail On Favorite Field Players Going Into Goal In MLS 56:47 Mail On When Playing Out Of The Back Goes Wrong Soccerwise Live 2pm ET Every Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday on Youtube/Twitch/Twitter

Hey everybody, welcome back to SoccerWise. David Goss here with your weekend recap and mailbag episode. We of course have another big week coming up at SoccerWise. We will cover all things USMNT and Canadian men's national team, which is fun for some and less fun for others. Tom will be back with me tomorrow. Our live show is going to go a little bit earlier. We're going to go at 1 p.m. Eastern time to get it out before the game starts

at 7 o'clock, the U.S. playing New Zealand, and then Canada playing against Mexico. Also so that I can go make my train because I am moving. Me and my wife are moving from New York to Miami, Florida. I am going on a long odyssey this week to get there. We will still have all of our shows every single day. But if you watch live, you'll start to see some changing backgrounds for me as I make my way down south and then eventually into a new home. So I apologize if there's any issues as we

go along, but I'm going to try and keep the show as consistent as I can along the way. Of course, Jordan Angeli is going to be back with me on Wednesday to help recap what was a monumental weekend in NWSL, which I will talk about in my little weekend recap here. Of course, Alex Morgan's retirement, her final match, and a ton of action in NWSL over the course of the weekend. And then Tom and me have some fun stuff planned for Thursday. We got a good mailbag question that I think I'm going to save for that. Our underrated MLS best 11s and maybe a little bit else as well. So if there's anything you want us to talk about, if there's anything you want us to

put in, of course, send it to me. Most ideally, you subscribe to our Patreon. Subscribe to our Patreon. You get access to our Discord. And from there, that is how you get into our mailbag. That's how you get in communication with me and Tom. It's where you get into our mailbag that's how you get in communication with me and tom it's where you get all of tom's tweets in one clean exclusive place so you don't have to be on twitter if you don't want to it's where you get our depth charts so you can see how all the moves that are happening affect each other maybe you could see the columbus crew depth chart at goalkeeper and their roster build it's something I'm going to talk about coming up in a moment on my MLS weekend recap notes. Let's dig into the show. And of course, we're going to start with Oh Canada, we start positive, then we're going to go negative on this

show. So let's start with Canada. The first victory over the United States in the U.S. since 1957. 27 tries since that match. And I think that match, you have to think a lot of the U.S. players were super focused on Sputnik 1 at the time. So maybe there's less legitimacy on that win. Yeah, I had to Google 1957 and see what was going on at that time for an excuse to bring up there and throw in. But a huge day for Canada. 2-1 victory over the United States in Kansas City at Sporting KC's Park. Coming off of Copa America, this is exactly what the Canadian men's national team wanted.

This is exactly what they needed to continue upward trajectory. There is a reason they scheduled the friendlies against France and the Netherlands before Copa America. There's a reason they scheduled the games against the US and Mexico after. They need to challenge themselves. They need to continue to push themselves both from a confidence point of view and from a belief point of view from the fan base. I have talked about it time and again over the last five years. There is not trust or belief or sometimes even recognition inside of Canada of this team. This is a team that has let their fans down at the biggest stages over and over again, almost for the last 40 years, while the women's side has continued to win and push things. And so the men's side has to catch up and they have to try and get the fans behind them going into 2026 World Cup. Qualifying for 2022 was that first step.

The performance at Copa America this year was the second step. And so to come off of that and be able to put in a performance like this, to beat your rival in the United States and the way they played is exactly what you want to see from this team. They imposed themselves on the game from the first minute.

They won battles. They were physical. They decided the way the game was played on the road against the team they clearly hadn't beaten there in a very, very long time. Paul Carr tweeted this one out. I believe Canada won 16 tackles in the opening 45 minutes, the most in any half against the U.S. men's national team since Opta began keeping the

data collection on that team in 2010. Canada finished the game with 31 tackles compared to just 12 for the U.S. So it's the stats to follow up exactly what we saw. The Canadian team was physical. They made the U.S. panic. They won the battles when they were able to close up exactly what we saw. The Canadian team was physical. They made the U.S. panic. They won the battles when they were able to close down the U.S. and get into those moments on both sides of the field, by the way, because they were able to win a lot of big battles in their defensive third as well to allow their team to stay high up the field.

This is everything that Canada wanted out of a match like this. They got it. You can feel the energy across the country right now. You can see it in the viewership numbers. Every time now this team steps on the field, they've got superstars as the face of the team in Alphonso Davies and Jonathan David and a lot of the younger pieces now pushing into this team like Derek Cornelius and Moise Bombito. They've got name recognition. They've got the results to follow it up. They've got hope.

They've got belief. And they're continuing to get better. And they've got Jesse Marsh at the head of all of it. You could see the smile on his face. You can feel the emotion for him. He is loving life. He said before this match, that's the team he wants to coach match that's the team he wants to coach it's the team he'd rather coach there's obviously a lot of off-field politics going on in all of that but

he's also not wrong his team stepped out there they won the game and I think you have to feel that there is belief that both sides got this right for Jesse Marsh he picked the team that won the game he picked a team that has a really high ceiling for Marsh, he picked the team that won the game. He picked a team that has a really high ceiling for the future. He picked the team or the team picked him, depending on who you ask, that has a lot of young players going to tough teams that are continuing to progress their careers. But he is also adding value. These performances are better than they were a year ago. They are better than they were two years ago ago he is adding value to the team with the clear tactical identity a tactical identity that fits these players and a tactical identity that is allowing an emotional point of view for this team

for them to impose games for them to go out and say if we do this right we will win it is the ability to play on the front foot in matches and not just on the front foot saying, oh, we play high and press high. On the front foot is saying, I'm a soccer player walking on the field saying, I'm going to look at my opponent and I'm going to take this game from them. I'm going to win this match. Not, can we stay in the game long enough to get an opportunity to get a goal to stay alive? It is that belief that you see from this team and they're not always going to play on the front foot look at the chile match look at large stretches of the peru match they were not on the front foot in large moments of that match but those individual moments the

50 50s the duels the recognition of when to step in playing free kicks quickly playing throw-ins quickly things like that come from stepping on the field in a belief in that way. I'm going to talk about some of the performances a little bit later on because we got a great question in the mailbag about a combined best 11 for these two countries, but I want to talk about a few right here because I think you see the embodiment of what Jesse Marsh has brought in a few of these performances. You have to start with Moise Mambito. He is a human eraser. Every mistake Canada made, he was there to cover in ways in which he covered pulisic one time shielded him from the top of the 18 all the way to the end line to win his team

a goal kick alfonso davies even though he's playing even though bombito's playing right center back and alfonso davies playing left back can cheat even higher because he knows he has bombito over the top to protect him if the u.. is able to win the ball back and go quickly in transition. The same for Richie Larea, Alistair Johnston from the start. I think you can play Matthew Chouinard and Eustachio in central midfield because you've got the coverage of both Derek Cornelius and Moise Bombito. But what Bombito is doing right now is on another level, and I will talk about it in my best 11. The player, I think, who has been affected most positively by the addition of Jesse Marsh and the evolution of this team

is Jonathan David. He is playing his best for Canada of his entire life. I think when you take these tactics and the pressure is taken away from Jonathan David to just quote unquote create something it has allowed him to play the game the way he wants to play the game and to play the right way he's playing the right pass or he's taking a shot at the right time instead of trying to carry this team when you watched him around the 2022 World Cup in World Cup qualifying where the team was successful in the World Cup and in the team was successful, in the World Cup, and in the performances after. He played in a way in which he felt like he had to do something

special, had to do something outside of the ordinary, and wasn't really playing within the team. I don't think he plays that pass to Schaffelberg for the first goal a year ago. And it's not because he's selfish. It's because when you watched him play, he would have felt like I'm in the attacking third. I'm in the box. I have to do something special. I have to take a shot. I have to beat the goalkeeper.

I have to be the league on star. I have to be the golden boot winner. I have not seen that from him over the last three months. And that is huge for this team because he is one of the two most talented players on this team. He is one of the best players in the history of canadian soccer already and to see him unleashed in this way and relaxed and comfortable and playing as a 10 where i didn't think it would happen for him with canada i thought he would have to be the nine and at some point as well as larin had played

would have to be pushed out to get the best out of Jonathan David because the game looked more overcomplicated for him when he dropped deeper and he looked farther away from the player you see with Leal. But he has been able to do it in this setup under Jesse March, and that is awesome to see. Ali Ahmed was phenomenal in this match. He's so smooth on the ball. I love how he connects passes in the final third and doesn't just hit hopeful balls across the six, put his head down, hit crosses.

He's constantly squaring the ball into Stacchio's feet for the big chance right before the first goal, looking for David's feet, looking for Laren's feet, looking to try and help the fullback making the overlap on his side, looking to play that player in, and then pull defenders. It's one of the nice things about this team, if Ali Ahmed's out there, is that he can come inside and be a third central midfielder and connect with your forwards and play in those areas. I thought he was phenomenal in this game. The first goal occurs because Ali Ahmed understands the moment he spaces himself well and then he cuts off Tim Ream's ability to play up the line he forces the pressure inside that forces the turnover off Johnny's foot and the Canadian team is already in position to attack because they are playing centrally that is Ali Ahmed reading the moment understanding the tactics and playing it out to perfection. And he can be a really big part of this team.

And I love that he said after the game that Jesse Marsh challenged him because he wasn't great at Copa America. But Jesse Marsh understood he was capable of more, right? You're not going to ask for more from a player that can't get there. But getting what you see from Ali Ahmed with Vancouver, Jesse Marsh challenged him for more and Ali Ahmed elevated his game.

He stepped up, and of course, he's new to the international scene. So he's a player who's figuring out how it works, the speed of play, the physicality, all those things as he gets there. This was a huge performance for him, and I think he's going to continue to be a part of this team consistently going forward, as with Matthew Chouinard. He gets the chance in central midfield I had put him in my lineup last week in that central midfield spot I got lambasted in the discord saying that this would be a full Schwannier hour-long conversation to Matthew Schwannier a beautiful performance fantastic in this game he obviously is not a dominant defensive player who covers a ton of ground it worked in

this matchup the ball possession between him and Eustachio it gives another lever for them to build out on because he can drop down and take the ball where Sampiet struggles at times and Jonathan Osorio can go in there but Osorio's more comfortable higher up the field and it allows Eustachio I think a little bit more freedom so Chouinard's in the battle for that central midfield spot. I think Ismael Colony probably wins that spot if healthy and playing with Marseille, but I'll talk about that as we get into our best 11 coming up in a moment.

Kyle Lahren's struggling, but I still think he has a positive effect on this team. His runs, his movement, his ability to link up with David and to open up space for Fonzie when he makes the runs down the left side or when Schaffelberg is trying to get to the end line. I think Lahren has to be in this group as often as possible, and you're just waiting for him to break out. He had three big chances in this game, two that you would have seen him score in 2021. He is not scoring right now, but you have to have the belief in him as a player because he's

done it before. Looking forward to the next game, Alistair Johnston injured. He's been withdrawn from the team. Sam Adekube coming on into the roster in his place, but Richie Larea was the one in this match to come on in the 20th or so minute after the injury to Johnston. And then Richie starts like a weird fight thing with Balu about 20 minutes in. Because never change, Richie. I absolutely love everything he does for this team. So that's the Canadian side. Oh, baby. U.S. men's national team. I will say this.

When people ask me and we talk about things, I always highlight. The 2017 friendly against Portugal. After the U.S. had failed to qualify in Trinidad and Tobago. You were looking at a five-year runway to the next potential World Cup. The national team was completely unmoored in that moment. Dave Sarakin is an interim coach. He's thrown out CJ Sapong and Juan Agudelo in a friendly against Portugal on the road. I thought that was going to be the low watermark for this U.S. men's national team. This probably surpassed it.

Low fan turnout, interim manager. After the U.S. cut it to 2-1 in this game and shout out to Aiden Morris, who I thought came on and played really well, it didn't feel like the U.S. was pushing for the equalizer. Pepe gets the one big opportunity Haji Wright driving through midfield is able to create it but there was not a ton of time where the U.S. had Canada pinned in and was attacking and winning chances and even getting called for fouls in ways in which you're over playing because you're over trying it was a fairly lifeless

performance against the team now you say on the flip side that you haven't lost to at home in 67 years Paul Carr also put this out there uh outshot 11 to 1 in the first half first time this team's been outshot by 10 plus shots since 2021 Gold Cup semi-final against Qatar that's the stats to show you that this is the low point of the last five years of this team. It's tough to watch, and I can understand the lack of enthusiasm from fans. Now, if Pochettino is signed and completed and brought into this team, that's the biggest step that the national team can make right now. You can't change players out. You can't transfer anyone. You can't make wholesale changes. So that's the biggest step to take. But it really sucks right now. And I can

understand from a lot of fans feeling that way. In this team, in the game, not a lot of standout performances, some stand down performances. Johnny really struggled in this one. Of course, he had the two turnovers around the two goals. But the conversation that he had was, I'm not really a lone six. I don't really feel comfortable in this team. He hasn't been starting this year for Real Betis. So we'll see how he looks when he finally gets starts in La Liga. But that is a huge factor.

And I think it's one of the things, and obviously Mikey Vars is not the head coach of this group and there's not consistency. But when you look at a lot of the players in the US pool right now, there's a lot of talent. And there's a lot of players that are connected to big clubs or playing at big clubs. You have to find talent with fit.

And I look at this team out there and you look at Johnny, you look at Patrick Schulte, and you look at Brendan Aronson. Three players I think that you say they are talented. They are playing for good teams. They are playing consistently right now. They are all players that I think need to fit in the right setup. You can't just have talent on the field.

Arrington needs to be in a pressing team. If you are not a pressing team, then he cannot be a go-to starter option. Schulte as well. I thought Schulte was fine in this game. Made some big saves, especially on those chances against Lahren. But you're not using his feet to build out the way Columbusumbus does and you're not over reliant on him does he have a future with this national team then as a go-to starter if the style doesn't fit his best skill sets and what he does at his best and johnny the same johnny's not a like for like sub for tyler adams so unless you have another

tweak in there i don't know how he becomes a starter as you go along those are some of the things specifically out of this performance that you notice. There's a lot more going on with this U.S. men's national team. A chance to bounce back slightly against New Zealand on Tuesday night. It was a really rough performance for Tim Rehm as well. It was his mistake on the second goal. It was his mistake slightly on the first goal as well. Building out of the back, Canada, I thought, did a really good job of packing the middle, forcing the game to the fullbacks. Without Sergino Dest on the field, without Jedi stretching the field, both those fullbacks stayed almost in a clean line with the centerbacks, and it really killed a lot of the

angles for the buildout. And you don't get this angle very well. But I would assume if we went back and watched that first goal, the turnover from Tim Rehm and looked at the movement and options in front of him, there probably were not a lot. It did not feel like a match where a lot of players were coming to be options. It didn't feel like a match where a lot of players were problem solving and taking the game on their shoulders and saying, oh, we're having issues. All right, I'll come and make a hero play here. I'll draw the foul to get us out of pressure. I will be the one that makes the run over the top to draw the defense

so that Pulisic can drop in. It didn't feel like there was a lot of that this match, and I think that should be pretty frustrating for fans going forward. But I would like to see someone else get an opportunity over Tim Rehm in this second game to see what other options are there at the center back position. All right, let's dig into the question here. Spencer says, please provide your current Canada-U.S. combined best 11. So I'm going to start with coach and say Jesse Marsh. That's a pretty obvious one. I think it might even be true after the U.S. finally hires Pochettino and sets things up.

I've talked about Jesse Marsh being the coach of this team for five years now. For the U.S. side, I love the signing from Canada. And I think you've seen the reason why. You don't get a ton of time. But to be able to set a team up in a way to go and win games and to play with confidence and to be connected, that's a lot of the stuff Jesse Marsh is pretty good at. And I think you're seeing it hit pretty quickly with this Canadian team.

Now, because Jesse Marsh is my coach, I'm going to set this team up in a 4-3-3. I am going to say we are playing somewhat of a pressing style. That will come into some of the decisions that I'm going to make going forward. I am going to be liberal in my decisions when it comes to injuries and non-injuries on this team. I'm going to take Matt Turner in goal. Maxime Crapo has been phenomenal.

He is a big game player. I have beat this drum a lot. I watch him play a ton. I thought he was going to be the starter in 2022. I thought he deserved to be over Borjan. And then he broke his leg, doesn't get to the World Cup, has now rebounded. Huge Copa America. He has won big matches for all of the club teams he plays for, but he is inconsistent in the non-big moments. And Matt Turner, when he played in Major League Soccer, the same league

Max Kripo plays for, put up historic numbers in his shot-stopping ability and his consistency there. Maybe not as good with his feet, but neither of these are going to change the game with their feet right now. So I'm still going to take Matt Turner in this team. On my back four, I'm not going to take Serginio Dest because he's injured and out and has not been around for long enough. And that would go into the pressing style of, I don't even know if he would get into Jesse Marsh's starting lineup with the way this team's set up. So at right back, the debate is between Joe Scali and Alistair Johnston. Neither of these players are game breakers. They are both consistent and steady. That's what you're looking for. Alistair Johnston is more experienced right now. And so the floor on his performances

is higher than Joe Scali's, even though I think the ceiling on his performances are also lower. So I will take Alistair Johnson in this starting spot. Of course, the human eraser, Moise Mambito, is going to be put in here by me. Chris Richards is going to be his partner, and it's a little bit awkward. Neither of them's left-footed. Neither of them's naturally the left center back, which is good enough on the ball to fill that spot. Both these players are good in open space. They're able to step forward and help you dominate the game on the press. And of course, Alphonso Davies is my starting left back, which I absolutely love on this left wing. Stephen Ustakio, locked in starter in central midfield. He has taken a step back over the last few months with his performances. The hope is that that balances back for him though. What we saw in 2021 and and 2022 he was in the conversation for the best player in

CONCACAF the 2021 Gold Cup it's one of the best performances in the region over the last 10 years he was a sponge for all pressure and when you pressed him he created chances for his team he was so good skilled playing with a big team at FC Porto as well. I am being liberal here on the injury side. I'm going to say Tyler Adams is in this team, even though he's unavailable. He did play in Copa America. He has played much more recently than Serginio Dest. And then the third central midfield spot was one where I kind of got lost. And there's a few options to set this team up in a few different ways. I am between Weston McKinney and Ismael Kone. I love Yunus Moussa. I like the way he plays soccer. If it was my team, I would play 11 Yunus Moussa's,

but this is not the way this team set up. I think that I would probably lean Weston McKinney still. Kone is currently injured, so that's why he's not, he was not in the U.S. game for Canada after making the move to Marseille. I think Kone's maybe a year away from taking this spot. No-brainer. I think they both fit the setup pretty well. Kone, cleaner in possession, can play both ways, though. Can play in transition and can win a lot of tackles. I think he's going to be a special part of Canada going forward.

But Weston McKinney pops up in good moments in pressing teams. And he's able to be a game changer in very random moments, in setups where a lot of stuff is easy for him to anticipate. And so I think if you're set up the way Jesse Marsh sets his teams up, I think Weston McKinney could be a real difference maker for this team. And up front, the front three, Jonathan David, Kyle Lahren, and Christian Pulisic. There's no number nine I'm taking for the U.S. over Lahren

with the goals Lahren has scored over the last five years in international soccer. Christian Pulisic has upped his game. He has continued to get better. He obviously gets into this team. Him and Fondi down the left is an absurd setup to have. And then Jonathan David, as I said, with his performances and his career setup, he's in this team. The other option would be you move Jonathan David to the 10, or Pulisic if you want to, and then you could bring in a different wide player in this team. The other option would be you move Jonathan David to the 10 or Pulisic if you

want to, and then you could bring in a different wide player in this group. I know I'm going to get a lot of shots about Gio Reyna. He doesn't really play soccer very often, so I'm not putting him in this team, and I don't know that putting him in a pressing system is the best for him, and so I like this group the way it is. Honestly, I would bring Timothy Weah in at right attacking spot at this right wing spot and play David as the 10 and drop Bustacchio a little bit deeper if I had to in a setup like that. So that's all for the US Canada talk. A lot going on, a lot to discuss. Jump into the Discord if you want to. Subscribe to the Patreon. You could chat with all of us about it as we are there all the time. And of course, the game coming up on Tuesday night.

Let's jump into our weekend recap. Let's start with the NWSL. Many of us tuned in across a number of networks for the biggest match of the weekend. San Diego Wave hosting North Carolina Courage. And it was Alex Morgan's final game in her professional career. She announced her retirement last week, about 10 seconds after we finished our show. So we have not had a time to touch on it. We were able to put out a clip you can go watch of the conversation we had around Alex Morgan when she was left off the Olympic roster, which I think is the same conversation

we would have now about her immense impact on the game, how incredible her career was, how consistent she was over the course of so many years, and how big her presence was in the world of sports, outside the world of sports, and what she has done for the women's game. So you can go watch that clip. It's on our socials. Me and Jordan, of course, will be back on Wednesday. You heard a lot of what Jordan had to say.

Cause she was on the call for this match. A huge moment, a shout out to the broadcast networks and NWSL. The commissioner talked about it, of being able to draw, to build the drive, to get all of the networks to multi stream or multicast this match, even when it wasn't the match with their rights.

It was a big deal. It's a big deal for the league. And I think it's a sign that everyone's on board in trying to build this all together. There's some really wild stats out there about where this league was, and it didn't exist when Alex Morgan started and some of the spots of where the sport was in the US and around the world when Alex Morgan started and where she is now. She's a winner. She's a champion on her own. And I think you could feel the emotions. You could feel the emotions from home. Like, I'm not even in the building. And you could feel it in pregame, in the interviews. You could feel it when she walked out on the field. You could feel it from

the other players. And you definitely felt it when she walked off the field in roughly the 13th minute. Of course, she wears the number 13, leaving her cleats on the field as, I believe as sumo wrestlers that started this, which is what you do when you retire, saying that you are walking away and now it has been taken on by a lot of other athletes and other professionals around the world. And I thought it was really cool that the postgame,

they stayed on to allow us all, not in the building, to watch the postgame celebrations, on to allow us all not in the building to watch the postgame celebrations to watch her give her speech celebrate with her teammates recognition with the fans you saw North Carolina players and coaches come over and have their moments each with Alex Morgan so it was a huge deal I am excited to see what her future is around the game she obviously announced in the retirement video last week that she is pregnant with her second child, and that will be her immediate future. But this is someone who has been around the game at the highest levels.

She has affected the game positively off the field in really strong ways. And you could see her being a tastemaker, a guider, whether it is, you know, as a specific position as a GM or a coach or inside of the league office or outside of that, just with her voice and maybe organizations that she chooses to build outside of the structure. I think she'll be a really big difference maker still around the game. We were close to the dream sendoff. She missed the penalty kick that was awarded to San Diego. She had it saved by Casey Murphy. You know, you can't have things too fairytale. Otherwise, you start to wonder what's real and what's not.

But I think no matter what you say, Alex Morgan, one of the great goal scorers in the history of the sport. She's one of the great players in the history of the sport. Shout-out to North Carolina. Came on the road in this moment and they won two goals in the opening 20 minutes off corner kicks with a team like North Carolina that's going to dominate possession, that's going to create chances in the run of play. You can't allow them to score two set piece goals as well. It puts San Diego down. It makes San Diego open up their lines a little bit more to try and create and try and get back into the game. And then you see the red card, Sheridan colliding.

I don't remember who it was on North Carolina that she collided with, but it was an awkward moment between Sheridan and Naomi Gurma. You are talking about one of the two best goalkeepers in this league and the best center back on the planet. And this is where San Diego sits right now. They kind of play in neutral. They don't know who they are. And this is a moment you would not expect from these two players. The red card puts San Diego behind the eight ball too far. And North Carolina is able to win this

game for one, a big win for North Carolina, a team that has really struggled on the road over the last few weeks. I think it's really fitting that Alex Morgan steps away from the game on a weekend that NWSL surpassed 1.5 million fans in attendance for this season already. That breaks the record for a season, and there are still seven matches to go. So they're going to shatter the record. Now, you've added two markets into the league because of expansion in Bay FC and Utah. So that's going to add a bunch of fans, but it feels like the average is still going to beat that coming out of that, which is everything

you'd want to add markets and have your match day average still be higher than what it was last year means that the two added markets are bringing in fans at a higher level than what you had last year. Of course, the KC current stadium is a huge part of this, averaging 11,500 fans a game. San Diego brought 26,000 fans into this match as well on late notice with Alex Morgan choosing to retire. And of course, there are a lot of other teams that are pulling in fans like Orlando. They remain undefeated.

They officially clinched their spot in the playoffs already. And this run is absolutely amazing to watch. A 1-0 win over Chicago in this match. We thought we'd be talking about Kansas City in this conversation as well. We have not, but we asked the panic meter on Wednesday with Jordan, where does it stand? And we both circled this match and said it was a must win for Kansas City. What are we going to see from them? And it was a bounce back victory against Utah. Shout out to Utah. They came in, they played well. They probably should have been ahead in the first half. Moynihan looked really good down the left wing. A couple of big opportunities that they weren't able to put away. KC showed their danger, but

wasn't fully there. They were not the dominant running downhill. You start to feel overwhelmed team that we had seen in Kansas City playing home games over the first half of the season, but you have the answer, the ultimate answer. Two minutes out of the halftime whistle, Shawinga goes coast to coast on this counterattack goal off of a Utah corner kick, and it was Shawinga's eighth straight game with a goal an unbelievable opportunity now I don't know what Utah are doing on this chance they play short first but then when you see goals normally where a team concedes off a defense or off an attacking corner kick you normally see something where either when it's played short a poor second pass that allows the defending team

to get out in transition, or you see someone overcommit. You know, someone who's sitting on the top of the box makes a run in thinking they have an opportunity at a ball or lose a 50-50 at the top of the box. None of that was the case on this. It was a pretty well-played ball in towards the top of the six. A KC defender wins it, and there is just no one on top of the box defensively for Utah Labonta picks up the ball drives forward she understands perfectly especially at this point in the season

the spacing and what she needs to do to allow showing you to get into the attack she plays the ball down the wing or into the channel perfectly showing had the two big chances in the first half in transition moments wasn't able to put them away. This is what she does. She's able to get herself chance after chance and will put one away every single game as we see in this streak. She's able to finish it off, and this completely changed the game. Utah, even the first minute to win that corner kick of the second half. Chloe Lacoste, high pressing, creating danger.

Utah was on the front foot and they lost a lot of the wind in their sails after this moment. KC were able to step their lines up a little bit more. You saw Vanessa DiBernardo get involved, get connected to the central midfield and start to control more of the game. And Utah weren't able to create some chances, but not able to dominate and put pressure on like it felt like it could be coming coming out of the first half huge moment for Kansas City as well midway through the second half Bia returning from injury her first appearance since the June 29th match when she got injured and she really helped Kansas City control the game late you can play through her feet it slides

showing out wide so it really pins the right back back because you can't leave Showinga 1v1 against a center back, and Bia is able to distribute. Dabinia looked really good connecting there as well. Bia, I thought this team would be able to maintain without her, but there is no question that they are better with her in the team, so that was a huge moment for them. For Utah, we've been high on them. I think you saw why in this performance. It was another good performance. A lot of the new pieces, Tanaka, Zornoza, Tejada, all looked really strong once again in this game. And Utah making some interesting roster changes around this match, releasing two big name players, including Amadine

Henry, who was, I believe, the highest paid player probably on this roster just because of her profile and what Angel City had to do to bring her in. And then what Utah traded to get her. I think it's a good recognition from Utah of saying we don't need to be hamstrung by the mistakes we already made. This is how we're going to put together a winning team. And I've looked at this depth chart a million times because we maintain the depth charts for you if you are a patreon subscriber on our own so you can go and subscribe to that and get them and there it didn't really make sense if Henri was healthy was she going to start over Zornosa were you going to push Tahata back to a center back position was Tahata going to move to the bench was Henri going to play as a quote-unquote 10? And you really wouldn't have a true 10.

You'd have three 8s slash 6s on the field. I wasn't sure how it all fit together, but it felt hard to believe that if Henri was healthy, she wasn't starting in the games. And this is your answer. And I think this is a really strong move from Utah, as we've seen over the course of this summer, to just reset this team on the fly and build for the future. The other two biggest victories of the weekend, I think, are Seattle, Reign, and Bay FC. Both of them beat teams that they were in the playoff race around.

Seattle, a 3-2 win over Angel City to pull one point behind Angel City and two points out of the playoffs for a team that was completely out of this going into the summer break. All of the additions have really hit so far. Serna Govacic has been a big piece of the front line. Laura Harvey talked about it after the match. Just her pressing. The way the front three are connecting. King, her ability to come off the wing and be a goal scorer.

Haidama led the team in 50-50s one and challenges one in this match. Playing as a center forward. Seattle had to hang on a little bit in this one, but it's a huge performance from then. And then Bay FC, big win over Louisville. It puts three points behind Bay and the playoff line. It puts five points between Bay and Louisville, one of the teams that I thought would be coming for them. Bay continued to bounce back from the performances pre-Summer Cup.

Abby Dahlkemper there now. They are 2-0, including the win in Portland. A huge week for this expansion side, trying to find their feet as well. And the final big moment of the weekend, Washington. 2-1 win in their home match over Portland. Lacey Santos, 96th minute winner off the cross from Trinity Rodman. Rodman coming off the bench, still sort of managing her minutes coming out of the Olympic break.

Rodman gets the opening goal, then gets the assist. And Lacey Santos is going to have a ton of responsibility on her shoulders with the absence of Corey Bethune. Another piece of news that broke about 10 seconds after we finished our show on Wednesday, heartbreaking news. Absolutely heartbreaking for her, for this team, for this fan base, and for anyone who likes this sport. She is must watch. She is box office, and we are all worse off

for not getting to watch her play soccer. We are hoping for the best in her recovery. We are hoping to see her on the field at the start of next season, at the latest. She has a huge future, not just in NWSL, but with the national team. And this was absolutely devastating for her. And yet, Washington has enough talent to stay in this.

They added Lacey Santos. They added Kouassi. They have Saar, one of the leading goal scorers on this team. They added Esme Morgan, so they've got the depth at center back. Options if they want to change up the formation, maybe, without Corey Bethune. But there are options in this team to not start Trinity Rodman, to not have Corey Bethune,

and to beat Portland at home. That shows you the quality in this Washington team. All right, let's move over to the Major League Soccer side. And what a weird weekend it was. Of course course international duty so not a full slate of games on saturday night but two controversial ones that i'm gonna have to get to here and we'll start with columbus i am sure everyone has seen this columbus crew lost 4-0 at home to seattle sean zwatsky central midfielder maybe a center back definitely positionally

flexible ends up playing over a half in goal for this team. Columbus shows up to the game with only one goalkeeper on the roster. He picks up a red card. Now, let me dig in here a little bit and try and explain what happened and try and get my thoughts around it. And I will talk about it much deeper, I'm sure, tomorrow with Tom. But Columbus were without three rostered goalkeepers for this match. They had two international call-ups in Patrick Schulte and Nico Hagen. Hagen playing with Guatemala, Schulte getting the start for the U.S. And Evan Bush, who's also on the roster as a goalkeeper, has been injured with a broken arm since April.

So they started Romero in this match. Romero, a player that they just traded for. And Columbus wanted to call up one of their Crew 2 goalkeepers. They have two signed and rostered Crew 2 goalies that they could call up. MLS said no because both those goalkeepers, Stanislav Lapkus and Cole Johnson, have both used up their four call-ups you're allowed to make. So you are not allowed to just move players from MLS Next Pro into MLS at will. You get four opportunities to call them up,

and then they can only play in a certain amount of games after they get called up. There is a cap to that if you are on an MLS Next Pro roster. Now, all the other players that have dressed for Crew 2 this season are all Academy players who have been loaned in to MLS Next Pro. You are allowed to loan a player in from your academy to Next Pro and not sign them to a professional deal. You cannot do that in Major League Soccer. So for them to have been available as a backup goalkeeper on the roster, any of those academy players would have had to have been signed to a professional contract, whether with MLS Next Pro or with the MLS team. That would have lost those players their college eligibility.

So you can see how that's not going to happen. So the options were to sign one of the crew two guys to a first team deal. Lapkus or Cole Johnson, you could sign them, I believe Lapkus to a homegrown deal, Johnson to a pro deal, then they would be available because they would be MLS players at that point. It wouldn't be a loan. They could have signed a free agent goalkeeper to an MLS next pro deal and loan them up because reminder, the window is closed. The player has to already have been a free agent. You could have signed them to an MLS Next Pro deal and then used one of your four loan ups on that moment. So they would have had to go out and find a new player who was a free agent and sign them for this match. Or they could have, as I

said, signed one of the Academy guys. They chose to do none of these. And what we have heard now from Wilfred Nance, amongst others, is that they asked MLS to allow them to loan one of those two guys that I said they were denied for extreme circumstances. Now, I think the reason the crew felt within their rights to ask for this is a few reasons. First off, of the call-ups that were the four call-ups these two goalkeepers had each gotten into the first team, one apparently was a friendly against Aston Villa. And I have no idea why this counts as a call-up to the team. And then three of them were CONCACAF Champions Cup match days. Because Evan Bush got injured in April.

Columbus played three more matches in CONCACAF play. They say they were required to dress two goalkeepers per match. Now, shout out to Jeremiah Ocean at Sounder at Heart, who covers that team and the league as well as anyone. He tweeted out the rules that he found that says that that does not seem to be true. It does say that you have to have three goalkeepers on your 35-man roster that's eligible for CONCACAF play. It doesn't say they have to be in the match day 23. It is interesting in this.

I don't know yet what happened. I'm going to try and talk to some people. I don't know why Columbus felt that this was the case. I also am not sure if putting Lapkus or Cole Johnson in your 35 counted as a call-up anyway because they were match day available inside of the CONCACAF roster and therefore if they were already available you might as well put them on the bench because you've already burned that call-up. But all of this was already communicated to Columbus. So it wasn't that Columbus didn't know this was coming. I just think they felt that this was unfair. Now, the last piece to remember on all of this,

and I think this is the part where Columbus feels most aggrieved, and I think they're somewhat right in it, is that in Major League Soccer, you opt in to play games on an international break. That is why not every team played this weekend, but some did because they made that decision. Columbus did not opt in to play in this match on this match day, but they had to reschedule this game against the Sounders because it was scheduled for the night of the CONCACAF Champions Cup final when they went

down to Pachuca and lost. So they didn't want to play in this window, but are being punished for being good. And this is one of the things I've talked about a couple times on this show and on other shows. There needs to be more incentive to be good and to play in CONCACAF. Like in Europe, making Champions League is the whole goal for teams because they get a huge payout and they get all this opportunity. In CONCACAF, that's not the case. You don't make a ton of money for playing in CONCACAF and you don't get to add a ton to your salary cap and to your roster. If you are going to want teams to

compete at a high level internationally, you need to add resources. And yes, parity is a big part of this league, but you should get things for winning. You should able to say oh wow we made CONCACAF Champions Cup so now we can afford to bring more players back we have more allocation money whatever you want it to be at a minimum you should be able to add a goalkeeper in your club from the second soccer team you own because these clubs own now two professional soccer teams, if you're not Montreal, for an emergency backup spot one more time in a season in this situation to cover. Now, as I said, Columbus knew this was coming. They made the trade for Abraham Romero anticipating this exact problem, but they did not go all the way to cover

this. Now, from what I've gotten from talking to people around the league, the feeling was that Columbus got screwed a little, but that they could have solved it and chose not to, to make a point. And that blew up in their face. They chose not to do one of the three moves I said to get a goalkeeper. And they ended up getting a red card for Romero and they needed to play a field player and goal, this might be the game that cost them a chance at the Supporters' Shield. At the end of this, everyone looks bad. Columbus looks bad.

The league looks bad. This is such an unnecessary situation and something you hope would be solved for going forward. Sean Zawadzki looked bad. That's not on him. That sucks. I have been the player who has the going goal a ton for my teams. It is a heart.

It is a soul sucking experience knowing a real goalkeeper would have made the save that you didn't. Albert Rusnak tried to take advantage. I don't think anyone comes out of this looking good. So that is the story there. I'm sure we will continue to talk about it. Wilfred Nance came into the postgame press conference, didn't take questions, opening statement, ethered everyone, and then walked off. Some of what he's saying, I think,

is fair. As I just laid out there, I think those complaints are all fair. But also, you got to find a player to roster to put a goalkeeper on the team. I went through transfer market free agents like there's four or five American goalkeepers who don't have a job right now that could come into your team. And maybe Justin Garces is one of them. Maybe could be a player that sticks around for you going forward. But all of this was, I think, unnecessary and unfortunate. Sidebar, I know no one cares about this because no one's saying it. And I know I'm in the minority here. I'm not sure that's a red card. I think it's soft call I get the point Romero doesn't play the ball he hits Jordan Morris but I think that he's making an attempt on the ball he doesn't put a knee up or

an elbow up or anything it's his body he collides with a player who's going in the other direction I don't know that this is dangerous play which is what he gets the red card for because it's clearly not dog. So because Jordan Morris has no chance to score. So was he made the last touch on the ball and is going the other way. So if it's for dangerous play, which it is, I don't know that I totally agree with that, but no one really cares about that.

And that's fine. Let's move to our other controversy. New England Revolution tied St. Louis two, two at home. There was a lot I liked in this game from St. Louis. I thought they played well early in the first half, and then they played really well when Jao Klaus came on to play alongside Simon Boettcher and change the spacing for them.

Klaus is special. He's a difference maker. It's exciting to watch him get back out there on the field for the St. Louis team. The end of this year is just, who are your centerpieces? Who are your cornerstones? Because with Klaus out there, not all of the attacking guys who have been good in Hartle, Tuchert, Indy Vasilev,

not all of them can probably fit on the field. They went with three at the back in this match. That probably makes sense. Who are your wingbacks in that setup? Is Boettcher a starter for you going into next year? Or are you going to next year? Or are you going to be a little wary based off last year where you were super reliant on some guys who had hot moments but didn't have a career background? So that's all going to be what St. Louis has to

figure out coming out of this. I thought Peyton Miller was electric in this game playing at right back. I talked about him coming out of his debut. I talked about him last year, having watched him at the MLS Next level and MLS Next Pro. He is a huge prospect at the fullback position, converted from a winger. This is why the pro setup for MLS Academies is huge, because his future was not at winger. If he was playing in a non-professionally connected club, he probably stays at winger because he's the best player on the team and they're going to win day in and day out with him at wing. For the Revs, they assessed it. They talked to him and said, we think your future is national team level. If we move you further back on the field, you learn to defend at a high level and then you are an X factor going forward. And

that's what we've seen from him so far. Let's get into the controversy though. So Caleb Porter comes into the postgame press conference again, similar to Wilfred Nance, and has a ton of complaints. He ethered the referee, the league, and a lot of the setup with the way, I don't know, his team has been affected by refereeing. So he had two major complaints. One was the referee, Tim Ford, going to VAR, looking at a potential handball and choosing not to give them a penalty. The other was Luca Langone coming off as a substitute in place of Nacho Heal. Langone was judged as coming off too slow based off the new rules that have been implemented. Heal was then held off the field for a minute and then until the next stoppage and St. Louis scored the equalizer in that time.

Let's start with the sub side. The sub rule is dumb. I think it's dumb, but it exists. And in the postgame presser, Caleb Porter turned Langone into the victim and said he's injured. He couldn't run off. He sprinted as hard as he could.

None of that's true. I mean, I don't know about the injury part, but you watch it. He walks. Then he realizes. Then he jogs a little bit. Then he sprints a little bit. My guess is he doesn't really know the rule being new to the league, and it wasn't properly explained to him.

And he made the mistake, and the club made the mistake. So you cannot say that Langone was trying to get off as fast as he can. You can complain about the rule, but the rule exists and you have to play within it. On the VAR side, I get the complaint. And it's fair because on the field, it was called no penalty. Then the VAR recommended a review because the VAR believes there is a clear and obvious error and sends Tim Ford to go watch it. Ford watches it and says there is no penalty.

And what Caleb Porter's complaint was, was like he has already been told we think there's a penalty and he goes and then reassesses back. And that has happened to them multiple times this year. And they are, I believe, the only team in Major League Soccer to not have a penalty this kick this season. The mistake in all of this was the VAR recommendation. This isn't a penalty. It wasn't called on the field and it should not have been recommended for a review.

When you watch the play, it is Horn, the center back, playing as a center back now for st louis charging towards nacho heel he he goes up trying to win a header with his two hands away from his body one of his hands is on heel the other hand is in the air heel jumps up quicker than him and chest the ball down and the ball chested down into horn's hand. Horn's hand is in an unnatural position. His Horn's hand is away from his body. It's making him bigger. It is not an unnatural position.

That's what the referee judged. That's what I'm sure we're going to hear from Pro coming out of it this week. And that's what Taylor Tolman was saying on the broadcast. And that's the call that was made. The mistake in all of that was that the VAR sent it down to the referee to review. I can understand Porter, one, being frustrated because he feels like, okay, someone in this refereeing crew basically has already said we deserve a penalty, then we didn't get one. But they didn't deserve that penalty. And then I can understand Porter coming into the press conference and fighting for his

team, right? This is a group that's been through a lot of tough stuff this season. It's been a tough run. If they had won this game, there would have been four points since the summer break. They would have been on points per game tied for the final spot in the playoffs. But you also can't come out of this game and say you got robbed. You cannot watch that game and say you did not win because of the referee. Ivacic tied his career high for saves in an MLS match

with nine saves in this game. You missed a couple really good looks. Your team, not because of the referee. And then you are nowhere defensively on the goal that's conceded. Langone comes off slow. Nacho Heal's not on the field. So then why isn't Ian Harkes protecting the ball?

Why are you not knocking it around for 30 seconds with a 2-1 lead? Why are other players not making runs to track on the goal when Romney goes wide for the cutback and you've got five Rebs players in a line on the top of the six and no one close to tracking the actual players who are crashing in for this St. Louis team for better to then put it in the goal. You can complain that a referee is wrong, but if you're going to do that, if I was a referee, I'd turn around and say, well, I didn't miss the chance Dylan Barrero missed. And I didn't make the mistake Ian Hark's missed. And I did not mark someone on a corner kick. So everyone in that

situation made mistakes over the course of that game. I get it from Caleb Porter's point of view. You're going to protect your guys. You're going to fight for them. But I thought the way the press conference went was in a way in which they got robbed. And I don't know that that's the right way to assess things coming off the field in that game. Shout out to Houston for getting a 0-0 draw against LAFC. LAFC are now 4-5 winless in MLS over the last five matches.

They got El Trafico coming up next weekend. They've got two games in hand on the Galaxy with, I believe, five points behind. So this is a must win for them, and this is going to be an electric one. This MLS weekend, we will cover all things MLS mls of course over the course of this week with tom let's dig into some mailbags before we get out of here russ bucket on theme says i need to do the research but has there ever been a situation in mls where a field player has had to be a goalie for this long coming off of sean zawatzki play and two which field player would you like to see play a full game and goal so on the first one i think anyone who's old enough to remember the first thing that pops in your head 2011 Mike McGee

played in goal for over a half for the LA Galaxy it was a Cali Classico match Donovan Ricketts went down injured early then Josh Saunders his backup comes in he gets a red card for what else throwing an elbow in Steven Leonard's face because Leonard had pissed him off pissed him off for no reason in kind of an innocuous moment and this was in the first half so this was basically heading towards first half stoppage time very similar to the moment with Sean Zawadzki and how long he had to play so Mike McGee went in goal then they go into the halftime break then he comes back out in goal by the way Zawadzki and Mike McGee, they don't change shorts to like match the goalie jersey. I get it on the fly, but like you've gone into the locker room, you've already, like you've already had the 15 minutes, might be a decent opportunity to do that. Mike McGee held a shutout in this game. It was a Cali

Classico against San Jose, as bad as San Jose was that year. And the Galaxy ended up winning the Shield by four points on the season over Seattle. So it was a huge performance from him. It is like high on his legacy, even though he won a Golden Boot. He won multiple MLS Cups. It also wasn't the only time technically he went into goal, which is a whole other story we'll do on another day. For the second question, first two names that popped in my head. I feel like Walker Zimmerman's a good athlete overall.

He seems like someone who plays other sports. He's also big. So I like the idea of him potentially if you have decent hands, if you have decent hand-eye coordination, and you could cover a ton of the goal. It feels like Zimmerman could go in there well. And I've said this a million times, but Christian Roldan's like a gamer. My joke was always like you could play him at shortstop or center field and you probably wouldn't lose because he

would just like figure out how to affect the game in any sport in any position he's obviously tiny but based off the Mike McGee experience maybe that doesn't matter so much I feel like he'd figure it out and I could throw him in goal we got a comment in the discord from Dave Capone who said Suarez was born to play a full game in goal unreal reaction time to get his hands to the ball historically of course reference to the Ghana game love that as well then final question here from webhead maybe a bit late for the question but I want to follow up on the discussion about giveaways while building out of the back from a little bit ago specifically you guys were defending Columbus after a bad giveaway because in theory playing that system should be a net positive even though they will occasionally give away easy goals how much would

you defend other teams that maybe aren't quite as good as Columbus for doing the same thing I'm looking at the Justin Glad giveaway against San Jose that led to a goal and I thought he probably took more heat from that than he deserved do you think this is a similar situation where this sort of thing is just going to happen from time to time, but the benefits are worth it? Or is it something about Columbus where they're good enough to make it worth it, but not every team? This is a great question, Webhead. I love this question. I love that you're thinking about this. I love that you're analyzing what we're saying because we are all across the map sometimes and should be held accountable as well as everyone else in the soccer conversation should be held accountable because there's a lot of inconsistency

in talking about all of this. One thing I want to pick out here, you use the term and you said, is it something about Columbus where they're good enough to make it worth it, but not every team is good is not the word I would use. Committed is the word I would use. So I'm a person in life that believes in balance. Like I don't believe there's one theory that solves everything in any portion of life. I think you are consistently finding combinations of the right ideas after out of different theories. But one of the things that happens in major league soccer, because of the salary cap, because of the way, now I'm going into soccer away from life, because of the salary cap,

because of the way it's set up, because of the way you can affect a roster and not affect a roster with money and all of these different things. I believe that the best MLS teams are over committed to one system of play and that they use that system of play to find inefficiencies against other teams. I'm going to go back and start with the easiest one. RSL built their diamond midfield. They were able to find the right players that fit their team all the way back under Jason Christ and build a really good team in what is considered a small market in Salt Lake. The Red Bulls under Jesse Marsh. They identify players and could identify players that other teams, it's not that they missed on,

that other teams don't want, or they don't fit for them. And then they could come into those Red Bulls teams and be difference makers for a team that could win supporter shields and contend for an MLS Cup. That is what has happened in Columbus. It is not that San Jose didn't know Max Arfstein was good at soccer and didn't want to keep him. It's not that Atlanta didn't know that Darlington Nagby was good at soccer. It's not that NYCFC didn't know Malte Aldemansen was good at soccer and could be a difference maker. It's that Columbus has over committed to a style

in which they dominate possession and play out of the back. And that over commitment allows them to bring in players who have different attributes and have flaws. But those flaws are covered by the style because their strengths overwhelm their flaws in this team specific setup. But to make the bad worth the good, you have to be fully committed. And so when you look at a team and you say, oh, they made a mistake playing out of the back. I talk about Columbus in this and I say the larger picture, they will create more chances than they will give up because they are fully committed to the style. And when they concede those goals, it's the laugh from Wilfred Nance, and they continue on and they continue to do those things. Other teams are less committed to it.

So when they concede those goals, they change the way they play. And they change the way they build out. And they build out differently. Or the build out is not really part of who they are. That's not the way they create chances. And therefore, it's an unnecessary moment to give up a goal being committed to building out when that's not actually the thing that creates the opportunities for you. Maybe you want to dump it and press deep into the corner. Maybe you want

to find different ways to play through midfield. Maybe you want to go long off goal kicks and get knockdowns because you have a Christian Benteke up top. There are other ways to play. Columbus have overcommitted to this style. It is a large part of their success, and therefore it's acceptable when they give up chances because of it because in the grand scheme of things, they will create more. It's not because they're better. It's because they are fully locked in.

So you go back to the chance with Justin Glad. It was a mistake from him, but when you go and look at that San Jose game, there were not options in front of him. And not just in that moment, throughout large stretches of that game. The second goal of that game, because I went back and checked because I thought this, also came from a bad build-out moment.

Is RSL winning games and creating more chances in the long run this season because they are super committed to building out consistently and patiently and into pressure and playing into pressure? Or is that a smaller part of their game model and therefore the negative part of it overweighs the positive part? I would also say I don't think Justin Glad deserves that much hate for that moment. It's a mistake. He plays a poor pass. Zach McMath also should save

that chance and Glad's been good otherwise over the course of the season but this is an awesome question this is a huge frustration for me in major league soccer like I think too many teams sort of sit in the middle and are kind of trying to win on talent and the talent differences are not that big match to match in major league soccer and I think a lot of teams because of that sort of become directionless and we see these teams just waver and falter match in and match out and it's a hard season it's a lot of travel there's a lot of weird stuff that goes on in mls but i think that's one of the reasons we don't see elite great teams at times in mls or as consistently in major league soccer all right thank you to all of you for the questions thank you for taking the

time to listen to this. I'll be back tomorrow with Tom. As I said, we are going to do it at 1 p.m. Eastern time a little bit earlier so that I can make my train and begin my odyssey down south. So thank you to all for listening. We'll talk to you again very, very soon. Thank you.