On the night Landon Donovan had his swan song in Crew Stadium, Columbus put together perhaps their best performance of the season with a 4-1 rout over the Los Angeles Galaxy. The floodgates finally opened after most of the summer was defined by a frustrating inability to finish scoring opportunities. The valuable three points at home were crucial for the Crew in an Eastern Conference playoff race that is shaping up to be a massive logjam, particularly for the fourth and fifth seeds.
Having picked up 30 points going into their final nine regular season matches, Columbus currently sit in that fourth position but are only five points ahead of the ninth-placed Chicago Fire. Of the five teams behind the Crew, four have a game in hand on them. If you’ve paid any attention to the standings over the past month or so, you’ve noticed that the teams occupying the final two playoff positions in the East change on an almost weekly basis.
Crew Dispatch: The Columbus Playoff Formula
Despite the minor disadvantage associated with having one less game to play than many of their playoff-contending counterparts, Columbus are relatively well-positioned going into their Saturday home tie with Houston. Both the Dynamo and the aforementioned Fire find themselves on the outside looking in as it relates to the playoff race having to go on the road and take on two hungry teams looking to separate themselves from the rest of the pack. In the case of Chicago, they take on third-placed Toronto who just finished a grueling four-game road trip culminating in a 4-1 drubbing to conference leader Sporting Kansas City. Needless to say, the team north of the border will be extra motivated to get back to winning ways at BMO Field.
If the Crew can wrest the full three points in the friendly confines while getting help from their home-standing Trillium Cup rivals, the Black and Gold will enjoy an eight point gap between both Houston and Chicago. Even more promising is the fact that four of their next six contests will take place at home, and the two road matches feature trips to league basement dweller Montreal as well as a rematch with Houston down at BBVA Compass Stadium. It’s not a stretch to characterize the next month of the season as a gigantic opportunity in waiting for this team as it relates to solidifying their claim on the postseason.
Putting aside table analysis, the developments from a tactical standpoint for Columbus have been immensely positive, particularly coming out of the Los Angeles game. The Crew have been effective all year at disrupting passing lanes, dispossessing players on their side of the field, and mounting meaningful counterattacks into the attacking third. Unfortunately, the quality from a finishing standpoint would continuously go lacking. That wasn’t the case against the Galaxy, with Justin Meram, Ethan Finlay and Ben Speas all making the most of scoring opportunities afforded to them as a result of high level distribution coming from the midfield. Even Giancarlo Gonzalez got in on the action with his first goal of the year on a spectacular header from a Federico Higuain corner.
I’m more comfortable with Higuain as a servicer of the ball as opposed to the singular attacking role he’s had to assume at certain points during the season. Crew head coach Gregg Berhalter’s move towards a 4-4-1-1 formation with Higuain as an attacking midfielder behind the striker is an optimal strategy in terms of taking advantage of the fact that Columbus is still lacking a go-to scoring weapon. Adam Bedell remains a work in progress up front, but if players such as Meram and Finlay can replicate the fierce, energetic play down the wings they exhibited last Saturday, this team is well on its way to legitimate playoff contention in Berhalter’s first year.
The schedule sets up as favorably for Columbus as it does for any team in the league going into the month of September. Their convincing home triumph over a Los Angeles side that included a soon-to-be retiring legend in Landon Donovan combined with a future star of American soccer in Gyasi Zardes should serve as a monstrous momentum boost going into such a crucial stretch. Considering that the capital city of Ohio itself will be celebrated as part of the festivities on Saturday night when Houston comes to down, it would only be fitting for that city’s MLS franchise, on the cusp of an impending rebrand, to vault itself ever closer to MLS’ 2014 postseason.
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