Which Charlotte FC will show up in Montreal?

STEVE GOLDBERG | THE CHARLOTTE POST

Charlotte FC's Idan Toklomati rounds goalkeeper Joe Willis for the game-winning goal in a 2-1 result against Nashville SC, the Crown's fourth home win in as many tries to start the season.

The question when Charlotte FC takes the pitch north of the border on Saturday is which team will make itself known.

Will it be the first half team against Nashville last week, which looked like it was still slogging through the altitude of Colorado on the way to a 2-0 loss, or the heroes of the second 45 half who came back with two goals to win 2-1 and stay undefeated at home.

The home form is what has the Crown level (4-2-1) with Philadelphia and Cincinnati on 13 points, one behind Miami (4-0-2) and two back of Columbus (4-0-3) in the MLS East. Officially, they stand fourth as the Union have scored one more goal.

Charlotte stands alone across MLS at home with four wins in four games. Of the top 11 teams, Charlotte, ranked seventh, is the only one yet to win on the road. The top eight except Charlotte have won twice on the road.

Coach Dean Smith was more specific, confining the dreadful play to the first 32 minutes, which was when Hany Mukhtar scored for Nashville, even though it felt longer than that for spectators.

 “What happened last week was we weren't good for 32 minutes,” he said. “I think it's always important that we don't get distracted between style of play and game plan. The only thing that we changed last week was our game plan without the ball, which was to press from out to in. That was the only thing that changed. Our style of play should not have changed whatsoever.

“So, I explained that to the players,” perhaps with more vigor and volume than he related to the media later in the week, “It's we still need to sprint the ball, we still need to work harder without the ball, and we still need to use the ball better. I think I said when I first come here, that style of play is not about systems. That's about what we want to be known for. And I thought we got lost.”

Adilson Malanda agreed, saying the halftime admonitions sparked a new attitude on the pitch with a more invigorated press that also engaged the crowd, which further spurred the team. “It really helped us and the goal that we scored, quickly enough I would say, the offside one, pushed us also to believe.”

We was robbed

The goal Malanda is referring to, which was scored on a header by halftime substitute Kerwin Vargas off an Ashley Westwood free kick in the 50th minute, wasn’t ruled out because of an offside but by an assistant referee’s belief that Brandt Bronico, who was in an offside position when the kick was taken, interfered with an opposing player though no one other than that official seems to have seen it. Even Sam Surridge, the supposedly offended Nashville player didn’t know anything happened and certainly didn’t ask for relief.

That incited the home fans, and when the center referee, Lukasz Szpala, refused to review it on the monitor, the entire stadium, let alone the Charlotte FC players, felt a great injustice had been perpetrated upon them.
The collective righteous indignation further fueled Charlotte, which began a full assault on the Nashville goal that set in place an emotional roller coaster polar opposite to the lethargy of the first half where Charlotte didn’t even register a shot until 41:50 into the game.

After Vargas was robbed, emotions took another turn in the 72nd minute when the Colombian launched himself to take a Nathan Byrne cross from the right with a high side scissor kick. Focused on the ball, he didn’t see that Nashville centerback Walker Zimmerman had leapt forward to head the ball from danger. That brave move put his head right into the path of Vargas’s swing, and the Nashville captain went down, briefly unconscious with a cut lip.

Medical staff rushed immediately onto the field where Zimmerman lay still for about 10 minutes before being carted off to the hospital. Everyone, and specifically Vargas, who was comforted by players from both sides, was shaken and there was a shared concern for Zimmerman. He was able to leave the hospital and fly home with the team and is now in concussion protocol.

As the entire stadium exhaled from that, the pace and passion of the match resumed with the two southern rivals fighting on far more even terms than the first half. The Charlotte pressure and determination all the difference.

In the 85th minute Wilfried Zaha was taken down for the fourth time, this time in the penalty area. He converted the kick to level the game. Even a draw would be good at this point.

But the Crown wanted more and kept pressing. It bore fruit in the 90th minute when Charlotte won the ball back in their third and the ball was launched up to Pep Biel at midfield. As he has done several times this season, he saw the future and hit an approach shot that will not be equaled at Augusta this week, falling into the path of Idan Toklomati, who still had work to do with three defenders on his heels, deftly touching it past the onrushing goalkeeper Joe Willis, and smashing it through those defenders gathered on the goal line. It was Biel’s MLS-best fifth assist of the season, equal with Cristian Espinosa of San José.
Charlotte saw out the 10 minutes of added time with defense and attack to win the game.

No Zaha

Zaha, who continues to grow as an influential player for the Crown will miss the match while recovering from surgery on Monday to correct a dislocation injury to his hand suffered in the match at Colorado.
According to Smith, it was not something that could be protected in a match.

Weather or not

What’s unique, more so odd, at this point in the season is that this will be Montreal’s first home match of the season after seven on the road. According to the Canadian Press, this is “due in large part to a lack of winter-proofing measures at its home facility, long early-season road trips have become the norm in recent years.”

There has been no joy for Montreal, which is off to its worst start (0-5-2) to a season since moving to MLS in 2012.

This comes in a week where it was announced that MLS will be considering a potential change to match the European season calendar, which runs from August to May as opposed to the current warmer weather February to December MLS schedule, the plight of Montreal and other more northern clubs – more than a third of the league – would be drastically affected. That’s not even considering the effect of climate change which has seen single and below freezing double-digit weather in the south into March.

The advantages would be in terms of player transfer flow, which would be more about when new players would be joining MLS sides. While FIFA sets the basic parameters for transfer windows, it is the national football associations and/or individual leagues who determine the exact dates and timing of the windows. The actual window for transfers can be whatever MLS wants it to be, so matching up with the European and other leagues is a matter of choice, dictated by what MLS wants for itself.

Kickoff is 7:30 p.m. at Stade Saputo in Montreal. The game will be broadcast on Apple TV MLS Season Pass and on WFNZ 92.7 FM.

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