The New York Red Bulls and Toronto FC are both in the midst of terrible skids and each will be hoping for the victory that can turn things around when they meet tonight at BMO Field (8pm, MSG+).
If the Red Bulls season is on life-support, then a loss tonight would essentially pull the plug on any faint playoff hopes the team might have. Meanwhile, Toronto FC is still trying to recover from a surprise home loss to Los Angeles last week that dropped TFC to three losses in its past four MLS matches.
The good news for the Red Bulls is that Mac Kandji, Jorge Rojas, and Alfred Pacheco are back in the starting lineup tonight (yes, Pacheco's return is questionably good news). The bad news is that Toronto FC has Amado Guevara back. Also, Danny Cepero is back in the starting lineup after Jon Conway's recent misadventures.
If you will be watching tonight's match please feel free to share your own thoughts, opinions and some play-by-play in the comments section below.
Enjoy the match (lineups are after the jump):
RED BULLS LINEUP
—————Angel——–Kandji—————
Rojas—————Celades——–Zimmerman
———————Stammler——————-
Pacheco—-Goldthwaite—–Petke——–Hall
———————-Cepero——————–
BENCH- Conway, Mendes, Wolyniec, Ubiparipovic, Sassano, Smith, Pietravallo
TORONTO FC LINEUP
—————-Dichio———————–
————————-Vitti—————-
————DeRosario——Guevara————–
————Robinson——–Cronin—————-
Brennan—-Garcia—–Serioux—-Attakora-Gyan
———————-Frei—————————-
BENCH- Brian Edwards, Chad Barrett, Gabe Gala, Emmanuel Gomez, Fuad Ibrahim, Rohan Ricketts, Marco Velez
ps, does anyone know what the deal with Mike Petke was after the final whistle?? i saw him being restrained/pulled away by his own players (Conway among them), but have no idea what his beef was (or if it was with a player or the officials)…on the TV broadcast, he shakes hands with a couple Toronto players and seems okay; at the stadium a couple minutes later, he was going crazy.
“lol, the red bulls are so pathetic their no longer worthy of ives running commentary.” gigi
Gigi,
You are 100% correct. If I were to pass along a story I recently heard about how the coach of this team conducts his business,…your heads would spin!!!
This ‘club’ is not worthy of any person’s support. It is amateur hour in New Jersey!
Seriously,…support a local Cosmopolitan League team. Support a local college team. You are doing a diservice to the game in this country if you continue to support this so called professional franchise.
lol, the red bulls are so pathetic their no longer worthy of ives running commentary. cepero deserved a better d infront of him.
1) This team needs a new coach, 2) Stop calling yourselves NY RedBulls if you are building a stadium in NJ.
JoeW: Points well taken.
As a TFC fan I thought you guys looked to be the better attacking team, but much like us there was no killer instinct in front of the goal.
At the back however, your defense looks pretty bad. Lots of disorganization and poor marking.
Or rather than blaming thin air and a thought, you could blame the people most responsible for this. The general manager and coach.
I’m just going to call this season the van den Bergh Curse. No particular reason, but we have to blame someone, right?
Andrew–you have no idea. I say this as someone who’s not a RBNY or former Metros fan, just a semi-objective observer. The current Quakes are pretty bad. I’m sure it especially stings that a franchise that was strong on the field up and left for Houston. That said, the NY/NJ version of MLS has been perpetually bad. This isn’t about which team–SJ and NY–is having the worst season. RBNY fans have a really bad stadium experience (no, not just a bad stadium b/c a bad stadium like RFK or Spartan can have a certain old-world charm at times) but security guards who seem anti-game, who want to kill the spirit of the supporters’ clubs. Of senior management that appears to be incompetent not just for 1-2-3 years but for probably the life of the franchise. Of rumors of big name players coming to the point where it becomes a joke by rival vans (“George Weah”). Of a franchise that redoes the roster practically every year. Of a franchise where players tank, than leave and prove successful with other clubs (RBNY fans probably just sighed at the game reports of Oduro’s first match with Houston). Of a franchise that has struggled to win hardware. Of management promises that get so over-used they become jokes (“69-90 days”).
I have tremendous respect for the RBNY/ESC fans who continue to go to games and support the team. Because it’s entirely a one-way street–this club and its management have never fullfilled their end of the bargain. I sometimes make jabbed posts to other clubs about attendance in Dallas or KC or other areas. I don’t do that anymore with RBNY because it’s amazing to me that there are still several thousand die-hards who refuse to give up supporting the game.
Believe me, while it’s not fun supporting a bad club (and DCU has had some of those years), and SJ was originally a very futile club, there is nothing that compares to what RBNY fans go through. I think in any other metro area in the US, given what the fans have had to put up with, there wouldn’t be a club anymore if those fans had had to deal with what the NY/NJ fans have had to stomach.
Ok is it me or did Zimmerman go to the david beckham school of running!
Besides the new Stadium going up , what has Austria done, it’s time that they grab the NY Franchise by the you know whats and start building a professional staff to run the soccer side , if you can’t spend the money on the right player get someone skilled in building a squad from the ground up Pay a good coach , good money , who will teach his players right rather than waste anymore time with a coach who seems to not know who his players are. i recall him trying to sub a player in this year when he didn’t have any subs left , that shows a lack of in game prep, you think he could have wrote it in his notebook, which probabley is just filled with nude drawings of Agoos!
lots of changes still need to be made for this team.. i think red bull should make it madatory for this team to drink 5 red bulls be4 game start and 10 at half.. cuz the just to many times we are asleep..
Supporting the Red Bulls week-in week-out can’t be any worse than supporting the Quakes.
ZIMM STARTED?!! That is a greatttt thing, he can really help this team out, especially when he’s on the field with Hall.
Too bad nothing can help this team…we still lost.
Giorgio, are you still working the comb-over? Sorry. I love your comments. I’ll see you at 54.
It’s nice of Giorgio to take a break from money laundering to offer his views.
i know it’s dumb but i love the giorgio chinaglia comments hahaha
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
You know, my friends, it hurts Giorgio to see New York playing like this. I remember how good it was in the 70s. This is “merda.”
The coach..he should be fired. The defense? terrible! The offense? Kandgi is selfish and Angel is washed up.
The only players Giorgio can bear to watch are Cepero (Imagine! Giorgio talking nice about a gola keeper), Celades and this Zimmerman kid who has some skills, isn’t afraid to take a shot and looks like he may know his way around a discoteqhue. My kind of guy!
I think they should disband this team, forfeit the rest of the season, rename it the Cosmos for 2010 as an expansion team and put me in charge.
This team makes me so sick that I don’t even want to make love to the ladies tonight.
I am having a Chivas Regal and going to bed.
Disgusting.
Good night.
JC OSORIO is the biggest worse Head Coach survivor of the history of MLS.
Actually I don’t think Cepero made a single mistake. Both goals came after amazing saves, but the defense was too poor to take advantage of the initial saves to recover. Cepero played the single best game any of our players have had this year.
Yeah, NY is woeful. We practically went to sleep in the second half and still should’ve scored a couple more.
Just the tonic TFC needed.