By AARON CRANFORD
The Montreal Impact didn’t need to win or draw at Estadio Alejandro Morera Soto, they just had to hold on. And with a 4-4 aggregate scoreline, the Impact advanced to the CONCACAF Champions League final on the away goals rule.
For a majority of the 90 minutes in Alajuela, Costa Rica, hearts were in the throats of Impact supporters, but with the 4-4 result, the Impact become the first Canadian team to ever reach the CCL final.
Montreal also becomes only the second MLS team in the Champions League era to reach the final (joining 2011 Real Salt Lake). No MLS team has won in the newest era of the competition.
Goals from Jack McInerney in the first half and Andres Romero in the second gave the Canadian side the answers they needed to pass the test down in Costa Rica.
The Impact will play the winner of Club America or Herediano in the two-leg CONCACAF Champions League final. Herediano holds a 3-0 first-leg lead on Club America, with the series returning to Mexico City on Wednesday night.
Montreal will host the second leg of the CONCACAF Champions League Final on April 29th at Olympic Stadium.
The tension and physical play was inevitable, and Jonathan McDonald received the first caution of the night after fouling Evan Bush in the box. In the first half, 18 fouls were called by Salvadorian Joel Aguilar with 11 of the fouls coming from the Impact. Evan Bush received a card for wasting time on a goal kick while Dominic Oduro was also shown a yellow card for preventing an Alajuelense attack.
The Impact did not back down from the fight at hand, playing a tough 45 minutes to hold the Costa Rican side scoreless. Belgian international Laurent Ciman dominated the back, helping his side clear 17 chances in the first half alone.
And their strong defensive effort was rewarded when Oduro sent a low cross into the box, and McInerney blasted it past Alajuelense goalkeeper Dexter Lewis’ left-hand side. The crowd went silent.
But right out of the second-half gates, Alajuelense answered. Pablo Gabas thumped a free kick past Bush in the 47th minute, and the crowd roared, urging their side on to continue the four-goal comeback.
And 13 minutes later, Gabas scored again. The midfielder tallied his second after toe-poking an in-swinging corner kick past Bush. In the 67th minute, Jonathan MacDonald had a wonderful chance to grab the third in the 67th minute, but his effort went inches wide.
As McInerney left the field in the 70th minute, he and Gabas got into a small scuffle, and Aguilar showed each a yellow card. The intensity and anxiety kept building.
But Alajuelense’s dreams fell so, so short. Romero gave Montreal their second of the night after remaining cool, calm and collected in the box. In a quick combination, Oduro found an open Patrice Bernier running toward goal, but Bernier passed the chance to a wide open Romero, who faked one shot, looked at the empty net and coolly slotted it in.
Allen Guevara added another for La Liga in the 79th minute, giving the home side a chance to comeback once again on the night. And in the 93rd minute, MacDonald scored Alajuelense’s fourth. The crazy comeback was almost complete, but there was just not enough time on Aguilar’s wristwatch. As the Salvadorian blew the whistle, Impact players and coaches could not hide their excitement on the field. They had made history.
CONCACAF atmosphere all around….Items thrown on the field, questionable ref, nasty pitch, shoving, etc…Great job Montreal!
Congrats to MLS … and CONCACAF.
Let’s hope MLS House backs them all the way in an effort to show MLS in the best light, and draw some attention to this championship.
I wonder if Jack McInerney ever wonders if Eric Wynalda is he real father.
I stayed up until midnight to watch the conclusion. Heart in mouths time, seriously.
The Montreal GK got pelted with a coin…. people were throwing their shoes onto the field… their freakin’ shoes! In the final minute, the Montreal GK goes to pick up the ball and an Alajuelense player slide tackles into him… no card. You gotta love CONCACAF.
Montreal can win this, but they will have to play much better on the road. That was a panicked nightmare, with garbage thrown in as a side order.
Or else get a bigger victory in Montreal. That should be a sellout based on previous games.
Enjoy Impact fans, we are all pulling for you.
Note: South Florida has huge Impact fan base.
I just want a MLS team finally win!
Since Galaxy won it, in 2000, MLS has huge history of failures in Champions league. MLS does not to win all them, but MLS has to win majority of them!
That was tense.
Monkey chants and missiles onto the pitch. Embarassing for Concacaf and Costa Rica.
Ahh…Latin American bigotry directed at people who look “too” Black, Native American or Asian. Quite ignorant especially given a majority of Latinos are mixed (even those who do not look like they are).
Excuse me, Latins (latinos) are Europeans and not mixed. Most people in the Americas aren’t latin, but some those people have latin heritage like me ( Italian and Spaniard background).
Latin people: Spaniard, Portuguese, Italian, Andorran, Romanian and part of France.
Yet it is still called Latin America.
Good try.
Looks like Scott was one of the folks in the crowd last night.
As someone that is Latino with African and Indigenous heritage, we don’t need Latinos like yourself representing us, thank you very much. Latinos come in all colours my friend. That’s what makes our culture great.
Wonderful achievement. On y va Montreal!
Away concacaf games like this are a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel. Irrational, nonsensical, dreamlike, mayhem.
Congrats Montreal
Did he play really bad D too ?
good job impact and red bull should be shooting their head off by now. (another reason why red bull is a mess)
redbull could have gone to the final as well and kept henry and cahill or gotten new dps.
For the final, impact should play outside in the cold. Home advantage baby. cold rowdy environment 🙂
This has NOTHING to do with NY.
haven’t you heard? EVERYTHING has SOMETHING to do with NY. how else would we be able to determine its importance?
This guy is not from NY and has admitted in other posts that he has never even been to NY.
Nearly fell apart but to be just the 2nd MLS side to reach the final is a great accomplishment.
allowing four goals in that second half is still a bunch of bullshit when it comes to MLS teams
started with the wizards at saprissa in days of old and tonight it continues had the 4th goal come ten minutes earlier, Montreal would have been talking about the second major collapse of their CCL history
it still blows my mind that an MLS team with a 4 goal aggregate score can still blow a lead that large
heres a training drill have 11 v 11 where 6 players constantly attack and the defense have them come in wave after wave have them shoot from every damm angle imaginable test your d and those mids have them control posession and learn to kill of these games.