The Columbus Crew and visiting New York Red Bulls will both look to jumpstart a potential playoff push when they meet on Saturday night.
Columbus (6-13-5, 23 points) has lost five of its last six league matches under interim manager Laurent Courtois in a stretch the Frenchman believes has included better play than the final results indicate.
That includes a 2-1 defeat at D.C. United on Wednesday night, when the visitors significantly outshot the hosts and held nearly three-quarters of the possession.
The Crew have scored in all six games during that slide. And Courtois is managing amid a roster overhaul, with the team signing nine new players during the secondary transfer window.
That gives him hope his side can still close the six-point gap on a playoff place, even without a clear leading man in attack; Diego Rossi, who now plays for Liga MX side Monterrey, still leads Columbus with six goals, while Wessam Abou Ali had five before sustaining a season-ending ACL tear.
“There’s a lot of aspects of the game on the ball that we are really pleased with. And we were aware of all the changes that happened that kind of impeded us to build this sort of chemistry,” Courtois said. “We still are not the version that I wish we can be and stay for good.”
The Red Bulls (7-11-6, 27 points) are even closer to playoff position, just two points behind the ninth-place team in the Eastern Conference. They arrive for the third of four consecutive away matches after a potentially demoralizing 2-0 defeat at LAFC on Wednesday night, one that included injuries to teenage midfielder Adri Mehmeti and defenders Jahkeele Marshall-Rutty and Justin Che.
Manager Michael Bradley’s side had to finish with nine men because the latter two incidents came after he had exhausted all of his substitutions, and LAFC found its second goal in second-half stoppage time.
Mehmeti and Che are both regulars for Bradley, who has consistently fielded the youngest average starting lineup in the league this season.
“That part makes it a tough night,” Bradley said of the injuries. “Generally speaking … I am extremely proud of the way they went after the game, the way they competed, the way they tried to step on the field against a good team in a difficult place to play and put the game on our terms.”
–Field Level Media
