The Philadelphia Union will try to extend their 12-match MLS unbeaten run Saturday night in Chester, Pa., when they face a Real Salt Lake side that defeated another Eastern Conference contender in its last match.
Philadelphia (11-10-6, 39 points) has won 10 of those 12 games while climbing into sixth place in the Eastern Conference.
Milan Iloski has scored six goals in his last six matches, including a hat trick in Philadelphia’s 4-2 victory over Orlando on Sept. 26, while 17-year-old Cavan Sullivan has scored six goals and assisted eight more in his last eight matches before missing the Orlando contest while on international duty, making his first career appearance for the senior U.S. men’s national team the same day.
Interim manager Ryan Richter’s group is arguably the most in-form MLS side. But the Union are still far from a guaranteed postseason spot, only six points above the playoff line with seven matches to play after their miserable start led to manager Bradley Carnell’s dismissal in late May.
“For all of us, we’re really proud of how the last few weeks have gone,” Richter said. “But our attention was in the training today and preparing for Salt Lake as much as possible and not so much about some streak.”
Salt Lake (9-13-5, 32 points) went winless in its last 10 overall matches, including nine league matches, before earning a 3-0 win over the New England Revolution on Sept. 26.
RSL begin the weekend 11th in the West, four points below the playoff line, after Sergi Solans scored a brace in that home victory over the East’s second-place side.
Solans leads RSL with 11 goals, and Pablo Mastroeni’s side hopes summer acquisitions Saba Lobjanidze and Dusan Zagar can increasingly become impact attackers after Xavier Gozo departed for Europe and Diego Luna succumbed to a season-ending knee injury.
As for ending Philadelphia’s streak, Mastroeni says it starts with preparing for the Union’s unorthodox style.
“This game is going to be about who controls the second ball. They go long on almost every play, whether there’s pressure or not,” RSL’s manager told The DJ and PK Show on local sports radio. “We don’t know what happens after the second ball. They don’t know what happens after the second ball. But I tell you what they will do: they’ll kick it behind your back line, and they will press. And so there’s a lot of these moments that they create that aren’t scripted. They’re off the cuff.”
–Field Level Media
