Galaxy-Rapids Post-game: Video highlights & more
Galaxy 1 Colorado Rapids 0
It's not me, it's you: Landon Donovan acknowledges the teammates who set up a finely worked move he ended with a confidently taken finish for the win over Colorado Saturday in Carson (AP Photo).
*Notable: With the win the first place Galaxy became the first MLS team to clinch a playoff spot.
Yawn. Dominant all season and coasting along atop the league for months, this was nothing less than the club expected.
"I think we clinched one a while ago to be honest with you," Galaxy Coach Bruce Arena said. "It's not causing us to jump through hoops and have a party."
Nevertheless, the Galaxy found yet another way to impress in an impressive season. Was the opening 45 minutes the best attacking football we've sen from the Galaxy all year? Lest we forget, the Colorado Rapids are the reigning MLS champions.
"This was a very good win for our team," Arena said. "We played well for an extended period of time, but never got the second goal."
And didn't need it, so impressive was the well-marshaled defense, yet again.
The revelation of the night was live wire striker Paulo Cardozo who made his first MLS start as an out and out striker, took six of the Galaxy's 16 shots on the night and throughly upstaged oft-maligned, but much more experienced striking partner Chad Barrett.
Again, it sounded like Arena expected no less.
"He's a player we've been bringing along the whole season," he said. "In the beginning of the year we adapted to him and tried to help him get a bit refreshed with this league."Over the last couple of months we've kind of forced him to adapt to us. Never easy, but it's all part of the development of a young player and I think he's responding well."
Watch:
Next for the Galaxy: Mexico's Morelia Tuesday in the CONCACAF Champions League where a win there would really underline the Galaxy's credentials as an emerging powerhouse.
1 Comments
Leave a comment
About 100 Percent Soccer
Sportswriter Nick Green has written the 100 Percent Soccer column since 2005 for the Daily News, Daily Breeze and other Los Angeles area newspapers. The blog of the same name began in 2007. A native of England, he began writing about soccer in the mid-1980s and in 2000 permanently exchanged a seat in the stands for one in the press box. He lives six miles from Carson's Home Depot Center, home of the Los Angeles Galaxy, Chivas USA and the training headquarters for U.S. Soccer and is married to a long-suffering soccer widow. Join Nick on FaceBook and follow him on Twitter.
If they can bottle that and drink it in October, they can win the Cup.
They're on 55 points and almost untouchable despite the tough schedule for the next three weeks. With six games left, there's a distant chance they could beat their 1998 record of 68 points. 4-1-1 would tie it.