The inside track on MLS playoff MVP
by Steve Davis on Nov 7, 2010 11:01 AM EST
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To find your Major League Soccer playoff MVP, a good place to start is the upsets.
San Jose manufactured the real stunner so far, overturning the odds by going into New Jersey to ambush the DP-heavy Red Bulls. Bobby Convey’s breakout night was certainly instrumental as Frank Yallop’s Earthquakes found a way. But Jon Busch’s performance over two legs had a bigger influence. He was all that and more in the first leg. Without some of his great work in the San Jose goal, New York would have taken a bigger margin back to Red Bull Arena, probably erecting a bridge too far for the Earthquakes. In the return leg Busch made more big saves and cut down enough opportunities to make a difference once again.
Dallas manufactured the other playoff upset so far – as we wait for Seattle’s chance to spurn the odds tonight in its opening round return leg against David Beckham, Landon Donovan and the Los Angeles Galaxy.
Dallas’ David Ferreira provided something meaningful to all three FC Dallas goals in the series. He whipped the pass into Jeff Cunningham for the home team’s opener in last week’s 2-1 win. Later, he was brilliant in holding off four challengers to slip the ball over to Eric Avila for the dramatic game-winner.
Last night Ferreira’s ball into Brek Shea turned into Dax McCarty’s goal. Around that service, Ferreira pulled his weight defensively with committed challenges and lots of scurrying about. (Although he was the one who kept Robbie Findley onside on RSL’s goal.)
So, for me, it’s either Busch or Ferreira so far, with 90 minutes of first-round playoff soccer (and perhaps even more) still to play tonight at the Home Depot Center.
By the way, about tonight’s Galaxy-Sounders match: Sigi Schmid’s men won’t have a chance unless they can match the Galaxy’s intensity and desire. It was men against boys last week in that department, with L.A. claiming the early series edge. On the other hand, home teams are 2-3-2 so far in the playoffs. So tonight’s match is certainly worth watching.
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Ferreira was my choice, until
You know I had become a big fan of David over the last month or so, I had resisted because of the blatant pimping of him all year by the FC Dallas TV team. That all ended in the second half of the playoff match last night as I watched him put together a resume tape for Arabe Unido, by going down every time he was touched (and a few times when he wasn’t) and it looked like a horrible effort by a guy who wants to be a leader.
Yes you can call some of it “sour grapes” on my part, or you can call it the tactics of slowing down a match, but I call it a sad performance by a player that I had really started to respect. Just go back and watch the second half again and see that each time he tried to start a counter and someone got close to him he just went down. The upside is that the officials didn’t buy into all of his acting efforts, which just furthered my opinion that this was a very “Un-MVP” performance from a player that I really expected more from.
"I watched him put together a resume tape for Arabe Unido"
That made me laugh. On twitter, Andy Williams referred to Arabe Unido as “Greg Louganis XI”.
Overlooked...
I think Kevin Hartman is completely overlooked in all of this. Dallas has lost ONCE this season with Hartman in goal(1-0 vs LA). He was absolutely immense again last night and Dallas is a different team when Hartman is in goal. His kick save was nice, but the save on Espindola’s redirection of an Andy Williams shot in stoppage time was unbelievable.
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by Daniel Robertson on Nov 8, 2010 1:29 AM EST reply actions
Busch
you said it, without him San Jose would have lost that series by like 5 goals, even with the three they had the other night.
I didnt see either FCD/RSL match last week, but if what denz says is true, then it goes more in Busch’s favor as he has done what a GK is supposed to do.
