Last September, Philadelphia Union went to Seattle and took 15 minutes of heavy punches from the Sounders before recovering and stealing a late 1-0 victory.
This year Seattle had to weather 90 minutes of pressure from the Union before escaping with a single point. Philly threw relentless pressure on the second place team in the Western Conference and barely allowed their opponents a moment to breathe. With Raul Ruidiaz and Jordy Delem rested, Brian Schmetzer went with a five-man back line. Union head coach Jim Curtin admitted that once the lineups came out his staff knew they were going to have to punch a hole through a very conservative visitor.
“Once you see that they’re going to change their formation and come here and maybe sit a little deeper, yeah that is certainly a sign of respect,” he said. “I think we have earned more respect from the league for sure. It's something that you're trying to build on a weekly basis. I think that were not sneaking up on anyone anymore; that parts over. So now we have to find ways when teams do sit in at our home stadium to break them down.”
At the center of the Union’s attacking push was homegrown midfielder Brenden Aaronson. The New Jersey native produced four shots but couldn’t quite find the finish he needed to put the Union ahead.
“I think Brenden’s night was his best game for the Union,” Curtin praised. “He had good movement all night, he had good service, he played good throughballs, he really worked tirelessly, defensively, you can see the energy he has even when we subbed him off, he’s at a full sprint to come over because he has such a high soccer IQ and he wants to win, so I can’t say enough good things about Brenden and the way he’s playing.”
The Union also got four shots from Kacper Przybylko and seven (!) from Jamiro Monteiro, who moved into the center when Philly went to a 4-2-3-1 in the second half.
For all the attacking firepower he had on hand to start the match, Curtin was able to call on perhaps his most threatening player early in the second half.
“Sometimes it feels crazy because you know how talented he is to not put his name in the team as a starter,” the head coach said of Ilsinho before adding that Kacper Przybylko also deserved praise for his standout performance that included everything but a goal. “We have a real top striker in Kacper. I’m happy with how he is doing and I’m proud of him to be honest.”
For all the strong individual moments, the biggest takeaway for Curtin was that his team was capable of controlling an entire match without losing their defensive focus. He argued that he was almost in a two-back system late and pointed out that he saw the possession defending he values from his center backs.
“I think our rest defending was about as good as it was,” he added. “Our recoveries were in good spots. Our forward passing was good. We took away a guy like [Nicolas] Lodeiro tonight, who was also a little quiet. [Cristian] Roldan was pretty quiet. We did a good job because we were aggressive.”
That aggressiveness has the Union back in first place in a tight Eastern Conference, but their next opponent just added a powerful attacking piece. Brian Fernandez and the Portland Timbers come to town on Saturday, May 25 at 7:30 p.m. ET.
Tickets are available here.
