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The Galaxy took on Toronto FC -- The Reds -- Saturday afternoon in front of another sold out crowd at BMO Field in Toronto.
The Reds came out fighting from the onset, creating their first scoring opportunity within seconds of start. Toronto took the game to a lackluster Galaxy that lacked creativity in the midfield, en route to a 2 - 0 victory.
Toronto's victory gave the Canadian side the season series over the Galaxy and also served to further highlight a serious problem within the Galaxy attack -- lack of depth.
Both teams came into the match missing some key players, but it would be the first time this season where all three of the blue-and-gold's big guns; Landon Donovan, David Beckham and Carlos Ruiz would not start.
Donovan was available for selection, but was kept on the bench due to injury that had also kept him off the field last Wednesday when the US national team faced England at Wembley Stadium. Beckham continues his duties with the English national team and will be playing later today against Trinidad & Tobago. Ruiz, who is coming back from an injury suffered in the first week, is not yet match fit and was not brought into the game until the later minutes.
Without their big guns, the Galaxy were unable to control the midfield and unable to string passes together. They struggled to reach the offensive third and when they did, the Toronto defense was up to the challenge, not allowing a single shot on goal in the first half.
While the Galaxy struggled, Toronto built on their 1st minute warning shot and continually threatened. Ironically, even though the Galaxy offense was nearly non-existent, its defense played one its better games of the season, which has not been the team's strong suit all year long.
The Galaxy defense were able to constantly trap the Reds' forward Jeff Cunningham in offside positions, and by extension, halt the Toronto attack. Galaxy right back Chris Klein was one of the few bright spots, putting in a superb defensive effort on his MLS record 95th consecutive start while also being the architect behind most of the Galaxy offensive creativity.
The bad news is that it is normally not a good thing when your defensive players generate more offense than do your offensive players.
In contrast, Toronto continually produced on the offensive side. Their first goal came at the 48th minute on a header by defender Julius James, after midfielder Rohan Ricketts sent in a great cross from a free kick a bit outside the Galaxy penalty box. The goal sparked further dominance from the Canadian side and the game open up quite a bit, with the Reds getting the better of it. Once again, Cunningham was put into offside positions by the Galaxy defense, but pressure was building on the Galaxy. In the 64th minute, Cunningham split the defense, the offsidee flag stayed down, and he put the ball into the net past Galaxy 'keeper Steve Cronin for Toronto's second goal.
Toronto kept rolling and threatened several more times all the way into the final seconds of the match.
For the Galaxy, control of the game eroded further in the second half, but from the 75th minute onwards, they began to show a bit more cohesiveness and generated a few opportunities. The insertion of Carlos Ruiz into the game seems to have helped that cause as he entered the game about 5 minutes prior. This observation seems to further underscore the need for the Galaxy to have at least one of their big guns out on the field at all times.
The CONCACAF World Cup qualifiers start in 2 weeks. Thus, Ruiz and Donovan will both be away from the blue-and-gold in the coming weeks. The same is true for defender Ante Jazic who plays for the Canadian national team.
Saturday's performance means this summer will be an interesting period as they'll need to figure out how to succeed through the absences.
Let's hope they can rack up as many points in the meantime, starting with Colorado next Saturday!
Photo by mtl_shag via Flickr
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