How MLS Won and Lost on Saturday night

Major League Soccer can’t get out of its own way even when it gets a big win.

Major League Soccer won’t get a better advertisement than the New England Revolution vs. New York Red Bulls match from this past Saturday night. With the Red Bulls needing two away goals to make the second leg of the Eastern Conference Finals an event worth watching, what had been, throughout the past two months, an attack-minded New England side sat back and allowed the visitors to gain momentum throughout the opening frame. The Red Bulls ultimately found the pair of tallies they required heading into the contest, but some lackluster defending and poor luck, both of which are hardly strangers to the New York franchise, saw New England go through to next Sunday’s MLS Cup.

This is MLS, though, so of course the league couldn’t merely enjoy the on-the-field action without a bit of breaking news dropping at halftime of the match, information that took away from the clubs playing for a conference championship and that also did zero favors to the North American top-flight.

Nov 29, 2014; Foxborough, MA, USA; New England Revolution forward Charlie Davies (9) celebrates his goal against the against the New York Red Bulls during the first half of the Eastern Conference Championship at Gillette Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Winslow Townson-USA TODAY Sports

The match itself was one for the ages, as entertaining and as fun a MLS contest as you will behold. It had a touch of everything to validate league diehards who defend MLS on a yearly basis, while at the same time showcasing the quality and end-to-end action necessary to keep casual viewers from flipping the channel from NBC Sports Network to ESPN GoalLine. Referee Baldomero Toledo “let the kids play” and had none of it whenever any man from either side would attempt to buy a call. The biggest names participating in the game left it all on the pitch, and the outcome of the match came down to the final 60 seconds.

It was competitive sports at its finest.

Red Bulls captain and living legend Thierry Henry, who has understandably refused to play on the Gillette Stadium turf in the past, put on a soccer clinic throughout both halves. Henry turned the clock back and ran with as much pace and fire as he has at any point during his RBNY tenure, and he twice dropped over-the-top balls on dimes for fellow designated player Tim Cahill. Cahill fought off New England defender Jose Conclaves inside of the penalty area before going through the legs of the opponent and tapping home that match-opening tally 26 minutes into the match. Cahill squandered an opportunity to notch a brace 66th minute when, while unmarked inside of the box, he skied an attempt that could go down as his final strike as a MLS player after Henry located the Australian international with a superb ball.

The futures of both Henry and Cahill remain in question. It was widely whispered back before the 2013 MLS regular season that Henry was considering calling time on his playing days after the 2014 campaign, and he has announced that he will not be returning to the Red Bulls next year. Cahill, meanwhile, has been linked with moves to either the English Premier League or to the A-League of his native country. The club has not yet commented on Cahill’s status.

To the victors go the spoils, so teaches the adage, and thus Saturday evening belonged to New England forward Charlie Davies. Davies did well to fight through a scrum inside of the New York penalty area and push an equalizer past the line four minutes from the halftime break, a goal that squashed what had been a RBNY onslaught. Replays would show that Davies scored via an accidental hand-ball, an unintentional crime that the previously mentioned Toledo couldn’t have possibly witnessed considering all of the bodies inside of the box. There was no controversy when Davies delivered a perfectly-placed header to beat Red Bulls goalkeeper Luis Robles for the series-winner 20 minutes from time.

While it’s Lee Nguyen who is the MLS Most Valuable Player candidate, the revival of Davies is helping lead New England through the biggest month of the league calendar. Davies has now hit the Columbus Crew and the Red Bulls for braces in postseason play, and he could prove to be the MVP of the playoffs if the Revolution hoist MLS Cup on December 7.

Saturday should have been a banner night for MLS. Recognized international superstars and United States Men’s National Team players battled for over 90 minutes in a gritty encounter that was MLS at its best. No, it wasn’t the prettiest soccer that would have made the likes of Real Madrid and Barcelona take notice, but anybody watching who wasn’t glued to the action clearly has little interest in following this sport let alone MLS.

And yet, the tradition that is MLS being its own worst enemy had to continue because, well, MLS.

Brian Straus of Sports Illustrated leaked during the match that MLS is kicking the tires on “tweaking” the league’s playoff format beginning in 2015. 12 of what will be 20 league franchises will, according to the Straus story, be eligible for the postseason next fall. Just when it seemed as if the ridiculous practice of over 50 percent of the league’s teams being invited to the playoffs was about to end, it turns out that the method for crowning MLS champion will be no less laughable than it has been over the years.

60 percent of MLS teams will reportedly have a chance to win the league title in 2015. That is akin to 19 of 32 teams qualifying for the NFL Playoffs. With the push of a “publish” button, the MLS regular season became as unimportant as it has ever been, an eight-month journey that will, for the majority of the league, be more about rosters being healthy come November than about teams earning positive results during the spring and summer months.

It’s not a hot take to suggest that MLS needed to fix a broken playoff system. Expanding the postseason competition was never the answer. That news overshadowed the New England victory, as it served as another reminder that those running MLS continue to be driven more by television opportunities and by hopefully getting any play in the press possible than in having a true league champion.

Maybe, if MLS is lucky, those early playoff games won’t be relegated to FS2.

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