Tuesday night’s Leagues Cup Round of 16 duel with Inter Miami CF was three-quarters over, and it felt like the worst kind of déjà vu for the Columbus Crew at Lower.com Field.
Just like in their 2-1 loss at the Herons in June, the Crew had dug themselves a 2-0 hole via a combination of self-inflicted wounds – the opener started with a Steven Moreira turnover deep in Columbus’ end that was a mirror image of that previous meeting’s second goal – and savvy tactics from Gerardo “Tata” Martino, whose hybrid of high press and deep block bamboozled the hosts.
“When we conceded the goal, I was not happy,” Crew boss Wilfried Nancy later said after his team's stunning 3-2 victory. “I said, ‘again’ because when we played against them [in June], we gave. They did it well and they pressed us, but it was a situation that usually we do better.
“I don't like to talk about effort because, for me, effort is a no-brainer, I would say. But there is not only the physical effort; it's really important also to have mental effort. We missed that a bit ourselves.”
"No panic"
Watching from the substitutes’ bench, Christian Ramirez could see perhaps more clearly than his Columbus teammates on the pitch how uncharacteristically hesitant they looked in the first half, and how it played into Miami’s hands.
“Positionally, I think we were really static in trying to follow exactly what Wilfried wanted to do, not realizing how they were defending,” the Crew’s veteran striker said postgame. “They nullified Diego [Rossi] and Cucho [Hernandez] and Dylan [Chambost] a bit in what we were looking to do.”
So when Nancy made a bold triple substitution at halftime (which he claimed was pre-planned) it gave Ramirez, along with wingback Mo Farsi and creator Alex Matan, the chance to put those observations into action. Even when IMCF slashed them open yet again in transition, doubling the lead via a fluid combination between Diego Gómez and Luis Suárez, a sense of belief lingered for the Black-and-Gold.
“When we went down 2-0, we saw no panic, we just kept telling each other we just need to get one, get one. Once you got that first one, you felt that eruption,” said Ramirez. “It just felt like a story that we’ve seen before.”
In doing so, the Crew would bring back a different flavor of déjà vu, the sweetest imaginable: an echo from December, when they booked their place in MLS Cup 2023 by storming back from 2-0 down at halftime to beat their Hell is Real rivals FC Cincinnati, 3-2, in the Eastern Conference Final.
Champs dethroned
Just as he did on that memorable night, Ramirez was a catalyst, a useful reference point for the Yellow Football Team’s dynamic attack as they posed IMCF new questions. He thumped home Max Arfsten’s cross to halve the deficit and cleared space with off-ball runs on the next two game-changing plays.
“We knew when we scored the first goal – we know us,” said Cucho Hernández, whose cross found Diego Rossi for the equalizer. “And we know we did this many times, and we are so happy for that.”
The defending MLS champions flipped the game on its head in a ferocious, dizzying 13-minute span, reeling off three goals and clinging to their sudden lead with frazzled desperation as Miami threw everything at them in the final moments as the stadium transformed from morose to euphoric.
“A hard game against a good team,” said Farsi. “Unfortunately we didn’t start the game very well, but second half, I think we adjusted a couple of things and yeah, we put our hearts and we gave everything. At the end of the day, we said, ‘second half, no regrets, we have 45 minutes to come back.’ Even after the second goal, we just kept pushing; we were in this situation before.
“They were pressing man-to-man in the first half, so there’s a lot of space in behind. If we’re able to move the ball right, left, we’re going to create space … and in counterattack as well, I think we had a lot of space.”
When referee Iván Barton blew his whistle for the final time, the noise spiked once more, the Leagues Cup’s reigning holders dethroned.
“I didn't like the first half. I didn't like the energy that we had. I was not happy with the energy because we can miss passes, we can miss something tactically and so on, but we need positivity,” said Nancy.
“In the second half, this is who we are. Last year, we had good moments because we came back from behind, so I'm not surprised. I'm really happy to have a game like this, because we suffered, and it was good to have a better competitive spirit and to be front-foot to win the game.”
"We don't quit"
Meanwhile, Miami found themselves victimized by a sequence of magical moments very much like the ones they conjured up again and again a year ago, as Leo Messi led them to instant, awe-inspiring glory in the 2023 edition of this tournament.
Deprived of their talismanic GOAT by international duty and injury for the last 11 games and counting, the Herons have done amazing work to stay on course. But here, the clock struck midnight.
“The reality is that I think we played a brilliant 65 minutes, where we could have even scored the third goal, and in 10 minutes, we were left in a state of confusion,” said Martino in Spanish. “It was not because we sat back, but sometimes because we wanted to press high when we were perhaps not in a position to do so.
"They transitioned quickly, they quickly found the two-on-twos … I am very sad about the result, because I think we take away very little considering how we played and the [caliber of] the opponent.”
As the players in gold and pink clashed and dueled, so did the men prowling the technical areas. Martino launched the first gambit, to good effects; Nancy responded with adjustments of his own.
“Those type of games are really, really nice to play,” said Nancy of the 'chess game' between the two coaches. “They were doing a kind of man-marking, so we played with different animations to try to disrupt the man-marking. I can say that it was interesting, around the 65, 70th minute what we did. For me personally, as a coach, this is amazing.
"This is so nice to play, this kind of game, because it's not easy and you have to be fresh to have good decision-making. We adjusted a few things, and Tata did also. It was a good game. It was a good game.”
With Miami dispatched in such fashion, and New York City FC upsetting mighty Tigres UANL, the Crew’s path to Leagues Cup hardware grows clearer, more inviting. They’ll host the Pigeons on Saturday night, and will enjoy home-field advantage for as long as they’re alive in the tournament.
“It's been a long moment that we haven't had a kind of situation like this. This is a good reminder that we don't quit,” said Nancy. “After that, if the team is better than us or they score more goals, no problem; but the spirit, we don't quit. I'm happy that we did it.”
