Columbus hands New England its first home loss, sets sights on Atlanta

Photo via Columbus Crew

The Crew came up with a massive win Wednesday night, defeating the New England Revolution 2-1 in Foxborough, Mass. It was a big win for a team who has struggled to earn points on the road, playing against a team who hadn’t lost in front of the home crowd during the 2023 regular season. Before last night, the Revs were 11-0-4 in Gillette Stadium.

Columbus opened the scoring in the 20^th minute. A nice feed from midfielder Aidan Morris found midfielder Alexandru Matan charging down the left flank virtually uncovered. Matan took the ball to just inside the 18-yard box and then dished to forward Diego Rossi who was centered in front of the goal. After a clean touch with the inside right foot, Rossi punched a right-footed shot to the bottom right corner and past the diving goalkeeper.

New England tied the match at 1-1 soon after halftime with a goal by Tomás Chancalay who smashed home a volley from 17 yards away. The ball was hit so hard it bounded out of the goal. Revolution defender Matt Pollster kicked the bounding soccer ball high into the stands, a move that could have/should have brought out the referee’s yellow card. Pollster was issued a yellow card in first-half stoppage time, and this unsportsmanlike move could have resulted in red card ejection.

Pollster was not penalized for the stunt, New England remained at full strength, and it began to look as if the match might end in a 1-1 draw. However, the Crew broke the draw in the 86^th minute when defender Malte Amundsen scored off a corner kick from Diego Rossi. The corner kick dropped right at Amundsen’s feet on the far end of the goal, and Malte one-touched the ball into the upper-right corner, clipping the underside of the crossbar. Columbus held on to the 2-1 advantage through five minutes of stoppage time to earn three points.

With the win, Columbus climbs one spot to fourth place. Fourth place is good enough to guarantee home-field advantage in the first round of the playoffs, a best-of-three series for the first time in 2023. However, there’s no time to rest; the Crew have a quick turnaround with a road game in Atlanta Saturday night, October 7^th. Atlanta United is in sixth place and have also clinched a postseason berth.

Atlanta will be traveling for the playoffs, but the Columbus Crew have something meaningful to play for in this match. The team will play aggressive with high energy, Coach Wilfried Nancy’s style of soccer, looking for another massive road win to solidify their position in the top four. The Crew will get a win against Atlanta 3-1, and then can look forward to putting an exclamation point on the regular season in the home finale against CF Montréal on October 21^st.