ClapOver the course of the last few weeks, it’s been somewhat painfully evident that LA Galaxy are struggling to maintain any kind momentum heading into the MLS Cup playoffs. That’s the polite way of saying it, whereas a realist would probably tell you that they’ve fallen off the side of a cliff.
That probably wouldn’t have been true a few games ago because they still seemed to be in with a chance of making it, and while that is certainly still the case, they took a massive knock last night when they were defeated by Colorado Rapids, as reported by ESPN and Denver Post.
A poor showing
While Colorado are no joke once they hit that next level, they definitely aren’t a team that you’d be expecting Galaxy to lose to – especially at this current stage of the campaign.
The Western Conference is so unbelievably stacked that they could’ve made the jump up into third place if they had won, and while you could say that serves as proof that they’ll be just fine, you can never be too sure one way or another.
The game was at a bit of a stalemate throughout pretty much the entire first half and then most of the second, prompting a response from both teams as we entered the final stages of the encounter. Colorado hit the first blow courtesy of Cole Bennett giving the hosts the lead, before Giancarlo Gonzalez equalised for Galaxy just three minutes later.
Just when it seemed as if they could push on and make something happen in the dying embers of the game, they gave away a penalty and Nicolas Mezquida stepped up to score the winner and hand the three points to the Rapids.
Questions need to be asked
There are some debates to be had about the state of the officiating and some of the official decisions, but in the end, none of that really matters. What matters is that something has gone painfully wrong along the way for this LA Galaxy team, to the point where it doesn’t matter what kind of result they get against LAFC – because they are the whipping boys in Los Angeles and that much is a fact.
So while some people may spend their time getting excited about the prospect of Zlatan Ibrahimovic getting a statue in his home country, we don’t. If he wants to focus the primary core of his attention on what’s happening back in Sweden, then we don’t want him here.
There’s no passion left in this team and they just appear to have run out of gas at the worst possible time. Major League Soccer is improving with each and every passing year, and the old school mentality that has been employed by the Galaxy just isn’t going to work out anymore.
They will probably find a way into the playoffs somehow but they don’t have it in them to make it past the first round – if that.
Colorado, on the other hand, have reasons to be hopeful.
