With a heartbreaking and crucial 2-1 loss to the Eastern Conference-leading Columbus Crew at Columbus Crew Stadium on Saturday night, the Union once again received a passing grade for effort and character, but a failing one for the result.
And for veteran Veljko Paunovic, who locked the game at 1 in the first half off a corner kick from Keon Daniel, its time for the Union to throw out the moral victories and grow up.
We just need to score more goals, said Paunovic, who has three goals in nine games. Now we have games in front of us and we have recover from this loss and trynot try, we have to start winning. It will be hard, but its for men. The young guys need to realize this is for men, we have to grow up, wake up and say, this is it.
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We pushed hard, we pushed forward and we had a lot of opportunities, but we missed them. It was hard for us and very disappointing for us to lose this game.
What the Serbian was alluding to could be the tentative attempts the Union attackers have been guilty of since leading scorer Carlos Ruiz was transferred on Aug. 5. For much of the first half against the Crew, the Union failed to make the final connection and whiffed on a total of eight corners. They simply werent hungry or physical enough to get the job done in the Crews box.
And although the contest was ultimately decided by a poor penalty kick call in the Crews favor in the 51st minute that was finished by Andres Mendoza for the 2-1 lead and win, missed chances and sloppy offensive play doomed the Union.
With his team winless in its last five games, coach Peter Nowak agreed that the Unions offensive issues are about desire and confidence, not lack of ability.
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I believe everybody saw today (Saturday), from the flow of the game, that I think in some capacity we didn't believe that we could score more goals, he said. In the second half, it was much better. But there was some hesitation in the first half. We can do better with the final pass in the final third, that needs to be improved.
With solid defense and offensive contributions from other scoring areas, getting over the hump for the Union can be pinned on the lack of production from its labeled scorers. Subtracting Ruiz from the equation, in their last nine games, the Union received just two goals from strikersJack McInerney on Aug. 9 and Danny Mwanga on June 25.
Leading the team with five but scoreless in his last eight games, Mwanga, who started the contest against the Crew, had a fairly pedestrian 60 minutes before being replaced by Freddy Adu. The same can be said for Sebastien Le Toux, who has three penalty kick goals on the season but none in the run-of-play, despite 2,160 minutes played.
It was a very close game, said Le Toux, whose squad fell six points behind the Crew for first in the conference. We fought to the end and created chances, we didnt put the ball in the net. We already knew Columbus was physical. We knew it was going to be a tough game.
With the New England Revolution visiting PPL Park on Sundayrepresenting the last team the Union defeated, 3-0 on July 17, the achingly talented group will have the opportunity to pick up their production up front.
Its that, or fall even further behind.
We will rest and talk about this game and what we can do better, Le Toux said. It would have been good to come out with a win and gain three points to keep it close. The season is not done yet, we still have a lot of games to play and we are ready to fight for our place in the playoffs.
E-mail Ryan Bright at ryanbright13@gmail.com