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Columbus Crew Loses 2-1 to Atlanta for MLS All-Star: Takeaways

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Columbus Crew Loses 2-1 to Atlanta for MLS All-Star: Takeaways

The momentum the Crew built during their five-game winning streak that began in late June has come to an abrupt halt in Columbus’ last two games.

After Columbus’ first game of the week ended in a 1-1 draw against Charlotte FC on Wednesday at Lower.com Field, the Crew suffered a 2-1 loss to Atlanta United on Saturday in their final game before the MLS All-Star break. And against Atlanta, the Crew lost in a way they haven’t before this season — they lost a game in which they initially had the lead.

The Crew took a 1-0 lead over Atlanta in the first half thanks to a goal from striker Diego Rossi in the 36th minute and went into halftime with that lead.

Atlanta defender Stian Gregersen leveled the score in the second half when he converted a corner kick into a goal in the 60th minute. Gregersen scored again for Atlanta 17 minutes later with a header from a corner kick from the left side of the field to give Atlanta a 2-1 lead, which he maintained until the final whistle.

“We made a mistake with the man we should have marked,” Crew coach Wilfried Nancy said. “It’s a big mistake, it can happen. These are two goals we conceded by not taking the right responsibility.”

Columbus Crew failed their corner defense not once, but twice against Atlanta United

On both corner kicks in which Gregersen scored, Crew midfielder Mo Farsi was assigned to mark the 6-foot-3 defender, making it his responsibility to shadow Gregersen during the set piece. For his first goal of the night, Gregersen made a simple cut toward goal, beating Farsi and creating a clear path for his header to score with virtually no other Columbus player in the zone for Gregersen to help defend.

“It’s the way we’ve defended them all year,” Crew midfielder Sean Zawadzki said. “They’re two really good serves and they’re in a tough position. We have our zone and it looked too far out of our zone to step out and close and head the ball (the corner) away.”

Nancy referred to the situation as one where the Crew “need to do better,” especially after it took Columbus less than 20 minutes to repeat its mistake of defending Gregersen on the corner kick. Farsi still covered Gregersen man-to-man and was beaten again, but this time the Gregersens ran directly at defender Yevhen Cheberko, whom he overpowered to force another header and score.

“The man coverage is trying to do their best to just get out there on the run,” Zawadzki said. “Sometimes it’s tough, it’s a really tough job to do no matter who the matchup is. … It’s not one person, it’s everybody.”

Columbus Crew again unable to capitalize on chances, is on 2 of 38 shots in the last two games

Despite the fact that the Crew scored just two goals in their last two games, which is less than the number of goals they scored in four of the five games during their winning streak, there were still opportunities for Columbus to score.

Against Atlanta, the Crew took 16 shots, two more than the 14 that Atlanta would end the game with. The difference was that Columbus had only three of its 16 shots on goal, and all of those shots came in the first half. Atlanta took six shots on goal and spread them out over the game.

“The last two games we had a lot of chances,” Nancy said. “(Against Atlanta) we didn’t finish well, we didn’t have the final move. So we couldn’t maximize the little chance we had. That’s something we’re going to work on a little bit.”

Columbus Crew heads into the much-needed MLS All-Star break after a tough week of matches

Salvation for the Crew came in the form of the MLS All-Star Game.

With the All-Star game, and then the break, scheduled for next week, and All-Star right at the start of the League Cup, Columbus will have almost a two-week break from competitive play. The only game the Crew has scheduled in July is a friendly against Premier League side Aston Villa.

As the winner of the 2023 MLS Cup, the Crew will receive a bye to the group stage and automatically advance to the Round of 16. Their first League Cup match is scheduled for Friday, August 9.

“It’s obviously not the way we wanted to end this part when we went into this little break,” Zawadzki said. “It’s a good time to go into this break, to kind of reflect on what we’ve done so far in the season. Even though (against Atlanta) was disappointing and frustrating, but when we look back on how we’ve done so far this season, we’re in a pretty good position.”

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