Minnesota United coach Adrian Heath said back before this past run of six games — five of which were at home — that how the Loons fared in this stretch would define where they ranked in MLS so far this season.
Well, the Loons were able to end it with a statement, beating the Montreal Impact 2-0 on Saturday at TCF Bank Stadium in front of an announced crowd of 21,331.
United went 3-2-1 in this home-game-heavy stand and is now 5-7-1 on the season. Montreal fell to 3-10-0.
Montreal actually looked to be the more attacking team to start the game. The squad had several scoring chances that just never panned out and actually outshot the Loons six to two in the first 30 minutes. But United came out of the water break — as it was a 90-degree evening — literally refreshed. Both playmaker Darwin Quintero and winger Alexi Gomez has near-misses in the last five minutes of the half, as Quintero shot wide and Gomez had Montreal goalkeeper Evan Bush save his volley one-handed.
But the Loons were able to continue that momentum after halftime, as striker Christian Ramirez scored in the 52nd minute. Midfielder Ibson actually picked off a Montreal pass in the midfield and threaded it to Ramirez in the box, whose shot trickled off Bush and into the net.
[ngg_images source=”galleries” container_ids=”218″ display_type=”photocrati-nextgen_basic_imagebrowser” ajax_pagination=”0″ template=”default” ngg_triggers_display=”never” order_by=”sortorder” order_direction=”ASC” returns=”included” maximum_entity_count=”500″]
About six minutes later, winger Miguel Ibarra scored, completing the Superman-Batman scoring tandem, as per the best friends’ nicknames. Ibarra beat Montreal left back Daniel Lovitz at the top of the box and fired off a distance strike right to the top corner.
This was also the second shutout of the season for the Loons and goalkeeper Bobby Shuttleworth, who made four saves.
United has two more games before a brief league-wide break for the World Cup. The team will travel to Sporting Kansas City on June 3 and then go straight to FC Cincinnati for a June 6 U.S. Open Cup match. The Loons won’t play again in the league until June 23.
___
(c)2018 the Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
Visit the Star Tribune (Minneapolis) at www.startribune.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.