Photo: PSP archives
Tai Baribo scored in the sixth minute of second-half stoppage time to cap a remarkable Philadelphia Union comeback from two goals down, defeating a winless LA Galaxy side 3-2 on a foggy, cool night at Subaru Park.
Mauricio Cuevas and Diego Fagundez gave the visitors their halftime lead, with Marco Reus playing provider on both goals. But the Union stormed out of the halftime locker room, with Nathan Harriel and Tai Baribo scoring two minutes apart. And Baribo capped off his brace with a dramatic late winner to secure all three points for Philadelphia.
Bradley Carnell named an unchanged XI from the team who started Saturday’s 2-2 draw with Columbus Crew. Andre Blake continues to miss out with fluid in his knee, so Homegrown Andrew Rick again took his place. The defending MLS Cup champion Galaxy started former Union keeper John McCarthy in goal and former German international Reus up top.
Philly started on the front foot and fashioned a pair of scoring chances off a free kick, won by Bruno Damiani. Quinn Sullivan’s kick forced McCarthy into a palm save, and the recycled play ended with Jakob Glesnes smashing one into the expensive pitchside seats.
The Galaxy took the lead in the 31st minute off a Union-eqsue counterattack. A poor touch near the center circle by Danley Jean Jacques was stolen and sprung to Reus, who charged at the Union’s center backs. Reus rewarded Mauricio Cuevas for a good supporting run on the right wing, squaring him the ball in the box. Cuevas slid the ball home past a helpless Andrew Rick to put the visitors surprisingly on top.
Los Angeles doubled their lead six minutes later, this time with Diego Fagundez the scorer. Cuevas just beat Glesnes to a ball on the edge of the area, deflecting it to the dangerous Reus. The veteran faked a shot and slipped it to Fagundez in space. With just the keeper to beat, Fagundez applied a smooth finish with the outside of his foot to beat Rick.
“Hey, Union, wake the [expletive] up,” came the chant from the River End.
They did not do so until the second half.
Three minutes after the restart, Nathan Harriel cut the Galaxy’s lead in half off a corner kick. Wagner’s long, looping service found Glesnes’s head, and Harriel deflected the header past McCarthy.
Two minutes later the game was tied, courtesy of Tai Baribo. Jean Jacque worked down the left wing and snapped in a tasty cross to the center of the box. Baribo rose to meet it, placing a perfect header just inside the post.
After the match, Carnell revealed that he had originally planned to make substitutions at halftime, but that he and the coaching staff decided to let the starters have “ten more minutes.”
“Credit to them, because they took it personally,” he explained.
With the scoreboard even and energy returned to the stadium, Philly were in the ascendancy. Jean Jacques had a decent chance to take the lead, but he fired his shot into the River End. Carnell then made a pair of changes, introducing Mikael Uhre and Alejandro Bedoya for Bruno Damiani and Quinn Sullivan. Both almost made an instant impact, with Uhre missing the end of a sharp cross from Indiana Vassilev and Bedoya popping a good cross from Frankie Westfield over the bar.
It remained one-way traffic as the second half passed, with the Union doing everything except finding a winner. Baribo fired a shot wide before Uhre couldn’t get any power on a dangerous header. Cross after cross came in without a finish, the Galaxy barely managing to push the ball past their halfway line.
In a strange moment, referee Fotis Bazakos stopped the match in the 76th minute due to an apparent injury — his own. Fourth official Sergii Demianchuk took charge of the match after a break.
Uhre had the game on his foot in the 81st minute after a well-worked free kick, just yards from goal. His touch, though, allowed an army of white shirts to enter the frame, with one of them blocking the dangerous shot at close range.
With five minutes to go, Carnell summoned Cavan Sullivan for Vassilev and Olwethu Makhanya for Westfield. But the Union lost some of their offensive potency, and the Galaxy came close to a winner of their own when substitute Christian Ramirez’s free header went well over the bar.
Everything changed with just two minutes to go in stoppage time. Off a corner, Sullivan did well to loop a recycled ball to Bedoya, who slipped in Uhre. The substitute put an inviting cross to his strike partner, unmarked at the back post, and Baribo powered home a winner, sending the sparse midweek crowd into stands-shaking hysterics.
It was only the second time in club history that the Union came back from two goals down at halftime to win, with the first being the memorable Ilsinho super-sub game against the Red Bulls in June 2019.
The Union continue their busy May schedule with a weekend road trip to Georgia, where they’ll take on a scuffling Atlanta United side. Kickoff from Mercedes-Benz Stadium is at 7:30 p.m. Eastern.
Three Points
- Just keep fighting. It was a spirited comeback for the Boys in Blue — not just the two quick goals to level the match after halftime, but the way they utterly dominated play in the second half. Baribo’s winner was a well-deserved reward.
- Tai game. Baribo has come a long way from his reserve status last season. He is a genuine game-changer up top, and after a quiet first half he did everything to secure all three points.
- Ugly start. No one will remember that first half, understandably so. Two goals off of poor individual errors gave a floundering Galaxy side life. Philly will need to clean up those mistakes to make the next leap in their development this season.
Lineups
Philadelphia Union
Andrew Rick, Jakob Glesnes, Nathan Harriel, Kai Wagner, Frankie Westfield (Olwethu Makhanya 85′), Indiana Vassilev (Cavan Sullivan 85′), Quinn Sullivan (Alejandro Bedoya 58′), Danley Jean Jacques, Jovan Lukic, Tai Baribo, Bruno Damiani (Mikael Uhre 58′)
Unused subs: Oliver Semmle, Jesus Bueno, Jeremy Rafanello, Olivier Mbaizo, Chris Donovan
Los Angeles Galaxy
John McCarthy, John Nelson, Maya Yoshida, Miki Yamane, Emiro Garces (Eriq Zavaleta 90+4′), Isaiah Parente, Elijah Wynder (Christian Ramirez 61′), Lucas Sanabria (Tucker Lepley 71′), Diego Fagundez, Mauricio Cuevas (Julian Aude 71′), Marco Reus
Unused subs: Novak Micovic, JT Marcinkowski, Matheus Nascimento, Eriq Zavaleta, Miguel Berry
Scoring Summary
LAG: Mauricio Cuevas — 31′ (Marco Reus)
LAG: Diego Fagundez — 37′ (Marco Reus, Mauricio Cuevas)
PHI: Nathan Harriel — 48′ (Jakob Glesnes, Kai Wagner)
PHI: Tai Baribo — 50′ (Danley Jean Jacques)
PHI: Tai Baribo — 90+6′ (Mikael Uhre)
Discipline Summary
PHI: Nathan Harriel — 6′
LAG: Christian Ramirez — 90+8′
LAG: John Nelson — 90+9′
Statistics
| PHI | Statistic | LAG | PHI | Statistic | LAG |
|
54 |
Possession % | 46 | 0 | Aerial Duels Won | 0 |
| 25 | Shots | 4 | 13 | Tackles Won |
5 |
|
10 |
Shots on Goal | 2 | 0 | Saves | 7 |
| 8 | Blocked Shots | 0 | 3 | Clearances |
5 |
|
422 |
Total Passes | 347 | 9 | Fouls | 11 |
| 80.6 | Pass Accuracy % | 74.3 | 1 | Yellow Cards |
2 |
|
3 |
Corners | 2 | 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 17 | Crosses | 3 | 3 | xG |
1.2 |
|
1 |
Offsides |
2 |
Wow! That was quick.
Peter writes as it unfolds.
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“Quick ….on the draw
I thought I’d be dead
He put the gun
To my head
And this is what
He said-
-NOW…..”
A tale of two halves!
Isn’t the chant, “Hey! Union! Wake the heck up” ? 😉
Some of the ugliest goals I’ve seen the Union score… but who cares with a result like that!
1. Ashli Rice Allen and her ASL accompanist showed up for the first half. Such a beautiful rendition with so much hope in it. Is our flag still there? Yep, still there.
2. Some aimless and at times head-scratching passing in the first half. Glesnes had this one, pronounced, very measured header to nowhere. Some real quality with it in the 2nd.
3. Lukić revving up the River End as the Union poured it on. Like Danley, like Vassilev, like other additions this year, generally seems to get this city and its fans. Well chosen for this club.
4. Microcosm… It seemed like Cavan wasn’t the right sub for this one at first… Then that nice recycle over his shoulder on the goal. The hero struggles. The hero prevails.
5. It felt last year like Curtin didn’t have anybody he could sub on. Sometimes the subs seemed like protests… like… who do I have? This year there’s always somebody clamoring to make a mark in the 2nd half. Maybe a mix of roster and coaching style? Roster apparent for sure.
6. Shoutout to the guy in the Union Yards on the way in who gave my daughter and her friend SOB scarves to hold up at 20:10. Man, you just made some memories.
7. Gas face to the one lane open on the Commodore Barry on the way out. It looked like an accident, fine, fine. But I believe the former senior commander of the US fleet deserved better.
Re him being the right sub: I was ready for a Cavan banger on the FK he came in and immediately took, but maybe next time.
I thought Bedoya supercharged the second half. He was the difference maker in my opinion.
Bedoya had a perfect night for the Union in how he should be used. 30-40 minutes and brought some energy to the game. Also I notice he and young Cavan seem to be a thing for the coach. They both played together in the Open Cup game. I’m glad to see that Carnell pulled Vassilev as this just wasn’t his game today. Seemed to turn the ball over and just couldn’t make good decisions. In the first half it just seemed like every pass was to no one or they just kept holding the ball to long and the defence would deflect everything after they tried to pass it.
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The second half was night and day. They looked a team that wouldn’t be denied the win. Uhre might not be scoring goals but the assist to Baribo makes you wonder if it is in his head. He split two defenders to get to the ball and calmly lifted the ball perfectly to Baribo for the game winning goal. He just doesn’t have that same patients and concentration when he’s trying to score.
*Wipes brow*. They turned what would have been embarrassment against bottom of the table LA Galaxy who haven’t won a match yet this season into three points. That’s Galaxy’s total points so far this season.
. . .
As Coach Lou Brown aptly put it in the sports comedy-drama ‘Major League’: “Nice catch Hayes. Don’t ever f***ing do it again.”
Vassilev is not very good at soccer. Great try-hard run-fast guy I’m sure. He could probably be a spot starter on a mediocre team. We aspire to be better than mediocre, though. If he was Carnell’s leader in the field or something I’d understand him starting. But he doesn’t direct anything. He dribbles into double teams and – unlike Gazdag who has the skills to create off the dribble – just coughs up the ball. Then runs really fast to the touch line to claim the contested throw-in. I can’t wait for Cavan to take over his starting spot.
Agree. He’ll do for now but a real opportunity for an upgrade there
It’s wild to me that VAR didn’t look at the first half body slam on Baribo, nor the elbow to Glenses’s neck. Both have been red cards in matches gone by, neither were checked. Bad teams scrap to win – kudos to LA. Good teams parry the blows and win anyway – Come on, the U. Onward.
Really felt like we jinxed them for a bit there, didn’t it?
I don’t know what Coach Carnell said at halftime, but I hope he wrote that shit down.
Fun story… the last game my friend attended, he took a nasty fall in the parking lot. Scraped up. Bruised. But the Union won that game. He happened to take a smaller tumble at home the next game day, which the U also won. It’s been a joke since that maybe him falling is good luck.
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So, yesterday towards the end of halftime I texted him (true story):
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Me: Could you maybe go outside and, I dunno, fracture something?
Him: Losing, eh?
Me: Yeah.
(literally minutes later)
Me: Did you… did you fall?
Him: No?
Me: Because its all tied up now.
Him: !?!
i have a chance this weekend to catch El Trafico. Never been to Carson. Last time I saw them both was the Cup run two weeks before we played the final. Comeback win by LAFC not unlike last night. Woof! This Galaxy team has no confidence when conceding. Holy hell, even the broadcasters were playing into it. “What’s going through their heads?” “Four words: Here we go again”
Glesnes had an AWFUL game, especially the first half. Made several nice passes directly to players wearing white. Team as a whole wasn’t much better in the first half as most of their offense (aside from the Sullivan free kick) consisted of going down the side and playing an easily intercepted cross.
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Obviously a great turnaround in the second half, although it seems like Uhre has completely lost his scoring touch.
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Hoping to see PSP’s player ratings (despite the short turnaround) mainly to see multiple refs get ratings (not that I saw anything wrong with the job both of them did). I think the ref got halfway across the field before I told my wife that he must have pulled a muscle or something and needed to switch with the 4th official.
Give it to Uhre for not giving up and finding the assist. Bedoya added composure to the chaos
Great comeback, kudos to the players for keeping at it and getting it done.
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Harriel was also awful in the first half. Sure he made up for it somewhat with scoring, but it is really hard to understand why Carnell continues to start the player who’s not playing his natural position over Makhanya. They both can pull out some bone-headed stuff, but why not start the actual center back?