It was a game marred by controversy. An always heated affair between Toronto FC and the Columbus Crew resulted in a draw, which extends TFC’s winless record against Columbus to 12 games.
A decent affair took its first turn in the 42nd minute when Julian DeGuzman lofted a pass over the opposing defenders to the newly acquired Tony Tchani. With one bounce, Tchani calmly struck the ball into Will Hesmer’s goal. The emotion experienced by Tony Tchani caused him to exit the field and salute the fans. Shortly after, the referee gave Tchani his second yellow card of the game for leaving the game without his permission which resulted in his early exit from the game.
Two notable observations from Tony Tchani’s yellow cards were that he was not involved directly in the altercation that resulted in his first warning. Danleigh Borman was tripped by Kevin Burns, and Alan Gordon pushed down the Columbus player. Tchani received the yellow. A second observation was that Alan Gordon previously did the same goal-celebration and did not receive a yellow-card. This may call for a look at consistency regarding the rules of celebrations. Nonetheless, Tchani should have known what he was getting himself into.
The Columbus Crew came out firing in the second half and only took four minutes after the restart to get the equalizing goal. Emilio Renteria headed home a Dilly Duka cross which produced the stalemate.
The rest of the game proved to have limited chances for both sides, with two notable runs by Toronto FC’s Joao Plata, who proved to be a handful for Columbus’s defenders. While TFC played tight defense at times, they did show fundamental and tactical lapses at the back which could almost led to goals for Columbus.
When all was said and done, David Gantar blew the final whistle for a 1-1 tie, resulting in Toronto’s 4th tie of the season (1-4-2). Next up for the Reds is a midweek clash (Wednesday) at FC Edmonton in the NCC Championship.
(image courtesy of torontofc.ca)
