Red Bull New York (a/k/a New York Red Bulls) will meet the awesome and loathsome New England Revolution in the first game of the playoffs at Giants Stadium on Saturday. The teams will play two matches (home and away) and the winner is decided by combined score. So, the Red Bulls must win at home by as large a margin as possible if they hope to beat the mighty Revolution!
MLS playoffs are a bit of an embarrassment. There are really not enough teams in the league to merit multiple rounds of playoffs. There are not really enough teams to merit multiple conferences (East and West). MLS should mimic every other soccer league in the world, with a single conference awarding the championship to the team who ends the year on the top of the table.
Switching to a single conference would allow a logical schedule where each team could play every other team once at home and once away.
Following the NFL/NBA/NHL/MLB paradigm of multiple rounds of playoffs makes no sense.
But this is what we have and this is what I will enjoy.
The conference semifinals are two-game, home-and-away, total-goals series. A 30-minute overtime period will be played if the teams are tied after 180 minutes, then a shootout if the teams are still tied.
Fox Soccer Channel will carry both Red Bulls-New England games as part of its Soccer Saturday package.
Dick Mac Recommends:
Bend It Like Beckham
Imran Ali, Ameet Chana
No comments:
Post a Comment