Columbus Crew captain Michael Parkhurst says that the club are fully aware of the difficult run of matches – especially in terms of the distance travelled – that they have in the next couple of weeks. The team will be making the trip to Vancouver to take on the Whitecaps.
Following this match, there will be a straight trip to the East coast in order to take on New England Revolution. These two matches will provide a stern test towards Columbus Crew’s ambitions of moving into the play-offs before the end of the campaign. The team has started in a disappointing fashion after managing just one victory in the three matches.
Their 2-0 win over Toronto came in front of their own supporters, but this was not enough to see them carry on the confidence against New York Red Bulls last weekend. A 2-1 defeat against one of the top teams in the MLS sees Columbus set just outside the play-off places after three matches. Even though they already trail the likes of Orlando City and New York City, the team will be feeling relatively confident since they have at least two matches in hand over these clubs. Berhalter is aware that he must rotate and fully use his squad in order to get the best out of them in the two matches.
“We’ve got the toughest stretch you could probably possibly play [this] week with two turf games in three games cross-country, but we have to deal with it. We have to get points. We’re sitting at 1-2-0 and we need points. So we have to get past it mentally. All things considered, with the travel and the venues and the timing – we play at 3 o’clock on Saturday after 10 o’clock on Wednesday – it’s a short window and there’s a lot of travel involved. So we’ll look at what we do with the lineups,” said captain Michael Parkhurst.