The Union return to MLS action six weeks after pausing for the Leagues Cup

When the Union take the field Saturday at D.C. United (7:30 p.m., Apple TV, free), it will have been six weeks since their last regular-season game.

A lot has happened since then: seven games in the Leagues Cup, clinching a berth in next year’s Concacaf Champions Cup, Tai Baribo’s arrival, Lionel Messi’s first visit, and the entire women’s World Cup.

Really: if you went to New Zealand and Australia after the July 15 win over New York City FC, returned after the World Cup final, and paid no attention to the Union in between, the team’s record (12-7-4, 40 points) is the same as it was before you left.

To be fair, that’s in part because the Union had a regular-season game rescheduled because they reached the Leagues Cup third-place game. Instead of hosting FC Dallas on Aug. 20, they’ll now do so on Sept. 27.

(And if you’re wondering, my travels didn’t quite fit in the gap. I watched the first half of the NYCFC game at the Denver airport during a layover before flying to San Francisco, from where I went on to Auckland. It feels like a long time ago.)

It’s a serious point, though, that the Union haven’t played a regular-season game in a long time. The dynamic was different in a standalone tournament, even one in the middle of the summer.

» READ MORE: Union sign forward Tai Baribo from Wolfsberger AC

So does any of what happened in the Leagues Cup matter now? And will it be a challenge at all for the Union to return to the regular season?

“Us being able to stay in a pretty good rhythm, win six out of seven games, was good,” manager Jim Curtin said this week. “And maybe most importantly, staying busy during this period, rather than the teams that went out after two games. I don’t know how they occupied the last 3½-plus weeks, almost a month, of this time where you’re just training. You can’t replicate games that easily.”

Also important is that the Union are pretty close to full health. Alejandro Bedoya has recovered from a quad injury that bothered him for weeks, and Julián Carranza is close to returning from the hamstring injury that cost him playing against Messi. (If you still want to what-if that game, that’s a good place to start.)

“Hopefully, Julián joins the squad fully, and then we make a run at these last 11 games,” Curtin said. “So I think we learned a lot about our group. I think we saw some guys step up and emerge as contributors to the group, and that’s a good thing, and adds to our depth down the stretch.”

In reflecting on the Leagues Cup as a whole, Curtin said he believes it was “a successful competition” for MLS and Liga MX. The latter might disagree, since all the Mexican teams had to play in MLS stadiums and endure a lot of travel, and the title game was an all-MLS matchup.

But there’s no doubt everyone made a lot of money, from ticket sales to U.S.-based fans of Mexican teams and a Messi-driven spike in Apple subscriptions.

» READ MORE: Brenden Aaronson is enjoying his new home with Union Berlin

Was it successful for the Union?

“Forty-seven teams entered this thing — you could argue about how many are good, or were a real contender to win a trophy, but we finished third out of 47,” Curtin said. “I know we’re not completely thrilled about that — the guys wanted to lift a trophy. But at the end of the day, we still showed we can compete against Liga MX. … It shows we’ve moved forward quite a bit.”

That wasn’t just a coach backing his players. The Union have gone 5-0-1 against Mexican teams this year: a win and a tie vs. Atlas in the Champions League, then wins vs. Tijuana, Querétaro (twice), and Monterrey in the Leagues Cup.

The last of those gets a bit of an asterisk because Monterrey played a lot of backups. But it’s also the win that qualified the Union for next year’s Concacaf Champions Cup — the rebranded name of the Champions League, since it really is a cup competition.

Plenty of MLS teams would be quite happy to go unbeaten in six games against Mexican teams in a year — and to have six games against Mexican teams in a year in the first place. That means you’re doing something right.

For now, though, the chance to do something right will only come on the domestic stage. The Union resume the regular season in third place, three points back of second-place New England — which reportedly is about to sell starting goalkeeper Djordje Petrovic to English power Chelsea for $17.4 million, a MLS record fee for the position.

First-place Cincinnati might not be catchable at this point, leading the Union by 11 points with 11 games to go. But New England is. That’s the focus for the rest of the regular season, and that’s all the Union need to focus on right now.

» READ MORE: Sinead Farrelly looks back at playing in the World Cup as she returns to Gotham FC