Union’s slide toward an early offseason continues with 3-2 loss at Columbus

The Union lost once again on Saturday, a 3-2 defeat at the Columbus Crew where they fell behind early and never recovered.

Columbus star forward Juan “Cucho” Hernández scored the first and third goals, in the 4th and 76th minutes, both off corner kick plays that looked remarkably easy against a team long known for its defense.

Nathan Harriel tied the score at 1-1 in the 25th, Mo Farsi gave the Crew the lead back in the 41st, then Hernández extended it. Jack McGlynn struck in the 78th, five minutes after entering as a substitute, but the Union came no closer.

The Union’s hopes of making the playoffs are still alive, by the narrowest of margins. But even if they win their next game, the Oct. 19 regular-season finale at home against FC Cincinnati, they’ll need multiple other results to go their way.

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You could scarcely draw up a simpler goal to concede than the one the Union gave up in the fourth minute. Columbus won it after a restart from a third-minute foul, Dylan Chambost took it, and Hernández ran past Danley Jean Jacques and outjumped Harriel for an easy header.

Christian Ramirez should have made it 2-0 in the 7th minute off a Hernández setup, but Andre Blake made a diving save to palm Ramirez’s header away.

As the reigning MLS and Leagues Cup champion Crew looked to take firm control of second in the East, they did not let up. They outshot the Union 6-1, outpassed them 122-27, and had 74% of the possession in the first 20 minutes.

The one Union attempt was by Quinn Sullivan, who tried to chip Columbus goalkeeper Patrick Schulte from near midfield in the 10th minute and sent the attempt high.

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It has not been a good few weeks for Harriel on the defensive side of the ball, and in last Wednesday’s loss at Orlando he blew some chances on the attacking end, too. But this time, he pounced on a big opportunity to make things right.

Dániel Gazdag won a free kick that Jack Elliott took quite well, swerving a ground-ball shot under Columbus’ defense and forcing Schulte to make a low dive. He gave up a rebound that Tai Baribo got to first, but before Baribo could settle the ball, Harriel called him off and smashed a shot past his U.S. Olympic teammate.

Columbus regained the lead 16 minutes later with its latest spell of great possession and passing. It culminated with Farsi firing home a rebound of a Blake save, past a standing-in-place Jakob Glesnes.

Soon after that, the Apple TV broadcast noted that the Union are 0-12-5 this year in games where they’ve given up two goals. Even taking into account Blake’s injury absence, that is a pretty damning statistic — not just for the win-loss-tie numbers, but because there are 17 games in the total.

The broadcast did not note that those 17 games only counted the regular season. Tallying up all competitions, the total is 23 games, and the Union’s record is 2-15-6. Blake has played in 11 of those games, including Saturday’s.

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Union manager Jim Curtin subbed in Alejandro Bedoya for Danley Jean Jacques in the 66th minute, and Jack McGlynn for Leon Flach in the 73rd. The moves did not produce a tying goal, and in fact both entrants were at fault on the Crew’s third.

It was another simple-as-can-be corner kick play. Hernández ran behind McGlynn and in front of Bedoya, who was late to his first step. The big-money Colombian then jumped in front of Harriel, who jumped high but not high enough, to head in his 23rd goal of the year. Add them to 12 assists this year, and it was clear why the crowd serenaded Hernández with “MVP!” chants.

“That could well be game over,” Apple analyst Danny Higginbotham said.

In fact, it wasn’t yet, thanks to McGlynn’s quickly-taken shot from the top of the 18-yard box. Higginbotham retracted his previous claim, a classic curse of the commentator.

But there was no tying goal. Dániel Gazdag came closest, volleying a cross from Wagner way over the crossbar from a wide open position in the 88th.

The Union knew at kickoff that their playoff hopes would stay alive until the season’s last day, thanks to Toronto FC’s 1-0 loss to Inter Miami at home in the afternoon. The defeat eliminated the Reds from playoff contention, as the game was their regular-season finale. (They’re off on the last day of the season because MLS has an odd number of teams leaguewide this year.)

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Among Saturday night’s results, a helpful one was CF Montréal’s 2-0 loss at Charlotte FC. But the most important game went against the Union, D.C. United’s 2-1 win at the New England Revolution.

The combination means the Union must beat FC Cincinnati at home in their regular-season finale on Oct. 19, and hope that D.C. loses at home to Charlotte or Montréal loses at home to New York City FC. All three games will be played at the same time, 6 p.m., and all will be broadcast on Apple TV.

The finale is the Union’s next game, because the soccer world now heads into a FIFA window for national team games.