Ignacio Piatti
By Nayib Moran
On Saturday night in Houston’s BBVA Compass Stadium, the Houston Dynamo obtained its second home win with a 3-0 win over the Montreal Impact.
Earlier in the week the Impact were in Costa Rica, playing the second-leg of the CONCACAF Champions League semifinals against Alajualense. They left Central America with a 4-2 loss, but with a ticket to the final on away goals.
The Impact’s start to the MLS season doesn’t stand out. Frank Klopas’ team has a current record of zero wins, two ties, and two losses, but the situation has to be analyzed a little deeper.
In order to get to the CCL final, IMFC eliminated Liga MXs Pachuca, a team that currently has the fifth best offense of the league, and Alajualense, one of Costa Rica’s historic clubs and currently in fourth place of Costa Rica’s Campeonato de Verano.
Since the Champions League format started back in the 2008-09 season, all of the finalists have been from Mexico’s Liga MX, except for Real Salt Lake, and now Montreal Impact.
Impact head coach Klopas appreciates what the league has done to help his team prepare for the final. The matches against Chicago Fire and San Jose Earthquakes have been postponed to later dates.
“I think it’s good because the most difficult thing is with the altitude, so the opportunity to be there early, and be there everyday gives us a chance to adapt. It think it’s great. From the league standpoint and from Chicago, it’s fantastic that we’re able to do that,” emphasized Klopas.
The date of arrival to Mexico City is yet to be confirmed, but Klopas wants to get to Mexico as soon as possible. “We’re discussing right now when we can go. The earliest, the better it will be.”
Midfielder Ignacio Piatti, one of the team’s key players pointed out how important it’s for the team to spend more than one day before the match against teams that play in cities with high altitude:
“It helps you a lot. When I played Libertadores, I went to Ecuador and arrived one day before the match, and Bolivia one day before, too.
“Here we will arrive six, seven days before the match, so I don’t know what the coaching staff is planning. All I know is that the game versus Chicago was postponed and the San Jose game as well, so we’re going to have 15 days to prepare this final,” declared the Impact’s no. 10.
The Impact’s opponent is Club America, Liga MXs current champion, and the team that made an echoing statement in the Confederation after coming back from a 3-0 loss in the first-leg of the semifinals against Herediano in Costa Rica to then win at home, at Estadio Azteca, in the second-leg, 6-0.
Klopas believes his players should feel excited about the task on hand.
“Listen, it’s a final, you’re not going to have an easy opponent, what a better opportunity we have to play against a historic club like America at Azteca stadium. If you’re not excited about that, I don’t know, you have to play other sports,” he detailed.
Piatti agrees with Klopas and indicated how important it will be to not let America score at Azteca:
“Definitely, we think the same as our coach; it’s a final, and we have to play it like it is. We already played against a difficult opponent like Pachuca, and at their place, we scored the first two goals and led 0-2, then they tied us 2-2 due to our distractions.
“So we have to try to not let them score. We know that the stadium is going to be packed; it’s a beautiful place to play at. I’m really happy to be in the final, and of course we want to win it,” concluded the former San Lorenzo midfielder.
Photo courtesy of Thomas Gosse
