Valencia's double gives Metros win over Crew
May 6, 2000 (Official Game Summary)
The MetroStars earned their second straight road win of the season tonight, beating the Columbus Crew 2-0, before a crowd of 17,558 at Columbus Crew Stadium. The MetroStars, now 3-5-0 (9 pts.) on the season, sit in second-place in the Eastern Division, behind only the New England Revolution 2-2-4 (10 pts). Even before the opening whistle, there were some interesting sub-plots to the second match-up of 2000 between these two clubs. Metros midfielder Tab Ramos made his first start since back on July 10, 1999, when the Metros played in Chicago against the Fire. He helped the Metros control the ball much of the first half. For the Crew, they received a bit of bad luck before the match, when starting 'keeper Mark Dougherty strained his hip in pre-game warm-ups and was not able to start. In addition, starting forward Dante Washington was involved in a car accident on Friday and was subsequently not able to play. In his place, the red and black faced off against former teammate Miles Joseph who was traded on Wednesday, and now found himself among the starting eleven for the Crew. After playing to a scoreless tie in the first half, the Metros finally broke through midway through the second half. In the 60th minute, Adolfo Valencia staked the Metros to a 1-0 lead. After running onto a through ball from Petter Villegas, Valencia made a touch on the ball in traffic to put it behind 'keeper Matt Napoleon who had come off his line to break-up the play. Valencia then ran onto the ball just in front of a wide-open goal and touched the ball into the back of the net for his second goal of the season. In the 69th minute, Valencia stretched the Metros lead to 2-0. Lothar Matthaus, who started the play in the middle, passed the ball up to Petter Villegas who broke in on a two-on-one with Valencia. Villegas passed the ball to Valencia just outside the box, who then proceeded to make a few touches on the ball before blasting home the goal high and to the left side of Napoleon.
Lineup: Ammann, Petke, Jolley, Corrales, Hernandez, Chung, Matthaus, Dooley, Villegas, Valencia, Ramos. Subs: Walsh, Shak.
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