UNION (4-2-3-1) 

Blake 

Gaddis-Onyewu-Elliott-Wijnaldum 

D.Jones-Medunjanin 

Picault-Ilsinho-Pontius 

Sapong

Bench: McCarthy, Yaro, Rosenberry, Tribbett, Alberg, Epps, Simpson

New England (4-3-1-2) 

Cropper 

D.Smith-Angoua-J.Smith-Farrell 

Watson-Koffie-Caldwell 

Nguyen 

Bunbury-Kamara 

Bench: Knighton, Tierney, Delamea, Woodberry, Hollinger-Janzen, Herivaux, Wright

 Preview 

- Union manager Jim Curtin admitted to approaching this stretch of games with almost two separate teams. Particularly in the back, changes are wrought from the U.S. Open Cup with three new defenders in: Ray Gaddis, Giliano Wijnaldum and Oguchi Onyewu.
- CJ Sapong left Wednesday’s affair with a knock, a result of being “beat up” in Curtin’s words. Today would seem a great opportunity to rest him, particularly with a trip to former team Sporting Kansas City looming Thursday, but Curtin opts otherwise. Jay Simpson again on the bench.

- Interesting to see the choice with Roland Alberg. He worked for 120 minutes against the Red Bulls midweek, but after scoring a goal and giving what Curtin called “his best game in a Union jersey” (a history that includes a hat trick), the calculus between rewarding and resting him is difficult. But with a recovered Ilsinho waiting in the wings, Alberg gives way with a chance to impact the game off the bench.

- The Revs are depleted. No Diego Fagundez. No Kelyn Rowe. No Xavier Kouassi. No Juan Agudelo. No excuse for the Union to get three points. Granted, Kei Kamara and Lee Nguyen are plenty dangerous – Kamara has five goals and four assists in 10 games against the Union – but the lack of depth should make a team prone to conceding goals even more susceptible.

Charlie Davies, left, playing for New England against Orlando City last week,
is the newest member of the Union after a trade completed Thursday morning.
(AP)

The final move in a hectic final day of the MLS transfer window needed an extra eight hours to clear. But when the dust settled Thursday morning, the Philadelphia Union had achieved clarity on its aim this summer.

The Union capped a flurry of deals by acquiring forward Charlie Davies from New England along with a 2018 third-round SuperDraft pick in exchange for a 2018 first-round SuperDraft pick, general allocation money and targeted allocation money.

Capped with the transfer of designated player Alejandro Bedoya and the departure of Sebastien Le Toux to Colorado, the Union don’t exactly overhaul the roster but put on some important finishing touches for what they hope is a playoff run.

All told, the Union acquired Bedoya, Davies, the third-rounder and GAM from Colorado. They spent GAM, TAM (both to New England and Chicago for the top spot in the allocation order to get Bedoya), a discovery rights swap with Chicago and first-round SuperDraft picks in 2017 and 2018 while also bidding farewell to franchise all-time leading scorer Le Toux.

In Davies, the Union get a workhorse depth forward who brings as much off the field as on, though at a third of the cost of Le Toux and two years younger. Davies, 30, has been limited to just nine games this season as he battled cancer that was recently declared in remission.

He had a breakthrough 2015 season, scoring 10 goals and four assists in 33 games, but he was marginalized in New England with the arrival of Kei Kamara.

Davies, like Bedoya a Boston College grad, spent much of his career in Europe. Like Bedoya, he played in Sweden with Hammarby and France with Sochaux, where he was a teammate of former Union player Vincent Nogueira. He also used a successful loan stint with D.C. United to earn a season-plus in Denmark with Randers.

Davies, who becomes the fifth member of the Union with U.S. National Team caps, has played 17 times for the U.S. from 2007 to 2009, when his career trajectory was infamously altered by a car accident that cost him over a year on the field.

Davies’s cap hit is a shade under $107,000 this year, compared to Le Toux’s $300,000. More important than his role as a reserve forward could be his veteran presence with a young squad, and the wise-beyond-his-years Davies certainly provides a benefit there.

.@NERevolution striker @CharlieDavies9 beats cancer and is ready to take his life back and return to the field. https://t.co/Soq2kOBc1V

— FOX Soccer (@FOXSoccer) July 31, 2016

It’s been an international transfer window book-ended by attention for MLS.

Days before the window opened, FIFA president Sepp Blatter made headlines by swiping at MLS’ progress, both in the world of soccer and the American mainstream.

“It is a question of time, I thought – we had the World Cup in 1994,” Blatter said Dec. 30. “But it is now 18 years in so it should have been done now. But they are still struggling. … There is no very strong professional league (in the U.S.). They have just the MLS but they have no professional leagues which are recognized by the American society.”

As with most of the hot air emanating from the Swiss exec, Blatter’s withering criticism didn’t make way for facts. The dealings in the transfer window didn’t seem to want to follow Blatter’s paradigm either. So a month on from Blatter’s blithering assertions, MLS has shown itself to be a chic marketplace for big European clubs to do their shopping. Read more »