MLS Boosted Treble

This is a meeting between two sides who’ve started the new season in good fashion, and they’ve both been involved in high-scoring matches.

Columbus Crew have the best match goals average across the entirety of Major League Soccer. Seven games in, Columbus are averaging 3.57 goals per game, and they’ve had over 2.5 goals scored in 57% of their matches.

At home, it gets even better on the goals front for Columbus. They’ve averaged a massive 4.33 goals across the three matches they’ve played, results being 2-0, 6-1 and 4-0 wins.

New England average 2.67 goals per game away from home, and they’ve had over 2.5 goals in two out of the three they’ve played. Their last two away games have been a 4-0 loss, followed by a 2-1 win.

Here we have the two best sides in Major League Soccer for corners, so I don’t think nine or more is a lot to ask for from these.

Visitors Vancouver Whitecaps have the best MLS rate as they average a massive 12.6 match corners per game. As for hosts Austin, they’re just behind them in the rankings as they average 11 match corners per game.

Austin concede the most corners per match with their average sitting at seven conceded per game, and as for Vancouver, they take the second-most per match with a rate of 6.70 per game. This meeting is recipe for lots of set-pieces – corners specifically.

This is one of the better rivalries in Major League Soccer, and it’s usually a good atmosphere whichever the two sides are hosting it.

It’s a derby based on the Pacific Northwest region of the United States, there’s just 173 miles between Portland and Seattle which is extremely close compared to most match-ups in the North American league.

In 2022, there were 13 yellow cards and a red handed out across the two meetings between Portland and Seattle. Tonight’s match will be refereed by Canadian Drew Fischer who’s given out 5+ cards in two of his last three matches.