When the Crew beat the Colorado Rapids on Wednesday, they did it with an acceptance that not every game they play is going to fit their preferred aesthetic. But in Saturday’s game against Charlotte FC, the Crew played one of their prettiest, most dominant halves of the season — and it carried them to their second consecutive win.
A chaotic five-minute stretch of the second half nearly spelled disaster for the home side, but behind two goals from forward Christian Ramírez and one apiece from forwards Max Arfsten and Cucho Hernandez, the Crew beat Charlotte 4-2, avenging their 1-0 loss at Charlotte since late April.
Saturday’s game was delayed for 30 minutes due to severe weather in the area, but once the game began, the Crew were in control from the first kick and needed less than five minutes of game time to take the lead. Just as the time on the clock ticked into the fifth minute, forward Cucho Hernandez played a through ball to forward Christian Ramírez running full speed at the goal. Ramírez had an open lane with only Charlotte goalkeeper Kristijan Kahlina in front of him, and he easily slotted the ball past Kahlina for his first goal since April 8.
The pace of the game turned hectic after the early goal, which gave Charlotte opportunities to challenge the Crew’s makeshift back line — wingback Malte Amundsen, defender Steven Moreira and midfielder Sean Zawadzki were the Crew’s three starting center backs — in transition. Charlotte forward Patrick Agyemang posed a physical challenge, with a four-inch height advantage over Zawadzki, who was the Crew’s tallest center back at six feet tall.
But when the Crew began to settle the pace down, there was little Charlotte could do about it. Forward Max Arfsten, starting at wingback in place of defender Mo Farsi, who was injured during warmups, doubled the Crew’s lead in the 21st minute, and Hernandez made it 3-0 with his second goal in as many games just before halftime.
Charlotte appeared to score shortly after Arfsten’s goal, but after a check by referee Alex Chilowicz, it was waved off because Charlotte winger Justin Meram was offside. Charlotte’s other major scoring chance in the first half came in the 33rd minute, as Harrison Afful fired a low shot towards the corner of the net, but goalkeeper Patrick Schulte made the diving save, and Amundsen cleared away the second-chance shot for a corner. kick that proved unthreatening.
After his audacious goal off the volley late in the first half, Hernandez had a chance to put the Crew up 4-0 early in the second half as he received the ball in the middle of the 18-yard box from midfielder Lucas Zelarayán on a corner kick. But Kahlina saved Hernandez’s shot, and the save seemed to give Charlotte the energy she needed to get back into the game.
Four minutes after Hernandez’s shot was saved, Charlotte forward Karol Swiderski worked around Moreira inside the penalty area and created space to shoot past Schulte for Charlotte’s first goal of the game. And the mistakes kept coming for the Crew after that. Two minutes after Swiderski’s goal, Meram took advantage of a misplayed ball by the Crew and immediately scored, putting Charlotte within one goal of the Crew in the 58th minute.
But just one minute after that, the Crew struck back again. Arfsten played the ball into the box and Hernandez made a dummy run, allowing the ball to fall to Ramírez for the shot. Ramírez took one touch to steady himself and sent the ball past Kahlina’s outstretched arm to once again give the Crew a two-goal advantage.
The Crew regained control of the game from there, and while Charlotte kept the pressure on when they were able, the Crew’s control of the ball prevented Charlotte from generating many dangerous looks.
In the 85th minute, Zelarayán came within inches of delighting the sellout crowd of 20,199 at Lower.com Field with the fifth goal they were asking for, but his shot hit the underside of the crossbar and bounced out. In the end, the Crew didn’t need an additional insurance goal. Ramirez’s brace was enough to lift them to the win, their second in a row.
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus Crew takes control against Charlotte FC to win 4-2