Union rotate starters, fall 1-0 to MLS Eastern Conference leaders FC Cincinnati on the road

The Union starting 11 was missing a number of stars, as the busy schedule finally caught up to the team.

Union midfielder José Andrés Martínez may have had the best chance of the game, in the 44th minute of a 1-0 road loss to Cincinnati on Saturday.Read morePhiladelphia Union

Published Apr. 8, 2023, 10:53 p.m. ET

With a calendar flexing a full slate of matches across several competitions, player rotation is crucial for the Union to contend in the matches lined up ahead.

It’s something head coach Jim Curtin has suggested despite routinely relying on his preferred lineup of first-choice players for both league games and Concacaf Champions League competition. But on the road against conference-leading FC Cincinnati, he finally took a page from the book of his own promises and radically changed his starting 11.

“The Champions League is a really big game for our club,” Curtin said after the loss, emphasizing that the player rotation was done to have key performers in top form for Wednesday’s deciding match in Mexico against Atlas. “While it hurts that we don’t take points in the seventh game of the season now, we had to make a decision to try to set ourselves up.”

No Alejandro Bedoya, the team’s captain and an automatic in the starting lineup in almost every game where he has been healthy. No Mikael Uhre, the team’s most expensive-ever signing. No Julián Carranza, the young Argentine who was arguably the steal of the season last year when the Union brought him in on loan from Inter Miami before signing him to a permanent deal. No Dániel Gazdag, the Hungarian midfielder who became the Union’s top goal scorer in a season with 22 goals last year.

Instead, Curtin kept all those players on his bench. Goalkeeper Andre Blake was the captain leading out the starters who were mostly recognizable on the defensive end, with Matt Real, Nathan Harriel, Jack Elliott, Jakob Glesnes, Olivier Mbaizo, Leon Flach, José Andrés Martínez and less so Jesús Bueno, Quinn Sullivan, and Chris Donovan.

The corps Curtin did compile kept the match scoreless, until the 69th minute, after a chaotic sequence in the box ended with Cincinnati midfielder Brenner Souza da Silva, known simply as Brenner, appearing to score a deflected goal for Cincinnati (5-2-0, 17 points). But the play was called back when referee Ted Unkel indicated he had already blown his whistle for a penalty kick on Cincinnati’s behalf before Brenner’s goal.

Luciano Acosta stepped up to the spot and scored the decisive goal past Blake for the 1-0 win.

“We’ve hit a little bit of a wall in terms of chance creation, shot creation, and hitting the back of the net, but I’m confident that this group can get it going,” Curtin said, alluding to the Union’s struggles in scoring goals this year after setting scoring records last season.

The Union’s most dangerous chance in the first half came mere seconds after the best chance for FC Cincinnati. In the 44th minute, with almost every Union player in the Cincinnati box for a set play, Brenner latched on to the loose ball and sent an outlet pass toward the Union goal. Both Santiago Arias of Cincinnati and Martínez were racing to the ball, with Martínez deftly getting a toe to it first to poke it safely in the other direction. He then picked his head up and lofted the ball in an attempt to chip Cincinnati goalkeeper Roman Celentano. While the shot was on target, the distance gave Celentano plenty of time to set up and make sure he secured the attempt.

Cincinnati probably rued not taking the game more to the Union (2-1-4, 7 points) in the first half, with so many of Philadelphia’s top players sitting on the sidelines. The team hadn’t put a single shot on goal, despite more possession. The Union had managed one. If Cincinnati didn’t realize it was wasting a golden opportunity, it’s likely their coach, Pat Noonan, a former Union assistant, emphasized that point during the break. It was noticeable as Cincinnati emerged with more verve to start the second half.

Interestingly enough, since Uhre, Gazdag, and Bedoya came on for Donovan, Sullivan and Bueno in the 60th minute, Cincinnati’s goal came while the Union had more of their stars on the field. In fact, the switch probably led to more open play on both ends.

The Union managed to threaten to score a few more times in the second half, with Bedoya’s shot in the 84th minute coming the closest to getting past Celentano, but in the end, the hosts were able to hold on.

Other Union teams win

The senior squad dropped its MLS match, but Union youth teams will play for a Generation Adidas Cup trophy in two categories. The U-15 squad earned its spot in the final after a 1-0 win over Orlando City. In a match with a bit of revenge mixed in for last year’s MLS Cup final loss, the U-17 team defeated LAFC, 2-1, and advanced to the final. The U-17 team will face FC Dallas in the championship game on Sunday, while the U-15 team will take on Austin FC.