The Daily Dirt October 24: Manic Monday

FC Dallas joined a small number of teams that have done a U.S. domestic double by winning the Supporters’ Shield yesterday. Adding it to their Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup trophy, 2016 has been a good one for Oscar Pareja’s squad. Mauro Diaz’s injury will greatly hamper their chances to win MLS Cup, but don’t rule them out. We’ll see if Pareja can find the magic combination for a five more games to get it done.

What’s wrong in Portland? Losing 4-1 in a must-win game to keep the playoff hopes alive is shocking for Caleb Porter’s bunch. In a league founded on parity, defending the Cup is always a brutal challenge. However, to see Portland join Columbus in missing the playoffs one year after playing in the final is a problem. Porter and Gregg Berhalter have some serious work to do in the offseason to right the ship.

All the credit in the world to Brian Schmetzer for getting the Sounders into the playoffs. The addition of Nicolas Lodeiro was a huge boost obviously, but he has also had to overcome the shocking loss of Clint Dempsey in navigating the second half of this season. I know Seattle wants to go big with a manager hire in the offseason, but it would be a shame to not see Schmetzer rewarded for the job he did in 2016.

We’ll have more on the MLS playoffs later this week, be on the lookout for our Roundtable set of predictions for the knockout round early Wednesday.

Domestic

FC Dallas gets trophy number two in 2016 as they clinch the Supporters’ Shield after a scoreless draw in LA (Big D Soccer)

Portland will not be able to defend their MLS Cup after ending their season in Vancouver losing 4-1 (Stumptown Footy)

DC United will host Montreal in the knockout round of the playoffs on Thursday (Black and Red United)

Seattle completes a huge turnaround, qualifies for the playoffs, and will host Sporting Kansas City Thursday night (Sounder at Heart)

Real Salt Lake backs into the playoffs and will travel to LA to face the Galaxy Wednesday night (RSL Soapbox)

Toronto will host a knockout game on Wednesday against Philadelphia (Waking the Red)

USWNT wins 5-1 over Switzerland in front of a large crowd in Minneapolis (Stars and Stripes FC)

MLS ranks seventh in the world in league attendance for 2016 (Soccer America)

New York Red Bulls II wins the USL Cup over Swope Park Rangers (USL)

International

What we learned from Chelsea destroying Manchester United (SB Nation)

Can Neymar reach his full potential playing next to Lionel Messi? (Sky Sports)

Local

The “Ronaldinho and Friends” match drew a capacity crowd to Silverbacks Park last night (Dirty South Soccer)

Missouri comes from behind to defeat Georgia in Athens (Georgia Dogs)