The big Swede has his team alive and well in the MLS playoff chase after another star showing as he reached the 20-goal mark for the season <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Zlatan Ibrahimovic was at it again for the LA Galaxy on Saturday, scoring twice to hit the 20-goal mark on the season and lead his side to a 3-0 win over the struggling Vancouver Whitecaps.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ibrahimovic opened the scoring from the penalty spot inside the opening five minutes and doubled his side’s lead just before the hour mark.<\/p>\n
And while the former Manchester United star didn’t finish off his hat trick, he won a penalty late on that was put away by\u00a0Romain Alessandrini to round out the scoring and leave the Galaxy just one point back of the playoff places in the Western Conference.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Ibrahimovic wasn’t the only former Manchester United star scoring in MLS on Saturday, with Wayne Rooney netting two goals of his own as D.C. United earned an impressive, and vital, 5-0 win over the Montreal Impact.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Luciano Acosta opened the scoring for United, with Rooney’s double coming either side of two goals from\u00a0Paul Arriola as the home side strolled to the win.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The result leaves D.C. just two points back of the Impact and final playoff place in the East, with United holding two games in hand.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Toronto FC stayed alive in the playoff hunt as well, taking a 4-1 win over the New England Revolution. The defending MLS champion will still need some help to earn a place in the postseason, but survived to fight another day.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For FC Dallas there are no such worries, with the Texas club locking up a playoff spot with a 0-0 draw against the Portland Timbers on Saturday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That result, coupled with Seattle’s 4-0 win over the Colorado Rapids, did do some harm for the Houston Dynamo. Despite taking a 3-2 win over the San Jose Earthquakes on Saturday the Dynamo could be knocked out the playoffs on Sunday should Real Salt Lake beat Sporting Kansas City.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The San Jose loss was also notable for Chris Wondolowski’s goal, scored from the penalty spot, which ran his career MLS total to 143, leaving him just two shy of Landon Donovan’s all-time mark.\u00a0<\/p>\n
LAFC took a tough 3-1 loss to the lowly Chicago Fire, denting the expansion club’s prospects of finishing in the top two places in the Western Conference.<\/p>\n
Bob Bradley’s side sit four points back of West leader FC Dallas and could end the weekend four back of SKC as well.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The top two places in the Eastern Conference were also decided on Saturday when New York City FC fell to Minnesota United.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The loss cliched a playoff bye for the New York Red Bulls, who will fight it out with Atlanta United for the top spot in the conference starting with tomorrow’s showdown between the two at\u00a0Red Bull Arena.<\/p>\n
For Philadelphia and Columbus, a 0-0 draw gave both clubs a point but means that neither will end the weekend assured of a playoff place.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The big Swede has his team alive and well in the MLS playoff chase after another star showing as he reached the 20-goal mark for the season Zlatan Ibrahimovic was at it again for the LA Galaxy on Saturday, scoring twice to hit the 20-goal mark on the season and lead his side to a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2030\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}