NEW YORK (Wednesday, October 4, 2023) – Columbus Crew forward Cucho Hernández was voted the Major League Soccer Player of the Month presented by CELSIUS® for September 2023.
Hernández is the second Crew player to take home Player of the Month presented by CELSIUS honors since the start of the 2022 season (Lucas Zelarayán, February/March 2022) and is the fourth different Columbus player to earn the league’s monthly accolade across the last 10 seasons, joining Justin Meram (October 2016), Zack Steffen (May 2018), and Zelarayán. He becomes the first Colombian player to take home Player of the Month honors since Seattle’s Fredy Montero in July 2010.
One of the league’s most dynamic offensive threats, Hernández continued his brilliant play for the Crew in the month of September, leading the league with eight goals and adding an assist across five matches. The Colombian striker registered a pair of hat tricks against CF Montréal (Sept. 2) and Chicago Fire FC (Sept. 20), becoming the first player since Josef Martínez in September 2017 to record multiple hat tricks in a single month. Hernández scored in four of the Crew’s five matches during the month and contributed to nine of the club’s 12 goals over the span.
In his first full season in MLS, Hernández has mounted a strong case for the 2023 Landon Donovan MLS MVP award, as he sits just one goal off the lead for the Golden Boot presented by Audi with 14 goals and has added 11 assists across 24 games. A significant piece of one of the league’s top offenses, Hernández’s 25 goal contributions are tied for the third-most in MLS and have helped guide Columbus (62 goals) to just the second season with at least 60 goals in club history. Columbus (50 points, 14-9-8) has secured a berth in the Audi 2023 MLS Cup Playoffs for the first time since taking home MLS Cup in 2020.
The Crew will look to take steps towards clinching a top-four seed in the Eastern Conference with a pair of road matches against fellow playoff clubs this week, as they travel to take on the New England Revolution on Wednesday (7:30 p.m. ET, MLS Season Pass) before heading to Mercedes-Benz Stadium to face Atlanta United on Saturday night (7:30 p.m. ET, MLS Season Pass).
MLS Player of the Month presented by CELSIUS is voted upon by a panel of select national media members in a process conducted by MLS Communications.
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