At halftime of Saturday's victory against the Montreal Impact, the Crew was passing to a 92.61% completion percentage, which was on-pace to set this season's single-match MLS high.
After the match, Sporting Director and Head Coach Gregg Berhalter remarked that he thought his team could have been more clinical in that first half.
Berhalter was naturally referring to his club's ability to get a second goal in the first half, but the point stands: it's been that kind of run for the Crew. As the standards and pressure continue to be raised at One Black & Gold Boulevard, the performances continue to be exceptional. A 2-0 win over the Impact was the club's fifth straight at home, but despite the victory, the Crew is not satisfied with some aspects of its play. In the context of always staying hungry, that's a great sign.
"I think we still need to get sharper going forward in the final third," said Ethan Finlay. "I had a couple of chances, Hector had a couple of chances where we have to make sure we can find the guy in the box. That's how you put teams away. I think tonight we could have done a little bit better of a job at that – getting to the endline, being a little more patient with the cross and letting the movement develop. That's all things that we can work on.
"We know we have three big games coming up where we need to be able to fix that."
The Crew is currently meeting every challenge while striving for even more at the same time. The club will get an opportunity to do that with how the schedule is shaping up: road matches at New England, Philadelphia and New York are on tap, with all three right near the Crew in the MLS Cup Playoff standings. Given how that slate is unfolding, it was vital that Columbus took care of Montreal at home on Saturday, and it did on the banks of a Finlay laser and a Federico Higuain penalty.
"It was incredibly important," said Finlay on the win. "We didn't want to get too far ahead of this game, but we know we have a tough test ahead of us in October, and I think we're excited for it. We had a good road record at the start of the year, and we want to finish strong as well on the road. The next three games are going to be challenging, but I think we're up for it."
The upcoming matches are even more important because each Eastern Conference opponent is meeting its challenges as well. Although Philadelphia lost on Saturday, both the Revolution and Toronto FC won this weekend, with New York set to play LA tomorrow.
"Looking around the League, looking at a New England win last night, looking at a Toronto win this afternoon, there was pressure in this game to perform," said Berhalter. "A home game, we wanted to obviously put in a game-winning performance at home. It was important."
