MLS State of Play: The final playoff spots

Major League Soccer’s playoff races still carry intrigue heading into the final two weekends of the season, but the midweek matches which threatened to either amp up the excitement or take it down a few notches fell decidedly in the latter category.

[ PL PREVIEW: Chelsea vs. Manchester United ]

DC, Seattle, and Real Salt Lake all won their matches, as only eliminated New England and Real have played more than 32 matches.

Here’s what still at play at the bottom of the East and West playoff pictures, with the latter going first:

Real Salt Lake puts its on Rio Tinto, then has to wait

Mike Petke’s men play their final match of the regular season on Sunday, nursing a four-point lead over the LA Galaxy. RSL’s opponents are equally desperate Portland, which has fallen behind Seattle in the race for one of two first round home matches.

Should Real win, it can not be caught by the Galaxy regardless of what Zlatan Ibrahimovic might have up his sleeve. It would put Portland in danger of missing the playoffs by losing out and seeing the Galaxy win both of their matches, as the second tiebreaker would decide it and LA would make amends on its current three goal disadvantage in differential on the virtue of simple math.

Oh, and Vancouver! The ‘Caps need to win out, have the Galaxy gain no more than two points, and have Real lose in Portland on Sunday.

Sunday
LA Galaxy at Minnesota United
Real Salt Lake at Portland Timbers
Vancouver Whitecaps at LAFC

Oct. 28
Houston Dynamo at LA Galaxy
Portland Timbers at Vancouver Whitecaps

Western
Team	GP	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Home	Away	PTS
x - FC Dallas	32	16	9	7	51	39	12	10-5-1	6-4-6	57
x - Sporting KC	32	16	8	8	60	39	21	9-5-2	7-3-6	56
x - Los Angeles FC	32	16	8	8	65	48	17	9-6-1	7-2-7	56
x - Seattle	32	16	5	11	47	34	13	9-2-5	7-3-6	53
Portland	32	14	9	9	50	46	4	10-4-2	4-5-7	51
Real Salt Lake	33	14	7	12	55	55	0	11-4-2	3-3-10	49
Los Angeles	32	12	9	11	61	60	1	8-4-4	4-5-7	45
Vancouver	32	12	7	13	50	64	-14	6-5-5	6-2-8	43
Minnesota	32	11	3	18	46	65	-19	10-1-5	1-2-13	36
Houston	32	9	8	15	53	53	0	8-3-5	1-5-10	35
Colorado	32	7	6	19	34	62	-28	5-3-8	2-3-11	27
San Jose	32	4	8	20	48	69	-21	2-5-9	2-3-11	20

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Let’s be honest: For seventh place Montreal to make the playoffs, the Impact need either DC United or Columbus to get a really bad team-wide flu.

The Impact are four points back of DC and five behind Columbus with two matches to go.

Columbus plays at Orlando City and home to Minnesota United. Orlando has a single win since May 16, while Minnesota has a win and two draws in 16 away matches this year.

DC is home to New York City and away to Chicago, so this is clearly the club Montreal will be seeing as its target. For as bad as the Fire have been, they’ve beat some decent teams at home (This is MLS, after all, where home teams run free).

So the Impact will want to win out, but at least get four points and hope DC loses out. The Impact is home to struggling Toronto in a derby match and away to New England. It’s not improbable it gets the points it needs, but will it get help.

Eastern
Team	GP	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Home	Away	PTS
x - Atlanta	32	20	6	6	67	39	28	10-4-2	10-2-4	66
x - New York	32	20	5	7	60	33	27	13-1-2	7-4-5	65
x - New York City FC	32	15	8	9	55	41	14	11-4-1	4-4-8	53
x - Philadelphia	32	15	5	12	48	46	2	9-2-5	6-3-7	50
Columbus	32	13	9	10	39	41	-2	10-4-2	3-5-8	48
D.C.	32	13	8	11	57	49	8	12-2-2	1-6-9	47
Montreal	32	13	4	15	45	52	-7	10-2-4	3-2-11	43
New England	33	9	11	13	48	55	-7	7-5-4	2-6-9	38
Toronto FC	32	9	6	17	55	61	-6	7-2-7	2-4-10	33
Chicago	32	8	7	17	47	59	-12	6-3-7	2-4-10	31
Orlando City SC	32	7	4	21	41	72	-31	5-4-7	2-0-14	25

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