San Jose Earthquakes 3-Atlanta United FC 4
To win a Supporters Shield it requires a lot of effort and a little bit of luck. Although Atlanta United FC didn’t seal up their first piece of silverware on Wednesday night at Avaya Stadium, they did push the ball closer to the net. Despite being down two goals late Atlanta pushed late and earned the 4-3 win over the San Jose Earthquakes.
The Quakes pulled out to a 2-0 lead early with goals from Nick Lima (13′) and Danny Hoesen (43′). Atlanta got one back minutes later with Hector Villalba scoring in the third minute of extra time. But San Jose extended the lead once again to two with Vako scoring in the 58th minute.
That’s when things went a little crazy. It appeared as if the Quakes might go up 4-1, a scoreline that would even put a high-scoring side like Atlanta to rest. But VAR ruled that in the lead-up to the goal that Magnus Eriksson had handled the ball, disallowing Chris Wondolowski’s goal. What made that call even worse for the home side was that Eriksson’s violation had occurred inside the Earthquake penalty box, giving the chance to narrow the lead again to one. Josef Martinez buried his chance in the 70th minute, giving ATLUTD life late.
With momentum swinging in their favor, Atlanta pressed the Earthquakes defense. They found the equalizer just three minutes later with Miguel Almiron finishing off a pass from Martinez. Martinez earned the go-ahead goal in injury time, knocking in his 30th goal of the season.
You can read Brian Taylor’s full recap of the wild night in California below. In the meantime please enjoy some of our photos from Lyndsay Radnedge and Center Line Soccer. You can also check all of our Earthquake photos from the 2018 season on SmugMug .
San Jose Earthquakes
