Battered Columbus trying to regroup for crucial match vs. Toronto

At 10:59 p.m. on Wednesday, the task of beating visiting Toronto FC got appreciably more difficult for the Columbus Crew leading into their crucial matchup Saturday afternoon.

At that moment, St. Louis City defeated the Crew on penalty kicks to win the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup after an often brutally physical scoreless draw. St. Louis earned a place in the 2027 CONCACAF Champions Cup with the victory.

The Crew were emotionally and physically spent, considering they were coming off a 2-0 win at heated rival FC Cincinnati on Sunday to keep their MLS playoff hopes alive and knowing that winning the Open Cup was their most realistic path to qualifying for the Champions Cup.

Now, winning the MLS Cup is the only way they can get there, but surging Toronto (8-10-12, 36 points) is one of the teams standing in their way with four matches left.

"You play 120 minutes. It takes a lot (out) of the body and you have to turn around and play a 3:30 game on Saturday," Crew captain Sean Zawadzki said. "It's difficult, but I know every single one in this locker room, everyone in this club is going to do whatever needs to be done, take care of their body, recover, hydrate, whatever it is, and be ready to go for Saturday because we know how much that game means to us and where things are standing,"

While the Crew (10-15-5, 35 points), who are 11th in the Eastern Conference standings, have won four of their last five in the league, Toronto is 2-0-1 in its last three and 10th in the East, one spot behind the New York Red Bulls for the ninth and final playoff spot in the conference. The teams are tied in points, but New York holds the tiebreaker.

"It's going to take a lot in these last games to get in there and you know we have difficult games coming up," Toronto forward Daniel Salloi said. "I'm saying that because every game is difficult at the end of the year and especially when it's a must-win, so we just got to keep working, keep fighting, and we've got to be above the line at the end of the regular season."

TFC defeated the visiting Crew 2-1 in their first regular-season meeting on March 21. Toronto turned around a 1-0 Columbus lead through second-half goals from Jose Cifuentes (56th minute) and Walker Zimmerman (83rd minute). Wessam Abou Ali scored in the fourth minute for the Crew.

--Field Level Media