Saphir Taider sinks Rapids as Impact wins fourth straight match

Julian McKenzie

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Saphir Taider sinks Rapids as Impact wins fourth straight match image

MONTREAL---The Montreal Impact’s turnaround of their season continued on Saturday evening. The goals ended up coming from an unlikely source. 

Midfielder Saphïr Taider scored twice in Montreal's 2-1 win over the Colorado Rapids at Saputo Stadium Saturday night. The Impact have won four straight matches, as well as five of their last six.

Taider was one of the Impact’s newest acquisitions made during the offseason, joining the team as a designated player in January. He was counted on more to be a stable presence in the midfield and less of a striker. However, the Algerian midfielder sure looked like a finisher on Saturday evening. 

“Today, it looked like it is part of his game,” Impact defender Chris Duvall said. “We see it every day in training so I’m sure it can continue,”

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The last time Taider scored two goals in a game was six years ago, when the Algerian was with the Italian side Bologna F.C.

“It’s been a month since we started playing better,” Taider said. “The season is long, but it’s good that we’ve remained confident even in difficult moments,” 

Montreal dominated possession in the opening half, but made just one shot on target. Colorado, instead, sat back and tried to defend in order to remain in the game. 

“It’s really tough to play a team that’s well organized in their box,” Impact midfielder Samuel Piette said. “There’s not a lot of space to play through the lines so we had to go along the wings, try to put crosses in.

“We knew we just needed one goal to win that game,” Piette added. “We weren’t stressed about it.”

Early in the second half, Taider was fed a pass from teammate Alejandro Silva while in the penalty area. The midfielder slotted the ball through Rapids’ keeper Tim Howard’s legs, giving Montreal the 1-0 lead in the 55th minute. 

Seconds later, Taider received the ball — again from Silva — and scored to give the Impact a 2-0 advantage. 

The Rapids struck back in the 78th minute thanks to Dominique Badji, who scored his seventh goal of the year. Rapids’ centre half Axel Sjöberg fired a shot at goal that was partially blocked by Impact defender Chris Duvall. But as the ball trickled through his legs and approached the goal line, Badji buried the slowly rolling ball.

Until Colorado scored their lone marker, Montreal hadn’t allowed a goal in over 400 consecutive minutes of play. The goal was as close as the Rapids would come to equalizing. The loss keeps the Rapids near the Western Conference basement, just three points above the San Jose Earthquakes. 

The Impact’s winning streak is a welcome change for the club, a stark comparison to losing 10 of their first 13 matches of the year. Impact manager Remi Garde feels his team has matured over the course of the campaign, and admitted that he hasn’t changed much in how he approached training or speaking to his players during his team’s upswing from mediocrity. 

“I’m not sure if, at the beginning of the season, we would’ve played the same way we did tonight,” Garde said. “In certain phases of the game, we would’ve been more impatient.” 

“I didn’t discourage myself or say that I need to change everything,” Garde added. “I thought that the best way for me to go out of this bad period for the team was to [continue] the work that I had to do,” 

The Montreal Impact will play a road game Wednesday evening, a battle against New York City FC. NYCFC sits in third place in the Eastern Conference and has yet to lose a game at home this season. Montreal has only won two road games all season. 

Julian McKenzie