Moreno Ready To Cap Off Big Season

By Shane Evans

The Columbus Crew are one step away from the MLS Cup, and leading goal-scorer Alejandro Moreno is ready to help his team over the edge. Following a very successful season, the 29-year-old Venezuelan identified a midseason match against Kansas City as the defining moment of the Crew’s season.

“Once we started the season off well, we got a couple of big victories, one against DC United in DC and Houston at home, I think the confidence in the group grew,” said Moreno in an MLS teleconference of how the season started. “We did hit a little lull there in the middle of the year where we weren't scoring with any frequency at all, we happened to go out to Kansas City. It was a game that was very important for us, we hadn’t scored in four league games and people were starting to doubt what we were going to do this year. We went out there and played a very good game, we had injuries and suspensions, but we won 3-0 and took off from there.”

That match is in the past, however, and the present holds a mouth-watering match-up with the Chicago Fire in the Eastern Conference Final. The future? A potential final against a team who Moreno and the Crew helped make the playoffs.

“I just think it’s very interesting that you have two teams that barely made it into the playoffs as you recall,” said Moreno of the participants in the Western Conference Final. “[Yura] Movsisyan scored in the last game of the season against Colorado to get in, and New York made it because we beat DC United. It’s funny how things work out, if we win on Thursday and New York win, we face the team we put into the playoffs in the final.”

As for his role in their match against the Fire, Moreno is confident he’ll be able to get things done, despite Chicago’s two imposing center-backs Wilman Conde and Bakary Soumare.

“I control the load, I work extremely hard, I’m smarter than people give me credit and to be quite honest, I’ve been around,” said Moreno of what he brings to the table. “Nothing like experience. There are things that I feel that I can do that perhaps people don’t give me credit for. I do my job and I do it to the best of my abilities and I’ve done that for seven years now.”

It’s obvious Moreno has been in this position before. He’s seen the highs and lows of the MLS. He knows what’s expected of him. Most importantly, he knows how to win, and that’s exactly what the Columbus Crew will try to do Thursday night against Chicago in the Eastern Conference Final.

“We certainly think Chicago is a very talented opponent and they have a lot of players who are doing very good things. They have a lot of key players but we certainly believe we have a lot of good players ourselves and we are comfortable in what we’re doing and we are a confident team. It’ll be a challenge, but we are up to it. We look forward to playing on Thursday and showing what the Columbus Crew can do on the field.”

Shane Evans is an associate editor of Goal.com USA