Real Monrqs beat Tacoma Defiance 3-0 in their MLS Next Pro Group Stage fixture at Zion's Bank Stadium on Sunday evening. The hosts moved clear of their visitors with goals from F. Ewald and L. Djiro, and here's the thing — it was the kind of match decided in three moments rather than one long performance. To be fair, the visitors had their chances but couldn't convert.
Ewald opened the scoring in the fifty-ninth minute, finishing what had been a growing pressure. Real Monrqs had controlled possession at 55 per cent and the shots told the story: six on target against two for the visitors. By then, two yellow cards — Riquelme and Winslow — had already shown the physical nature of the contest.
The second goal came from Ewald again in the eighty-third minute, and you could see how the visitors had got dragged out of position. Three substitutions for Tacoma Defiance that night — Cisneros-Tafolla, Jauregui, Murphy and Silva — weren't enough to shift the momentum. Real Monrqs kept pushing forward.
Djiro added a third in the eighty-ninth minute, rounding off a performance where the hosts registered 80 attacks compared to 75 for their opponents. The shots accuracy figure of 46 per cent for Real Monrqs versus 25 per cent for Tacoma Defiance said what the scoreline confirmed: chances went begging for the visitors.
The statistics showed a match where Real Monrqs had the edge in everything that mattered. Six shots on target produced three goals, while Tacoma Defiance's two attempts yielded nothing. The hosts also won more corners, 6 to 3, and had fewer offsides to worry about.
Real Monrqs sit sixth with 26 points from 23 games, while Tacoma Defiance remain fourth with 36 points from 24 matches. The gap between them is ten points, and this result doesn't change the table positions but it does end a run of difficult results for the hosts.
