Union lose badly at last-place Toronto FC, 3-1

The Union suffered a woefully ugly loss Wednesday, falling 3-1 at Toronto FC.

Toronto entered the night in last place and tied for the worst overall record in MLS. But with incoming new manager John Herdman watching from the stands, the Reds found goals from Lorenzo Insigne in the 23rd minute, Deandre Kerr in the 58th, and Jonathan Osorio in the 63rd.

Julián Carranza tied the game for the Union (13-8-4, 43 points) in the 45th minute, which seemed to swing momentum in the visitors’ direction. They were unable to capitalize in the second half, though, and offered surprisingly little resistance on defense.

The night ended with a fracas sparked by Jesús Bueno’s retaliatory kick on Raoul Petretta. Bueno was initially given a yellow card, but a video review upgraded it to a red card. José Andrés Martínez was also booked, as were Toronto’s Insigne and and Victor Vázquez.

It was Martínez’s third yellow card in six games, which earned his second suspension of the season for card accumulation. He’ll miss Sunday’s nationally-televised home game against the rival New York Red Bulls (7:55 p.m., FS1, Fox Deportes).

It’s one thing to to have a new manager bounce, but it’s another to have the bounce when he hasn’t officially started the job yet. Herdman quit the Canadian men’s national team on Monday amid the program’s turmoil, and signed on to become Toronto’s new boss starting Oct. 1.

Herdman was in a suite for this game, and watched his new team’s biggest star open the scoring in the 23rd minute. It started with Osorio jumping on a misplay by Jakob Glesnes after a poor backward pass by Martínez. Osorio played forward for Deandre Kerr, who squared for a charging Insigne to finish.

That was Insigne’s first goal for Toronto (4-13-10, 22 points) since June 11, and it came six days after he reportedly walked out of a practice over a disagreement with interim manager Terry Dunfield.

» READ MORE: Tai Baribo is still adjusting to his new life with the Union

Right as the clock turned to the 45th minute, Mikael Uhre received a throw-in from Olivier Mbaizo and delivered a really impressive play.

The Dane stuck the back side of his 6-foot-2 frame into Osorio, backed him down, then turned and hit a beautiful chip toward the six-yard box. Alejandro Bedoya jumped to head the ball on, Toronto goalkeeper Tomás Romero couldn’t grab it, and Carranza pounced at the back post for the finish.

It was Carranza’s 13th goal in 28 games across all competitions this season.

Union manager Jim Curtin will surely be angry with his team’s poor defending on Toronto’s second half goals. Glesnes was particularly at fault.

He froze at the six-yard line as Kerr spun off him to score his goal, then didn’t jump at Kobe Franklin’s cross while Osorio ran in behind to line up a header.

Curtin made a double-substitution in the 69th minute, sending in Quinn Sullivan for Uhre and Bueno for Bedoya. He also sent in Joaquín Torres for Dániel Gazdag and Chris Donovan for Carranza in the 81st. But there were no more goals.

The closest the Union came was in the 79th, when Jack Elliott headed a corner kick off the crossbar and Bueno’s shot of the rebound forced a leaping save by Romero.

» READ MORE: Jack McGlynn and Leon Flach played key roles in the win at D.C. United

Eight minutes after Insigne’s opener, Leon Flach sat down on the turf in pain. It wasn’t clear what caused the injury, but it was clear what the injury was. The TV cameras showed Flach repeatedly pointing to his groin. He exited in the 33rd minute for Jack McGlynn.

Flach dealt with a similar injury in the spring, and has had some injections over the course of the season to mitigate residual pain. Time will reveal whether this is a flareup of that, or something new.

Six years after he made history in a Union jersey, Romero was finally on a field with the team in MLS.

When the 22-year-old Cherry Hill native was a 16-year-old in the Union’s academy, he played for the club’s former reserve team, Bethlehem Steel. Romero became the youngest goalkeeper in the USL’s second-tier league to ever start and win a game.

Romero chose to go to college at Georgetown instead of turning pro at 18, and he backstopped the Hoyas to the 2019 national championship — including a penalty shootout triumph in the title game.

At the start of 2021, Los Angeles FC traded some cash to the Union for Romero’s homegrown player rights, so he wouldn’t have to go through the draft. He was the third-string goalkeeper on LAFC’s roster last year, which meant he got a MLS Cup title ring when his new team beat his old one.

After the season, Toronto acquired Romero in one of MLS’s byzantine offseason drafts for out-of-contract players who don’t qualify yet for free agency.

» READ MORE: Brenden Aaronson called up, Mark McKenzie returns to the USMNT for September friendlies