Colorado Rapids vs Austin FC Preview With Verde All Day

Commerce City, Colo.- The Colorado Rapids return home against Austin FC on Saturday. Colorado comes into the game 13th in the west off the back of an away loss to St. Louis FC. Austin FC enters the match just below the Rapids in 14th, also off the back of an away defeat to rivals, Houston Dynamo. It’s an all-important matchup for both teams. Burgundy Wave spoke with Phil West of Verde All Day to discuss.

Burgundy Wave: Who are some players to look out for on Austin FC; where does the danger come from for this team on attack?

Phil West: Well, that’s an unintentionally hurtful question! Since Austin returned from the midseason World Cup break, it’s earn a 3-1 win in oppressive heat that got broken open with two assists from 18-year-old Ervin Torres in just 14 sub minutes, and then a 3-0 loss at Houston we’d all rather forget. Chance creation has been a challenge all season, and some new experimentation with inverted wingbacks from interim head coach Davy Arnaud isn’t going all that well so far. Owen Wolff, who led Verde in goal contributions last year, hasn’t looked right all season after having to undergo sports hernia surgery as preseason kicked off. Facundo Torres currently leads the team in assists, but most of those have come off set pieces.

Brandon Vázquez has gotten his first two starts returning from ACL surgery last year, but hasn’t scored a goal since the Open Cup match he was injured in more than a year ago. So, if there’s danger in open play, right now it’s most likely to come from Myrto Uzuni, who has been — how shall we put it? — enigmatic since arriving in Austin last year. Przemysław Płacheta (shem-i-suave pwa-het-uh) is a fun new winger from Poland picked up as his time at Oxford United was winding down; he’s fast and fun and has had some flashes so far. 

BW: With Austin just below the Rapids in standings, how do you expect the team to approach the match tactically and mentally? 

PW: We’ll find out on Saturday if the inverted winger experiment is something that Arnaud is committing to, or if it’s going to be scrapped for something else that, I don’t know, allows Joseph Rosales to play in his natural left back position — something that Arnaud and Nico Estévez before him have been weirdly resistant to doing. I led the press conference following the Houston loss observing that Austin’s the only team in MLS that doesn’t have an away win this season — which came as news to Arnaud — so my hope is that the team’s more cognizant of that now and plays accordingly. 

BW: As Austin continues to build towards success, what is the importance of this season and match against Colorado, and your prediction for the match? 

PW: It feels to me that Verde’s always up for this matchup (especially the matches in Commerce City — an away trip that fans have christened Denverde), and I expect something on the order of a frisky 2-2 draw. Though Arnaud is claiming to be “all in” along with his squad for a playoff run, I’d rather see him use this part of the season to being instilling principles that head-coach-in-waiting Jim Curtin wants to play with (though they’re already struggling with the “30-35 yards between the center forward and back line at all times” and the “defending with our lives in the box” principles he laid out in his welcome press conference). I also want to see what we have in some of our younger players, though it does sound like one of our U22 Initiative players, Nicolás Dubersarsky, is on his way to a loan in Argentina, which makes the team quite thin at the 6. Austin’s 14th in the West; I feel like 2026 postseason play isn’t in the cards (and wouldn’t go well were they to luck into it). 

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