{"id":43060,"date":"2025-07-06T09:52:07","date_gmt":"2025-07-06T09:52:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/43060\/"},"modified":"2025-07-06T09:52:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-06T09:52:07","slug":"nashville-sc-beats-philadelphia-union-1-0-on-hany-mukhtar-game-winner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/43060\/","title":{"rendered":"Nashville SC beats Philadelphia Union 1-0 on Hany Mukhtar game-winner"},"content":{"rendered":"

The first hour had everything \u2014 slick passes, mid-air collisions, diving saves and a large, raucous crowd in attendance \u2014 foreshadowing a classic ending to a showdown of two of Major League Soccer’s best teams.<\/p>\n

The ending was, in fact, classic. Just not in a way Nashville SC<\/a> or the Philadelphia Union likely envisioned.<\/p>\n

While Jonathan Perez’s 63rd-minute red card flipped what had been an intense battle on its head, Nashville had no intention of rolling over. Hany Mukhtar’s game-winning penalty-kick goal 11 minutes into stoppage time gave 10-man Nashville (12-4-5, 41 points) a 1-0 win over the Union (12-5-4, 40 points) on July 5 at Geodis Park, extending its unbeaten streak to 14 matches across all competitions.<\/p>\n

“Both teams played at a really, really high level,” said Nashville coach B.J. Callaghan. “We’re on the fortunate side. … The whole group that we have, the belief that they have in each other, the way they push each other, the way they compete against each other, this is a real culture win.”<\/p>\n

Nashville has won four straight to vault into second place in the Eastern Conference and Supporters’ Shield standings, one point behind FC Cincinnati. It hosts D.C. United<\/a> in the U.S. Open Cup quarterfinals on July 9.<\/p>\n

Playoff-type match<\/p>\n

A game featuring the two top goalscorers in MLS \u2014 Nashville’s Sam Surridge<\/a> and Philadelphia’s Tai Baribo \u2014 was dominated by the goalkeepers instead.<\/p>\n

Nashville’s Joe Willis recorded his seventh shutout of the season (good for third in MLS), making challenging stops on close-range shots by Chris Donovan and Bruno Damiani in the second half. Willis also got help from center back Jeisson Palacios, who cleared a shot from Damiani off the goal line in the 24th minute. Philadelphia’s Andre Blake made key saves on Mukhtar and Alex Muyl early in the game.<\/p>\n

Further upfield, the action was marked by a “playoff” intensity according to Mukhtar, who noticed “a little bit extra” in every duel.<\/p>\n

“I’d like to think we made it difficult on them,” Callaghan said. “They made it difficult on us.”<\/p>\n

Jonathan Perez red card forces Nashville to play a man down<\/p>\n

Perez was sent off after he kicked Baribo in the head while going for a loose ball. In a postgame statement<\/a>, the Professional Referee Organization cited “full contact with the studs to the head,” which warranted a red card for “serious foul play.”<\/p>\n

“The whole game was played at high intensity,” Callaghan said. “A lot of bang-bang type of plays, lot of tackles, lot of high kicks. I respect the referee’s decision on the field. It’s not an easy job.”<\/p>\n

With just 10 players, Nashville played a more compact defense, looking to neutralize the Union’s prowess on crosses and free kicks. Mukhtar cited recent inspiration from Paris-Saint Germain, which was down to nine men in its FIFA Club World Cup quarterfinal against Bayern Munich on July 5 and won 2-0.<\/p>\n

“We’re here for Jonny,” Mukhtar said. “He has been brilliant this season so far, and these things can happen to every single player. We need to respond. … This gives you extra motivation. One man down doesn’t mean anything.”<\/p>\n

MORE: <\/strong>Nashville SC right back Andy Najar named to 2025 MLS All-Star team<\/a><\/p>\n

Hany Mukhtar scores late winner<\/p>\n

Mukhtar was as good as his word.<\/p>\n

Off a 96th-minute throw-in, Mukhtar saw an opportunity. He broke free of Philadelphia’s Olwethu Makhanya and won the race to the ball, but Makhanya knocked it loose with a sliding tackle in the penalty box. Mukhtar waited, arms outstretched, wondering when the foul would come: it took over a minute before a VAR check confirmed Makhanya had hit Mukhtar’s leg, giving Nashville a penalty and a chance to steal all three points.<\/p>\n

In Nashville’s 3-1 win over the Union<\/a> on March 16, Mukhtar beat Blake on a “Panenka” penalty \u2014 a soft chip down the middle. This time, he went with the opposite approach.<\/p>\n

“I had just one thing in mind,” he said. “Hit it, you know. Just smash it.”<\/p>\n

Jacob Shames can be reached by email at jshames@gannett.com and on Twitter @Jacob_Shames.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The first hour had everything \u2014 slick passes, mid-air collisions, diving saves and a large, raucous crowd in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":43061,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,1074,1089,1075,33783,33786,1077,6656,2987,33785,1571,5382,50,450,1457,1448,1076,2830,1311,8895,449,1451,17506,15776,221,1926,15779,62,1458,15777,1078,448,447,456,646,15742,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,33784],"class_list":{"0":"post-43060","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-exclude","10":"tag-exclude-from-paywall-logic-testing","11":"tag-from","12":"tag-joe","13":"tag-joe-willis","14":"tag-logic","15":"tag-mls","16":"tag-nashville","17":"tag-nashville-sc","18":"tag-national","19":"tag-national-sports","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-overall","22":"tag-overall-positive","23":"tag-pa","24":"tag-paywall","25":"tag-pennsylvania","26":"tag-philadelphia","27":"tag-philadelphia-union","28":"tag-point","29":"tag-positive","30":"tag-sc","31":"tag-scores","32":"tag-soccer","33":"tag-sport","34":"tag-sport-scores-u0026-statistics","35":"tag-sports","36":"tag-sports-news","37":"tag-statistics","38":"tag-testing","39":"tag-the","40":"tag-to","41":"tag-to-the-point","42":"tag-u0026","43":"tag-union","44":"tag-united-states","45":"tag-united-states-of-america","46":"tag-unitedstates","47":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","48":"tag-us","49":"tag-usa","50":"tag-willis"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43060"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43060\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43061"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}