LA Galaxy vs Portland Timbers at Dignity Health Sports Park

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You hear them before you see them. A few hundred people from Portland, inside your building, singing continuously for ninety minutes to find out whether the home end can answer.

That is the actual contest at this fixture, and it runs parallel to the one on the grass. Both of these clubs got to MLS early and helped build whatever the league turned into, and twenty years of that history means neither side has to be told what the other represents.

By mid-October the table has almost finished sorting itself. The grass is worn down from summer, the evenings have cooled, and every point carries weight it did not carry in June — which is when a regular-season match starts feeling like something else entirely. Carson, under the lights, in the back half of the month.

Bring the friend who claims soccer is boring. Sit them near the away end and say nothing.