90 minutes down, only 90 more to go, and it's advantage Toronto FC thanks to a 66th minute strike by Ryan Johnson off a Julian de Guzman cross that gives the Reds an advantage heading into the second and deciding leg of the Voyageurs Cup -- to quote Lady Gaga:

I'm on the edge of glory,
And I'm hanging on a moment of truth.
Out on the edge of glory,
And I'm hanging on a moment with you.

- Lady Gaga, "Edge of Glory"

It's not the best result that TFC could have gotten out of the match considering the way they attacked and how close they came to win, but with the way the match ebbed and flowed from one end to another, it is safe to say it is a very fair result. With that, Toronto is once again sitting on the Edge of Glory.

The Reds were coming off a bye week and were playing without Torsten Frings, Miguel Aceval (injury) and Richard Eckersley (suspended), while the Whitecaps were playing at home after losing a weekend match in New England. Both teams showed intent to win the trophy, and the early action showed it.

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Aron Winter had talked before the game about having a surprise in store for Montreal, who knows exactly what he was referring to, unless it was the appearance of Torsten Frings, but there was plenty of things on Wednesday night that surprised everyone watching, not least of which was the final score, as Toronto FC moved on to the Voyageurs Cup final with a 2-0 win.

Yes, after almost 2 months since their previous, and only, win this season against L.A Galaxy, Toronto once again flipped the switch into must win cup game mode and came away with a well deserved win that included all sorts of things have been in short supply this year in league play, and never at the same time. Effort, luck, composure, feisty determination and a good defensive performance all combined to make sure L'Impact still haven't beaten TFC in Voyageurs Cup play. Yes it's just one game after a series of mostly poor performances, and there's a long way to go before anyone can say TFC have turned any kind of corner, but at the very least, the season has 2 more weeks of having a purpose, and just being able to celebrate a win again feels nice. For Winter, it will mean a week's respite from talk of his firing.

Montreal had come into the game without letting a goal in in 288 minutes, including the first leg, but it took only 2 minutes for TFC to put an end to that, with a healthy does of luck. With Ryan Johnson peeling off to the left as he did many times during the game, Joao Plata and Eric Avila combined very nicely to create a half chance for Plata. The Impact defence collapsed in on Plata and blocked his shot. The ball fell very nicely to Reggie Lambe coming in from the right, and his luck continued as his shot was deflected and spun just inside the far post.

Luck also played a similar part in the second goal as after a corner, a blocked clearance pinballed to Ryan Johnson. He reacted well to get a header on it, which was blocked only for the ball to fall right to his feet from where he made no mistake to make it 2. It has to be a huge relief for Johnson who's had a lot of near misses and chances since his last goal, and who had expressed his frustration with the lack of support in recent games.

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Yeah, yeah, Toronto FC lost 2-0, on the same day Montreal and Vancouver both won against the best teams in MLS so far. Whatever. 0-8, worst start to an MLS season ever, whatever. Where it gets really depressing is the post game interviews. I won't post them all here, but if you haven't already, click the link and go see the most beaten and defeated set of interviews ever. Well, until we lose to Montreal on Wednesday that is, to officially finish the season off just slightly more than 2 months after it kicked off in such grand fashion at the dome.

That's Ryan Johnson, whose new favourite adjective seems to be unbearable. He expressed his disappointment that TFC played so defensively at home rather than going out to play positively and try to win. He of course didn't wait until post game to make his frustration known, he was very openly arguing and gesturing at the coaching staff in the first half, clearly annoyed at the lack of attacking intent and the lack of support he received.

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I think it's safe to say that tonight's first leg of the Voyageurs Cup semi-final between Toronto FC and the Montreal Impact could be summed up by a quote from a classic by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts...

I think of you every night and day,
You took my heart, then you took my pride away.
I hate myself for loving you,
Can't break free from the the things that you do.
I wanna walk, but I run back to you,
That's why I hate myself for loving you!

- "I Hate Myself For Loving You", Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
(Desmond Child/Joan Jett)

In a stunningly terrible to watch game, neither TFC nor the Impact were able to find the back of the net without incurring an offside flag. TFC was able to garner a paltry 34% possession in the full match, as the first leg of the "Eastern" Voyageurs Cup semi-final ended in a love-all draw heading back to Toronto for the series decider.

Montreal started the match by basically hogging the ball, hoping to find someway to pierce the porous Reds defence. This went on for a solid 20-30 minutes, with a few chances sprinkled in. A number of excellent runs from the likes of Lamar Neagle, Felipe Martins and Sanna Nyassi (who made a pest of himself in front of the Toronto net all evening), and a run of eight corners did not produce a single goal for the Impact.

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(And before you begin, check out the transcript from our very first CoverIt Live event...the above video will make more sense once you've taken a look at it!)

Well, here we are. Oh-and-seven with no end in sight. And it all looked sort of pleasant too, before the dreaded altitude, and the usual defensive brain farts ended any hope of ending it. But on the bright side, the team fought back from being down twice to bring the game level, and brought some pressure on RSL in what was a closer match than what the score line suggests.

The match started tenatively, but was turned on its head off a RSL corner from Alvaro Saborio in the seventh minute. An unmarked Kyle Beckerman was allowed to finish off a goalmouth scramble after Jamison Olave took advantage of Adrian Cann's decision to not challenge for the ball from a corner kick. Here we go again, we thought, as Cann and the rest of the TFC backline was completely caught unawares.

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25 seconds. That was the total amount of time that had elapsed before Dominic Oduro gave the Chicago Fire a 1-0 lead at BMO Field. It goes down as the fastest goal in Fire history and surprisingly is only the 5th fastest goal in MLS history. The goal came as the direct result of a defensive lapse but this time for an unlikely source.

Off the opening kick off the ball was played to Milos Kocic who collected it and played a nice short pass out to captain Torsten Frings. Frings was then caught sleeping in possession as Patrick Nyarko raced forward and nicked the ball right off his foot. The ball kindly rolled into the path of Oduro and all he had to do was slot a low shot past a stranded Kocic.

It was clearly not the start that Toronto FC would have been hoping for but they did respond quite well. They pressed forward for much of the first half in what turned out to be a very wide open affair. Both sides were getting shooting chances and testing the opposing keeper. Reggie Lambe proved to be Toronto's biggest threat on the day as he was first well denied by Sean Johnson then later made a weaving run, before hitting his shot into the side netting. TFC finally opened their account at home for the season thanks to a brilliant strike by the Bermudan winger. Lambe collected the ball after Sean Johnson had punched Joao Plata's corner clear to the top of the 18 yard box. It did not take the winger long to bring the ball under control and unleash a shot that found the top corner and left Johnson with no chance of making the stop.

It was not long after that Lambe added a second to his goal tally. His second came after a bit of a scramble in the box that saw Matt Stinson and Sean Johnson clash for the ball after Ryan Johnson had played in a low cross. The ball slipped past both of them to Lambe who found himself with time and space to pick out which part of the net he wanted to hit.

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"I think we are in a period of bad luck and you can see it." "Things are just not going the way we want them to go, it's bad luck, it's the only thing I can explain" "I think we are having bad luck" "This is probably the most unlucky I've been in my whole career"

Those are post game quotes from Aron Winter and Ryan Johnson, and if you focus strictly on the second half of Toronto FC's 1-0 loss to Chivas USA then I'd agree. Chivas were sitting on their 1-0 lead, and allowing TFC to attack them. Eventually TFC managed to make some chances, and just in the last 20 minutes or so, Johnson just missed with one header, and had another shot cleared off the line after beating the goalie. Danny Koevermans was once again the victim of a save of the week candidate, two of them this time from Dan Kennedy to go with the one from Donovan Ricketts last week.

So, sure, looked at out of context and independently of the rest of the season, it seems like bad luck. But when you add on an insipid first half performance, and another goal given up by poor defending, I wouldn't even say the result of this game in itself is bad luck. For the season as a whole, the CCL was fun, but where it really counts, in league play we're now 0-5, which is both TFC's worst ever start to the season and longest ever losing streak. It's now 3 straight defeats at 'fortress BMO' without even scoring one goal. Even without getting into the previous 5 years of failure, there's clearly a lot more than bad luck going on here.

The season's gone from frustrating - we're not actually this bad, to depressing - oh wait, we are this bad aren't we? and now it's at the point of being comically bad, where the only way to preserve your sanity is to stop caring, sit back and laugh and wonder just how the hell you managed to convince yourself it'd be different this year.

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I don't know about you, but is it possible that playing with 10 men is actually a good thing for Toronto FC?

A Sinisa Ubiparipovic goal in the 18th minute was the difference, while Andrew Wenger added on the icing on the cake at the 81st minute. Danny Koevermans finally broke his drought at the 88th minute -- but again it was too little, too late: a 2-1 defeat means that TFC will start their season 0-4. The last time they achieved this start was the inaugural season -- except this time, they've scored two goals instead of none.

I don't think there's much we can really take from this match. Terrible refereeing from Hilario Gravija resulted in the sending off of Logan Emory, which actually seemed to light a fire under the lifeless Reds. The set pieces seemed dangerous, but again finishing was the killer -- despite the fact that TFC didn't really deserve any points from this match. Overall, it was a typical

Already there's calls for Aron Winter's head...prepare your pitchforks if you wish, I can understand. But I say it's a little too soon especially with the bad string of injuries (losing Torsten Frings has to hurt) and the extra matches we've had to play due to the CONCACAF Champions League. Some may argue that Real Salt Lake's 4-0 start while making their run is something that we could have recreated...I say, good luck with that.

Doesn't mean that we don't have dead weight either -- Terry Dunfield probably played the worst game in a red shirt, while once again the red-headed stepchild of our three DPs, Julian de Guzman, put yet another nail in his coffin as a professional soccer player. Expect both to be joining Miguel Aceval and Ty Harden to be in the permanent doghouse with TFC supporters, before their soon-to-be-finalized exits.

Otherwise, that's all for this match. Nobody wins a golden trophy, everyone deserves a Kick In The Groin. Onward to next week!