We’re almost a third of the way through the season. Let’s take a look at two teams that are definitely Supporters’ Shield contenders, one that might be, and one that almost certainly isn’t yet, but is playing some damn good soccer.

And of course, we’ll look at everything else as well, because that’s what we do here. In we go!

I’m going to let this excellent thread from Matthew De George do the explaining for how the direct movement of Philadelphia’s shuttlers (in this instance he’s highlighting Leon Flach, though Ale Bedoya’s movement on the other side is even better) always opens lanes for the attackers, and did so once again late into Saturday night during Philly’s 2-2 draw a continent away at LAFC:

(Click through into that whole thread. It’s very good.)

There is nothing in the boxscore from this for Flach. Hell, it barely shows up in the advanced stats – you have to dig through Second Spectrum’s tracking data to sift through off-ball attacking runs. And there, lo and behold: the Union are recording the highest number of off-ball attacking runs per transition opportunity that’s ever been recorded in this league. That is, above and beyond everything else, who they are – they live for transitions. And it is perhaps a little bit ironic for a team that, as LAFC head coach Steve Cherundolo put it after the game, “skips midfield entirely,” that Flach and Bedoya are so crucial to the process of turning those transition moments into chances. They are the unsung heroes there.

Every Shield-contending team (as both these obviously are) needs guys like that. Every team also needs guys who are more loudly sung, and such has started to be the case for Philly’s young Julian Carranza, whose quality is coming…