‘Terrible’ first half dooms Impact

Evan Bush hopes the TORONTO Montreal Impact’s disastrous display against their biggest rivals serves as a wake-up call.

If not, the goalkeeper will continue picking the ball out of his net like he did Saturday night.

A horrendous 22-minute stretch in the first half where Toronto FC toyed with Montreal’s defence was the early difference in what would turn into a 3-1 loss.

“It was terrible,” Bush said. “There’s no other words for it, really. It looked like we were hiding from the game.”

Sebastian Giovinco scored in the seventh and 22nd minutes before Jonathan Osorio buried the visitors in the 29th as Toronto sliced a porous Montreal backline that wasn’t getting much help from its midfield counterparts.

“They outclassed us in every manner,” Bush added. “We have to look ourselves in the mirror.”

Montreal entered play in the sixth and final playoff spot in Major League Soccer’s Eastern Conference, nine points up on Toronto with a chance to put the defending champion’s fading post-season hopes on life support.

Instead, Toronto now sits six points back of the Impact, who needed a 90th-minute winner to beat the lowly Chicago Fire at home last weekend, with nine games left compared to Montreal’s seven.

“I was not expecting that,” Impact head coach Rémi Garde said. “We knew before the game that they would put intensity on this game because it’s a derby, it’s a rivalry between the two cities, the two teams.

“I’m a bit upset at that, but we still have games to play.”

“We’ve fallen in a trap a few times this year where you look at the table,” Bush added. “Toronto is still a top team in this league, regardless of how many points they have.

“We should have got caught last week and we escaped at the end. We got caught this week. Hopefully that punches us in the face and gets us going.”

Alejandro Silva got a goal back for Montreal in the 30th minute on a wonderful first-time strike that beat Toronto’s Alex Bono on the short side.

The Impact had another goal from Saphir Taider correctly ruled offside in the 34th. Silva then hit the near post on a free kick from 25 yards in the 40th for Montreal and Ken Krolicki’s goal a minute later was again ruled offside after Bono sloppily spilled a shot.

The teams wrap up the season series on Oct. 21 at Stade Saputo — the second-last game on the schedule for both clubs.