After a one-week hiatus (that was much longer than one week, thanks to the international window), Hany Mukhtar is back on the MLS Team of the Week. Even more impressively, he is the league’s Player of the Week. Mukhtar took 35.71% of the media vote* and 28.24% of the fan vote to edge out Inter Miami’s Indiana Vassilev.
*Disclosure: I am the President of North American Soccer Reporters, which operates the media voting.
He scored two goals in a 3-1 win on the road at DC United, finishing a feed from Dax McCarty in first-half stoppage time for what would ultimately be the game-winner, then adding an insurance goal to make the count 3-0 early in the second half, blasting a lefty rocket that was deflected near the top of the box and looped past DC keeper Rafael Romo. In addition to the goals, Mukhtar completed 9/13 passes, took two more shots on target (among his seven total shots), and earned four fouls while committing just one himself.
It is Mukhtar’s fourth Team of the Week honor this year, after being named in weeks 8, 12, and 14 (#ANALYTICS: he’s TOTW quality every-other week). Nashville as a team has 12 members of a TOTW so far. In addition to Mukhtar’s four selections, Gary Smith made the cut in Weeks One and 14, midfielder Aníbal Godoy joined Smith on the list in Week One, Walker Zimmerman got the nod after Week Four, Dave Romney and Randall Leal in Week Six, and Romney again in Week 10. CJ Sapong represented the club on the Week 13 list.
He was Player of the Week for Weeks 13 and 23 last year (the campaign in which he finished runner-up as league MVP to New England Revolution’s Carles Gil), and in Week 18 of 2020.
Club and Country 