Quotes: Portland Timbers at New England Revolution
Portland Timbers Quotes
Head Coach John Spencer
General thoughts on the game:
“I’m just very disappointed. I think this is one of those performances that keep the media talking about why we can’t play away from home. This is one of those performances, a very poor performance. And in saying that, we still probably created four good looks at goal today. Matt Reis pulls off a great save from Franck Songo’o, other than that we had two or three clear cut chances. I think that we’re a better team than we showed.”
On the debut of midfielder Franck Songo’o:
“Once we get him fit and healthy we’re looking to start him. We’ve missed him. He’s got a lot of quality on the ball as you’ve seen. He can strike a great ball.”
On Saer Sene’s goal:
“I keep saying that you’ve got to deny service into the box. And if you don’t deny service, goals can happen and that’s what happened. We got punished for not stopping a cross. We’ve got to get to the ball quicker.”
On moving forward following the loss:
“I think we certainly need to start games better. When you play in this league, you can’t go a goal down and expect to come back every week. For us, we need to get back to trying to keep clean sheets and starting the game better. If you come out and you’re sloppy and you’re lazy and you don’t close the ball down, you’re going to get punished and that’s certainly what happened today.”
Goalkeeper Troy Perkins
General thoughts on the game:
“Our attitude wasn’t there. We wanted to close down service from the flanks and we didn’t do that - especially in the first 30, 45 seconds of the game. It’s unacceptable to have that. I think the first half we couldn’t find ourselves. The second half a little better, but overall it just wasn’t good enough from anyone.”
Midfielder Jack Jewsbury
Overall thoughts on the game:
“It’s disappointing. We’ve harped on that this week. After the Dallas game, we were disappointed with the start. And obviously 28 seconds into the game, getting scored on, I don’t know what it is. We’re going to have to change that, for sure. It’s something that isn’t good enough, so it is what it is.”
Working toward better starts:
“It’s definitely a concern we need to address as a team. The reality is we’ve done that the last couple weeks and still, in the first minute of the game, on the road, on a team in their first home game of the year, you know they’re going to come out firing on all cylinders. We’ve got to be ready once we step on the field. I thought the group came back again, in the second half we played much better. But even in the first half we had some chances to get ourselves back in the game, but we just didn’t have the finishing touch.”
New England Revolution Quotes
Head Coach Jay Heaps
General thoughts on the game:
“It was a good start for us, obviously. Sometimes when you get a goal like that it changes your game plan a little bit. It took us some time to settle in, but I think as the game went on, there were things against us, things that were hurting us, but we fought through it and that’s what the most special part of the night was. When it got tough, we got tougher.”
On the fast start: “It’s one of those where we were fired up from the beginning. We knew that they were going to be flying, so we had to make sure we came out with some energy and that’s what we showed.”
Midfielder Ryan Guy
Preparing for Portland:
“We worked a lot this week on (defensive) shape. We knew [Portland] were going to be athletic, we knew they were going to push a lot of guys forward if we did go up, and that’s exactly what happened. I think the coaching staff prepared us very well for the game. We’re all very positive about everything that went on, and we never let up throughout the game. I think this is the first game in a long time that we were winning or not losing, and we actually tried to play in the last five to 10 minutes. I thought we bided our time well and took time off the clock when we needed to.”
Defender Chris Tierney
On his cross to Saer Sene for the goal:
“Jay (Heaps) said put balls in their box, put them under pressure to start the game. So Saer (Sene)’s great at getting at the inner crosses so I figured why not whip one in and just try and put in a good area and Saer did great to get on the end of it.”
Notes:
New England’s opening goal 28 seconds into the match was the eighth-fastest, regular-season goal in MLS history and fastest since August 8, 2009.
The Timbers conceded the fastest goal in the club’s two years in MLS. New England’s opening goal in 28 seconds replaces a fourth-minute goal allowed against the LA Galaxy on April 23, 2011.
The Timbers are 1-1-0 against Eastern Conference opponents in 2012.
With the victory, New England has won six straight home-opening games.
Dating back to last year, the Timbers are 2-2-3 when wearing their red kits.
Portland has yet to win a match played in the Eastern Time Zone, falling to 0-4-3 in the club’s MLS history.
Darlington Nagbe made his first start of the 2012 season on Saturday in the same place he made his MLS career debut as a 66th-minute substitute against New England on April 2, 2011.
The Timbers were forced to make their second-earliest substitution in MLS club history in the 24th minute when Andrew Jean-Baptiste entered for Hanyer Mosquera due to an injury. David Horst was substituted on for Kevin Goldthwaite in the 10th minute of a road game against Chicago on July 16, 2011, also because of a first-half injury.
Jack Jewsbury has received a yellow card in consecutive games for the first time this season. Jewsbury was cautioned in back-to-back games only once last season (Sept. 21 vs. San Jose, Sept. 24 at New York).
Saturday marked the first time the Timbers have been shutout this season. The team is 0-9-1 all-time when not scoring a goal.
Goalkeeper Troy Perkins made his 32nd consecutive start in goal for the Timbers. Perkins is one win shy of his 50th career victory.
