Portland Timbers vs. Colorado Rapids Quotes
Portland Timbers Quotes
Timbers head coach John Spencer
On talking to players after a game like that:
“I had a chat with the guys at half time, a chat at full time. Obviously we’ve got a game Tuesday so it’s a quick turnaround.”
If the quick turnaround is a good thing:
“Not if we play the way we played tonight. I think from the first whistle we could’ve had a shot at goal – first minute. From there, I thought Colorado were the better team.”
On the team’s play:
“We had a great performance last week. I said to them, “you’ve got go out, you’ve got to match it, everybody’s eyes are on us again, saying can you play away from home, can you do this, can you do that,” and we never put [those questions] to bed. So, as I said, we’ve got a quick turnaround for San Jose, got to focus and try to get the confidence a little bit higher again and get ready to play, and obviously deal with the Salt Lake game on the road again.”
On conceding the early goals:
“I keep saying it time and time again, if you don’t deny service into the box, especially with guys like Conor Casey and Omar Cummings, they’re going to punish you. As I say, I’ve seen probably four or five goals today around Major League Soccer, one from [Danny] Koevermans in Toronto, two Eddie Johnson goals that came from decent service into the box: guy attacks the ball, you score goals. If you don’t deny service, players like [Brian] Mullan can serve the ball, and Conor Casey can attack it. You’re going to find yourself in trouble if you give them that much space six yards, seven yards from goal. He’s going to score goals.”
On giving up a late goal:
“We tried to go with three at the back, and try and push and get forward a little bit more, and try and create something and end up we get done at the back. Jamie Smith gets a tap-in. Can’t fault the effort, trying to get back, but three-nil was unacceptable for us.”
Timbers goalkeeper Troy Perkins
On all the action in front of goal in the first 30 minutes:
“We just weren’t denying service. We were allowing them have a lot of time on the ball. Anytime you give professional players the time and the space like that, they’re going to pick guys out. We knew coming in that’s what we wanted to do, deny space and deny service, and we didn’t do it. It’s our own fault.”
On the team’s struggles on the road:
“It’s an attitude, especially when you come into a place like this. Mentally, if you don’t make that decision to not feel anything, and just get through it, you’re going to be in for a long night like we were tonight. We’ve just got to be stronger mentally; it’s as simple as that.”
On the stretch of three games in eight days:
“You can’t linger about things. We’ve got a game in a little over 48 hours now. If we don’t get points in this game, we’re in a really bad spot. We’ve got to keep pushing and keep pressing.”
Timbers captain Jack Jewsbury
On the opening 30 minutes:
“I thought that we came out slow from the get-go. We were second to everything tonight. Bottom line, it wasn’t good enough. Now we’ve got to pick our heads up, we’ve got a quick turnaround, which for us I think is a good thing. Look back on this one; it’s not a good memory. It’s one of those things where now we’ve got to get back against a tough team on Tuesday, in San Jose and pick our heads up and move on.”
On struggling to get goals on the road:
“We’ve been trying to put our finger on it for a while, what exactly it is to get us going. We’ve tried a lot of different things. I think it’s just a matter of us, as a group, coming together and saying hey, it’s not good enough. We’re a better team than we are playing on the road. It can’t just be at home when the crowd is behind us, and it is easy in that sense. We’ve got to be able to create our own energy on the field whether it’s home or away.”
Colorado Rapids Quotes
Rapids head coach Oscar Pareja
On if this was a must win game:
“When you lose two games in a row, you feel that and you have to bounce back. I think the group has been working well enough to believe that they will do it. To be quite honest, the way I saw the team training this week, we were not too stressed about it. I thought the boys showed it on the field with a lot of composure and patience. This is a team that is growing. I'm very pleased with the effort that they put forth, especially because they showed me during the week that they have the character to bounce back from those hard moments.”
On whether this was the best game he's seen from his team this season.
“The sensation when you score three goals at home and then you see players come in like Conor [Casey], like Jamie Smith and Omar [Cummings], you may rate it as one of the best games. And obviously we as a coaching staff, our job sometimes is not to see all those positive things, but see where we can get better. Certainly today was a magic night.”
On Conor Casey and Omar Cummings fitness and form:
“They're getting there. Omar, I thought, was great tonight. He's still carrying a little bit of pain, and you can tell sometimes he doesn't feel 100%, but he came in and did the job. Same with Conor. Conor is getting the timing with all the players. Conor has not played much with a couple of guys that came this year. So all those things make me think there is a lot of room to keep growing.”
Rapids midfielder Jamie Smith
On his goal:
“I think it was Martín [Rivero] who played a good ball through for Tony [Cascio]. Tony is real fast and he got through, took a good first touch and I think he just kind of lifted it over the ‘keeper, and I think it would’ve been more difficult to miss than to score. I don’t know how I finished it, actually; I just got my body in front of it and I was on the line, so… I’ll take it.”
On getting a win at the start of difficult stretch of games:
“The next four weeks are going to be real busy. I think that it’s just a case of taking it a game at a time. The Coach kind of emphasized that, and I thought that’s what we did. It was a solid, 90 minute performance – it wasn’t good here, good there, it was the full 90 minutes we dominated and it sets us up well for the next three or four weeks.”
Rapids forward Conor Casey
On the play leading up to his first goal of the season:
“We were possessing the ball on the right side, and Brian [Mullan] had found me earlier, put a great ball in that I put over the bar, and [the goal] was pretty much the same play from my perspective. A great ball in and I was able to get this one down and on goal.”
On how it felt to score:
“It feels awesome. It’s been a long time coming. When you get injured like that, you’re never sure if you’re going to get back, so it feels really good to get the win and a goal, at home.”
On the team’s performance:
“It’s important for us. We haven’t really done that yet this year, a full 90 where we competed for the whole time. To go up two goals in the first half, we made it a lot easier on ourselves. We needed a game like that to get some confidence back. Now we look forward at a bunch of games in a row, and if we can put some performances like that together, we can pick up points real quick, so it’s definitely a positive.”
Notes:
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The Timbers yielded three goals in a match for the first time since a 3-1 loss against the LA Galaxy on April 14.
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Colorado remains the only MLS club the Timbers have yet to register a point against, kicked off a streak of three games in eight days for Portland.
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Midfielder Sal Zizzo made his first start of the 2012 MLS season on Saturday.
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In three matches against Colorado all-time, the seven goals scored by the Rapids have come from six different players. Only Jaime Smith has scored more than once for Colorado against Portland.
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Saturday’s match marked the first time the Timbers played a game in the Mountain Time Zone this season.
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Portland forward Kris Boyd has recorded a shot on goal in 15 straight games, one shy of a club-record streak of 16 straight games.
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Midfielder Rodney Wallace made his first appearance since May 20 after returning from an injury and international duty with the Costa Rica National Team.
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Goalkeeper Troy Perkins made his 44th consecutive start for the Timbers, dating back to April 23, 2011.
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Midfielder Diego Chara made his 27th consecutive start for the Timbers, dating back to Aug. 14, 2011. Chara will miss Tuesday’s match against San Jose due to caution accumulation after picking up his fifth yellow card on Saturday.
- Timbers defender Hanyer Mosquera sat out the second of an MLS-imposed, three-match suspension for an incident in the LA Galaxy match on June 17. Midfielder Lovel Palmer missed Saturday’s match due to a one-game suspension for receiving a red card during second-half stoppage time against Seattle Sounders FC on June 24.
