Sacramento Republic FC (37 pts., 10-7-6 overall, 5-3-3 at home) at Portland Timbers 2 (24 pts., 7-4-12 overall, 2-1-7 away) Saturday, 8:00 p.m. at Bonney Field Television: CW31 Radio: KHTK 1140 Online: www.SacRepublicFC.com/Matchday Last five: SRFC: W-T-W-T-L PT2: L-W-W-T-L New forward sighting tonight? Who? Cole, Chaney or Kneeshaw?
Well, that was about the closest 4-0 game I ever saw. The SRFC defense continues to not do the simple things well, like crisp passing in the triangle. T2 was all over SRFC in the first half in pressuring the back four when they were futzing around with the ball, and Koval luckily made up for his near-howler with a brilliant save on the line. If nothing else, we got some GD help in this one.
I thought it was a good game. Keep in mind our defense is still missing Klimenta, and good CBs are hard to come by, so while Da Fonte and Christian are decent, they make mistakes. Newton has been okay, though his judgement does him a disservice. I'm frankly not concerned about defense if we can score 3 or 4 goals a game. I'd rather win in a big offensive game than a conservative 1-goal score line like Buckle seemed to be playing for most of this year. Btw RIP to his father, that must have been tough to coach today but Buckle did it anyways.
I'm with Sierra, the defense is a cause for concern. PT looked dangerous in the first half and they are, frankly, not very good. JJ saved his own butt. At this point in the season we should not be making mistakes like he made. I was a little surprised we buttoned down the defense in the second half, given the certainty that PT would press forward. So, I guess that was good. I hope Hord is a good signing. Kiffe seemed a little tentative last night. He seemed to not press forward much, until late. I wonder if he wasn't 100%? Offensively, everything looked good and potent. I feel pretty good about our chances going forward.
BTW, too bad Iwasa didn't get another one v one with the keeper in the 2nd half. He was called offside, but if he had started the run at the time Thompson played it forward then he was actually onside because we should have started from the defensive end of the field. I wonder if the CR doesn't understand the rule or if Cam was straddling the line.
It also takes time to gel, and rotating different players in and out doesn't help. I've been pleasantly surprised with Guzman back there. Made a few mistakes, but with his speed, is able to backtrack and recover My son said he had a foot over the line. I never saw a good angle on the replay, and my boy was pretty adamant while I was screaming at the refs
Guzman seems to be one of those guys that can play any position on the field. I think the only place we haven't a seen him is CB.
Yeah, the defense was bad, but I've seen a much closer 4-0 game. In college, I remember being on the losing end of a 4-0 in which my team held probably over 70% of possession, peppered the opposing goal with shots, and allowed exactly four shots all game. But anyway, I wasn't all that convinced even though we scored four goals, because three of them came from similar plays where Portland's defense got caught flat-footed by a long pass and a single player beat the offside trap. I'd still like to see better off-the-ball movement as a team. Maybe we create more space if Kiffe plays his usual game. Meanwhile, I notice that the team is 1-3-3 in games I've attended at Bonney Field this season, and 5-0-0 in games I've missed (including this last one).