Sporting Kansas City - San Jose Earthquakes (Saturday, 4/11) pre/in/postgame thread [R]

Ha! I never said Niko *can't* make a play like that, I said he needs to start trying. I've been posting the last few games that Niko's using his right foot more. That was excellent. He's been reading my posts apparently. 'Bout time! If he can make a move to his right a regular part of his repertoire it'll make a big difference. Then players can't cheat to his left.

Also, I'm gonna refrain from making Skahan "Captain Of The Wrestling Team" jokes, at least for tonight!

Other players who I thought did well:

Benji, battling all game as he always does and almost got the assist-ish on the Romney goal. He and Fernandez set that play up.

Beau was good as usual. I wish he would have taken the shot though on that one chance in the box in the 2nd half where he had a lot of space from about 15 yards. He tried to pass to someone on his right (Benji?), and the chance went wanting.

Munie, as always. There was one play in the 63rd minute where he made a tackle to kill a counter, and the ball popped about 5 yards towards SKC's defending half, it was contested by another SKC and he won that tackle too, then picked his head up and made a good pass. He also almost scored on the Romney goal. I got an assist, which is a little odd because he wasn't passing there, but whatever.

I thought maybe on that Jake Davis foul on Fernandez that Davis may have used the f-word (the 6-letter one) or something. Quakes players reacted pretty strongly. They checked for spitting so it could have been that, but the ref apparently didn't see anything. Kind of odd that they'd send it down for review if they didn't see anything in the booth. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

Bruce has this team absolutely humming. Caveat, this is SKC, we're going to have much tougher games ahead, but to make it into the Playoffs you've got to beat the bad teams consistently. I think we might be facing our toughest stretch coming up; 5 out of the next 8 games are away from home, and were' facing some pretty tough outs in LAFC, Seattle, Vancouver, Dallas, etc.

 

Well the Quakes beat 2 of the 3 top teams in the west last year, Vancouver and San Diego, back to back before this game, including a win at Vancouver.

 

Going to need a healthy Timo and Ricketts.

 

I think LAFC is much better than both of those teams this year. They won't rest their best players against us at home like they did against Portland. Seattle just beat us at home, and we play them away, and any time you go East Coast and back, it's tough on the body/clock.

 

yeah, i agree, that Beau play was a bit cheeky....i believe Bouda was the intended recipient of that 3 foot pass. The Munie play was stellar. I also really enjoy watching Roberts' developing game...especially his calm accurate passing...really great for a CB to pass that well....he's on his way to Ream level stuff...breaking multiple lines...and he's sneaky physical. We survived Romney at LB, but we won't against any mid to higher level team...looked like KC were trying to go after him but we were giving him support...which causes us to shift and potentially unbalance our D....Ricketts better be ready to go.

 

San Diego is not doing so well this year, but Vancouver is also 6-1, with the highest GD in the league, and were a little unlucky not to beat Miami last year in MLS Cup. LAFC may be a little better than them this year but not by a lot.

 

Jack is a pretty good interview. He doesn't give the total cliched answers, he's answering pretty honestly. You feel like there's not much filter there. I liked his answer when asked to comment on his brace. "Hey, I'm just the guy that was in front of the goal when the play happened". And it didn't seem like the aww, shucks teamwork thing, it seemed geniune. And he said - "We don't care who scores the goals", which might have been a little different last year . Also, talked about team speed as being a key factor to the team's success so far, and said Timo is also very fast.

 

He is a very good interview, and I agree he seemed quite genuine. Great win on the road. I started watching at around 30 minutes and didn't feel uncomfortable when we went down a goal.

It's only seven games, but this seems run of form seems quite real.

 

Ladies and Gentleman, your 2026 San Jose Earthquakes are currently tied for First Place in MLS!

 

And Quakes beat the team they're tied with in their barn.

 

I thought that was odd too... it's >12 hours later but as I remember it ended up a really well paced and placed corner. Better than most of our corners this year.

 

It was a good corner. Whether that’s beginner’s luck or skill maybe we’ll find out. We’re definitely more dangerous on the in-swingers.

 

I noticed the spitting in real time. The camera was zoomed in on Davis right after the foul but it was impossible to see how far away from Fernandez he was. I thought it looked odd but it also looked like he was faced more down than toward Fernandez.

It wasn't until the VAR video did I see how close he was. Not sure why VAR didn't show that broadcast view along with the one we saw. If they had both I bet it would have been a red card.

 

Brace yourself… Skahan went crazy. MOTM things

 

The Quakes lineup last night had 8 of 11 from the US college system.

 

And the 4 subs? All US college system players. Marie, Fernandez, Harkes, and Jasinski. That makes 12 US college guys out of the 15 that played.

 

I'm starting to become optimistic.

 

Just in time for our epic collapse!

I think that at best, we finish sixth, maybe fifth in our conference. We’re good, but we aren’t world beaters. This game against LaF#ck will be a test and measure of just how good we are.

Go Quakesfans!!

 

Ruh-roh, kiss of death!

 

I fully expect a fine from the disco. Maybe even a suspension. It depends on what he said when he yelled at Fernandez. I’m surprised he didn’t at least see a yellow card for unsporting behavior. That was shit. — Also, I hope that Fernandez didn’t do or say anything to deserve that.

Speaking of Fernandez, he good, but tiny. Not sure he’s going to be tough enough for MLS.

Go Quakesfans!!