Author: Abe Asher

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Soccer Timbers

2022 Western Conference Preview

Felipe Mora, Sebastian Blanco, and Yimmi Chará. Photo by Kris Lattimore.

With just days to go until the start of the 2022 MLS season, the Western Conference promises to be as competitive as it’s ever been before.

For the first time, the West is up to 14 teams — adding a quality side in last year’s third-place Eastern Conference finisher, Nashville — as expansion side Charlotte FC take their place in the East. (There is no expansion side in the Western Conference this year.)

Several of the West’s worst teams last season, such as Houston and Dallas, have splashed out club-record transfer fees on new strikers. As the Timbers get set to defend their Western Conference crown, there will likely be few easy games.

1. Seattle Sounders

That’s right. After their humiliating exit from the playoffs last year, the Sounders enjoyed an outstanding offseason.

There’s a sparkling new training facility and a rebrand centered around the club’s 50th anniversary underway. Seattle signed the best player on the team that eliminated them last season in Albert Rusnak. They inked several stars to contract extensions. And they brought several incredibly important depth pieces back.

Brian Schmetzer’s teams have not always been all that good in the regular season, but — given Seattle’s CONCACAF Champions League ambitions and the depth on this roster — this year may well be different.

The front six, which includes five internationals and an ace Brazilian central midfielder, is probably the league’s best unit. The back five isn’t far behind.

If Seattle has had an obvious flaw in recent years, even at full strength, it’s that they could be beat in transition and often played methodically. That necessarily hasn’t changed — but on their day, this team is going to take some beating.

Lineup: Frei, Nouhou, Arreaga, Gomez Andrade, A. Roldan, C. Roldan, J. Paulo, Rusnak, Lodeiro (C), Morris, Ruidiaz

2. Los Angeles FC

LAFC’s regression in the final two years of Bob Bradley’s tenure at the club felt both unnecessary and disappointing. Unnecessary because so many of the club’s personnel moves didn’t make sense, and disappointing because the 2019 team was so tremendous to watch.

Now, the club has turned the page entirely from its hugely successful first era. Bradley is in Toronto; Eduard Atuesta and Diego Rossi are overseas; and new boss, Steve Cherundolo, has a bevy of new recruits to plug in around mainstays like Carlos Vela and Latif Blessing.

Interestingly, many of those new players came from within MLS, a marked departure from LAFC’s player acquisition strategy the last several years. Kellyn Acosta, Ryan Hollingshead, and Maxime Crepeau have played in and won a ton of MLS games. Given the issues LAFC had gutting out wins last season, the team should benefit from their experience.

At no point during the last two years did the underlying numbers ever not like LAFC, and it feels like even a touch more composure and toughness could put them on track to have an excellent year. If Cherundolo can adapt quickly to the league, they’ll be contenders again.

Lineup: Crepeau, Hollingshead, Mbacke, Murillo, Escobar, Acosta, Cifuentes, Blessing, Rodriguez, Vela (C), Arango

3. Nashville SC

Nashville makes the move from the East back to the West for their third year and first in a new soccer-specific stadium. The travel will be grueling, and the lack of games against their geographic rivals in the South seems like a missed opportunity.

They’ll likely shift back to the East when St. Louis joins next season, but for now Nashville should have the quality to make a serious impression on the West.

This team easily could have advanced to the Eastern Conference Final last year, and they strengthened in key areas in the offseason — adding MLS veterans like Sean Davis and Teal Bunbury to compete for minutes in the spine of the team.

Nashville isn’t exactly thrilling to watch, and they won’t blow many teams away, but they’re very difficult to play against, very good defensively, and in every game have two of the best players on the field with Walker Zimmerman and Hany Mukhatar.

They still may be one or two attackers short when it comes to competing with the league’s very best. But they’re built for consistent regular season success, no matter what conference they’re in.

Lineup: Willis, Lovitz, Romney, Zimmerman, Maher, Muyl, Godoy, McCarty (C), Leal, Mukhtar, Sapong

4. Portland Timbers

Last year, on the field anyway, it was the tale of two seasons for the Timbers: very, very poor through mid-August, and very, very good after.

That was almost enough to win the club’s second MLS Cup, and definitely enough to give the its leadership faith that the Larrys Mabiala/Diego Chará/Sebastian Blanco core has another title run in them with just a few reinforcements.

There is good reason to believe. Chará and Blanco, when healthy, remain elite — two of MLS’s most impactful players. There’s plenty of talent around them, too, particularly in the midfield and attacking positions. Giovani Savarese has never missed the playoffs as a manager; there are few better tournament coaches in the league.

But if Blanco gets hurt, or Chará gets old, or the defense looks more like the unit that was shipping goals last summer than the one that locked things down in the fall, the Timbers will fall off in a hurry.

Lineup: Ivacic, Bravo, Zuparic, Mabiala, Van Rankin, D. Chará, Williamson, Y. Chará, Blanco, Asprilla, Mora

5. Sporting Kansas City

In many ways, Sporting is the model of consistency in MLS: Their manager, Peter Vermes, is entering his 14th season at the helm, and his teams are always well drilled. Lately that means they get veteran leadership, value the ball, and try to control games with it.

It works — mostly. Save for the COVID season of 2020, Sporting hasn’t missed the playoffs in ten years. They also haven’t been to the Western Conference Final since 2013, in large part because of a lack of team speed and a tendency to fade in seasons.

This team right now looks no better or worse than any of the last five or six Sporting teams: They’ll have quality players in attacking positions, they’ll play cohesive soccer, and they’ll rack up a bunch of points at home.

But they’ll still likely get run over in transition by faster, more explosive teams, and even on occasion less talented teams like RSL in the playoffs last year. In addition, center forward Alan Pulido is out for the year, leaving a huge question mark.

Unless Vermes has something up his sleeve, this Sporting team will be solid, but limited.

Lineup: Melia, Sweat, Ismat-Martin, Fontas, Zusi (C), Espinoza, Kinda, Walter, Russell, Salloi, Shelton

6. Colorado Rapids

People around MLS waited years for Robin Fraser to get another managerial opportunity, and the Rapids have benefitted handsomely for giving him the controls two years ago.

They’ve also built their roster very well by stockpiling proven MLS players, young American players, and a select few internationals, and inserting them into a clearly defined system. It worked exceptionally well last year, when the Rapids cleared the 60-point mark and topped the West in the regular season.

But there’s little indication that this year’s side is better than last year’s. Kellyn Acosta and Cole Bassett are both gone, and Austin Trusty is headed off to Arsenal in the summer. The key offseason acquisitions, Bryan Acosta and young attacker Max Alves, don’t inspire a ton of excitement.

The glaring issues the Rapids had last season — namely, the lack of a standout center forward or truly elite attacking players — remain the glaring issues right now. This team has a high floor, but very possibly a low ceiling.

Lineup: Yarbrough, Esteves, Trusty, Wilson, Abubakar, Rosenberry, Acosta, Price (C), Kaye, Lewis, Rubio

7. LA Galaxy

Ah, the Galaxy. It’s been quite a few years now since this team was the unquestioned class of MLS in the Bruce Arena/Robbie Keane era, and quite a few years in a short stretch where the team has faded down the stretch and failed to make the postseason.

This year, it looks for all the world like the Galaxy will again be right in the middle of the pack.

The attack, spearheaded by a locked-in Chicharito, should be excellent. Whether or not Douglas Costa produces, the combination of Hernandez, Kevin Cabral, and the inimitable Victor Vazquez pulling the strings will produce plenty of goals.

Defensively, there’s no real indication that this team will be markedly improved from the one that conceded 54 goals last year. They need better individual performances from their backline and more steel in central midfield. Is Mark Delgado the player to give them that? We’ll see.

Greg Vanney has a very good track record, and the Galaxy did improve in his first year, but this will likely remain an entertaining work-in-progress.

Lineup: Bond, Villafaña, Williams, Coulibaly, Araujo, Raveloson, Delgado, Cabral, Vazquez, D. Costa, Hernandez (C)

Yimma Chará. Photo by Matthew Wolfe.

8. Minnesota United

This is year six for Adrian Health in St. Paul, and it feels like his team has stagnated somewhat: After fielding a very competitive team in 2019 and nearly making it to MLS Cup in 2020, the Loons regressed last year, struggling to score goals and getting handily dispatched by the Timbers in the first round of the playoffs.

The offseason, following that 3-1 loss, has been rather indifferent. The club re-acquired striker Luis Amarilla and brought in Honduran midfielder Kevin Arreaga, but lost captain Osvaldo Alonso and kept the bulk of last year’s side intact.

There’s certainly quality enough here to ensure that the Loons are professional and competitive each time they take the field, but aside from Argentinian playmaker Emanuel Reynoso, there are very few elite players in the squad.

Will that be enough to make a fourth straight playoff appearance? Possibly. Will it be enough to do serious damage in the playoffs should they get there? Unlikely. This team needs some pop, both up front and at center back, and until they get it, I’m betting on another regression this year.

Lineup: Miller, Gasper, Dibassy, Boxall, Métanire, Trapp (C), Dotson, Fragapane, Reynoso, Lod, Hunou

9. FC Dallas

Dallas appeared adrift at the end of last season when they fired manager Luchi Gonzalez and were on their way to selling Ricardo Pepi for a club-record fee. There were serious questions about the ownership’s commitment to winning.

Those questions, in one offseason, appear to have been answered. Dallas was aggressive from the outset, and ended up singing Alan Velasco from Independiente and committed huge amount of money to a trade for Paul Arriola. They also brought in a new coach, Nico Estevez, who will install a new 4-3-3 formation.

Best of all, perhaps, is the possibility of a full year of Paxton Pomykal in midfield. He has the ability to be a top MLS player if he stays fit, and a could be a creative hub behind what projects to be a lethal front three.

Defensively, there are more questions than answers: How much does Matt Hedges have left in the tank? Who is the starting goalkeeper? Overall, Dallas promises to be more interesting than they have been since the Oscar Pareja era.

Lineup: Maurer, Farfan, Martinez, Hedges (C), Nanu, Quignon, Servania, Pomykal, Arriola, Velasco, Ferreira

10. Vancouver Whitecaps

Between the pandemic and an MLS investigation into the club for its handling of allegations of misconduct against two former Whitecaps women’s team coaches, it has not been an easy few years for Vancouver supporters.

But, the way the team played at the end of last season under then-interim coach Vanni Sartini was one small bright spot. They went for it in the months following the sacking of Marc Dos Santos, and, improbably, reached their first postseason since 2017.

We’ll see whether they can keep that momentum going this year, and — particularly — whether they can play as aggressively over the course of an entire season and get away with it.

Their standout goalkeeper, Maxime Crepeau, is gone and, while Ryan Gauld is here for the entire campaign, the front office made few reinforcements to a team that, talent-wise, is not among the West’s best.

Lineup: Hasal, Dajome, Jungwirth, Veselinovic, Blackmon, Brown, Alexandre, Teibert, Gauld, Caicedo, White

11. Austin FC

There was, despite overwhelmingly poor results, plenty to like about Austin’s expansion season: They played cohesive attacking soccer in Josh Wolff’s system, they valued the ball, and they were clearly just a few pieces away from competing for a playoff spot.

Austin tried to get those pieces in the offseason, though the jury is very much out on whether they did enough work on last year’s roster to give themselves a chance to compete all the way into the fall.

Jhojan Valencia has arrived to play defensive midfield, while Ruben Gabrielsen and first round draft selection Kipp Keller will slot in the for the likes of the retiring Matt Besler in central defense. The defensive spine of the team was a major area of need, and Austin addressed it.

The problem is that none of those players have any MLS experience, and none appear to be the kind of proven, show-stopping defender that would improve the unit on day one. This team will score goals and stay in goals more than they did last year, but it doesn’t look like a playoff team on paper.

Lineup: Stuver, Kolmanic, Romaña, Gabrielsen, Lima, Ring (C), Valencia, Fagundez, Druissi, Dominguez, Djitte

12. Real Salt Lake

It was a wild finish to last season in Utah, in which the club saw its manager leave to become an assistant for one of its rivals, get bought by a new ownership group, and then make an improbable run to the Western Conference Final.

RSL got waxed by the Timbers in that game at Providence Park, but they did enough to land Pablo Mastroeni the full-time coaching job and generate a springboard of goodwill to take into 2022.

Now, the hard part. RSL lost its highest profile player in Albert Rusnak to Seattle, the same club their former manager Freddy Juarez joined in the middle of last year, and they haven’t really replaced him.

In fact, this team, which played plucky and brave soccer last year, but rarely very good soccer, hasn’t been improved much at all. Only one player has come in, and while more signings may be in the offing, RSL just isn’t going to scare anybody at the start of the year.

Mastroeni was mostly very aggressive tactically when he got the job last year, but that meant that his team was often wide open defensively. We’ll see if he decides to change tack with more to lose personally this go around.

Lineup: Ochoa, Brody, Glad, Silva, Herrera, E. Luiz, Ruiz, A. Julio, Kreilach, Rubin, Wood

13. San Jose Earthquakes

This looks set to be the final year of the great Matias Almeyda experiment in San Jose, which started with such promise in 2019 and has since fizzled into an acrimonious wait for the end.

Almeyda gave an interview where he ripped the club’s player-acquisition strategy in the offseason, and it’s true that San Jose was lapped in spending ambition by the likes of Dallas and Houston this offseason, not to mention the LAs and Seattles of the conference.

It’s also true that this ‘Quakes team has enough talent to be competitive — though it’s an open question whether Almeyda’s man-marking system, or whatever hybrid of it he uses, in whatever formation, helps or hinders them this season.

In Cade Cowell and Jeremy Ebobisse, there’s some exciting attacking talent. Offseason pickups like Jamiro Monteiro and Jan Gregus are proven in MLS. The roster build looks a lot like Colorado’s from a few seasons ago, even if the overall vision looks less cohesive.

It’s not hard to see San Jose causing some problems for teams this year. But it’s also not hard at all to see the whole project falling apart relatively quickly.

Lineup: Marcinkowski, M. Lopez, Alanis, Nathan, Thompson, Judson, Yueill, Cowell, Monteiro, Espinoza, Ebobisse

14. Houston Dynamo

It is very clearly a new era in Houston. The club is under new ownership, and that new ownership appears eager to spend and revitalize a team that has slid so far from relevancy in its city that even its biggest games last season were sparsely attended.

The first order of business was bringing in proven MLS sporting leadership in former goalkeeper Pat Onstad to run the front office and Paulo Nagamura to manage. The next order of business was spending big to acquire Paraguayan forward Sebastian Ferreira for a club-record fee, and there will likely be one or two more big name DP signings to come.

For now, though, this is still largely the team that trudged through last season under Tab Ramos, struggling on both sides of the ball, with effort week in and week out, and with a not inconsiderable talent deficit to boot.

Steve Clark, as Timbers fans can attest, will help in goal. The center back partnership anchored by Tim Parker looks a strength. But until the Dynamo bring in a pair of high-level attacking midfielders and a two-way center mid, the ceiling will be low.

Lineup: Clark, Lundqvist, Hadebe, Parker, Zeca, Vera, Rodriguez, Carrasquilla, Quintero, Picault, Ferreira

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Soccer Timbers

Breaking Down the Timbers’ 2022 Depth Chart

Diego Chará on the ball in MLS Cup. Photo by Matthew Wolfe.

The Portland Timbers are days away from kicking off the 2022 season at home on national television against the New England Revolution.

In ordinary years, this would be cause for great excitement. This year, with the club’s leadership embroiled in controversy over its handling of the Paul Riley coercion and harassment allegations and under investigation over its handling of the Andy Polo abuse allegations, it’s decidedly different.

For many, the joy of attending Timbers matches has been complicated. For some, it’s been, at least for now, erased. The club is set to meet with the leadership of the Timbers Army for the first time since the Riley story broke on March 3, and members of both the local and the national media are pressing for answers on the Polo situation.

It is likely that the start of this, the Timbers’ 12th MLS season, will be overshadowed by events off the field. But the fervent hope of most every supporter is that at some point—preferably some point soon—we can return to talking about soccer.

On the field, the Timbers are in a precarious position. Diego Valeri is gone. Steve Clark is gone. Sebastian Blanco is about to turn 34 and Diego Chará is about to turn 36. Larrys Mabiala will be 35 by playoff time.

Despite the young talent around that trio, the season is shaping up to go one of two directions: a last chance to compete for a championship with the team’s 2017 core minus Valeri, or a transitional year in which that core fades. Here’s a look at where the team is at heading into Opening Day.

GOALKEEPER

The Timbers have enjoyed some very good goalkeeping in their MLS history, but they perhaps never got better than what Clark gave them over the last several seasons: phenomenal shot stopping, very few blunders, and a certain joie de vivre that will be sorely missed this year.

Clark is now in Houston. The Timbers, perhaps because of salary cap issues, did not seem to make a serious play to retain him in free agency., nor did they acquire a clear starting goalkeeper to replace him. That means that, for the foreseeable future, it will be Aljaž Ivačič and David Bingham in goal.

Neither goalkeeper inspires a great deal of confidence. Ivačič, the towering Slovenian, was signed to eventually be the starter back in 2019, but couldn’t beat out Jeff Attinella or Clark over the next three seasons and has looked uneven in his handful of appearances with the first team.

Bingham, meanwhile, the former San Jose and LA Galaxy starter, was out of the league in 2021 and trained with the Timbers before joining the club in the offseason. He hasn’t been an everyday starter since 2019, when he struggled behind a porous Galaxy defense.

The job, considering the club’s investment in him, should be Ivačič’s. He is younger and has more upside than Bingham, though he may not be on a long leash in what seems like a make-or-break year—Giovani Savarese has not shied away from rotating goalkeepers based on form.

Former LA Galaxy II backstop Justin Vom Steeg and homegrown Hunter Sulte are also on the roster.

LEFT BACK

It’s the Claudio Bravo show. The young Argentinian fullback blossomed last season after a difficult beginning to life in MLS, distinguishing himself as a major attacking threat and holding his own defensively down the stretch as well.

Bravo is an excellent player to watch, and at just 24, he has plenty of room left to grow. The Timbers are relying on his durability, because there’s not much behind him on the depth chart—likely just Pablo Bonilla sliding across the backline.

Larrys Mabiala challenges for the ball in MLS Cup. Photo by Matthew Wolfe.
CENTER BACK

The Mabiala/Dario Zuparic tandem dug deep in the fall and winter, just as you would expect from a veteran duo, and delivered the kind of steady, locked-in defensive performances MLS Cup teams always get from their center backs. Both players had standout moments in the playoffs, and Mabiala in particular was tremendous in MLS Cup.

But now both players are hurt to start the season, with identical sports hernia injuries. They’re slated to be back in mid-March, but until then, the Timbers’ depth at this position will be tested.

Bill Tuiloma has stepped into these kinds of positions before, but it’s fair to say that 24-year-old California native Zac McGraw has not. McGraw only started two games last year—games where the Timbers shipped six goals—and it will be a big task for Tuiloma to shepherd the backline in the absence of the two starters. Rookie Justin Rasmussen, signed the day after scoring a banger against Viking FK in preseason, could get minutes as well.

In the bigger picture, there are plenty of reasons for confidence and a few for concern. Mabiala generally goes through periods where he struggles with the pace of play, and neither he nor Zuparic have the kind of speed or agility that clubs increasingly look for in center backs.

This unit has always gotten it done when it’s mattered for the Timbers in recent years, but after conceding 52 goals in 2021 with an excellent goalkeeper behind them, the margins for regular-season error may be thinner this time around. We’ll see how this group holds up.

RIGHT BACK

The Timbers finally, after the beginning of preseason, hammered out a deal to bring last year’s starter, Jose Carlos Van Rankin, back for 2022.

But the structure and length of Van Rankin’s deal—a loan through the summer that the Timbers can extend through the end of the year—is not exactly a vote of confidence. Neither the Timbers nor Van Rankin’s parent club Guadalajara seem sold on the fullback, which is understandable. He was frequently caught out of position and flat-footed defensively last year.

Van Rankin’s precarious position has almost certainly opened the door for Bonilla, who, at 22, has established himself with the first team and is getting looks with the Venezuelan national team. The question for Bonilla is about maturity: in his young MLS career, he’s committed well over a foul per game, averaged a yellow card almost every three games, and was recently sent off in a preseason match. He’s a competitor, which is a good thing, but his performances for the club have been uneven.

Bonilla is six years younger than Van Rankin, considerably cheaper, and still growing as a player. If he wins the job, it’ll make the Timbers’ lives easier. If he doesn’t, Van Rankin’s loan will be extended.

CENTRAL MIDFIELD

Assuming Chará doesn’t fall off a cliff this year, this is a position of real strength for the Timbers.

The captain, who was the best player on the field in MLS Cup two and a half months ago, remains the premier defensive midfielder and one of the most valuable players in the entire league.

Erik Williamson, who was trending in that direction before tearing his ACL in Seattle last summer, figures to slot in next to him once fit in a season that could put him back in contention for a place in Gregg Berhalter’s World Cup squad.

The Timbers have also invested in the highly-rated young Argentinian David Ayala in this spot, who, given their depth at this position, they can afford to integrate slowly and allow to acclimate to MLS without serious pressure, just as Santiago Moreno, another young Designated Player, did last season.

Alongside that trio, Cristhian Paredes significantly raised his stock with the club during the playoff run last year and remains, when he’s locked in, an above-average MLS center mid: skillful on the ball with a good understanding of both attacking and defensive space.

George Fochive may be more of a blunt instrument, but he is now, just as he was during his first spell with the club, a reliable depth piece who can chew up minutes and provide cover for his central midfield partner as a true six.

Savarese can get three of these players into his lineup if he plays a 4-3-3, which, given the strength of the midfield, might make some amount of sense. If it’s the 4-2-3-1, however, competition for the spot next to Chará will be fierce.

Sebastian Blanco. Photo by Matthew Wolfe.
ATTACKERS

Even without a marquee singing to replace the departed Valeri, this should be another position of strength.

With Sebastian Blanco’s return, protracted as it was, the Timbers have four starting-quality attackers: Blanco, Yimmi Chara, Dairon Asprilla, and Santiago Moreno.

None are true playmakers in Valeri’s mold, and all four may be most comfortable on the wing, but their ability to interchange and complement each other gave defenders fits throughout the playoffs and should allow Savarese to throw different looks at different opponents.

Asprilla dramatically elevated his usefulness and fluidity on the ball last year, but his greatest weapon, as always, is his directness and power in the air. He’s physically a handful for defenders, especially fullbacks. Moreno’s speed makes him a handful in a very different way. He was almost unmarkable against Real Salt Lake in the Western Conference Final. Chará is, of course, a workhorse—a positive and a contributor in most every phase of the game.

With all that said: there is no minimizing Blanco’s importance. The Timbers were completely adrift without him last season, averaging 0.9 points per game in games he missed, and absolutely dominant after he returned to the lineup in the summer.

It’s not just Blanco’s attacking threat, which from just about anywhere on the field, in just about any game state, is significant. It’s also that he is very clearly this team’s alpha, a player who reliably changes the feel of games with his presence alone.

There are very few players in MLS who we can say the same of. The Timbers need him healthy, which, given that seemingly every medical team that took a look at his knees this winter raised red flags, is going to make for some very tense moments in the coming months.

Marvin Loría, who played one of the best games of his Timbers career against RSL last time he featured in a competitive match, is back as well, as is Blake Bodily. Savarese will likely find Loría minutes, while Bodily is could be in a do-or-die year if he wants to continue his MLS career.

STRIKER

The Timbers are in an interesting position here: they committed big money to two players, Felipe Mora and Jarosław Niezgoda, who the front office felt could be answers at center forward in a way that Jeremy Ebobisse was apparently not.

Mora will likely miss at least the first month of the season injured, giving Niezgoda, who has made just ten starts over the last two years, his very first run as the clear starting forward. There is no question that the Pole is an instinctual finisher, excellent in the box. It does remain to be seen how active he can be in other phases of play and whether he can affect games and contribute to the attack if he’s not scoring.

Mora, though he ran hot and cold last season, certainly did that. He’s possibly the most complete forward the Timbers have ever had, and even if he doesn’t take over games like Fanendo Adi or Brian Fernandez did, his 18-goals-in-35-starts strike rate speaks for itself.

If they’re healthy, these are valuable, talented players. Whether they justify their combined budget charge and elevate themselves into the league’s top striking tier very much remains to be seen.

Homegrown signing Tega Ikoba figures to make his first team debut during Mora’s absence, and, given the injury history of the two players ahead of him, the Timbers will be hoping he adjusts to life in MLS quickly.

Categories
Soccer Timbers

Timbers March Past Real Salt Lake Into MLS Cup

Photo by Matthew Wolfe.

When Sebastián Blanco pulled up grabbing his hamstring early in the second half on Thanksgiving Day in Colorado, there were plenty who figured the Portland Timbers’ 2021 season was over.

It wasn’t a crazy thought. But then the Timbers, minus their chief attacking catalyst, grew stronger and stronger in that half and beat the Rapids 1–0.

The next day in Kansas City, ownerless, permanent manager-less Real Salt Lake upset Sporting, meaning that the Timbers would, improbably, host the Western Conference Final at Providence Park against a team they’d already beaten three times this year.

And then you could feel it, couldn’t you? That unmistakable sense that the stars were aligning, that these Timbers, all but given up for dead in August, were on a collision course with MLS Cup.

It didn’t hurt that the number one seed in the Eastern Conference, the New England Revolution, were upset on their home turf on Tuesday. That meant that all that stood between the Timbers and hosting their first major championship in club history was a fourth victory of the year over Real Salt Lake.

The Timbers entered Saturday afternoon’s match without Blanco, available only on the bench, and without Dairon Asprilla, suspended after being red carded in the waning moments of the win over the Rapids. In place of their two attacking stars, they inserted 24-year-old Marvin Loría for only his second start since mid-August and 21-year-old Santiago Moreno for just his fourth start ever with the team.

It was not by any measure the most talented Timbers team to ever grace the field in a playoff game. But there was that sense. Hundreds of people camped overnight outside the stadium. A huge tifo in the North End. And an opponent that, from the first minute, the Timbers looked like they could handle.

The Timbers played this game with relish. Not with overwhelming skill, not with sublime passing moves and sustained individual brilliance, but with tenacity and cohesion and confidence. That’s what wins you playoff matches—especially on turf, especially in the rain, especially in front of one of those ear-splitting Timbers crowds that has made Portland synonymous with soccer support in every corner of the world.

The kids weren’t overawed. The veterans didn’t give an inch. And now Portland is a week away from hosting MLS Cup against either Philadelphia or New York City in what will be one of the biggest sporting occasions in the history of the Rose City.

Early forecast for next Saturday? 43 degrees and cloudy. Chance of rain. Just the way we like it.

Salt Lake’s memorable playoff run, which saw them eliminate Seattle before they knocked out Kansas City, is over. After two monumental efforts, they rarely looked inventive enough to break the Timbers down. Of course, they never looked like they’d break the Sounders down either, but went through on penalties after failing to register a shot in 120 minutes In their first-round match.

On Saturday, they never had a chance to go that route. Just four and a half minutes into the game, Felipe Mora flicked a sharp entry pass into the box for Yimmi Chara to run into. His cross hit two Salt Lake players and skidded right into Mora’s path, and the Chilean, running towards the six-yard box, deflected it in.

The Providence Park crowd let out an almighty roar. Mora had hardly had time to break his running stride as the ball came flying at him, and it was the pace from the attempted outside-of-the-foot clearance from RSL’s Aaron Herrera that eventually carried the ball past David Ochoa. It was a dream start, one that would allow the Timbers to stay compact defensively and work with the space that RSL’s need for a tying goal would eventually open up.

Over the next half hour, the Timbers’ front four buzzed as RSL struggled to build fluidly from back to front. Moreno’s pace in particular was scrambling the Salt Lake defense, and it was the Colombian who had the best chance to double Portland’s lead after Ochoa palmed a Loría shot into the middle of the box, but he eventually fired over the bar.

It was after that warning shot that RSL finally found their footing in the game. They spent much of the half trying to work the left side of the Timbers’ defense with Anderson Julio and Herrera, and it was the fullback who opened up enough space to whip a cross towards the dangerous Damir Kreilach on 33 minutes, but Kreilach’s header from point blank range was stopped by Steve Clark.

It was a classic, show-stopping Clark save, and, in a week when people around MLS talked an awful lot about his opposite number,  Ochoa, a sudden reminder of what a truly game-changing goalkeeper can do for a playoff team.

RSL never got a better look. Though they closed the half in the ascendency, the Timbers were crowding them out of the middle of the field and limiting their ability to play between lines. Their attacking fulcrum Albert Rusnak, who missed the first two games of the playoffs with COVID-19, couldn’t get himself going. Nick Belser, the former Timbers draft pick, was struggling with the pace of the game in central midfield. And the Timbers kept running hard, avoiding mistakes, and waiting for a moment to stretch their lead.

It came on the hour mark. Dario Zuparic lofted a ball towards Moreno in midfield that the winger controlled off his chest, dribbled forward, and, from 25 yards out, ripped towards goal. The shot thudded off the post, hit the diving Ochoa in the back, and nestled in the back of the net.

It was total bedlam. The Timbers’ bench exploded. Ochoa laid flat on the turf, hands covering his face. Moreno ran to the corner with his shirt off, all 5’8 of him flexing for the cameras.

It was over. Salt Lake, never a sure bet to get a single goal, weren’t going to get two. A quarter of an hour from time, Herrera, perhaps still frustrated by his fifth minute mistake, lunged in on Loría and was rightly shown a second yellow card.

RSL finished their season with ten players on the field, out of luck and out of gas. Ochoa needed to make a diving save to deny what would have been a roof-raising third goal from a Diego Valeri free kick in stoppage time, and with Alan Kelly’s whistle several minutes later, the Timbers clinched the Western Conference title for the third time in seven years.

If there were any question marks about the state of the Timbers heading into this game, they were answered emphatically. They played like a big team. It didn’t matter which players were and weren’t available—and there can be no greater compliment to a coaching staff or a group of players.

To Zuparic and Larrys Mabiala, who hardly put a foot wrong in central defense all night. To Clark, who improbably will get a second shot at MLS Cup with the team he unforgettably lost his first chance to six years ago. To Diego Chará, who was sensational in the middle of the field. Certainly to all of the role players who looked like they’d played in this game a hundred times over, and to Giovani Savarese, who has once again dialed up an extraordinary cup run.

The magic is real. MLS Cup in Portland. Next Saturday.

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Soccer Timbers

Timbers, Real Salt Lake Prepare to Defy the Odds Again

Photo by Kris Lattimore.

The Portland Timbers and Real Salt Lake will meet Saturday for the Western Conference Final in what is both simultaneously one of the biggest and most improbable games in the history of Providence Park.

To say that neither team should be alive at this advanced stage of the MLS postseason is nearly reductive. That the Timbers were seeded fourth and Salt Lake seventh for this tournament does not begin to communicate just what each team has survived to keep playing into December.

RSL, for its part, may be the single most extraordinary story in major American sports right now. The club hasn’t had an owner all year. Their manager quit in the middle of the season to become an assistant coach for a conference rival. Their interim manager was the former captain and manager of their biggest rival. They snuck into the postseason with a stoppage time goal on the final day of the regular season in Kansas City. They then went to Seattle in the first round of the playoffs, failed to register a shot in roughly 125 minutes of play, and knocked out the Sounders on penalties.

They then went back to Kansas City, fell behind in the first half, pulled themselves level in the second half, and got another stoppage time winner from ex-US national team forward Bobby Wood to advance to the conference final.

They’ve won both postseason games with their best player and captain, Albert Rusnak, missing due to COVID-19. To make it to MLS Cup, RSL will have to travel to the most intimidating environment in MLS and beat a team that has already handed them three losses this year.

This stuff just doesn’t happen in other leagues. Not with the regularity that it does in MLS, where the top seed in each conference fell in their first postseason match and unfavored road teams have won four of the last five playoff games.

It simply doesn’t sense. Any of it. And that is why plenty of neutral observers like Salt Lake to upset the Timbers in the West and NYCFC to upset Philadelphia in the East and MLS Cup to be contested in a baseball stadium by an ownerless team and a team owned by the City Football Group on December 11.

Thing is, while the Timbers’ arrival at this stage of the postseason is not nearly as unexpected, the suddenness of the club’s surge and amount of adversity they’ve overcome this year is similarly extraordinary.

Individually, this Timbers team has relatively few standout performers as compared to other Timbers teams that have made playoff runs. Beyond Diego Chará and Sebastián Blanco there are only a handful of above-average players, and plenty of average ones too.

But like a number of other Giovani Savarese teams, the Timbers have refused to die this year. Their second-half revival started when they went to Seattle and beat the high-flying Sounders 2–0 in the game in which Eyrk Williamson tore his ACL a week after getting trounced in Austin, and that victory set the tone.

They went undefeated for the next month and a half before imperiling their playoff positioning with three straight losses in October. They responded to that adversity by winning their final three regular season games by a combined score of 8–1. They’ve now conceded only two goals in their last five games after conceding seven in the three games before that.

The underlying numbers hated the Timbers all year. It didn’t matter. They over-performed those numbers and have continued to over-perform them right into pole position to host MLS Cup.

Of course, the Timbers’ resurgence in the fall coincided with Blanco’s return to full fitness—and when he pulled up clutching his hamstring in Colorado on Thanksgiving in a scoreless game, it seemed very much like the team’s season would go down with him.

But it very much did not. With Blanco’s season likely over, the Timbers didn’t miss a beat. They only grew in strength and belief throughout that second half against the Rapids, and by the times Larrys Mabiala jabbed home the winning goal, it was entirely deserved.

Now the Timbers will be without both Blanco and Dairon Asprilla, undeservedly red-carded in the dying moments of the semifinal victory. They’ll have to rely on a pair of young, mostly unproven backup wingers for offensive punch on Saturday, or recall aging club legend Diego Valeri. No matter how Savarese decides to play his curtailed hand, the Timbers will relish the opportunity in front of them. The higher the level of doubt this year, the better they have played.

It is perhaps little wonder that it is two likable, fiery, longtime MLS battlers in Savarese and Mastroeni who will square off on Saturday. There may be better soccer minds in the league, but there are few people better equipped to ride the maelstrom of chaos that defines so many playoff runs. Some managers seize up under that pressure. Even the great Bruce Arena was slow to change a failing plan in New England’s loss on Tuesday night. These two have, somehow, figured it out so far.

Savarese has a big personnel decision ahead of him this weekend with Blanco and Asprilla out. Mastroeni does too. His DP Rusnak should make the trip to Portland and be available for selection on Saturday, though it’s an open question whether he’ll be inserted back into a starting lineup that has momentum after a long layoff.

RSL will also be missing their ace defensive midfielder, Everton Luiz, who was booked in both the Seattle and SKC games. He’ll be a big absence for the visitors, whose defense, now set up in banks of four, has been their calling card so far.

What happens next in this off-the-hook, quintessentially MLS postseason? You tell me. The form book says Portland. Past history says Portland. Home advantage says Portland. And it said Seattle and Kansas City before that, so there is no reason to believe that Salt Lake will arrive cowed.

But the Timbers have played with, dare we say, an air of inevitability about them for much of the fall. Timely offense, timely defense, and, when they’ve needed it most, a steadfast refusal to be knocked off stride.

It has not, it is worth highlighting again, been an easy year in  Portland. Investigations into GM Gavin Wilkinson for his role in the Paul Riley abuse coverup are ongoing, as is the pandemic that has devastated so many lives and kept so many away from the stadium. This, though, what we’re about to see on Saturday, is a reminder of what makes this sport such an unparalleled thrill: a proper occasion featuring two teams that have played so far beyond reasonable expectations that expectations have ceased to be reasonable.

They think they might just win it. This year.

Categories
Soccer Timbers

Blanco Show Sends Timbers to Colorado

Blanco celebrates. Photo by Kris Lattimore.

It was apparent from the very early stages of Sunday afternoon that Sebastian Blanco was going to have an outsize impact on the Portland Timbers’ 2021 playoff opener.

In the end, we got the full Blanco experience. He blasted a clean look inside the box and a free kick just outside of it towards the south end scoreboard in the first half. He was booked for a brutal late challenge on Franco Fragapane. He hurt his back at the end of the half and limped off the side of the field with the stretcher poised.

Santiago Moreno warmed up on the field during the intermission after Blanco limped to the locker room, but when the bell tolled, the Argentine was right back out there — and two minutes later, his expertly-taken goal had lifted the Timbers into the lead for good.

For years now, despite his advancing age and despite the catastrophic knee injury that sidelined him for nearly 12 months, there have been precious few players in MLS so impossible to defend, so capable of single-handedly deciding games. We saw it in 2018, when Blanco scored jaw-dropping goals to help carry the Timbers past the Sounders in Seattle and Sporting KC in Kansas. And we might just be seeing it this year two — Blanco Superman-ing a good if not great Timbers team into a memorable playoff run.

It was obvious on Sunday afternoon, as it has been all season, how the Timbers feed on Blanco’s energy. By the end of the day, it was his two goals and his spitfire, no holds barred, relentlessness that Minnesota United couldn’t match.

The Timbers came from behind on Sunday afternoon at Providence Park to dump the Loons out of the postseason 3-1 and book a Thanksgiving Day showdown with the first seed Rapids in Colorado. If they survive and advance on Thursday, it will no doubt be due to a player signed as a complimentary piece who has long since taken the mantle as the Timbers’ primary, irreplaceable instigator.

The regular season numbers were crystal clear: the Timbers averaged 1.9 points-per-game with Blanco in the lineup, and just 0.9 without him. Without Blanco’s inspiration, Sunday’s first round match against Minnesota — the postseason match in front of fans at Providence Park in three years — could have gone very differently.

Minnesota arrived in Portland on the back of a challenging, uneven year in which they very rarely resembled the swashbuckling side that so nearly advanced to MLS Cup last season.

But Adrian Heath’s team entered the playoffs with no small measure of confidence regardless. With a veteran group of players, and a sterling recent record against the Timbers, regular season behind them, perhaps this would be the moment this year’s Loons stepped into their own.

It started well enough. After absorbing an early spell of Portland pressure, Minnesota broke forward with a sumptuously smooth move back-to-front move and took the lead. Old Timbers enemy Osvaldo Alonso picked the ball up deep in the Loons half and broke the Timbers’ midfield line with a forward pass for Emanuel Reynoso. The Argentinian playmaker got the ball wide to Robin Lod, who easily cut inside of Claudio Bravo and hit Romain Métanire on the overlap. Fragapane arrived unmarked on the back post to turn in Métanire’s cross, and it was 1-0.

As lovely a team goal as it was from Minnesota, it was a reminder of all that has gone wrong all season for Portland defensively: they allowed the Loons to play through their midfield with astounding ease, their fullbacks were both caught out, and the result was a tap in.

That Fragapane, who was accused of racially abusing Diego Chará on his last visit to Portland over the summer, was the player to finish the move was an especially bitter pill to swallow.

But unlike earlier in the year, the concession didn’t knock the Timbers off course. Instead, they continued to buzz and press forward — playing with the clear confidence of a team that finished the regular season as the hottest in MLS. It was a sign of things to come. Minnesota was up a goal, but was increasingly struggling to break the Timbers’ pressure and possess the ball. It felt like a matter of time before the one of the Timbers’ energetic front four broke through.

In the end, though, it wasn’t one of the front four who hauled Portland level — it was center back Larrys Mabiala, who first had a spectacular bicycle kick attempt cleared off the line from a free kick, and then, minutes later, sent a towering header from a short corner past Minnesota’s backup goalkeeper Dwayne St. Clair to tie the game.

Blanco went down injured shortly thereafter. But just following the restart, he made his biggest contribution yet. Chase Gasper and Bakaye Dibassy got crossed up trying to deal with a deep Claudio Bravo cross, and Blanco smashed the resulting half-clearance on the volley past St. Clair. He wheeled away in celebration clutching his back, likely in pain, but also perhaps making clear that even when hobbled, he was the most dangerous player on the field.

It was a hammer blow. Minnesota simply didn’t have the gear required to match the Timbers’ attacking intensity and movement, and as their own attacking players failed to get in rhythm, they became increasingly frustrated and impotent.

The game state had turned; now the Timbers, with all that pace, would have the opportunity to sit back and break forward at a Minnesota back six not blessed with any great amount of speed.

After 20 minutes, the Timbers’ third goal came from very little. Blanco picked up the ball from Felipe Mora some 25 yards from goal, took two steps forward, and smashed it in again off the inside of the post and into the back of the net.

The Loons were still up for a fight — they finished the match with six players having received yellow cards and the ill-tempered Fragapane lucky in the waning minutes to escape without a red — but they couldn’t hang with their hosts. Heath now has the offseason to figure out with his front office how to rejuvenate this Minnesota team.

The Timbers, as it turned out, didn’t need an offseason. Blanco’s return and a few tactical adjustments brought this team roaring back to life after its summer swoon.

It’s not just Blanco. Dairon Asprilla was a menace. Yimmi Chara was similarly active. Despite their ongoing defensively shortcomings, the fullbacks got forward effectively. And Mabiala, another old campaigner, came up with a signature moment in his very fine Timbers career.

A trip to the altitude of Dick’s Sporting Goods Park on short rest will be a stiffer test than this ultimately was. But you wouldn’t comfortably bet against the Timbers right now — not in the kind of form they’re in, and certainly not with the player they have leading the way.

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Soccer Timbers

Timbers Face Minnesota as MLS Postseason Gets Underway

Minnesota United beat the Timbers in Portland in June. Photo by Matthew Wolfe.

The Portland Timbers’ up-and-down odyssey of a 2021 will be largely defined on the field on Sunday and in the weeks to follow, as the club begins its playoff journey with a match against Minnesota United.

This marks the Timbers’ club-record fifth straight playoff appearance and fourth straight under the management of Giovani Savarese—an accomplishment that Caleb Porter never came close to achieving during his time with the club.

But where Porter’s best teams more often than not made a substantial amount of noise in the playoffs, Savarese’s Timbers, have not won a playoff game since the second leg of the 2018 Western Conference final in Kansas City. They lost in the first round of the 2019 playoffs to Real Salt Lake and were defeated in last year’s opening round on penalties by Dallas in a vacant Providence Park.

This year, expectations are higher. The Timbers enter the playoffs on a roll, having won three straight games by multiple goals and averaging more than 2.2 points-per-game over the final two-and-a-half months of the season.

By going back to a tried-and-true formula—sitting compact defensively and pressing forward with tenacity—the Timbers closed as one of the league’s hottest teams.

The result was an ultimately comfortable fourth place finish in the West and hosting rights for this year’s first round playoff matchup with Minnesota United, with the Colorado Rapids waiting for the winner in Commerce City on Thanksgiving Day.

The Timbers aren’t an appealing matchup for anyone right now. But despite their outstanding form, this match against Minnesota may be a battle.

Adrian Heath’s Loons came within a game of reaching the MLS Cup last year, returned a substantial amount of playoff experience, and have one of the league’s finest playmakers in Argentine Emanuel Reynoso.

They also have a tremendous record against the Timbers in recent years. Most recently, the Loons beat Portland twice over the summer, once at Providence Park on a scorching June day and then again in St. Paul in July.

Of course, those two games came during one of the Timbers’ poorest stretches of the season, when Sebastian Blanco was not yet playing significant minutes and Jeremy Ebobisse was still the club’s starting center forward.

Much has changed since then. It feels like this will be a contest to see whether the Timbers’ high-powered attack can overwhelm Minnesota’s defense—or whether the Timbers’ defense, the second-poorest of any playoff team in either conference, will be exposed on the playoff stage.

Elsewhere in the West…

The winner of the game in Portland will face the shock Western Conference winners from Colorado on Thanksgiving.

On the other side of the bracket, Seattle hosts Real Salt Lake in a matchup that will see RSL face their former manager, Freddy Juarez, who walked off the job in the middle of the season to become an assistant with the Sounders.

RSL closed the season in chaotic fashion under interim manager Pablo Mastroeni, losing two straight games before sneaking into the playoffs thanks to a dramatic stoppage time winner from Damir Kreilach in Kansas City.

The Sounders, who are among the favorites to reach and win MLS Cup again, are getting healthy. Raúl Ruidíaz and Nicolás Lodeiro are back in the fold, and Jordan Morris, who tore his ACL last winter, played 45 minutes in the club’s regular season finale—and should play a significant role in the club’s postseason run.

Sporting Kansas City hosts the Vancouver Whitecaps in the other game on that side of the bracket, with the Whitecaps having become one of the stories of the season under their own colorful interim manager Vanni Sartini.

Sporting, like Seattle, was a juggernaut all year, playing excellent, clean Peter Vermes soccer and leading the conference in goals scored. But Sporting has also had a mostly appalling playoff record since their MLS Cup triumph in 2013, and a fair bit of that failure has come at home.

Seattle and Sporting are heavy favorites to advance, and if the Timbers join the Rapids on the other side of the bracket, it will be the West’s four best teams standing in the conference semifinals. But this being MLS, it’s dangerous to pencil those matchups in too soon.

And in the East…

The Supporters’ Shield-winning and record-setting New England Revolution lie in wait for the winner of New York City FC and Atlanta United at Yankee Stadium, with the road team in slightly better form after their horrific start to the season.

Atlanta has a manager who experienced plenty of playoff success as a player and assistant coach in Seattle in Gonzalo Pineda, while NYC boss Ronny Delia’s only prior playoff experience came last year when his team was defeated on penalties by Orlando in its first game. Delia’s team is dealing with a pair of significant injuries, while Atlanta is healthy.

But NYCFC has a significant home field advantage due to the oddities of playing at a baseball stadium, and they play more cohesive soccer than Atlanta has at any point this year. It will be interesting to see how it all plays out.

On the other side of the bracket, Nashville hosts Orlando.

The Lions, as has been their wont in recent years, are sputtering down the stretch.

Orlando has a few match winners, namely Nani, who hasn’t played in weeks and should be well-rested, but Nashville is as solid as any team in the league: consistent, strong defensively, and nearly impossible to beat at home.

The winner of that game will get the winner of an all-Northeast matchup in Chester between the Philadelphia Union and New York Red Bulls.

The Union, one of the stories of last year, quietly put together a very nice second half and enter the playoffs as one of the teams to beat in the East.

But their second half was not nearly the surprise that the Red Bulls’ was. Gerhard Struber’s team was given up for dead over the summer, sitting near the bottom of the Eastern Conference and playing rather miserable soccer in front of paltry crowds. They turned it around, though, high pressing with aplomb and stringing together 1-0 wins.

It remains to be seen whether the Red Bulls have the quality required to compete in the playoffs, but it is remarkable that they are here at all.

All the drama starts Saturday—the final act of a season unlike any other in MLS history.

Categories
Soccer Timbers

Asprilla Bicycle Steals Show as Timbers Beat San Jose

Photo by Matthew Wolfe.

There have been precious few uncomplicated good things about the Portland Timbers’ 2021 season.

Long before last night, Dairon Asprilla was one of those things. A career-long inconsistent, temperamental depth player turned—seemingly out of the blue—into an everyday starter, hustle machine, and consistent goal scorer, one of the first names on the team sheet each week, all year long.

The improbability of a player like Asprilla, at 29 years old, in his seventh season with the club, making the turn and having a season like he’s had this year is difficult to overstate.

The one thing that Asprilla has always had, from the moment he arrived in Portland, is knack for the late-season spectacular. And on Wednesday night, with the Timbers hosting the San Jose Earthquakes in the thick of a battle for playoff positioning, he delivered the kind of signature moment to punctuate this career year that only he could. In the 55th minute, with the Timbers leading San Jose 1–0, Santiago Moreno, spotting a streaking Asprilla, slightly overhit his through pass. It should have been an easy play for Earthquakes goalkeeper JT Marcinkowski.

But as Marcinkowski came to claim the ball ahead of Asprilla, he bobbled and spilled it on the top left corner of the box. Asprilla controlled the ball with his back to goal, popped it up into the air with his first touch, and then, still going backwards, away from goal, launched an exquisite arching bicycle kick that sailed over the retreating Marcinkowski’s head and in one hop nestled into the back of the net.

A bicycle kick goal in any game, at any level of soccer, is a rarity to savor. A bicycle kick goal like this one—with Asprilla picking up a loose ball, back to goal, setting himself up, and still getting the power and precision on the overhead required to beat the defense, is like little else you’ll ever see.

In a vacuum, it was an astonishing moment. Add in all of Asprilla’s history in Portland, and it was the that much more extraordinary.

After all, it was just two seasons ago that Asprilla scored a similarly jaw-dropping bicycle kick in a game not for the Timbers, but for T2, facing not the Earthquakes in a crunch MLS match, but the Las Vegas Lights in a sleepy USL encounter. And keep in mind, Asprilla was not a rookie that March night at Merlo Field. He was approaching his 27th birthday, having scored a grand total of five regular-season MLS goals in four years in the league. He looked for all the world like an entertaining player who had neither the ability nor the mentality to be an everyday contributor for the big club.

But perhaps because of that spark, that feeling that Asprilla could be a special player if only he could get the support he needed and mentally lock himself in, the Timbers stuck with him. It is a testament to the club’s faith and Asprilla’s faith in himself that he’s still with the Timbers this year to produce a season like the one he’s had and this goal that no one in Portland will ever forget.

The accolades poured in almost immediately, from Alyssa Milano, from SportsCenter, and from newspapers around the world. Asprilla is deserving of every one.

From a competitive standpoint, the goal—as Asprilla’s always do at this time of the year—mattered a great deal as well. It all but put away the Earthquakes, handing the Timbers a massive three points and stopping their three-game skid.

Otherwise, it was a night of positives for Giovani Savarese’s team. Santiago Moreno turned in by far his best performance for the club, the defense kept its first clean sheet in nearly a month, and, perhaps most importantly, the attack threatened consistently and scored twice with Sebastian Blanco sitting on the bench.

The Timbers’ first goal, which came with just more than ten minutes to play in the first half, was excellent in its own right. Bill Tuiloma, back at his natural position at center back, brought the ball out of defense and pinged an entry pass in to Yimmi Chará, who combined with Felipe Mora and hit Moreno, who returned the ball to Mora, who whipped a dangerous low cross into the middle that Diego Chará stabbed in to open the scoring.

It was quietly one of the best team goals of the season—made by the excellent central attacking midfield play of Yimmi Chará, the equally excellent center forward play of Mora, and the awareness of Diego Chará, the captain, making up the numbers to unbalance the Earthquakes defense and finishing instinctively.

That one goal would have been enough. The Timbers were compact defensively, allowing the Earthquakes nearly 60% possession and getting out-passed 490–336, but San Jose lacked the creativity or cohesion to break Portland down. Though they eventually took 17 shots, they located just five on target. Steve Clark’s only memorable save came from very little shortly after the restart, when a quick spin and shot from Jeremy Ebobisse on top of the box had Clark stretching to turn it wide. Other than that, and a scuffed chance in the opening ten minutes, Ebobisse had little to show for his return to Providence Park.

The Timbers could have run up the score further in this one as well, with Blanco nearly scoring the night’s second world-class goal on a signature slaloming run through the box shortly after coming on, but San Jose made it to the final whistle with a respectable scoreline intact.

The Timbers now get a full off week before they travel to Utah to face Real Salt Lake for a playoff-positioning six-pointer, one that they should have Blanco back in the starting lineup for. But when that game kicks off, and for many games to come, we’ll all still be basking in the glow of that Asprilla moment—reminder, amidst a difficult season and continued, righteous, painful acrimony between the club and its supporters, of what a joy this sport can be.

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Soccer Timbers

Timbers Fall Limply in Colorado

Photo by Kris Lattimore.

As bad as Wednesday’s streak-busting collapse against the Vancouver Whitecaps was, the Portland Timbers’ 2–0 loss to the Colorado Rapids in Commerce City on Saturday night was equally limp.

With Sebastian Blanco and Dairon Asprilla out of the lineup, the Timbers’ typically lethal counter attack was muted, and soft defending on the wings and in the box meant that they never stood much of a chance against one of the league’s most competent sides.

The LA Galaxy’s home draw with Dallas and Minnesota’s home draw with LAFC means that the Timbers’ no-show didn’t cost any ground in the Western Conference standings. They’re still on track to host a home playoff game in November. But home playoff game or not, this performance dumped another glass of cold water on the notion that the Timbers might challenge the West’s elite to get back to MLS Cup.

The Rapids don’t have Portland’s pop, nor do they have a single player with the pedigree or ability of a Blanco or Diego Chará. But they are, in many ways, the Timbers’ antithesis—a team stacked from back to front and front to back with solid, proven MLS players. Acquiring talent within the league, on a budget, steadily over the course of three years, has pushed the Rapids back into the upper echelon of MLS.

On Saturday night, with the Timbers dragging in the altitude, they went about their business with relative ease. The game settled into a slow, stolid pattern after a period of early Colorado pressure, with the Timbers set up in their patented late-season defensive banks of four and trying to play on the break through a re-called Diego Valeri making his first start since the end of July.

But with Blanco and Asprilla on the bench, the Timbers lacked verticality, while the Rapids struggled to muster either the creativity or the energy necessary to break Portland down.

Colorado had few chances apart from an early corner, content to swing the ball languidly around their midfield, but as the half wore on, they began to work their wingbacks into space on both sides on the field and get runners in the box. Even as the half wound quietly down, it felt like single great cross could undo the Timbers’ defense—and in first-half stoppage time, a telling cross is finally what the Rapids got. Wingback Braian Galván got the ball deep on the left wing, whipped a cross into the middle of the six-yard box, and the veteran Dominic Badji, on his second tour in Colorado, nipped between Dario Zuparic and Renzo Zambrano and planted his header into the far corner.

It was a classic center forward’s goal, and coming just a minute before the halftime whistle, it changed completely the complexion of the game.

The Timbers started the second half with a new sense of attacking urgency and quickly generated their best pressure of the game, a stinging Valeri shot forcing William Yarbrough into his best save of the night five minutes after the restart.

But the change in momentum was brief. The Rapids nearly added a second goal just two minutes later when Danny Wilson had a free run at a corner and glanced his header just wide. Just after the hour mark, they put another one away on another frustrating defensive sequence.

Wilson played a long ball in the direction of a breaking Galván, and a backtracking Yimmi Chará misplayed it, allowing Galván to send a cross into the penalty area from the byline. Larrys Mabiala attempted to clear it, but succeeded only in flicking the ball into the path of an onrushing Diego Rubio, who headed it past Steve Clark.

That was, for all intents and purposes, the end of the drama. Rubio nearly scored again just minutes later, hitting the post with another header, and Clark stood strong to turn away a clean Cole Bassett chance on the break just several minutes after that.

The Timbers never mounted a significant response, and it seemed that Giovani Savarese, whose response after going down 2–0 was to introduce the trio of George Fochive, Marvin Loría, and Jose Carlos Van Rankin, could sense that his team had neither the legs nor the will to claw their way back into the game.

Savarese said after the match that he thought it was a “good game.” It was not. The Timbers were bloodless, finishing with an expected goal tally of just 0.3, and the Rapids dispatched them as coolly as you would expect a veteran, playoff-bound team to. Colorado is never a particularly easy trip, especially late in the year, and especially this year, given the formidable team that Robin Fraser has mustered. But even given all that, and given the short turnaround and squad rotation, this was a meek showing.

The Timbers’ final three games, all against Western Conference teams currently outside the playoff positions, should provide them with an opportunity to boost both their standing in the table and their collective confidence heading into the postseason. We know that the Timbers, on their day, can play with anyone in the league. The last two months proved that. The problem is that this team’s flaws are so glaring, and the underlying numbers are so unfavorable, that it is not at all difficult to see them ending this up-and-down campaign on the kind of low they endured in August.

The Timbers have conceded the second most goals in the West and again have one of the conference’s worst goal differences. The season, much like the club as a whole, is hanging by a thread right now. There is remains time to right the ship, but it’s quickly melting away.

Categories
Not Soccer Soccer Thorns Timbers

Club’s Handling of Riley Predominates as Timbers Win

Photo by Matthew Wolfe.

It was, by many of the usual metrics, a lovely Sunday afternoon at Providence Park. The sun was shining, the air was crisp, and the Portland Timbers won their seventh game in eight attempts, continuing an improbable run up the Western Conference table that has them positioned to contend as the weather finally begins to turn and the MLS season enters its final stage.

But the result, a 1–0 Timbers victory on the strength of a late headed goal from the Polish marksman Jarosław Niezgoda, felt like little more than a sideshow.

This Timbers victory should have been the second game of the weekend played at Providence Park. The Portland Thorns were supposed to take the field first, on Saturday, for a derby match against their northern rival, OL Reign.

That match did not happen. In its place, after all games across the NWSL were suspended following the horrifying revelations reported by The Athletic last week regarding the conduct of former Thorns manager Paul Riley, Thorns supporters rallied outside the stadium in support of the players Riley abused and those who remain within an American soccer league that has at every turn disregarded their safety.

They also called for the firing of Timbers and Thorns general manager Gavin Wilkinson, who has emerged again as a lightning rod for anger.

Timbers fans last called en masse for Wilkinson’s firing in the autumn of 2012, when the club was suffering through a miserable season on the field. They were wrong then. The Timbers won the Western Conference the next season and an MLS Cup two years later, and Wilkinson’s prowess as a soccer executive has proven beyond any significant doubt many times since.

They’re not wrong now. This time, the frustration is not that Wilkinson can’t pick soccer players. It is that he, along with Timbers and Thorns owner Merritt Paulson and the club’s president of business Mike Golub, failed to ensure that Riley’s career ended after they were made aware of the allegations of his predatory, coercive, absolutely despicable behavior towards their players.

The club investigated Riley following the 2015 season and, with his contract expiring, let him walk. We don’t know exactly what that investigation turned up, and we don’t know exactly how seriously the club endeavored to communicate to the NWSL and Riley’s future employers that he was an active danger to their players too.

What it looks like, lacking that information, and knowing the connections between the Wilkinson and one of the men responsible for hiring Riley to his next job, is that the Thorns, like the Catholic Church, simply moved an ill-behaved coach on to his next parish, consequences be damned.

Sinead Farrelly. Mana Shim. How many others there are—both among those who spoke anonymously to The Athletic and those who weren’t reached or chose not to be interviewed—we don’t yet and will probably never know.

Timbers players Saturday released a statement expressing their support for NWSL players, while Giovani Savarese and other members of the Timbers coaching staff wore teal ribbons in a show of solidarity.

Savarese and his team entered Sunday in a difficult position. Around them in the stadium, and particularly in a vociferous North End, the supporters called—colorfully, loudly, and repeatedly—for their boss to be fired.

The Timbers Army, singing and chanting to the beat of a drum branded with the logo of the Rose City Riveters, made their position known from pregame to the final whistle. Banners hung or hoisted in the North End included “Believe, Support, and Protect NWSL Players,” “Protect the Players, Cut the Rot Out,” and, most memorably, a simple, “You Knew,” along with plenty of two-sticks aimed specifically at Wilkinson.

All the team on the field could do was focus on the task at hand, no matter how trivial it felt taking place in the middle of one of the biggest storms in franchise history.

Knowing a win would cement their status as in the West’s top four with Real Salt Lake’s loss on Saturday, the Timbers faced a Miami side in desperate need of points to keep their distant playoff hopes alive.

Starting without Sebastian Blanco, whose return to fitness was so critical in their revival this fall, and with Diego Valeri suspended for yellow card accumulation, the Timbers lacked a measure of attacking inventiveness in the first half. But Miami was rarely more than ponderous going forward themselves, with the Timbers comfortably defending deep and looking to break with pace.

When Blanco was introduced with a quarter of an hour to go in the second half and no score, the Timbers quickly began to rack up chances. It was thanks only to some excellent emergency defending from Miami’s three center backs, led by Leandro Gonzalez Pirez that the game remained level for as long as it did, and thanks to some very soft defending in the middle of that box that Niezgoda was allowed to freely position himself in the path of a Blanco corner seven minutes from time and nod in the opener.

Miami thought they had equalized just moments later when substitute Julian Carranza headed a cross past Clark, but the goal was ruled out for a push on Dario Zuparic. Miami manager Phil Neville said after the game that his team was “robbed,” and perhaps in a narrow sense, he was right. The whistle on Carranza was soft, one of a number of marginal calls that so often decide close, pedestrian late-season games.

But in a broader sense, his team did not take advantage of the opportunity presented to them in Blanco’s reduced fitness and Valeri’s suspension. They lost the expected goals battle by nearly two and only forced Steve Clark into a pair of notable saves, one on an uninspired Gonzalo Higuain, the other on Brek Shea.

Miami had one more great chance after Carranza’s equalizer was ruled out, deep into stoppage time, but Gonzalez Pirez, outstanding on the other end of the field, sent his open look well wide. That was it. The Timbers are now seven points clear of fifth, on a glide path to hosting a playoff game.

Afterwards, Savarese and Clark were asked about the NWSL. For many of the supporters, the afternoon ended with that subject—and the club’s response to it—foremost in mind. The Timbers Army and the Rose City Riveters are extraordinary in the American sporting landscape for the outspokenness and seriousness with which they take their sociopolitical commitments.

They also, in recent history, have been extraordinary for their effectiveness. The supporters, with the help of others across the MLS, namely in Seattle, stared down the league and won its fight to fly the Iron Front in 2019. The coming fight to hold the organization accountable for its role in perpetuating Riley’s career will, in many ways, be a much bigger challenge.

Paulson’s most enduring trait in a decade-plus as a major league owner, right alongside his passion and inability to stay off Twitter, has been his loyalty to and faith in Wilkinson—a loyalty that has been richly rewarded in on-the-field success.

This scandal is not not going away any time soon. U.S. Soccer and FIFA have opened investigations. The NWSL remains in turmoil, with the Thorns scheduled to play the Houston Dash at home on Wednesday night. Their current manager, Mark Parsons, who is vacating the role in a matter of weeks, has not faced the media since the story broke.

The level of protest at this, a Timbers game, not a Thorns game, made that plain It is as yet unclear what is coming next for Riley and everyone who passed the buck and did the bare minimum instead of stopping him cold. But it is obvious, if there was ever a doubt, that Portland fans are going to keep close score.