It was quite entertaining in the end, a sort of bizarre back and forth between two teams who shouldn’t have needed to win as badly as they did. The eventual result, a 1-1 draw, was also interesting in that it didn’t conjure up any huge emotive in either side.
For Portland, a point on the road is never bad. Leaving New England with a tally would have, at the beginning of the year, been considered a fine achievement. But that was the beginning of the year – before the Revolution’s dramatic tailspin saw them lose nine of ten, and before Portland played themselves into a playoff hole that hardly leaves any wiggle room for missed opportunities.
From that standpoint, it’s very possible that the Timbers season expired with stoppage time ticking away at Gillette Stadium. The games and schedule from here on in get even scarier than the math.
It’s not like the Timbers didn’t have chances – the offside call on Gaston Fernandez’s goal that would have eventually secured three points played into a offside rule gray area that remarkably doesn’t crop up as much as you would think it would. Was Fernandez onside? Probably. But the Timbers had other chances.
It was obvious here how much reliance was placed on Diego Valeri’s goalscoring exploits in the Timbers’ run over the last month – he was off by inches with two golden chances in Foxborough, and the Timbers simply don’t have any other threatening goal-scorers right now.
For the amount of chances Portland created, there is cause for concern. Darlington Nagbe didn’t look himself at all in his forty minutes, and the Timbers have a real forward problem: Fanendo Adi hasn’t scored in nine games since being signed permanently to a sizable designated player contract, while the only thing Maxi Urruti provides to the team besides his hot-and-cold goalscoring streaks are a bad haircut and worse flopping.
So in the end, it all led to Liam Ridgewell’s coast-to-coast, barnstorming run and finish to rescue the situation.
Only Jay Heaps, losing control of his limbs on the Revolution sideline, seemed to realize that Ridgewell was a real threat to score when he skated by two defenders and into the box from a comfy angle virtually untouched. Ridgewell has a vein of attacking prowess – and it should be said a much less scary one than Pa Kah – and it showed here. It made for one of the most memorable goals in Timbers history.
Perhaps best of all was Ridgewell’s log roll celebration shout-out to his Sunday League playing brother. English football hasn’t had that much fun since 1966. Ridgewell is a good time. He’ll do just fine here.
It wasn’t all Timbers – not by any stretch. New England, adopting a shoot on sight policy for most of the match, had their chances too. Charlie Davies’ run and finish to set up the opening goal were sublime – the kind of class everyone knew he was capable of before his tragic car accident in 2009.
For having the most corner kicks in the league, the Revs’ staggering incompetence from those set pieces gave Donovan Ricketts some fine catching practice as he turned out save after save in another in what is now a string of terrific performances.
In front of him, I’m still not sold. Someone is going to have to explain to me exactly how Danny O’Rourke won the right-back job over the perfectly valuable Jack Jewsbury and Jorge Villafana, and while Norberto Paparatto has been solid so far, the thought of him facing Seattle next weekend is particularly frightening, seeing as that’s how it all unraveled for him the first time around.
Paparatto is much more comfortable now after spending the better part of a year in his new country, but a certain lack of limber remains worrying against the likes of Dempsey and Martins.
There have been a ton of goals for both teams in Timbers games this year, and there’s no real reason to think that’s going to change going into the stretch-run.
For Portland to be elite, Valeri has to be great. This was true early in the season, when he was affecting games by pouring in assists and the occasional goal, and it’s been true of the last two months, when he’s been pouring in goals and the occasional assist.
That reliance on one player is worrying. Others picked up the baton when Valeri was staggered with a hernia injury at the end of last season.
The good news here is, at the beginning of the year, the Timbers probably lose this game. The team has gotten better, partially because of sheer will, and partially because familiarity has returned after a frustrating beginning of the year that was full of second-guessing and upheaval.
Caleb Porter, while maybe not rediscovering the swagger he had last year, has taken steps in the right direction. At the beginning of the year, he had no self-awareness and was unable to handle adversity. To put it simply, he’s learned how to lose.
This post-game quote, “First half, I thought we were a bit flat, dug a hole for whatever reason. That’s on me. Coaches are the ones who get their teams ready, and for some reason some guys weren’t ready. So that’s disappointing,” takes responsibility, something we never used to see.
This one, on Fernandez’s wrongly disallowed goal, “I’ll come off as the whiner, but that’s the reality, we should have had it,” shows that new understanding.
That’s encouraging. The last time Seattle came to Portland, Porter was blaming his players, being obnoxious to reporters, and throwing Alvas Powell at the wall and hoping he’d stick. At this point, Porter has gotten a grip. That’s good news.
In the long-run, I think the Timbers will be okay. If we could start the season over with the team and mindset they have now, I think we’re looking at a playoff team. As things are, that might not happen this year.
Yes, Portland came out flat and underestimated New England, and yes, they could have and should have won this game. But the performance and result were fine. Believe it or not, the Timbers’ destiny is very much in their own hands. The benefit of playing in-conference opponents in playoff positions is that six point swings are on the table every week.
Point is, the buck has to stop somewhere – for better or worse. It didn’t stop in New England, for better or worse. This draw just greased the skids of whatever comes next.
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