General Soccer Thread

[MrSaigon]

2100 (of 4900) paid attendees at the Chivas USA match.
Who needs a soccer team? Florida? San Diego?

[thrill]

2100 (of 4900) paid attendees at the Chivas USA match.
Who needs a soccer team? Florida? San Diego?

San Antonio or Orlando.
Recent expansion has proven that if you can draw in the minor leagues, you'll draw in MLS (Seattle, Portland, Montreal, Vancouver).

They need new owners first.

[MrSaigon]

Thriller in Portland for the opener, but I have no report because I'm out of country. Sadmoticon (on that count, at least). Porter's style is quite attractive, even on a crappy stream. And our new Argentine looks fantastic. Hopefully our defense is alright.

[robbotis]

Thriller in Portland for the opener, but I have no report because I'm out of country. Sadmoticon (on that count, at least). Porter's style is quite attractive, even on a crappy stream. And our new Argentine looks fantastic. Hopefully our defense is alright.

It was quite the game. I was impressed w/ the Timbers pressure, the entire second half.

[thrill]

Sai, your guy Caleb Porter has a little bit of the Mourinho in him when it comes to the press.
http://goal.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/0 ... d=tw-share

I guess that makes Petke, Benitez. Sorry, Petke.

[MrSaigon]

I guess neither coach is incorrect, but Porter is righter. Portland's fortunate goals came in the midst of near constant possession and pressure. New York's gifts may have come during a time while Portland was still looking for their marbles, but they were both very blunderous and not well-earned. I suppose Porter didn't need to say as much, and obviously both statistics and gameplay are affected by the road team getting a two-goal lead, but Portland put a dress on NYRB and made them their [expletive] in the second half, and Silvestre could hardly have given NY two better opportunities if he tried.

[MrSaigon]

I'm enjoying this Timbers team a lot, but I don't really understand how our defense is going to work in this system. Our defensive midfielders (Chara and Johnson, who are good) are going to have to be flawless, or our CBs (and even they bolt forward sometimes) are going to have to be superhuman. Hopefully it just looks super scary right now while we're still putting things together. It's pretty terrifying when we turn it over while moving forward right now, especially if it comes from the central midfielders because there's no help ahead of the backline--which consists of 2 at that point.

[thrill]

Think you're in for a rough afternoon, Sai. Seattle v Portland on NBC sports in 20 min for any casual fans who want to see what MLS is capable of becoming.

[MrSaigon]

I thought I was in for a long afternoon, too. Good day. Looked pretty good, controlled possession, looked more dangerous than the Sounders. They'll probably get it going, but Seattle didn't look very good, and playing Martins just seems stupid to me.

My rant up above bore fruit again. Turnovers in the middle are killing us. Opponents are scoring on more than 25% of their shots.

But I like this team a lot. A goal in the 90th to earn a draw on the road? Not the kind of thing we did the last two years. Actually invert that; concede a goal at home in the 90th to lose a result, and you have a common thread from last year.

[MrSaigon]

Op-Ed on the impact of the Timbers in Portland. The Oregonian was somewhat critical of the claims Paulson made about the impact MLS would make when seeking financing for the park. I'm not a fan of publicly-financed sporting arenas, but this is interesting.

http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index ... cart_river