Search the Community
Showing results for tags 'LA Galaxy'.
-
Hosted by Kevin Laramee @OfftheWoodworkx @KevLaramee http://canadiansoccernews.com http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/off-the-woodwork/id898309206?mt=2 http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/off-the-woodworkx Sports Podcasting Network http://sportspodcastingnetwork.com http://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/otw-studios/id1018126433 http://feeds.feedburner.com/otwstudios Support Kevin and SPN http://patreon.com/sportspodcastingnetwork
- 5 comments
-
It could have been all so different after Ian Christianson was sent crashing in the box as half-time approached and with the game still goalless. Caleb Clarke hit a woeful penalty wide left and the 'Caps were punished when LA took the lead moments later, in the 43rd minute. Carl Robinson always talks about "fine lines" and that was one there in a huge game-swinging two minute spell. "I think it would have made a huge difference," Koch said of Clarke's missed penalty. "We would have been a goal up shortly before half-time and hopefully would have gained some confidence, some momentum and maybe the game would have been better in the second half. "Any time you miss a penalty kick like that, it has huge implications on the game and today it certainly did." LA added a second half penalty of their own, after a harsh handball decision on Craig Nitti, after the ball hit his shoulder, and there was no way back for the 'Caps after that, the closest they came being when LA keeper Clement Diop tipped a Clarke shot onto the post in stoppage time. The game marked the halfway point of the regular season for WFC2 and saw the young 'Caps slump to three straight losses. That in itself is bad enough, but to be scoreless in all of those games will cause further concern. But, onwards and upwards. We'll have a look at the season so far through the eyes of Alan Koch and Carl Robinson later in the week. Next up for the 'Caps is a home Cascadian derby on Sunday against Timbers 2. How Canada's second round match-up against Switzerland at the Women's World Cup will affect the crowd will remain to be seen, but treat your dad for Father's Day if you can and take him along to the match. AFTN photographer Tom Ewasiuk was at WFC2's loss to LA II to capture all the action before, during and after the game and here's his "Story In Pictures", with a full Flickr slideshow at the end. [Also check out Tom's website www.residualimagephotography.com for more of his photos and work]. Ready for battle - the teams come out Oh Canada Victor Blasco was lively early and came close to giving the 'Caps the lead The game marked Marco Bustos' first USL start, and appearance, at home after injury WFC2 get the chance to take the lead after Ian Christianson is sent crashing in the box and the referee points to the spot Caleb Clarke steps up... But hits his 41st minute effort woefully wide And sod's law, LA go up the pitch and take the lead two minutes later after Travis Bowen is left unmarked and heads home Worse is to come in the second half as Craig Nitti is wrongly adjudged to have handled after this shot which hits his shoulder And Aeriel Lassiter makes no mistake from the spot to make it 2-0 LA in the 60th minute The 'Caps try to get back into it, switching to a 3-5-2 formation, but Blasco is thwarted again Others try but there is just no way past Clement Diop And it finished WFC2 0 LA Galaxy II 2 You can see more photos from the match (and of dogs!) in the Flickr slideshow below:
- 2 comments
-
- vancouver whitecaps
- wfc2
-
(and 4 more)
Tagged with:
-
REPORT: Los Angeles Galaxy's last defeat at the StubHub Center came on March 8th last year in a 1-0 First Kick defeat to Real Salt Lake. That was 29 games and counting, in all competitions, as Vancouver Whitecaps headed to Carson, California. 'Caps coach Carl Robinson has said post match that records are made to be broken, so why couldn't it be them? No reason at all as it turned out. Kekuta Manneh's 32nd minute strike was the difference between the two teams on the night, but Vancouver had the far better chances throughout, hitting on the counter and squandering their opportunities to win by a few. That's still a concern, but that's also for another time. After making six changes to his starting line-up for the midweek loss in Montreal, Robinson returned his big hitters for this one, against a weakened, but still strong, LA side. The home side had the better of the early going without creating any real threat to David Ousted's goal. Goalmouth action in general was hard to come by, with both defences mopping up whatever was coming towards them. The game needed a spark. It came in the 32nd minute and opened the scoring for Vancouver. Manneh collected the ball inside his own half, playing it forward to Octavio Rivero who took a few touches before playing it back out wide to the winger. The Gambian had been a handful for the Galaxy defence to start the match and gave them more trouble, cutting inside of a backing off Omar Gonzalez before firing home past Brian Rowe from the edge of the box. The young speedster was having an impressive game, both in attack and with a strong defensive shift, and he nearly set Cristian Techera up for the second with four minutes of the half remaining, but the Uruguayan fierce strike was touched off the near post by Rowe. A strong first half by Vancouver, and keeping themselves tight in the second was now the key. As it turned out, LA didn't really look all that threatening in the final third and Vancouver continued to have the best chances, just not taking them and killing the game off. Manneh had a chance to add a second ten minutes into the second half, when he sprung the Galaxy defence, but his first touch let him down and allowed Rowe to come out quickly and block the danger. Robbie Keane came close moments later, as you wondered how costly a miss Manneh's could be. But there was more, and worse, to come! Sub Alan Gordon came within inches of getting his toe on a dangerous Stefan Ishizaki ball across goal in the 63rd minute, in a lucky escape for the 'Caps. As LA pressed, Vancouver should have made it two in the 72nd minute on a quick counter-attack. Rivero received a pass from Pedro Morales just inside the 'Caps half, easily turned Leonardo and bore down on goal on a two-on-one break with the 'Caps captain. With Rowe narrowing the angle, the Uruguayan made the perfect pass inside to Morales but the Chilean could only look on in anguish as his shot crashed off the left post with the goal gaping. The rebound fell to Rivero but took an awkward bounce and LA cleared the danger. The Galaxy nearly made them pay, but Keane was unable to connect on a long ball forward. It was deja vu with seven minutes remaining when Rivero found himself on another two-on-one break, this time with sub Darren Mattocks, but the strikers ball inside was too hard for the Jamaican to get on to. A concerning as the misses are, it wasn't to matter and the Caps held on for a historic win. Vancouver now go into a bye week and two weeks rest until their next match away to New York Red Bulls on June 20th. It just got a lot more enjoyable for them. Psychologically, this result could be massive. FINAL SCORE: Los Angeles Galaxy 0 - 1 Vancouver Whitecaps ATT: 20,219 LOS ANGELES: Brian Rowe; Oscar Sorto, Omar Gonzalez, Leonardo, Baggio Husidic; Stefan Ishizaki, Juninho, Mika Vayrynen (Kenney Walker 56), Ignacio Maganto (Sebastian Lletget 75); Robbie Keane, Edson Buddle (Alan Gordon 60) [subs Not Used: Andrew Wolverton, A.J. DeLaGarza, Tommy Meyer, Rafael Garcia] VANCOUVER: David Ousted; Steven Beitashour, Kendall Waston, Pa Modou Kah, Jordan Harvey; Matias Laba (Russell Teibert 75), Gershon Koffie, Cristian Techera, Pedro Morales (Darren Mattocks 80), Kekuta Manneh (Mauro Rosales 75); Octavio Rivero [subs Not Used: Paolo Tornaghi, Christian Dean, Nicolás Mezquida, Robert Earnshaw] REACTION: VANCOUVER WHITECAPS On how it feels to get the win tonight: "It feels very good; it feels very nice after a long road trip in Montreal on Wednesday and then coming here against the champs, 29 games unbeaten. I challenged them before the game, I said 'you got to believe you can do it', because I firmly believed we could, and I was proved right." On the play of Kekuta Manneh tonight: "I thought he was excellent, if you look and see what he does off the ball well, his movement, his patterns are getting better, on the defensive side he is getting better and obviously he could have maybe scored another goal or two because he got through once or twice and his touch let him down. With all young players, they make mistakes, it is important you work with them and you continue to evolve with them and we will continue to do that with him. Octavio [Rivero] put two on a plate, one for Pedro [Morales] which he hit the post, Cristian [Techera] was a constant threat, and then Mauro came on and showed passing range as well. I am delighted for the boys because we put a lot of work in this week." On the performance of the defence tonight: "Excellent, really really was positive with them, because if you do you jobs correctly, individually and collectively then you have a chance to win any game and you rely on your forwards to take chances. Kendall and Pa were excellent, we know Los Angeles likes to attack the fullbacks and get width that way, you have to defend your box and we did that very well today. All of the guys in the locker room deserve a huge pat on the back for their performance tonight." On moving forward after this win: [On TSN radio] "It's important that we keep a perspective on this. We'll keep our feet ground. I don't get too excited when we get a really, really good result and I don't get too beat up when we don't get a very good result. What's important to me is performance. Over the first period of this season, our performance levels have been pretty high for three quarters of the time. When we come back I've got to make sure that we can kick on again because the quality and belief in the squad, if it continues to improve on a daily basis, on a weekly basis, then we'll hopefully get to where we want to get to." KEKUTA MANNEH On the team's performance tonight: "I thought it was great, we played as a team like we always want to. It was a great result, we have never won here I heard, so it was a good win for us going into the break and we can put our feet up and relax. It was a really good win for us." On matching up with Omar Gonzalez: "The first time I took him outside, second one I took him inside and on the goal he probably didn't know where I was going to go. I talked about it with the coaching staff and the players, they told me 'you have a lot of potential', but you have to learn the game, go in and out on the defenders and it will be difficult for defenders to predict where you are going to go, so that is what I did. The first two opened up the goal. I had made up my mind, talking with the coaches since last year, just have the ball on your feet, make your mind up, decide what you are going to do before you have the ball and that is what I have been working on and finally pulled it off today." On getting the victory going into a bye week: "It's really big, like I said we had never won here so it was extra joy for us, but it is a really good win. I don't know where we are standing on the table but I think we are up there now, it is a good win, we can have a week off and everybody go where everybody want to go and then come back and get ready for New York." MAURO ROSALES On the match tonight: "I am obviously very about the team and how we worked, that kind of game makes us think how good this team can be, we just have to believe in this team and believe in the work that we do every day to become a good team. The Los Angeles Galaxy, and this stadium, and their fans, they had a 29 game unbeaten streak, it was a very good game for us, and the motivation was perfect for us. I have high praise for the guys and collectively we were very sharp and focused. We did what we had to do to win this game, and we did what we need to do to win these kinds of games in this environment. If we want to become a very good team, we have to win games like this, so I am very happy for the team." On rebounding from the game on Wednesday: "We took many positive things from Wednesday, it obviously wasn't the result that we wanted, but we came here with the same mentality, just play in a way to be focused, be together, try to work, and we fought to the end. We did the same in Montreal but we couldn't hold the result last minute, so there were a lot of positive things and I am really happy for the team." On winning before the break: "Knowing what we did today, we have to come after the break with the same mentality, with the same willingness to go and commit to become a good team. This is the halfway point of the season, but nothing is going to be OK if we just take everything we have done up to this moment and throw it away. We need to keep moving forward, we need to keep moving to the level that we want to be at and everybody knows that. Everybody obviously is going to take a rest, we had too many games and we need that break and it is going to help us charge our batteries for the last part of the season." LA GALAXY BRUCE ARENA On having zero shots on goal: “I don’t think it was from a lack of effort, we should have shot a few more times. They did a good job, got a lot of players behind the ball, made it tough in and around the penalty area to their credit.” On tonight’s match: “Conceding that goal in the first half, it was tailor made for their team. The way they play, and with their speed on the counter, and we gave away a ball in our middle third of the field and they got a goal. They certainly did a very good job having good numbers behind the ball, and countering us in the second half. We had some chances to have a little bit better quality, perhaps create a few dangerous chances, but we fell short.” On Vancouver’s centre of defence: “They played well. Obviously they are very good in the air and they dominated us there. We weren’t good enough on the ball to play around them.” On Robbie Keane’s fitness: “Well he is just coming back from being away for two months. I think we’re doing the best we can; it’s been a little bit of a patchwork job in the first half of the season. That’s unfortunate, but that’s the way it goes. No excuses, but we’re a little bit short handed in a lot of the spots on the field and it shows with some of our quality. He’d probably tell you that the last 20 minutes were pretty rough for him. We had to be aggressive with our substitutions to try and get a goal. I decided to keep Robbie out there. It might have been a little too much for him, but it’s probably good for him to get the 90 minutes in.” On Kekuta Manneh: “He was pretty much their dangerous player in the first half. A couple times, he burned us and we got caught on the goal. He is a good player. Perhaps we could have been a little bit better on a few of those plays. We stopped him a couple times, but the goal, give him credit. He did well to get the goal.” ROBBIE KEANE On having zero shots on goal: “We didn’t play obviously as well as we had too. They played well, give them credit. The game plan’s to stop the balls in the middle. Go through the middle. They defended well so full credit to them, they deserved to win the game” On Vancouver: “They have pace. When you’ve got pace like that, it very hard for defenders. Especially with someone who is quick with the ball. It’s hard to defend against so they did that very well.” On inconsistent season: “We’re still in there, so it’s no crisis. We’re inconsistent, but we’re still there in the pack which is the most important considering the inconsistency that we’ve been playing. So as long as we’re there, and everybody gets fit, more minutes that people get on the field, and all the players that come in, I think you’ll see a different Galaxy side. But full credit to the players that have been working their socks off, it’s been a difficult few months. But the players are showing a lot of character. Even tonight, we kept pushing and pushing to get that goal, it didn’t happen. Naturally, when you do that, of course they are going to get chances on the counterattack.” OMAR GONZALEZ On losing against Vancouver twice this season: “I thought they were very organized. I though tonight they played very well. They came here with a set tactic and they played it very well where they got everyone behind the ball. They clogged holes, we couldn’t find Robbie [Keane], we couldn’t find Edson [buddle], and we were just going side trying to open them up but they shifted as a team very well and didn’t allow us to break them up too much. Unlucky on a pass and [Kekuta] Manneh picks it up and just takes off and I tried to take him to the outside and he just cut inside really quickly and got a shot off and that’s how that goal happened.” On Kekuta Manneh’s play: “I know he likes to cut inside so I made sure to take him outside and close the angle but there was a time where he was more central so I was vulnerable to both sides and I allowed him to cut inside a bit more and that’s why he was able to get open on that shot.” On whether Manneh is the fastest player in MLS: “[He is] definitely one of them. He is up there with [Fabian] Castillo, fast with the ball. There’s a few guys in this league who are very fast without the ball and also with the ball and those guys are very dangerous.” On Vancouver’s counter attacks in second half: “The reason why they got so many counter attacks later in the second half is because we’re just going for broke. It’s either going to be 1-1, or 3-0. We wanted to tie the game so we have to take chances and we took chances by sending players forward and we just kept on losing the ball. We didn’t have the quality up front tonight and so we kept on coughing it up and they kept on going on counters. It’s a tale of us not being sharp enough and them making the most of our mistakes.” On getting no shots on goal tonight: “Obviously we had a tough one. I think it was a long month of May. Maybe guys were a bit tired and we just have to bounce back, I know we will, and it’s going to be a tough game in Columbus. Long travel and we just have to bite down and just grind another win." STEFAN ISHIZAKI On Vancouver: “I know that they were going to play on the counter, and they did. They didn’t have many chances in the game, but they got the goal and that’s all that counts in this game. They are very, very tight. Especially in the center of the field; they are playing with a tight back four and then two guys sitting in front. It made it really hard to find our strikers and really get any possession centrally on their field. We didn’t play the ball fast enough to the wings and we didn’t cross it early enough. Especially in the first half, we played a little bit too slow. We played better in the second half and penetrated them a little, and we did have chances even though we didn’t have any shots on goal, we did have our chances. With a little bit more luck, we could have scored, and maybe even gone for a second goal. But I give credit to them; they played a good game and tactically very smart." On tonight’s match: “I thought we did well the second half. We switched it, and we had a couple of crosses. But obviously sometimes you can’t just cross it in the area because they have two big men there centrally. [Kendall] Waston and [Pa-Modou] Kah are big guys who are really good at heading the ball. But I thought we had a couple of good chances and Ignacio beat his man a couple of times, went down the line. I did a combination plays with Keane a couple of times, and I went around my guy a couple of times. We were a lot more dangerous the second half.”
- 2 comments
-
- Vancouver Whitecaps
- LA Galaxy
- (and 6 more)
-
Have a listen! You can listen to this, and all previous, episodes of the podcast on iTunes HERE. Or download it for your later listening delight HERE. We also have an iPhone app, so you can now add our podcast to your phone as an app. Visit the podcast's mobile site HERE and then at the bottom of the screen just click the "Quick Launch" icon and the podcast will be added to your home screen and appear as an app. And if that's not enough, we're on Stitcher Radio Network. Download the app and listen to the AFTN podcast on your device, along with over 20,000 other shows HERE. Or after all that, you could just listen on the player below!
- 1 comment
-
- vancouver whitecaps
- la galaxy
- (and 5 more)
-
THE GOOD Laba and Teibert's domination of pitch If you where only listening to the game on the radio you wouldn't even have known Robbie Keane was playing. He was invisible all game long. Other than a few touches far away from the goal, he wasn't a factor at all this game. Teibert was in his pocket all game long. Didn't give him any breathing room at all. If the ball was heading to Keane, Teibert made sure he was on him and making just enough contact to not get a foul but enough for Keane to be frustrated. At one point Keane went to the ref and started whining about the contact that he was facing all match. With all the effort Teibert was putting in stopping Keane it gave Laba the chance to clean up everything else through the middle of the pitch. He was his world class self being tough on tackles and breaking up passes all game. These two together are forming a great partnership and moving forward, they will only get better with the more minutes they are to play as a dynamic duo. THE AVERAGE Quality Finishing Another game where the Whitecaps could have easily had double the amount of goals they actually got. If they were firing on all cylinders the game could easily have been three or four-nothing. Even with the four game winning streak, this team can still get better. They have weak spots, need a winger and need more from their right-back. With the arrival of Cristian Techera this week, this only means more speed, pace and firepower for this exciting to watch Whitecaps team. At the current pace this team is on pace for 48 goals this season. That is way below the 55-60 that Carl Robinson has stated he expects out of his side this year. THE BAD Steven Beitashour's a step too slow Game after game we see Beitashour getting caught out of position way too often. He is either too far up the pitch and getting beat over the top, or too far in the middle of the pitch and getting bested too easily down the wing. For a player of his salary, and in MLS that matters, he needs to be better. He has struggled a bit ever since he returned from the World Cup playing for Iran. With such a dominant performance by the whole team it was easy to notice some off the hiccups that Beitashour had during the game.
-
- vancouver whitecaps
- mls
- (and 5 more)
-
REPORT (by Steve Pandher): They didn’t leave it as late as most have come to expect, but Vancouver Whitecaps won their fourth straight beating the defending MLS Cup Champions LA Galaxy 2-0. It was Kekuta Manneh who opened the scoring with his first while Octavio Rivero collected his fourth of the season and David Ousted earned his third cleansheet. It was a dominating first half by the Whitecaps as they controlled the flow of the match and had the advantage in possession. Unfortunately they weren’t able to finish and the best opportunity came from Pedro Morales early on, who spun from his mark inside box but directed the ball right at the keeper. The second half started more promising for the Galaxy with a little more possession and an attempt from distance by Juninho. It was to be the Whitecaps who struck first in the 56th minute when Kekuta Manneh opened up his account for 2015 to give the Caps the lead. After collecting the ball, Morales made a perfect reverse pass into the path of Manneh who took on Meyer, turning him, before depositing the ball inside the near post. The sellout crowd at B.C. Place only needed to wait another ten minutes to see their team double the lead as Octavio Rivero scored his fourth goal in five MLS starts. After taking the ball from Rivero, Nicolas Mezquida made it to the byeline where he sent the ball into the six yard area. Jaime Penedo was able to get a hand on it but he sent it right to Rivero who had an easy finish from in close. Despite being up by two and seemingly in full control, the Caps continued their attack and tried to get that third. The final ten minutes saw Hurtado, Mattocks and Morales make runs down the wing and attempt to completely kill off the game but found Penedo standing tall. They didn’t need that goal as they closed out the Galaxy and ended the night at the top of the table of both the Western Conference and all of MLS. Vancouver will not have much time to enjoy this win as they return to B.C. Place for the their first midweek match against the Columbus Crew on Wednesday, looking to make it five straight wins. FINAL SCORE: Vancouver Whitecaps 2 - 0 Los Angeles Galaxy ATT: 21,000 (sell out) VANCOUVER: David Ousted; Steve Beitashour, Kendall Waston, Pa-Modou Kah, Sam Adekugbe; Russell Teibert, Matías Laba, Nicolas Mezquida (Deybi Flores 82‘), Pedro Morales, Kekuta Manneh (Darren Mattocks 78‘); Octavio Rivero (Erik Hurtado 86‘) [substitutes not used: Paolo Tornaghi, Tim Parker, Jordan Harvey, Robert Earnshaw] LOS ANGELES: Jaime Penedo; A.J. DeLaGarza, Omar González, Tommy Meyer (Alan Gordon 78‘), Todd Dunivant (Edson Buddle 64‘); Stefan Ishizaki, Juninho, Mika Väyrynen (Robbie Rogers 40‘), Baggio Husidic; Gyasi Zardes, Robbie Keane [substitutes not used: Brian Rowe, Dan Gargan, Rafael Garcia, Ignacio Maganto] MATCH STATS: Shots: Vancouver 18 - LA 6 Shots on Goal: Vancouver 9 - LA 1 Saves: Vancouver 1 - LA 7 Fouls: Vancouver 6 - LA 10 Offsides: Vancouver 3 - LA 1 Corners: Vancouver 1 - LA 4 REACTION: VANCOUVER WHITECAPS CARL ROBINSON Thoughts on the match: “We scored two goals in the second half. I thought we played very well in the first half without capitalizing on our chances created. We couldn’t hit the target. It was like shooting practice without a goal. The second half we were a little bit more clinical.” Big win for the team: “It’s one game for us. It’s important that we won because we won last week, and we probably didn’t play as well as we should have or could have. Not from the fault of any of the guys. They don’t go out there and try to perform badly, but that happens sometimes. Their levels aren’t what they should be, and I asked them for a response today. After 45 minutes and it was nil-nil, I was a little bit worried because we were playing well, but it’s about winning. We managed to get two goals against the best team. Say what you want, they are the best team. They prove it year in and year out. They have some of the best players. It was a good result for us, but it was one game. We’ll enjoy it tonight because tomorrow it’s gone. We have a big game on Wednesday.” Thoughts on stopping Keane and Zardes: “You can’t give good players space. I spoke all week about Robbie especially, how smart he is at getting into pockets. He can destroy teams on his own, and we wanted to make sure that didn’t happen. We did a lot of work with Mati and Rusty, and I thought both of them were absolutely fantastic. They were great with their tactical understanding. If you limit their space and time, and don’t allow them to get shots, we’ll have a chance to win the game.” Thoughts on Kekuta Manneh: “I told Kekuta he had done very well in the first half without hitting the target. I told him in the second half that he needed to stay positive and hit the target, and he did so it was a good performance. I think he has shown over the past couple of weeks glimpses of it, but for 70-odd minutes he was outstanding today.” Thoughts on bringing in Deybi Flores: “Warm-up players were excellent today. I think we deserve the three points. It was probably Mezquida’s best game for the club. The way he drifted. The way he found pockets of space. He set-up the second goal with a little bit of magic, and I wanted to bring a little bit of energy in that area, so I put Deybi on. He was full of energy. He could have probably had a goal or two himself, so yeah, it was promising from him.” Thoughts on team confidence: “Yeah, I think they have to feel good about themselves. As I said we put up a great performance against the best team. What we have to do since last year is be more consistent, then we become a very good team. I don’t want to be a good team one week, and a very poor team the next two or three weeks. It’s about consistency, but with young players, you don’t always have consistency. My job, and my staff’s job, is to get it more consistent than not. That’s part of our focus here, but as I said, we’ll enjoy it, but it’s just one game. It’s another game off the calendar, but we have two massive game coming up with the first game on Wednesday against a very good Columbus team.” Thoughts on Kah and Waston: “People talk about goal-scorers and finding goal-scorers, but I think the centre back position is the hardest one to find on any team. When you find a good one, or good ones, it’s important you get them on your team and get them on to your squad, and develop them. We’ve been very fortunate, obviously with bringing in Kendall mid-way through last year, and Kah coming in at the beginning of this year, replacing Andy O’Brien, another top experience player, and bringing in Diego as well. I still have Timmy Parker and Christian Dean. I’m happy with all five centre backs I have, and I’ll carry all five centre backs. You need five centre backs all season. They’ve started off very well. Diego’s missed the last two games, and he’s back in the fold on Wednesday.” Thoughts on team playing well right now: “I just challenge them. I see it on a daily basis. They are really good players. They’ve got a really talented group in here, but as I said, it’s about consistency. When you train Monday to Friday, I want them to train hard and get that winning mentality, that competitiveness between themselves. And if you do that Monday to Friday, then it’ll come out on Saturday. I see them play during the week and they are outstanding. Sometimes we’ll get it right and sometimes we won’t, as we’ve seen in the past two weeks, but it’s important when you don’t get it right, you grind out victories, but we got it right today. We played very well. We have to start believing in our good players because everyone can talk you up, but it’s about playing consistently and doing it over a period of time.” DAVID OUSTED Thoughts on tonight’s defence: “The centre backs played fantastic. They cleared almost everything today. One of your esteemed colleagues told me I didn’t have much to do today and he was right. I had an easy night because we did great defensive work.” On the early season success: “There’s definitely confidence in the locker room. There’s also knowledge that we need to be even better every time we go in. When people are going to play the Whitecaps, they are going to say, “They’re really good and we need to beat them.” So we need to be even better and we need to work even harder if we want to keep ourselves up there. It starts on Wednesday with a game at home again.” On Kekuta Manneh’s goal: “It was fantastic. He’s done it all week in training. We know he can do it. It’s fantastic to see him get what he deserves from all the hard work today.” On Octavio Rivero’s offensive output: “I’m actually not surprised. He’s been known all along as an excellent striker and he’s shown he’s working hard and he’s believing in himself and now, he’s getting his goals.” On containing the LA Galaxy offence: “They’re a really good team. Normally, they’re good at breaking teams down and it’s a testament to what we did defensively today – not just the back four but midfield and up front, getting in those right areas and getting around their dangerous players. I think we did tremendous today.” KENDALL WASTON Thoughts on the match: “It was very important for us to win today. Last game was a good game and today we were able to continue the good pace. Thank god we won. Now, this game is over, we have to think only of Columbus.” On the defensive strategy against LA Galaxy strikers Robbie Keane and Gyasi Zardes: “We just wanted to be close to them. They like to play between each other. The team today was very compact. We kept the ball so that gave us a second breath. That helped a lot because we had a lot of good possessions. Today we did the things that we didn’t do last game so obviously, today was a better game for us. We scored two good goals and that is very important for us.” On Kekuta Manneh’s recent play: “He’s a very important player for us. He’s a young guy that wants to reach the top level. I think he’s improving every day and he wants to get better. Today was a nice goal for him because in the last games, he got others opportunities when he couldn’t score, so today we’re very happy for him that he could score.” On getting the crowd pumped: “Sometimes we just need the people to get into it. This thing is a group thing – us players, the staff, the fans, we are together and we want to make history together, that’s why I did that.” PEDRO MORALES Thoughts on the match: “It was a very important game. The whole team played very well. It was a very good tactical performance. We had more possessions tonight than the last game. It’s important to win here in our house and now have a four-game winning streak. We have another important game on Wednesday.” On Coach Carl Robinson’s post-game message: “Coach Carl Robinson told me we needed to play defence better in the middle and that won’t be a problem for this team. I feel happy when we play like this, when we move the ball. We’ll enjoy this game and now just wait for the next game on Wednesday, and hopefully we get another win.” LA GALAXY BRUCE ARENA Talk about the result: “They were the better team all night, they outplayed us the entire match. They outcompeted us form the start and it was a big factor in the game, give them credit, they outplayed us in every aspect of the game.” What can you take from this game: “Can’t take anything good. Personally every player can look at their performance and make sure it doesn’t happen again.” The attack wasn’t really good: “We didn’t do anything well tonight, no excuses.” How much better is this Whitecaps FC team than the one you saw last year: “Who knows, you don’t know anything this early in a season. Ask me that question in August and I’d hopefully have an answer for you. Right now they have four wins in five games, that’s real positive.” What do you think of Rivero: “Good player, good player.” Slow start, is there enough time to bounce back: “We have what 30 more games, 29 more games. There’s a chance to bounce back.” A.J. DELAGARZA Thoughts on the match: “I don’t think we created many chances, the final third all the way up from me could’ve been better the entire night. We gave up two goals on a night you’re not going to win many games away from home like that.” Was their speed an issue, especially going against Manneh: “I don’t think they really used him [Manneh] too much, except on the counter attacks and you saw that’s when he got his goal. Then we went to three backs and you’re dealing with Manneh, Mattocks, and Hurtado all guys with pretty good pace coming at you, Omar and I were on three on two quite a few times.” Is there anything you can take from the game? “There’s not much you can take from this game, we just got outplayed, outworked and I think all the way around any guy won their battle tonight.” How do you rebound from tonight with Seattle coming home? “We're at home, we know what we can do there. If we can’t get points on the road we have to win every single game at home. Start with Seattle then we play Kansas City after that. These are as big games as you can have six games into the year.” GYASI ZARDES Thoughts on the match: “I could talk about myself, my teammates they were good today. I felt like was multiple times I wasn’t a threat going forward, got be a threat, got to put the defenders on their heels when I’m playing up top or out wide.” Do you think the offence isn’t clicking right now: “It’s early, a bunch of us left with our national team, our attacking forwards, it’s hard to come back and just get in the groove of it, but then again there’s no excuses we didn’t show up.” Is it about regaining a sharpness: “This week we’re going to work on our chemistry, just getting the ball moving. Usually we outplay teams, we don’t let other teams touch the ball, although tonight we let Vancouver catch a rhythm.” The team got run over a bit tonight: “Yeah this team is very fast on the counter attack, when we lost the ball they were already running away with it.” Slow start again this season: “To be honest we’re one of those teams, we have a lot of veteran players. Last year I think we even started out worse than this year. It’s a long season and we’re going to move and stride forward. I feel okay with the team coming forward.” What did Vancouver do to make it difficult: “They had a lot of numbers back. A back line of four, they didn’t really go up, their wing backs stayed tucked in it was good on their part. Their defensive midfielders who come back and helped, he didn’t push to far up the field.” ROBBIE KEANE Thoughts on the match: “We have to give them a lot of credit, they were the better team there’s no question about that, they outplayed us.” Does the chemistry need to get better: “They played better than us, it’s not about chemistry. Tonight that obviously wasn’t there but you know it wasn’t because we weren’t trying, it was the fact that they were the better team.” Is it a good wakeup call this early in the season: “It seems to happen to us a lot at the start of the season. Start off very very slow and then end up kicking on and then winning it, hopefully that will be the case again.” What did Vancouver do: “Nothing, they just played better than us, they were the better team all around. They kept the ball, they counter attacked very very well and at the end of the night they scored two goals. You just have to hold your hands up and accept we weren’t good enough tonight and they were the better team.” Is it a different Vancouver team? “Yeah completely. If you look at the squad now they have that Carl has inherited it’s his own team now. Before it wasn’t really his own team, it was from previous managers. This is 100% Carl’s team, as good a manager as he is, it was a matter of time before he had a good good team and that’s what they were tonight.”
-
- vancouver whitecaps
- mls
- (and 5 more)
-
Have a listen! You can listen to this week's podcast on iTunes HERE. Or download it for your later listening delight HERE. We also have an iPhone app, so you can now add our podcast to your phone as an app. Visit the podcast's mobile site HERE and then at the bottom of the screen just click the "Quick Launch" icon and the podcast will be added to your home screen and appear as an app. And if that's not enough, we've joined Stitcher Radio Network. Download the app and listen to the AFTN podcast on your device, along with over 15,000 shows HERE. Or after all that, you could just listen on the player below!
- 1 comment
-
- vancouver whitecaps
- mls
- (and 8 more)