The San Jose Earthquakes will come back from Los Angeles with mixed feelings after yesterday's game at Chivas. The result is fair. Chivas dominated most of the game and could have won, but San Jose finished the game in a better shape and almost stole the three points in the final minutes.

Although he was probably hoping to get the three points before the match, Frank Yallop was happy with his team earning one point in a difficult game: "To be honest, on the chances it was pretty even, on the play, I think Chivas played better than us, probably"' he said. We could have stolen it at the end, but for long spells we were not at our best". But what I liked about our night tonight: we didn't crumble, and we stayed in there, and we actually came back in the end and we could have stolen it. So that was encouraging".

Ronnie O'Brien, who almost scored the same goal as last week with a beautiful left footed shot saved by Zach Thornton (Chivas' goalkeeper) 5 minutes before the end, had the same feeling: "We had a couple of chances, but all in all I think for us a draw was a fair result. I think the way we played, we got a draw out of fighting. We didn’t get a draw out of playing extremely well. We hung in there, did what we had to do, so we could’ve stolen it but a point’s decent for us".

However, back in the race for a playoff spot after 2 wins and 7 goals scored in the last two home games, the Earthquakes had given their fans reasons to have high expectations.

Taking a point on the road is never a bad thing but, having lost so many points in the first part of the season, the Earthquakes will now need to do more to have a chance to make the playoffs.

In this perspective, yesterday's result could be seen as a missed opportunity. Chivas was on a negative streak before the game and a win yesterday would have had a immediate consequence: San Jose would have left the last place of the standings to their direct opponent and would have joined Colorado and the LA Galaxy in the 4th position of the Western Conference.

With 3 home games coming in a row, starting next Saturday (August 30th) against the Kansas City Wizards, San Jose will have other opportunities to catch up with the teams just above them in the standings and maybe pass them.

They will need to show a higher level of performance than they did yesterday to take as many points as possible out of these three games. Seven points seems a realistic objective, but it will require the same kind of performances the Quakes produced in their last two home games.

There will then be 3 home games and 3 away games remaining, in which they will need to show they can continue winning at home and also play well far from Buck Shaw.

This may be a lot to ask to an expansion team but the signings of new players and the immediate great performances that followed turned what seemed out of reach just a few weeks ago to a difficult but possible goal to reach. It could be enough to, at least, make the season exciting until the end!

Thierry Heumann (email)

 

Statistics

Attendance: 12,209

Yellow Cards:

SJ: James Riley (Professional Foul, 37'), Jason Hernandez (Reckless Foul, 57'), Ronnie O'Brien (Reckless Foul, 90')

CHV: Shavar Thomas (Reckless Foul, 53')

Stats:

SJ: Shots 14; Shots on Goal 3; Saves 3; Fouls 12; Offsides 2; Corner Kicks 8.

CHV: Shots 11; Shots on goal 3; Saves 3; Fouls 19; Offsides 6; Corner Kicks 1.

Zach Thornton
Kraig Chiles (Alecko Eskandarian, 59')	Jim Curtin	Shavar Thomas	Francisco Mendoza
	Paulo Nagamura
Sacha Kljestan			Johnathan Bornstein
	Jorge Flores (Daniel Paladini, 86')
Atiba Harris		Ante Razov

Asst: Jose Corro	Ref: Richard Heron		Asst: Emiliano Monje
	4th Official: Ramon Hernandez
Arturo Alvarez (Ryan Johnson, 59')		Scott Sealy (Ned Grabavoy, 84')
Darren Huckerby			Ronnie O'Brien
Ramiro Corrales (Kelly Gray, 14')		Francisco Lima
Eric Denton	Nick Garcia (C)	Jason Hernandez	James Riley
Joe Cannon

 

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