PORTLAND, Ore. – In many ways, Sporting Kansas City represent the Portland Timbers’ season in a nutshell.
The Timbers have not scored a goal against Sporting, their Thursday opponent in the Knockout Round of the Audi 2015 MLS Cup Playoffs (10 pm ET; UniMás in US, TSN 1/4/5 in Canada), in three games this season – underscoring Portland’s season-long goalscoring issues.
But that’s not the full story.
Portland have also limited Sporting to just one goal in those three games, another microcosm of their 2015 regular season, this time emblematic of their status as one of the league’s best defensive teams.
Moreover, in the last two games against Sporting, Portland created plenty of chances: 18 shots in a scoreless draw Sept. 9 and 17 in a 1-0 loss on Oct. 3. Overall, Portland led the league in chances created.
“They’ve had success against us by being conservative, by being organized and by not letting us break them down,” Timbers head coach Caleb Porter said. “But we’ve created a lot of chances against this team; we just didn’t finish.”
Therein lies Portland’s reason for optimism heading into the match at Providence Park.
The goals have flowed in their last two matches. Portland beat the LA Galaxy 5-2 on Oct. 18, then the Colorado Rapids 4-1 on Sunday to give them three straight wins since their 1-0 loss to Sporting and to finish the season as the third seed in the Western Conference.
Porter and Timbers players have labeled that Sporting loss as a wake-up call, forcing them into a must-win mentality to even qualify for the playoffs.
“I like where we’re at right now in terms of confidence in goalscoring,” Porter said. “We’ve been creating all year, we lead the league in shots, but now finally we’re getting rewarded by getting goals. It’s all starting to bounce our way, and it couldn’t come at a better time. Momentum is huge going into the playoffs.
“Things come around in this sport. Sometimes it’s cruel in the short term, but it always tends to come around if you continue to earn the right for it to come around.”
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Whether that will translate into a flipped script against Kansas City this time around is anybody’s guess.
“It doesn’t mean we’re going to be able to break them down,” center back Nat Borchers said. “We’re hoping to create some more chances against them, but we haven’t scored against them, and that’s a credit to them and their defensive shape.”
Also up in the air is the status of defensive midfielder Diego Chara, who Porter said is a question mark after he was forced to come off injured in the second half of the Rapids match. Jack Jewsbury, who missed the previous two matches with an injury of his own, replaced Chara.
Team captain Will Johnson, who has missed the last five games after having screws removed from the surgically repaired bone in his leg, is also a question mark. He was included in the game-day roster against Colorado but did not play.
Dan Itel covers the Timbers for MLSsoccer.com.
