Disappointing. It was a word heard often in the San Jose Earthquakes dressing room following their season opening 1-0 loss to the New England Revolution, played in front of a sellout crowd at Buck Shaw Stadium.
"It's really frustrating, very disappointing on so many levels," goalkeeper Joe Cannon said. "Great crowd with the weather, and they deserve better. And I thought we deserved better. It was not a case of (the Revolution) saving balls off the line, or their 'keeper having a great game, it was us missing the goal. We've got to do better on that end."
The Earthquakes controlled the run of play, and outshot New England 16-7 on the night, but they didn't really test Revolution goalkeeper Matt Reis.
"You know, we're disappointed," Darren Huckerby said. "I thought we were the only team really attacking. You can't say we were unlucky because we had our chances; it just wasn't our day today. To create five, six, seven good chances, that's what you're aiming to do in a game. It's up to us to finish our chances when we get them. If we took our chances, we would've won comfortably today."
Said Quakes head coach Frank Yallop: "It was a tough night for us. What we didn't want, really, was coming out and not winning our first game at home. It's very disappointing."
A light rain made for a slippery surface on Saturday night, but the Earthquakes didn't use that as an excuse for their offensive struggles.
"I think we moved the ball quite well at times on a difficult surface," Yallop said. "We did everything we needed to do to give our strikers a chance to score goals, and (a shutout loss) is tough to take."
The Earthquakes best chance came at the half-hour mark, when Arturo Alvarez's left-footed blast from the top of the arc was saved by Reis. The rebound fell to Cam Weaver, who slammed his shot off the crossbar.
"Cam's chance in the first half, he should have scored, really," Yallop said. "He was seven yards out when he hit the bar. Not often you get that (chance) in a game, and you've got to hit the target."
New England's goal came 10 minutes after intermission, when Jeff Larentowicz chipped a long ball into the box that Kelly Gray tried to flick away. Instead it fell to Kheli Dube racing down the left side, and he slotted a shot past Cannon and inside the left post.
"It was a little unfortunate," Yallop said of the goal. "Kelly's just trying to get a head on it and hit it out, and it goes over (to Dube) and he finishes it well."
San Jose had plenty of chances to score an equalizer, but couldn't find the net.
"The effort was there," Yallop said, "but the quality around goal was what was lacking. We were a little bit hurried when we should be a bit calmer."
Late in the game, the Earthquakes looked to score when Huckerby's cross found Pablo Campos open at the six-yard box, but Campos' header missed wide left in the 84th minute.
"Pablo's chance at the end, he's got to do better," Yallop said.
Yallop did find some positives on the night, saying Bobby Convey was "not bad" in his debut, and that Arturo Alvarez "did well tonight." He also liked how his team had most of the ball.
"I know (New England) had a few guys missing from their team, but still, they're a quality team and for us to not give any chances to the opposition other than the goal, really, was good," Yallop said. "But this game is about scoring goals, right, and we didn't score any tonight, which is disappointing, especially at home.
"As long as we get a few results in the next few games, we can forget about this one. But we wanted to start with a win, and it's just disappointing not to get that."
Pete Ratajczak is a contributor to MLSnet.com.
