The Timbers make their first trip to the new Avaya Stadium to battle the San Jose Earthquakes for the second time this season, Sunday at 2:00 PM on ESPN2. Portland enters the match mired in a dreadful run on the road — the Timbers haven't won away from home in any competition since late May, easily their worst stretch of the season.
What's more, the games the Timbers have lost of late on the road haven't been close. Portland has been outscored 15-1 in their last four road games, and that lone goal was a last-minute penalty last Saturday in Dallas with the Timbers already losing 4-0. In sixth place in the Western Conference, the Timbers need a big response on Sunday.
The History
The last time the Timbers played San Jose was the last time they won, a July 5th scorcher at Providence Park with the lone goal coming in stoppage time, miraculously in every which way, from Jack Jewsbury. That goal from Jewsbury was his second game-winner of the year, and it came at the the end of an extremely competitive and tense match.
Since then, though, both teams have floundered — the 'Quakes themselves haven't won since the end of June. Portland is usually pretty good against San Jose, and the Timbers haven't lost to the Earthquakes since 2013, but this is a new era: Dominic Kinnear is in charge in the Bay Area, and the team has moved into their own glamorous new arena just west of the San Jose International Airport.
The most talked-about feature of the new stadium, which just opened in March? The outdoor bar in the north end, which is the largest in North America.
The Tactics
The Timbers, minus Ben Zemanski, are finally all available for selection. No more injuries, internationals, suspensions, or waiting for Lucas Melano: Everyone is ready to go.
The team we see on Sunday will be Caleb Porter's first choice eleven at this point in the season. Will Johnson, who missed the Dallas game because of that red card picked up at the end of the Vancouver match will come back in for Diego Chara, while the hope is that Melano can settle the wing position beside Diego Valeri and Darlington Nagbe that hasn't produced nearly enough for the Timbers in 2015.
Melano is more a winger than an out-and-out striker, and he should compliment the bruising Fanendo Adi well up top. Rodney Wallace and Dairon Asprilla will both see their minutes decrease now that the latest Argentine is in the fold, while there's no telling quite where Melano's entrance leaves his compatriot Gaston Fernandez — who was so vital to this team's resurgence in June.
San Jose relies on captain Chris Wondolowski to an alarming degree for offense, so much so that Kinnear started Wondolowski last weekend against Vancouver on a Sunday, even though Wondo has also started for the US national team in the Gold Cup in Philadelphia not 24 hours earlier.
He's the man to watch, as his tricky DP midfield counterpart Matias Perez Garcia. San Jose's defense was its calling card early in the season, but — and the Timbers can relate — that defense isn't scaring people like it once was.
The Lineup
12 - Kwarasey
2 - Powell
24 - Ridgewell
7 - Borchers
19 - Villafaña
4 - W. Johnson (C)
21 - Chara
6 - Nagbe
8 - Valeri
26 - Melano
9 - Adi
The Pick
Both teams will have tightened up their defense, but while the Timbers have much more talent than San Jose does, betting on Portland on the road right now doesn't seem smart. 1-1 draw.
