After some 30 games of the 2015 season, the Portland Timbers ended up right back where they started on opening night Sunday afternoon at CenturyLink Field: minus Will Johnson and Diego Chara, playing with zero pressure, and admirably turning in a performance more skillful than simply gritty.
Sure, the Timbers lost the battle to the Seattle Sounders. It finished 2-1, one Seattle goal by way of wild goalmouth scramble, and the decisive tally thanks to a penalty kick won on a play that is always called an offensive foul—most famously in basketball, where it's known as charging.
But the Sounders stole the victory even more egregiously than they stole their tifo design. Portland dominated for 90 minutes, all the while waiting for the kind of guns-a-blazing Seattle performance that never came.
Quite simply, the Timbers were expecting a team that never showed up. It's a bad feeling to lose to the Sounders, of course, but this game somehow getting away seems a small price to pay in a season when the Timbers more or less have ruined Seattle's entire season. The 2015 series finishes—if there's no playoff matchup—as a 2-2 Portland KO.
What made this strong Timbers performance possible was the outstanding play of Jack Jewsbury and George Fochive. In contrast with the oil-and-water routine of Brad Evans and Eric Friberg in Seattle's midfield, it was a thing of beauty—worked by one guy has been a USL player since April and another who looked so old in his last outing that it seemed like starting the USL player in his place would have been merciful.
It was a performance that Jewsbury needed. Unshackled from major defensive responsibility thanks to Fochive, the old captain was free to get forward, distribute, and be his best self. The only time Jewsbury showed his age was during the cartwheel celebration he promised his daughters after prodding home the goal that drew him level with legendary marksman Nat Borchers as the Timbers' second-leading scorer.
Meanwhile, you know what you're going to get with Fochive: Determined, slightly rambunctious, uncowed work. His best moment was taking Obafemi Martins to the cleaners only to watch Martins get a star treatment call from referee Alan Kelly.
It wasn't the only star treatment call Martins would get either. Just before halftime, the Nigerian barreled into a stationary Adam Kwarasey at high speed and went down after latching onto a long-ball. Kwarasey was so sure of his conduct that he was about to take a goal kick when he realized that Kelly had pointed to the spot. Evans would convert what ended up as the game-winner.
It was a grown-man performance from Fanendo Adi, who stitched together the Timbers' attack with some superb, domineering holdup play on Chad Marshall and Roman Torres. A player like Lucas Melano makes Adi—who cut down on the whining and sustained his work-rate against Seattle—all the more dangerous and valuable, and the hope is that Portland's front four remains unchanged from now until whenever this season ends.
Diego Valeri was a beneficiary of Adi's work, getting plenty of touches and making the most of them in what was probably his best performance of the season. He had a hand in setting up Melano, who continues to look terrific when he has room to roam off of the other attackers.
The game turned when Osvaldo Alonso, the Sounders' oldest and most dependable warrior, entered as a second half substitute. Alonso settled and gave shape to Seattle's midfield, and he, along with the several other players like Marshall and Frei who are refusing to let the Sounders completely self-destruct, killed off the match.
The Timbers were gassed by minute 80, and bringing Larry, Curly, and Moe off the bench didn't help matters whatsoever. Maxi Urruti looks like he hasn't been outside since Lucas Melano signed, while Darion Asprilla's progress has slowed alarmingly, and Rodney Wallace's game is, at this point, about scary as a glow-stick. Portland's punch off the bench—there is none—has to be among the biggest concerns around this team heading towards the playoffs. Once the subs came in, the game was over.
After the match, a measured Caleb Porter tore into the Irish referee—usually one of MLS' best—musing that Kelly was, "sleepwalking through the game," and that he hoped that Kelly's boss Peter Walton was watching.
Porter, unsurprisingly, hurt his case for sympathy with a swipe at supposed negative media coverage around his team, but these things have a way of evening themselves out over the course of a season. Portland, remember, played poorly and won at home against Chicago and then at Real Salt Lake. The good news is that the Timbers played better last week than they did the week before, and then better this week than last week.
That's a team trending in the right direction as they have every fall since Porter's arrival. This group believes in itself, well beyond the scope of its managers us-against-the-world mentality. With a front four that is as talented as any in MLS outside of LA, it should.
The Sounders still have plenty of work to do. Chemistry is lacking. Getting Alonso back, along with, eventually, Clint Dempsey, will help immeasurably, but new DP signing Nelson Valdez looks about as special as a box of Wheat Thins, and generally, this team looks completely devoid of any true belief that a turn around is imminent. Sunday did nothing to change that.
Searching for 2013 parallels? Watch the progress of these Sounders. Watch Portland, too. In '13, the Timbers last regular season loss came on this day—August 30th. From there, it was seven wins and three draws on that magical run to Western Conference Final.
This Timbers team is unquestionably better than that one. The question here is whether they can find the same spirit that flowed through the 2013 group en masse.
Yes soccer is a results business, but even the most ardent of MLS supporters would tell you it isn't a serious results business until the weather turns cold again. This was a good performance. There's no such thing as a good loss to Seattle. But a promising loss to Seattle? The Timbers just had their first.
