Pardon this late post concerning our pre-season friendly yesterday against the Montreal Impact. I've just been swamped this week with work as I prepare for an important business trip next week. Stupid work getting in the way of the one thing that really matters... soccer/Timbers!
Anyway, yesterday the Portland Timbers won their first pre-season game and their first game ever as an MLS side. Exciting news considering we've been stuck in a sort of rut with draws, which I believe are actually worse than losses. Drawing a game brings on complacency, average-ness, a general feeling like there's nothing to really improve on because there wasn't an actual loss. If you lose, you learn something, move on, and adapt. While you might lose out on a single point, you're more likely to rebound. I once saw the Los Angeles Galaxy sink into a 10 game draw streak. It was terrible...
Anyway, the game against Montreal wasn't broadcast so I cant give you any specific details. However, one thing I was impressed by was that it only took our #10 wearing forward, Eddie Johnson, a mere seven minutes to score the game-winning goal. I have a feeling Eddie Johnson will be one of our surprise stars for the 2011 season.
Of course, the game was still only against Montreal who, until 2012 will remain a D2 team. Still John Spencer didn't seem to mind as much and took the victory for what it was, a solid win.
"It doesn’t matter who we’re playing against, we have to go out and win the game," Spencer said, referring to his consistent message to the team. "And I think it was important for the morale and the confidence to get [their] first win as an MLS team. I think the guys enjoyed it."
The Timbers have one more game this Saturday against Sporting Kansas City at 10:30am PT before heading back to Portland to prepare for the Cascadia Summit March 4th-6th against the Seattle Sounders and Vancouver Whitecaps.