Game Flow: Portland Timbers Lose in Rapid Fashion

I am just going to put this table and three stats as my opening paragraph:

Game Flow

Kick off-15': I am sure Caleb Porter addressed the slow starts a number of times leading up to the game but whatever was said did help resolve the issue. The Portland Timbers were all over the place offensively and defensively they had quit a few breakdowns. The Colorado Rapids on the other hand looked ready to go from the first whistle and repeatedly abused Jack Jewsbury which lead to at least two good goal scoring opportunities in the opening minutes of the game. The Portland Timbers did not record their first shot on goal until around the 15th minute and that was on a long punt by Donovan Ricketts!

15' to 45': The Timbers slowly eased into some semblance of a rhythm offensively and figured out how to deal with Deshorn Brown on the right but only managed to create one decent goal scoring opportunity. There was no flow the offense and a lot of passes were errant or right to the Colorado Rapids. One other thing that didn't help was the fact that the linesman missed three offside calls which could have led to goal scoring opportunities.

45' to 96': The Timbers started out well but creating only 7 shots, 3 on goal, will not be enough to win let alone time games. Especially when the conversion rate of those shots is a paltry 16.7% (2 goals out of 12 shots on goal) and if you look at total shots it gets even more depressing with a 4.7% conversion rate. I believe the league averages are around 20% and 8% for each category.

It all went to pot when Portland's defense neglected to account for Deshorn Brown's speed or it could be the fact that every single one of our defensive line checked out and was caught ball watching and again they were caught out of position 1 minute later. Someone invent the denuralizer already! I want to forget I even watched this game.

Observations:

• I guess the offensive problems weren't Maximiliano Urrutti's fault.
• I swear all Portland Teams hate traveling to the Mountain Time Zone, check out the Trail Blazers records in Denver and Salt Lake....
• Something is wrong with this team and I am not sure what it is but the whole team looked a step slow.
• Steve Zakuani again looked out of sorts even though he combine with Darlington Nagbe for the best chance of the night. I counted at least three passes straight to Colorado players with Timbers out of position defensively.
• Do we really miss Ryan Johnson that much? Or is it Rodney Wallace?