Rose City Forecast 26: New England Revolution vs Portland Timbers

Welcome to the first prediction thread of September!

At last! A win! It had been a little over two weeks since the last Portland Timbers win, but with four games in that span, it felt longer. On Wednesday, they put an end to the losing run with a 2-0 victory over visiting Toronto FC. While the offensive players continued to struggle to find the net, Diego Chara and David Guzman stepped up and notched a goal a piece. And with no own goal to break a solid defensive performance, Attinella and the back line got a clean sheet. May there be more to come!

MofoOG had the prediction of the match, calling a Timbers win and shutout and that the cards would be under. GeorgeCorps17 earns the bonus prediction points for hoping that Captain Jack Jewsbury and defender Nat Borchers would join Jorge Villafana and Lucas Melano on their returns to the pitch. That really would’ve been the old squad getting back together.

A perfect prediction would have earned 18 points.

2-0

Chara (Sebastian Blanco OR Zarek Valentin); Guzman (unassisted)

First yellow to Marky Delgado

Under on cards.

Updated standings include the Seattle match.

With only two days between games, the Timbers are traveling across the country to face a spiraling New England Revolution that hasn’t won a match in eight games. It seems like they’ll have a chance to break that streak against the Timbers, however, as PTFC will be playing with either tired legs or a team of mostly back-ups and will have almost no chance to train before the game. Timbers Coach Gio Savarese is quoted saying that it’s important to have a fresh team, so plan for some new guys to get a run. Will they struggle to get it done against the faltering team in Massachusetts or will they take their chance and earn the Timbers a result?

Total Cards O/U: 3.5

The Scoring Format:

• Correct score: 5 points
• Correct result (draw/win/loss): 3 points
• Each clean sheet: 2 points
• Each goal-scorer: 1 point
• Each FK/PK/assist/lack of assist: 1 point
• Goal/assist bonus: 1 point
• Player with the first yellow card of the match: 1 point
• Each player with a red card: 1 point (Cannot earn points for predicting 0 red cards, but you may predict up to 3 players with a red.)
• Over/under on total cards: 1 point
• Most outrageous(ly accurate) prediction: 2 points

Some ground rules and explanations/clarifications (the fine print):

You may amend your prediction at any point up to kick off to account for game day 18 announcements. I recommend at least getting an initial prediction sooner, just in case you forget to come back in that hour or two before the game.

Keep your scoreline predictions realistic. Basically, if you’re predicting lots of goals all the time to just earn points on goals and assists and ignoring the score, I feel that goes against the spirit of this thread. This hasn’t been at all a problem in the last two years, so let’s keep it that way!

The goal/assist bonus is an additional point if you correctly get the correct scorer and assistant on the same goal. (For example, if Nagbe scores, assisted by Valeri, and you predicted that exact combination, you get a total of three points: 1 goal, 1 assist, 1 bonus. However, if you predicted Nagbe scores, assisted by Adi, and Adi scores, assisted by Valeri, you would get two points from the Nagbe/Valeri prediction: 1 goal, 1 assist.)

Please be clear whether you think a goal will be unassisted, assisted, or from a PK/FK: Unassisted = no assist, run of play; Assisted = player who got the assist; PK/FK = directly from a free kick. For the purposes of this thread, a PK counts as an FK, and an FK as a PK. If you just leave the assist section blank, I will assume you’re declining to make an assist prediction.

Even though a player can be awarded a secondary assist by OPTA, I will award a maximum of one assist point per goal. But that point can come from either the primary or secondary assist in the box score. However, please keep your predictions to one assist per goal.

For the over/under on cards, a second yellow leading to a red counts as two cards, not three.

You may predict more than one red card if you’re expecting a chippy match, but only up to three total.

For the most outrageous(ly accurate) prediction, I will be trying to toe a line between completely absurd and mundane in my choices. As I see it, the goal here is to add even more fun without going too over-the-top ridiculous. So, in my mind, the best predictions will be something that could conceivably happen, but don’t happen often, like amusing coaching spats or goals that bounce off the crossbar, then off the keeper’s back, and then in. Things like that.

If you’re looking for where I set the over/under on total cards, check the end of the preview paragraph after the standings.

Format:

In the comment title, post your predicted score with the winners; for example, 4-2 Timbers

In the body of your comment, start with the goals and assists, like so:

Nagbe (Valeri)

Valeri (Free kick)

Adi (PK)

Blanco (Unassisted)

Beckham (Free kick)

Donovan (Beckham)

Next, choose your first yellow card, and that means picking only one person:

First yellow to Nigel De Jong

Then reds, if any. (NOTE: No points awarded for correctly calling a red-card-free match, so take a guess.):

Nigel De Jong gets a red card for stomping Blanco.

Clearly note whether you’re predicting over or under on total cards. Don’t leave me to try and figure it out!

And lastly, make your fun prediction:

Nigel de Jong tries to stomp Nagbe’s ankle again, but this time, Nagbe avoids the tackle. Being angry, Nagbe, for the first time in three years, kicks the ball straight into NDJ’s groin. Camera pans to a trademark Chara smile.