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Rampant Red Bulls furthen road woes for SJ Earthquakes

By on April 17, 2015

So far this season, the San Jose Earthquakes have done a decent job in protecting their new home, Avaya Stadium. “We want to protect this house because we take pride in it, because we believe it is ours — the community’s and the fans,” said Quakes veteran Chris Wondolowski. They have beaten the Chicago Fire and Vancouver Whitecaps at Avaya and narrowly lost to Real Salt Lake.

Away, however, their form has been less impressive. They lost 1-0 to FC Dallas on opening day, with Dallas’ performance warranting more goals; then however, Innocent Emeghara sparked a great win at Seattle the following weekend.  The last two road matches were East Coast losses at New England and the New York Red Bulls, a worrying trend considering the Quakes will be on the road for the next month.

Although Dominic Kinnear’s men kept the scoreline respectable tonight, only David Bingham’s strong performance in goal held the match at 2-0 — in stark contrast to their recent home win over Vancouver when he did not have a single save to make. Few parallels can be drawn between the two matches: they struggled to control the midfield tonight, and while Bingham said, “each game we’ve taken steps to improve defensively,” the Quakes arguably took one step back in their performance tonight.

Chris Wondolowski was rested after training with the US Men’s National Team at midweek, while Adam Jahn was unavailable due to suspension, leaving the Quakes without an attacking spark up front. Innocent Emeghara struggled with a move to center-forward, and while Sanna Nyassi had scored the winner over Vancouver, he cut a frustrated figure out wide against New York. Moreover, he was too often caught playing too individualistically — a worrying theme that Kinnear has repeatedly criticized. “We’ve sometimes got to be a bit less selfish,” he said after their loss to Real Salt Lake.

The game began slowly and San Jose Earthquakes’ high pressing broke up play on multiple occasions. Yet the visitors struggled to get out of their own half and after Cordell Cato’s pass was cut out by Felipe, the Red Bulls charged — pardon the cliche — like bulls. Felipe completed a one-two with Bradley Wright-Phillips, whom the midfielder then attempted to find with a low cross from the right. Wright-Phillips only got a touch on it, but that was enough to put the ball past Victor Bernandez at the far post to Sacha Kljestan, who had the simplest of tap-ins to put the Red Bulls in front.

The Quakes were caught on the back foot and it only took five minutes for Jesse Marsch’s men to double their lead. Lloyd Sam’s cross found the unmarked Mike Grella at the far post, where the winger finished in similar fashion to Kljestan. Bingham tipped Kemar Lawrence’s incredible long-range volley over the crossbar and just managed to keep the Quakes in the game on the other side of the half as well, sprawling to push Dax McCarty’s header over.

Wondolowski and Tommy Thompson both came on in an attempt to alter the flow of the game in the Quakes’ favor but it was already a matter of seeing the game out for the Red Bulls, who put in impressive performances both up front and at the back. Nyassi missed an open goal from a tight angle and Wondolowski fired over from the edge of the box, but the Quakes couldn’t find an opening; indeed, it could have been three for New York when Wright-Phillips dragged a low effort inches wide in the latter stages.
Man of the Match: Bradley Wright-Phillips

Photo credit: Szapucki on Flickr

About Alex Morgan

Alex Morgan, founder of Football Every Day, lives and breaths football from the West Coast of the United States in California. Aside from founding Football Every Day in January of 2013, Alex has also launched his own journalism career and hopes to help others do the same with FBED. He covers the San Jose Earthquakes as a beat reporter for QuakesTalk.com and his work has also been featured in the BBC's Match of the Day Magazine.