MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER POST-GAME QUOTE SHEET
REAL SALT LAKE 1 : 2 FC DALLAS
SATURDAY, AUGUST18, 2012 – RIO TINTO STADIUM – SANDY, UTAH
RSL HEAD COACH JASON KREIS
On tonight’s soccer being a cruel game…
“No doubt about it. For me there was one team that wanted to play the game and there was another team that wanted to defend and counter and hit us on the counter punch, a very clear game plan. They won one tonight. It’s an unfortunate situation, but it’s going to happen sometimes.”
On defensive breakdowns and Dallas’s two goals…
“I think that they weren’t causing us really any troubles except for those two plays. The first one come off of a give-and-go in which Tony gets played in behind with Castillo and didn’t react quickly enough to it. The second one comes off of our aggressive decisions. Again we’re trying to get players forward, we’re going after the win, and a tie is not good enough for us at home so, all in all, in the grand scheme of things we lost a whole whopping one point. The breakdown for me was what happened in our half of the field not what happened in their half of the field. We go to serve the ball up with Beltran and the ball pops out to I think Jackson, and Beltran and Gil are both there to make a tackle or make a foul. One of the two has to happen, nothing else can happen. Unfortunately neither happened and he turned and was able to play a long pass, and then one more pass later the ball was in the back of our net. We have got to continue to take care of the details. We can make aggressive decisions about going forward and sending numbers forward, but we have to realize that as quickly as we lose the ball we have (beckoning) numbers in their half of the field and we have got to win it right back or a foul.”
On variations in starting lineup contributing to first half disjointing…
“I don’t know. Well mostly I think your right; in the first half it did seem disjointed. I don’t think there was a whole lot of flow to it, and I think that was exactly to Dallas’s playing. We’ve seen before that teams try to make things difficult on us, trying to frustrate us, try to get back and put numbers behind the ball and then things can become difficult for us.”
On Kevin Hartman’s performance…
“Kevin Hartman’s a very, very good goalkeeper. I think that if he hadn’t had the night he had, we would have won that game handedly. He made a couple of really good saves on some longer shots. I think that for me, he was the difference maker.”
On Sabo and Kyle Substitutions…
“What was intentional is that we’re putting a tremendous amount of emphasis on Tuesday night’s game. And with Kyle, Sabo, and Johnson all playing 90 minutes on Wednesday night with their national teams, two of three in different countries, it just made it so there wasn’t a choice for me. They got to be rested tonight and there was only a question of how long I would want them to play, which was defiantly less than a half. Hopefully the one thing we gained out of tonight was some rest for a couple of our players so their fresh and ready to go come Tuesday night.”
On Javier’s health…
“He was questionable throughout the week, because we brought him out last week, but I think we made a very wise decision and got him out of the game before he hurt himself worse with his groin. I thought he looked real good tonight. All anticipation will be that he will recover in time for Tuesday.”
On the snowball effect of the current losing streak …
“I think that we are in a very precarious position right now, because we put a ton of emphasis on this game. I was very emotional with my team yesterday and said “enough is enough, but now we’ve got nine games left and we need a positive big-time reaction and we need 3 points tomorrow night and we need to roll from there. I thought that we got everything but the result tonight. I really feel that we got emotion from our players, and we got good attacking movements, we had a lot of chances to score, we just did so many things well. It’s an unfortunate situation, as you started the press conference with that unfortunately this game can be very, very cruel, so now we’re at a presence of what we do from here because this could be a real emotional heartbreaker for us, but we can’t let it be, we have got to stay together and we’ve got to continue forward and we got to continue to believe and Tuesday night, if we play this way then we’ll get the result and then maybe roll from there.”
RSL DF NAT BORCHERS
Overall thoughts on the match…
“They definitely flipped the script on us this time. You know, last time we were able to get that game winner in stoppage time and they got it on us this time around. We knew they were dangerous coming into this game and they got a lot of speed and break well on the counter. We didn’t do a good enough job of preventing that counterattack.”
On entering the second half…
“You know what, I thought we were in really good shape going into the second half and I thought we started really brightly in the second half as well. I thought as the game wore on they were able to stretch us a bit too much and we maybe lost a little confidence with the ball but I thought when Kyle came in and you know, I thought when Sabo came in they brought a lot of energy, which was great, and we were able to create some chances.”
On not overreacting and looking forward…
“Absolutely, I think there’s always a tendency to overreact and not be able to put things into perspective. You have to look at this game; you have to say “well, we did have a very good game for 88 minutes, perhaps.” We had a few instances where we lost the ball in possession and they almost punished us and then at the end they punished us on the counterattack. We‘ve just got to shore up things defensively with those counterattacks, but I think we definitely have something positive to build on with the chances we created and the ball movement today.”
On quick turnaround to Champions League play…
“It’s a quick turnaround. We have to stuff this one off and look forward to another challenge with the Champions League. It’s really all or nothing right now with the Champions League. We’ve got to come out strong against the Panamanian team.”
RSL DF TONY BELTRAN
Overall thoughts on the match…
“I thought we played good at times but you know we pretty much weren’t being aware of Dallas on the counterattack, especially that last one. I probably should have fouled there. They got behind me on the first goal as well. We need to be sharper defensively because I think we had it in us to win this game but obviously mistakes killed us.”
“We gave up that one counterattack and just have to do a better job of when we were pushing for that goal because I know we’re capable of getting that and being more alert of the possibility of them counterattacking and where they’re dangerous. We need to clean that out and maybe we get a second goal or you know maybe we lock that dirty point.”
On substitutions spicing up the attack…
“It definitely felt like it. You know, once those guys come in it was a big boost. They’re great players. You can hear the crowd get into that. Although they came in and definitely changed the game, it just didn’t go that way.”
RSL DF KWAME WATSON-SIRIBOE
On the team’s performance tonight…
“I think we dominated. I think at times we did very well. We pushed for that goal and they countered on us and it’s something that sucks because we pushed for the win and it’s just something that’s unlucky.”
On looking ahead…
“We have to keep driving through because the season is almost over. We have to take it one game at a time. Now we have CONCACAF game on Tuesday, so we can’t put our heads down; we have to keep going and continue to work hard. We’re in a slump right now, but we need to stay positive and keep pushing.”
On the lineup…
“I think everyone that came in brought energy. I don’t think the lineup really significantly changed, but when people came on, it was very fantastic. They all came and brought energy.”
On the team’s defense…
“As a defense we always want to keep zeros. Dallas basically gets 2 shots and they score so we know as long as the defense, including myself, keep them at zeros, we know the offense will score. Its something that I think we’re all frustrated with because we’re working hard, but things just aren’t going our way right now, but we need to continue to stay positive and continue to work hard and I think everything will work out.”
RSL FW JUSTIN BRAUN
Overall thoughts on the match…
“Obviously a little disappointing. They were pressuring for another goal at the end and unfortunately we had to press forward to try and get that goal and they caught up with that counterattack. It’s definitely a heart breaker. Unfortunately we’re walking away with nothing tonight.”
On contribution of second-half substitutions…
“Obviously Beckerman and Saborio are world-class players. Anytime you put them on the field, they kind of add a different dimension. As a sub, when you come on you just try and bring some energy and bring something different to the game and I felt like the subs did that tonight.”
FC Dallas Head Coach Schellas Hyndman
Overall thoughts on the match…
“It was really a hard fought match by both teams, both teams were missing players. We decided to use our players who played in the national camp, they chose to bring players on later. I think being at home, with the crowd, the enthusiasm, and with a good bunch, they came at us really hard. This is just me talking, but it felt more physical than it really needed to be. These two teams really do try to play. They made a couple of tactical changes at half time though that I thought gave us some strength to go at them, make them worry a little bit.”
On the similarity between this game and the previous RSL-FCD May 26 match…
“I remember last time we were here, we tied it, and they came right back and scored. We were talking about something like that not happening again. Similar game…I thought Salt Lake dominated us last time, and we kept on fighting to get goals, tied the game, and then Borchers scored. It was really gutty, especially at that time of the year, we were all hoping for things. Tonight…two good goals by us. We just continued to weather the storm.”
On getting their first win on Utah soil since 2007…
“I think since I’ve been coaching I don’t think we’ve ever had a point here. The feeling was beating RSL going into the MLS playoffs, that was a great feeling. The feeling is great. This is a very difficult place to play. Jason does a great job with the organization of his team. They always battle, they have a fantastic fan support, that brings the best out of them. It feels great; the guys feel great.”
On MF David Ferreira’s performance…
“Well we’re a completely different team. I think before, we battled, we were always hoping to get a result. Now we’re kinda going in thinking we’re going to get a result. When we were winning 1-0 he came up to me and said, “I’m dead, I’m absolutely dead,” and I said, “Ok, we’ll get a change for you,” and he said, “No, I’m gonna keep fighting, but I just want you to know I’m dead I can’t run.” Then Matt [Hedges] got hurt, so we used our 3rd sub, and I just had him hold up a little bit higher…it really made a difference didn’t it.”
On GK Kevin Hartman’s performance…
“There’s a reason why he’s had the most shutouts in the league… played the most minutes in the league. He’s just outstanding, definitely a difference maker.”
On how important the 3-game winning streak is to secure a spot for playoffs…
“Obviously it’s important, it gives us dreams, and we’re beating teams in our conference. As I said to the boys, I don’t know how important Real Salt Lake is going to take us, since they don’t really need the points. We’re desperate, we need the points. As I said to the boys, this is the first time all year we’ve won two games in a row, now three. We’re now in a position where we think we can win. We’re just playing well. We have a tough schedule; the team’s we’re playing are tough. What do you look for as a coach? Just to get the best you can out of the players; they’ve given us that all year, even though the results haven’t gone the way we want them to go, I’m proud of them for the fact that they’ve fought in every game.”
On playing LA galaxy next…
“They beat us on our field. We had a down game, we had a sell-out crowd, and they played us really hard. It’s just going to be another good game.”
FC DALLAS MF BREK SHEA
On the build up to the second goal that he assisted…
“Jackson did well-he beat two or three guys and I opened up wide. He played me the ball and I touched it a few times to try and suck the defender in. Then I played it across to David [Ferreira] and he scored a great goal.”
On what FC Dallas needs to do now to make the playoffs…
“I think we had a lot of injuries and we never really had all of our starters playing at the same time, and we still don’t. I think that we are learning how to play with it and we are getting healthier. If we continue to play the way that we’ve been playing, we are building confidence each game, hopefully if we keep doing our thing and other teams don’t, we’ll get into the playoffs.”
FC DALLAS GK KEVIN HARTMAN
On the reason that they have been getting good results lately…
“I think throughout the year we’ve learned that it’s going to take a 90 minute effort from 11 guys. Towards the beginning of the year we were really close to winning quite a few games and getting points. Unfortunately we would just have one lapse that would really kill us. David [Ferreira] has come in and really orchestrated what we do from the back to the front and side to side. We’ve made some good additions to the team.
On what he saw from the Real Salt Lake offense tonight…
“They certainly had a number of opportunities where they could have scored more. Fortunately for us we were able to come up with some saves and block some shots. Some things just went our way.”
