QUOTE SHEET
Utah Royals FC 0-1 Chicago Red Stars
Rio Tinto Stadium; Sandy, Utah
April 14, 2018
Utah Royals FC
Head Coach Laura Harvey
On the product on the field:
“With this team, and honestly with the women’s game generally, you’re going to get hard work, you’re going to get effort, you’re going to get people who put absolutely everything into the game. I don’t think there is ever a time where you question work ethic. The thing for us is we have to be better on the ball, and we have to find areas on the field where the space was. I think in this league you don’t get tons of chances, and when you do you’ve got to score. They got a decent chance and it was great finish and we had a couple of chances but couldn’t finish. So, if you look at the story of the game, that was probably it.”
On performance on the ball throughout the game:
“I think we always knew it would be frantic at the start of the game, and it felt that way. I felt that we made a few wrong decisions on the ball at critical moments. Chicago played a relatively high line and there were opportunities for us to play in behind that line, but we didn’t, and the times we did we thought we could have scored, we had shot on goal. I think that’s an area we have to better at, but it will come. It’s been a weird start of the season, and we just haven’t had loads of training as a team. We’ve had loads of training, we just don’t have loads as a team and that’s the downside of having international players because you don’t see them. So that’s been difficult, but no excuses because everyone is in the same boat. But now we have a good opportunity to be together for a long period of time to really iron out these cracks for a minute. I think we are a hard team to beat. We’ve only considered one goal in open play in three games, and I think that was outside of the 18-yard box. I think we know that, but we now have to be better in terms of who’s on the ball and be a little bit more of a threat going forward. It will come.”
On atmosphere affecting game:
“The crowd was amazing, unbelievable. To come out to this size of the crowd is great, but we have some of the best players in the world who’ve played in these occasions before. Everything around the game has been phenomenal. I think the coach’s fear is always that you get caught up in the occasion a little bit and I was very conscious that we didn’t do that. It’s hard not to when it is what it was. I’m not going to blame that because I don’t think that was the case. Games in this league are always frantic at the start, it is how it is. The NWSL is the best league in the world for a reason - because it’s so competitive. I thought both teams struggled to settle straight away, but I felt they settled quicker than we did on the ball. We found our rhythm at times, but that final pass was just little bit off.”
Defender Becky Sauerbrunn
On team defense through 3 games:
“We’ve been decently stingy on defense. I think we have been hard to breakdown and we’ve protected the goal pretty well. Teams have to do something pretty special to score goals on us.”
On Chicago’s goal:
“I’ll have to see it again but from my view of it we initially cleared it and I think we just didn’t step to that second ball. I think she (Colaprico) had too much time and she scored a really good goal.”
On the atmosphere of the team’s first home game:
“The environment was unbelievable. Kudos to Utah for showing up and supporting us. It was something special today and I feel like I was a part of something special. It’s disappointing we didn’t get the win to add to the wonderful day but to play in front of a crowd like that, this is why we play soccer.
On the product on the field:
“It was ok. I think we have a few more levels that we can get to. We need to add a little more sophistication because we had more time on the ball than we thought we did. I think we had chances and if we put one of those on goal maybe one goes in. I thought it was pretty good, but I know we have better.”
Chicago Red Stars
Head Coach Rory Dames
On the win:
“It’s always nice to get the first win of the season. Credit to the players. They were very locked in, we had to do two weeks of training to get to this point, and very happy for them and the rest of the staff. They put in a lot of work the last two weeks.”
On momentum going forward:
“We play again Wednesday, against a team that didn’t have to play this weekend, with the same sixteen healthy players we have today. Our biggest thing is to get healthy, get to the next game, we obviously have to get some rotation for the Wednesday game and then we go from the Wednesday game to the game on the weekend that we play. You would hope that we would pick up some momentum, but we have a lot players that are playing much bigger roles than we had anticipated this early. It’s great, to be able to play in that environment and that atmosphere and have to be able to deal with those circumstances, I’m really pleased with the group.”
On the goal:
“I told Dani at half time I would vote for her for goal of the week. Dani has some special abilities there is no question about it, she hits that kind of stuff in training all the time with either foot. The fact that she did it in that moment, in that situation, with the crowd that was here, I’m happy for her. She has those abilities to do those things when we allow her to get higher up the field but pretty special goal. Big goal for us obviously.”
Forward Danielle Colaprico
On the atmosphere:
“The atmosphere is unreal, it’s awesome. The only other place we really experienced that is Portland, so it’s great to see that the league is growing. It was amazing being out there and it’s very surreal.”
On the effect of the atmosphere:
“Personally, I honestly forget about it, which is a good thing but it could be a bad thing too. It’s okay to be nervous as long as you control the nerves and use them the right way. Everyone came out and just tried to put that in the back of their head and didn’t really think about it. We came here to get 3 points and that’s what we did.”
On playing off second balls:
“That’s one thing we stress. When you come on away trips it’s always going to be a battle. One thing we talked about before the game is winning first and second balls. When the first ball came, I jumped right on the second ball and went for it and found the back of the net. It was good, and I think we came out on top on the first and second balls and that’s great for us.”
