Portland Timbers 1-0 FC Dallas: The First Thing, You See, Is to Get Your Foot Planted

Like this, but with just one yellow card.

Dear God, if that wasn’t a cage match. Referee Allen Chapman blessed the whole thing with professional indifference but, in the end, no limbs were lost and no real crimes committed. The Portland Timbers came out of the rough and tumble with one goal more than visiting FC Dallas. And that felt fair, at least where I live (Portland, OR, so…), but a 0-0 wouldn’t have exactly insulted justice. Dallas gave as good as they got. That’s as much for me as it is for you, because I don’t know what the hell to make out of that goddamn team…

To dust off some clutter, Portland beat Dallas 1-0 last night at Providence Park and not one damn thing about that came easily. At the same time, I thought I saw the unveiling of the Timbers’ broad attacking approach to the game in the stretch between the 5th and the 10th minute: believe that every pass will connect, so try everything, and ruthlessly hunt down anything that tells you differently like the damned lie it is. At the precise time I sketched that note onto my pad, Portland was merrily marching up the field by flailing the ball from one side of the field to the other. It looked a little desperate and more than a little low-percentage, but it generally came off, while definitely confusing Dallas and throwing them off. The (highly relative) success of the whole “swinging for the fences” strategy didn’t last for long, and Dallas came back into the game and, generally put up a real fight…

…but, in one blessed/curs’d moment, every cog in the Timbers game-plan, and broad theory of roster construction, meshed together to steal a goal out of a game seemingly sworn to give up no goals. And I think that’s the real story of last night’s game.

Both of these teams took similar approaches to the game. When I tried to phrase it last night, I started with “defending aggressively” – by which I meant chasing down the ball and/or passer at some point on the field, as opposed to keeping your shape and making him break you down. Both Portland and Dallas assumed that general position, but they started at different parts of the field. In their better moments, Dallas rasied a bristling line of confrontation at the center stripe – i.e., anything that crossed it got swarmed like piranhas on whatever the hell is dumb enough to walk into the Amazon. During one truly fascinating phase, the kept both of Portland’s centerbacks and Sebastian Blanco trying to force their way inside that line; Blanco, specifically, could drop out of it, but he couldn’t go back in. Given that Blanco is, or has been, a major piece for Portland getting the ball moving forward, maybe Dallas studied some video and adopted that strategy to nip his usefulness in the bud.

Portland took a different tack, and I’m not sure that this isn’t the same thing I’ve seen for several weeks in a row without recognizing it. Once they get the defense set and the attack’s offense stalled, Portland’s players immediately start pushing up from the defenders forward. If the opposition can’t find a pass forward and decide to drop it back, Portland’s players chase that back pass and start harassing the hell out of whoever has the ball. The Timbers pressed all over the field – and to the extent I worried about them running out of gas – but they kept a decent sense of proportionality and made sound choices about when to retreat and where. The key thing, though, was pushing out fiercely the second they got their feet planted.

That worked more or less, even if not spectacularly. And the “swinging for the fences” thing worked out entirely when Blanco’s long curling diagonal found its way through an implausible number of legs to find Brian Fernandez for the kind of finish Portland absolutely needed in order to wrestle all three points away from Dallas. That pass had no business going through, but it did, and that’s by and large how history works. And, yes, Portland should have had a second, even if Jeremy Ebobisse's shot was harder to finish than it looked, and that wasn't Portland's only opportunity. Still, the 1-0 feels like the correct statement for all involved.

To give Dallas their due, Portland fans should start watching this team if they already aren’t. While they should absolutely concerned about how consistently they’re dropping points to the league’s smarter, better, faster teams, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Dallas will be one of those teams that all the others in the Western Conference will have to play through and/or keep up with if they have any plans of getting anywhere in 2019. In more ways than one, I saw a team very similar to Portland, only younger and, arguably, not quite as good. Watching a full 90s minutes of Paxton Pomykal sold me on the body/brain package he brings to the field, Michael Barrios continues as one of your more underrated attacking players, and that back-line continues to be hell to break down.

Not totally unrelated, I’d study how Dallas managed Portland’s attack/transition (basically synonymous) if I were the rest of the league. (And I’d encourage FC Cincinnati to look into for inspiration and as a matter of general survival.) It’s easier to turn a smaller patch of ground into a no-man’s land.

This looked every inch like the tough win it was, basically, and that leaves me putting a little more value in each of those three points. Now, to close out with some details.

- Diego Chara did a reasonable imitation of God last night (omnipresent, omnipotent, and you’d be forgiven for wondering about omniscience), and it’s not unreasonable to think that the team has been remade in his image.

- If I down-played anything in the above, it was Portland’s overall aggression (see duels 'n' tackles), the way they bit after everything all over the field. I don’t recall them ever crossing over into foul play, but they definitely threw the proverbial first punch last night.

- Larrys Mabiala and Julio Cascante deserve honorable mention. Mabiala, in particular, deserves specific credit for mopping up the second ball when they got past anyone in or around Portland’s area. Cascante, meanwhile, did admirable patrolling from the back to keep Dallas away from Portland’s goal.

- So, do we all agree that Steve Clark appears to have won the first-team starting job, with or without Steve Clark breathing all over the back of his neck. Also, do we agree that Clark looks much improved just since the start of 2019?

- I'm starting to take a real, "fuck-it" shine to Jorge Moreira. He's like a goddamn wild-card that's always in play out there. Fun 'n' adventures, y'all!

The more I turn this game over in my head, the more anxious I get about the Western Conference. I’m not totally current with the weekly review (goddamn late games; one normal week, you assholes; can I get just one?), but I’ve already spotted lively performances from RSL, San Jose, and Colorado. Dallas might have stumbled out of their long week with only one point, but they gave the opposition several helpings of what for before returning home. I expect the Timbers will keep rising in the standings, but I also expect they’ll have hands clawing at them all the way up.