The wins are coming fast and easy for the Portland Timbers now, as a pleasant night in the Rose City was matched with a pleasant performance from its home team. Goals from Argentines Maxi Urruti and Gaston Fernandez were more than enough to put Portland firmly amongst the playoff places in the Western Conference and notch a 2-0 win over the visiting Houston Dynamo.
The Timbers weren’t at their best, but they didn’t need to be. The hectic acrimony of the midweek circus win at Seattle was replaced for this match with a calm, comfortable pace that was rarely threatened. This win makes five straight for the Timbers in all competitions, four straight in MLS, and three straight at home.
The next week will bring stiffer challenges—LA on the road on Wednesday and the rematch at home against the Sounders on Sunday—but for just a moment the Timbers and their management can reflect with great satisfaction in turning a season that was nearing crisis mode a month ago into one that seemingly has unlimited potential.
Winning is always better in sports, and winning is what the Timbers are doing a lot of right now. It’s going to be a fun summer.
Certainly, as with all big winning streaks—and this is the Timbers’ biggest in MLS by a long-shot—there has been an element of luck in the Timbers’ run.
Since the May 27th game against DC United, in which the visitors brought their reserve team and the Timbers got a desperately-needed 1-0 win, Portland has gone on to play the New England Revolution without Jermaine Jones and Juan Agudelo, these Dynamo without Brad Davis, Giles Barnes, and Boniek Garcia, and, next weekend, Seattle without Clint Dempsey or Obafemi Martins.
The effect of Houston’s missing players was lost on no one. The Dynamo offense was a dumpster fire without its three foremost creators, almost completely devoid of ideas and real purpose. They looked, ironically enough, like the Timbers did when they lost to the Dynamo at BBVA Compass Stadium a month ago.
But Portland has turned this campaign on its head since then, and while being lucky is terrific, it’s no substitute for being good.
Good is exactly what the Timbers are right now. They’re not lighting the world on fire, not scoring goals with ease, and not blowing teams out, but Portland has a rock-solid defense, an ability to manufacture goals, and a surprising amount of depth that is helping during a packed month of June.
The defense was superb again against the Dynamo, even with Nat Borchers rested in favor of Norberto Paparatto with the two games next week kept firmly in mind. Portland now hasn’t given up a goal at home in league play since the Orlando City match in mid-April—a run of over 360 minutes.
This clean sheet was especially important, because it served as a fitting farewell for goalkeeper coach Mike Toshack who coached his last game with the Timbers against Houston. Toshack is off to be a head coach at St. Lawrence University in New York, but before he goes he got to lift Adam Kwarasey’s log slice, receive a long embrace from Merritt Paulson, and accept the plaudits of the Timbers Army from the main capo stand. It was a touching sendoff.
One of the defenders who made it possible, Jorge Villafaña, had his best game of the season. Villafaña displayed a creative spark in the final third that had been missing from the young fullback’s gritty, relatively understated game, and his cross to set up Maxi Urruti’s opener was, once again, an absolute peach.
Diego Valeri and Will Johnson, the Timbers’ two regular free-kick takers, are almost back at full strength, but even when they’re both back at their best, Villafaña should still take certain set pieces. He’s the best, most consistent crosser on the team — something of a secret weapon.
Urruti had more to do after being picked out by Villafaña than Fanendo Adi did in the same situation two Saturdays ago, and the striker played his part to perfection, looping a perfectly-placed header past Tyler Deric to give Portland the lead.
The Timbers wrapped things up with soft penalty—hey, it was a Baldomero Toledo game, be thankful we got a soft penalty instead of a red card for someone tying their shoes wrong—when former Timber David Horst was called for a foul in the box on a corner kick.
With Will Johnson still recovering from his broken leg, penalty duty fell to Gaston Fernandez. La Gata dispatched his spot-kick with relish, and from there, things were academic.
Houston will feel hard done by on two calls—an early corner-kick goal which was ruled out for a questionable foul against Ricardo Clark on Villafaña, and the penalty against Horst—but in reality, the Dynamo were rather dreadful.
Their central midfield of Clark and Luis Garrido worked hard and mucked up the game, but with so many key pieces out, Houston couldn’t muster any sort of sustained offense until the game was out of reach. The Timbers never needed to kick things into high gear. They cruised, and by the time Horst got turned into a pretzel by Diego Valeri, it was time for the Dynamo to head for home.
This was nicely done from the Timbers. As was made abundantly clear in the game at Starefire, this team is strong mentally. That mental composure—not toughness, in this case—helps on nights like this one.
Portland will continue to get better. Will Johnson and Diego Valeri still haven’t started the same game yet this season. Valeri hasn’t started a single home game. It feels like there is one attacking piece yet to be added in the summer transfer window, and at some point, the offense will be intuitive.
That big week next week? It ends with a game against the Sounders that will test everything the Timbers have worked for in late May and June in a 100-degree oven. But for the first time in a long time, the Timbers feel ready for anything. They know they’re a playoff team, and they’re acting like it. Houston was just another step in a road that is going to lead well into November.
