For a night, the Timbers don't have to dream
Youth shines at elevation in 3-0 Portland win.
There’s so much delayed gratification in retooling a roster, especially in the way the Portland Timbers have gone about it. They shipped off an MVP candidate and, aside from Diego Chara and Felipe Mora, rely heavily on a group of players whose average age would fit right in on a college football roster.
What a general manager and coach will do is sell you on hope and trust. And when a season starts the way the Timbers’ had, where Portland gained just one victory in its first four matches and struggled to find any offensive rhythm, those principles will be tested — especially when heading into a road game, at altitude, against an undefeated Colorado Rapids club that gets on its opponents early.
The Timbers came into Saturday night without a goal in the opening 45 minutes of a match this season. Colorado had scored four.
The hope was that the Timbers could maybe achieve a road draw.
The trust was that they wouldn’t get blown out of the water.
In that case, consider Saturday a shocker.
The Timbers beat Colorado 3-0. After trading chances throughout the game’s first half, Portland (2-2-1, 7 points) put it on the previously undefeated Rapids with waves of attack in the second half. David Da Costa*, Antony and Kevin Kelsy scored. Jimer Fory and Finn Surman were superb. James Pantemis recorded his second clean sheet on the year.
“I think what we saw tonight, we saw in [David] Ayala, in Surman, in Fory, in Santi [Moreno], in [Juan] Mosquera, in Antony, in Kelsy, in Ian Smith — I think I’ve named eight young players there under the age of 23/24, plus David Da Costa, who are going to be the backbone of this team for the next two to three seasons,” Neville said. “I think it’s so exciting to see the growth in these young players.”
Frankly, it was just exciting to see the Timbers put the ball in the net.