Things were looking dire for the Portland Timbers.
Coming off an unsettling 2-0 loss last weekend to the New York Red Bulls on their home ground, the Timbers faced a trip to take on red-hot Columbus Crew SC on Saturday night. Portland had been shut out in their previous two matches and were riding a four-game winless run. To top it off, their tenuous hold on the sixth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference was being seriously threatened by a surging pack of three teams below them in the standings.
Enter Fanendo Adi. The big Nigerian striker was benched against the Red Bulls but returned to to record an impressive brace in a 2-1 Timbers win at MAPFRE Stadium.
“We showed a lot of character,” head coach Caleb Porter said in his postgame comments. “Our backs were against the wall, and we showed what I’ve seen from these guys time and time again. When you need more you get more out of these guys, and that was a huge result. … The minimum standard in this club will be to go into every game and fight and work and grind and stick together, and I thought we did that.”
Adi's performance underscored an overall turnaround from Portland’s loss against the Red Bulls that Porter criticized for an overall lack of execution. It was clear that message was received, with the Timbers starting on their front foot and threatening often through a combination of possession and counterattacks.
It paid off in the 28th minute when Darlington Nagbe played a clever ball from the top of the box in front of goal to Adi, who finished nicely past Crew SC goalkeeper Steve Clark.
Adi got his second of the game – the eighth time since joining the Timbers midway through last season that he was scored two goals in a game – on a 50th-minute counterattack that ended with a Rodney Wallace cross from the left that Adi put away.
It was a performance under tough conditions made even more impressive after a call for a penalty kick went ignored when Nagbe was dragged down in the box with the match still scoreless just minutes after the first kick. There was also another potential violation that went uncalled when Clark appeared to punch away a ball outside the box to erase a dangerous Diego Valeri run that might have resulted in a third Timbers goal.
“We came into the game knowing that we were playing against a very good team,” Adi said. “Of course, at this stage of the season, you have to win. We knew it was going to be difficult to play our kind of game, but we picked up the points. Last game we did very badly at home. That gave us extra motivation to go into the game.
"We did very excellently. We defended very well, and I think playing for each other helped us the entire game.”
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In that New York game, Portland wilted under the Red Bulls' high pressure – another sign that their trip to Columbus could spell danger considering Crew SC play a similar style. Crew SC finished with the possession advantage – and made things interesting when Kei Kamara briefly tied the game with his league-leading 22nd goal right before halftime. But Portland used a dangerous counterattacking game to outshoot Columbus 13-11.
“If you just sit back all game and let [Crew SC] get on the ball and do what they do, eventually they’ll break you down,” Porter said. “We wanted to make it difficult on them, disrupt their rhythm and the build-up. Not let them get us in the back half. Overall, I felt that we did a really good job on them through the play, defending the flanks and cutting out crosses.
"I think, coming into the game, we knew if we were aggressive and pressed correctly, that they would have a hard time.”
Dan Itel covers the Timbers for MLSsoccer.com.
