MLS: Sporting Kansas 1-1 LA Galaxy
Sporting KC Manager Peter Vermes
On the overall performance of the team…
I thought they were great. I thought their performance was tremendous. I thought the way that we played – the amount of action, the way we played off the ball, the possession and the amount of chances we created – I thought it was all really good. I was very pleased. I look at it this way. I look at it this way: We play like that in a lot of games and we’ll win a lot of games. I thought we dominated them, especially in the first half. We were all over them. We didn’t stick enough in, but we were all over them for sure.
The team has dominated possession in many games this season, but has still been unable to score. What do you attribute that to?
I don’t think it’s that we don’t recognize the moment. I don’t know if we’re looking for the perfect goal. In tonight’s match, we had an unbelievable goal by Brad [Davis]. In the first half, we had so many other chances that we could have put away if we just would have let the trigger go a little bit earlier or had cut the ball back and just been a little more clinical in the front pass. But I can’t fault the guys for the number of chances that we created. Sometimes you miss and that’s the way it goes. But when you play like that, it builds a style of play that you want, not only now but for the end of the season. You have to have a purpose in how you go get your points, and tonight there’s no doubt that we went out with a purpose and played really well and aggressively. I thought we had great numbers in the box and were able to win the ball back in tough situations. So I’m very pleased with the way we played.
On whether aggression was key in dominating possession…
The change in the way that we played, formation-wise, really put a lot of pressure on them. I also think that we had the key people who we wanted on the ball. They were on a ball the majority of the game, and I thought that helped a lot. And I know this is going to come off poorly, but we had a lot of veteran men on the field tonight, because we had a lot of guys coming back from injury, and so we were able to change the team around in a way that we got our older, veteran type of guys, which really changed the game.
On the inability to shoot and score when the team is a man up…
I’m not concerned. Whenever you’re a man up, the team winds up just really bunkering down and in their mentality, they become galvanized. They become a wall. And a lot of times, I’d rather play 11-v-11, because it ends up being a very difficult proposition to break them down, and it’s hard to get anything through there. We had great movement in and around the box, and the chances were there. We didn’t give them anything, but at the end of the day, we didn’t score. But you can’t take away how well we played today. I think we’re doing more than enough to get something.
LA Galaxy Head Coach Bruce Arena
On getting a result in Kansas City…
I think our guys did a great job, even when going down to ten men. Some days are going to look like this, but the grind up to get a point here is important. We are pleased with that. I don’t think we played well today. We had a lot of issues with this game today. It’s a point. We are going home. We are not looking back.
On what happened with Ashley…
I have no idea. We need to publish law eighteen and make a lot of copies of that and send it off to everyone involved. Do you know what law eighteen is? Law eighteen is common sense. That’s the law we definitely violate in every game.
On Sporting KC’s offensive attacks…
I thought they played a good game today. They were very aggressive. They won a lot of second balls. They are obviously a team that came back home and played real hard trying to get three points. We were fortunate to get one point.
On scouting lineup formation…
Zusi playing right back was interesting. Nothing else surprised me really. We made one change. Probably wasn’t the best. Larentowicz did a real fine job. He is coming back from an off-season surgery and we don’t want to throw that many minutes at him this early. We were pretty conservative with him and I thought he did a very good job. And same for Robbie Rogers coming in for Ashley. I was very pleased with him.
