LA GALAXY HEAD COACH BRUCE ARENA
On the weather conditions and how it affected the team:
“The other team dealt with the same conditions.”
On Houston Dynamo’s play:
“Yeah and obviously they’re a little more adjusted to this environment than we are. When you’re on the road and you concede a goal in the first eight minutes you put yourself behind the eight ball and we certainly did that.”
On impression of Romney and Lassiter:
“Romney did a good job. Lassiter, he’s a young kid but Romney, on the night could have been our best player.”
On Steven Gerrard’s performance in Houston’s heat:
“Just okay. It’s not a good game to have to put him through. Obviously he’s trying to get himself fit and these conditions are very difficult for that. You could see he was fatigued at the end of both halves and maybe we could have utilized him in a reserve role as opposed to starting him tonight.”
On subbing out Bradford Jamieson in the 45th minute:
“It just looked like he struggled physically. He looked to be pretty tired and he had a difficult time out there the last 15 minutes of the first half.”
On his strategy going into the match:
“To win.”
On Houston’s conditions:
“Right, well the strategy was not to give up a goal in the first eight minutes. That was the strategy.”
On the team’s strategy after giving up a goal early in the game:
“Try to get a goal back. It’s not rocket science out there.”
LA GALAXY FORWARD ROBBIE KEANE
On a possible injury he suffered during the game:
“I don’t know. Not sure. Something happened in the first half. I felt something and then at halftime it started to stiffen up and then obviously after the game I can’t lift it over my head. I can’t remember which incident it was.”
On the seriousness of his injury:
“Obviously, I don’t know. I’ve just seen the trainers. When you can’t lift it over your head there’s obviously something wrong. I’m hoping that it’s not too bad.”
On the game:
“We killed ourselves. Eight minutes into the game, we conceded a sloppy goal and then another goal. That’s two goals that we could’ve avoided. And then when you’re playing away from home in that humidity, it’s always difficult when you’re chasing the game. Tonight we made it hard on ourselves.”
On the difficulty of playing in Houston’s heat:
“Yeah, it was tough. It was tough. It’s the same for both teams. Obviously they’re more used to it than we were. It certainly is tough. But we made it tough on ourselves because you can’t concede an early goal away from home, especially in this heat. They’re more used to playing in this heat so they know how to control the game when they go a goal up and that was the case.”
On the team’s chemistry and having to players from Galaxy II in the lineup:
“No excuses. I thought Dave [Romney] did very well at left back. He looked very comfortable. The other lads came in when it was a lost cause really. We were losing the game. Certainly they weren’t to blame. Listen, we’ve only got ourselves to blame. We were sloppy in the first half. The first 20 minutes weren’t good enough and we punished ourselves for that.”
On what’s needed to win on the road:
“I don’t know. Just have to keep plugging away. Eventually it’s going to happen. Hopefully sooner rather than later.”
On how to cope when after a 3-0 loss”
“As far as I’m concerned it’s over. Finished.”
HOUSTON DYNAMO HEAD COACH OWEN COYLE
Opening remarks on the win:
“Yea, well I think we knew that we were going to play against the champions. Robbie was on two consecutive hat tricks and they scored five last week and have been in outstanding form, so we knew that it was going to be a tough game. But we also knew as well that when we’re at our maximum, we’re capable of beating anybody in the league and we showed that tonight. I’ve said before and I said it to the players tonight after the game – the key to us moving forward is the consistency. I mean we’re missing eight players tonight. We knew we played very well during the week at Kansas, even though we were obviously down to only ten men. But coming into tonight, it was important that we show everybody the qualities that the Dynamo have and we did – we scored three tonight, I’d say we could’ve done five or six. We kept out some very talented players – world class players in my mind, but that’s a bit of a catalyst for us moving forward. It’s one game, not two or three.
After the Chicago game, a game we thought we could win. What we did do was we turned the 1 to 3 at San Jose. We never, I think, performed to the level we needed to. It was nice to win back home. What? Seven of the last ten on the road. We’ve been in fantastic form. But again, those players tonight, and Will Bruin led the line again, as he does and I’m so pleased with him because he’s developed into a real top class [player] in my mind. He scored a wonderful goal and ran himself into the ground. We talked about some fresh legs coming in in Erick “Cubo” Torres and I get Giles Barnes back. I believe I can find a front three in Barnes, Bruin, and Torres that can complement with the other quality that we have. It was a big result that we craved and one we needed to give everybody a lift.”
