For a look at how Sporting Kansas City reacted to their 2-0 defeat to the LA Galaxy, a quote sheet is provided below.
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SPORTING KANSAS CITY HEAD COACH PETER VERMES
On how he viewed his team’s performance:
“I actually thought up until the goal we were actually pretty good. Look, it’s a handball. It doesn’t get called and it breaks us a little bit right at that point. Now here we are, we already have the fatigue aspect to deal with and now we’re trying to chase the game after a goal gets scored based on an easy call by the referee and it doesn’t happen. At that point we go in at halftime trying to chase the game a little bit, coming back in the second half. Obviously the fatigue and the goal opened us up a little bit more. The second goal doesn’t really doesn’t mean anything at the end of the day based on the fact that we were trying to push forward to get back in the game at that point. It’s a tough road trip the way we had to travel.”
On the Galaxy’s pressing style of play:
“I think they were good tonight. They were good from front to back. I thought their energy was good. I will say though that we turned them over quite a few times in that first 30 minutes up until that goal. Then we started chasing and it sits in your mind you get a little fatigued and now all of a sudden we start to open up and I still think up to that point we were pretty decent and being away from home and trying to play against somebody is who we are and we’re going to keep doing it.”
On Sporting’s shutout streak coming to a close:
“I really don’t care personally about the shutout streak. All I care is that we have a clean sheet at the end of the game, we scored one or two then obviously we get the points. It’s a shame in a game like this because I think they’re two good teams, for a goal to be scored that way. You have center ref, you got linesman and you got fourth official and the fourth official is right there I mean he had a great view of it and for that not to happen between the three of them is a failure in the system. Those guys made a mistake for sure. I spoke to Ricardo but at that point, what are you going to do? I wish we had instant replay, that’d be great.”
SPORTING KANSAS CITY GOALKEEPER JIMMY NIELSEN
On that Galaxy’s attack:
“Well, they were definitely better than we were today. It’s disappointing from my point of view with our performance today. Huge game, big game, in my opinion two of the better teams in the league and we didn’t perform at all. Overall, credit to LA, they were better than we were today.”
On Sporting’s shutout streak coming to a close:
“It’s disappointing the way we performed, that’s what’s disappointing. Not the shutout [streak ending]. Big games like this, you just don’t play bad like we did today. Right now I’m extremely disappointed and sad that we couldn’t perform better on a fantastic night like this, full stadium, two big teams, very disappointed.”
SPORTING KANSAS CITY DEFENDER MATT BESLER
On the physical nature of the game:
“LA is a great team so we knew coming in that it was going to be a battle. It was a dogfight, there was a lot of physical play especially in the middle of the field tonight.”
On the Galaxy’s attack:
“We knew coming in it was going to be a difficult challenge. LA is one of the best teams in the league and when they’re playing well they’re a tough team to beat at home so we have to give the credit to them. And for us, it just wasn’t good enough for tonight and we’ll have to make it better for our next game.”
On breaking down the Galaxy prior to the game:
“We had a few areas we wanted to expose but again, credit to them. They played a great game. We weren’t able to break them down and they got two against us. So, credit has to go to them.”
SPORTING KANSAS CITY FORWARD GRAHAM ZUSI
On Sporting’s approach early on and how they veered away from it:
“After the first 15 minutes of good pressure and balance, we got away from that for one reason or another. Our initial pressure on the ball disappeared and allowed them to move the ball up the field at their liking. And that’s when they can cause some problems. Given that much time on the ball, their movement off the ball is very good as well. We kind of fell apart defensively and allowed them to get a couple goals.”
On Landon Donovan’s return to the Galaxy and his performance tonight:
“It wasn’t that long of an absence but Landon’s a great player, always has been always will be. I don’t think you saw him miss a beat out there. He was a key on both of their goals and he’s looking like Landon of old.”
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