Earthquakes 2, Crew 1

By: Melissa | February 23rd, 2008

Hooray! Our first for realsies win! And Kei Kamara scored both our goals! Here’s a little write up from Cal Poly’s site:

Kamara kicked the scoring off in the 17th minute. Gavin Glinton slid a pass on the ground through the defense on the right side to a streaking Kamara. The explosive striker then struck a low-lining shot past Columbus keeper Will Hesmer to put the Earthquakes ahead 1-0.

The Crew would equalize in the 34th minute as San Jose’s Ryan Cochrane had trouble clearing a ball from the back for San Jose. The Crew took possession at the top of the box, swung the ball to the right and Alejandro Moreno directed a pass to Eddie Gaven. Gaven’s shot sailed low past San Jose keeper Dan Benton, who came on for Preston Burpo in the 22nd minute.

The opening minutes of the second half produced little fanfare, but Kamara again brought the crowd of 3,861 to its feat as he collected a ball with space on the left side of the box. Kamara faked one way, slid the ball back and rocketed a shot into the lower right corner of the net to give the Earthquakes a 2-1 lead.

Columbus had ample opportunity to equalize in the 62nd minute as Guilherme So fired a shot from 10-yards out, but Benton came off his line to block it. So tracked down the loose ball, bent a pass across the box and a San Jose defender headed the ball away. Frankie Hedjuk stepped into the cleared ball and boomed a shot, but Benton was game to the challenge.

Firstofall, you may be wondering – Dan Benton? Turns out Cannon got injured (knee) before Friday and didn’t play while Burpo got hurt early in the game. And holy crap there are a lot of positive posts from people who attended this game. The biggest, coolest, and most important observation was Garcia and Cochrane together in the back. Too bad Cochrane re-injured his ankle towards the end of the match. Also, Salinas received huge marks for his hustle and (OMG so awesome) his passing. Here’s a report from bigsoccer user scotto:

Just watched the E’Quakes beat up on the Crew at CalPoly – 2-1. Pretty decent match – unlike the one at PAL. Kei Kamara (former Crew) scored both goals. The second one was really pretty – several step overs at the top of the box, then a blast to far post.

I was very impressed with the combo of Nick Garcia and Ryan Cochrane in the back – very solid defensively. The rookie Shea Salinas (Furman Univ) was very, very good. He reminded me of Ian Russell with his speed up and down the flank. He put in several beautiful crosses, too. Ramiro actually surprised me with some of his moves. He seemed to have gotten more comfortable on the ball in Norway.

I guess that the Quakes were down a few players due to injuries.

Looking at the lineup for both halves (from the Cal Poly report above), I’d say it is much more consistent versus our situation at the Houston games. Looks like we are maybe sort of kind of starting to establish our regulars? But, last night, there was another mass round of substitutions towards the end of the second half. I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say it does look like our “core” is developing into Hernandez, Garcia, Cochrane and Riley on defense, with Salinas and Corrales regulars in the midfield. I guess the jury is still out on Grabavoy and Guerrero? The only consistent forwards for this game were Kamara and Glinton (replaced by Morales and Arias late in the second half). No mention of Noel. Did he not make it to SLO? Perhaps my friend and I really did need to create that signfabrice.com website.

I think thats about it for now. Oh hey – it also looks like the official uniforms are finally out (Kamara is modeling one in the picture above). And SSV reports that Ronnie Ekelund, last seen on the sidelines at the Kezar game, is indeed working for the Quakes in some sort of assistant capacity.