Quakes Win Second in a Row; USOC Preview; Wondo to USMNT for Gold Cup

By: Chris | May 23rd, 2011

The Earthquakes kept their second half scoring trend alive by scoring 2 beautiful goals against New England Saturday night for their second win in a row. The Quakes are now 2-2-2 at home. The recent good home form will hopefully translate into another win at home tomorrow night as San Jose takes on Chicago in the Final Qualifying match for a US Open Cup berth.

Saturday’s game was a back and forth affair and neither team looked very convincing in the first half. The Earthquakes had the first real shot on goal in the 13th minute on a free kick. Stephenson stepped up from about 25 yards out but his blast hit the top of the crossbar and went into the stands. Shalrie Joseph had New England’s first chance on goal in the 25th minute but Busch easily punched the ball out of danger. Each team had 1 shot on goal in the first half and most of the action was in the center of the field where players were fighting to maintain possession.

The second half was a livelier affair as 2 yellows were handed out to Convey and Lenhart. Both New England and San Jose had more scoring chances but neither could put one in the back of the net until the 71st minute. Wondo had the ball on the right side of the field, cut back to his left foot and lofted a cross intended for Lenhart. The ball floated over Lenhart’s head but found an unmarked Ellis McLoughlin who squatted down and powered a low header into the far side of the net for his first MLS goal. 8 minutes later the Quakes had another free kick in a dangerous area. Ampai and Convey stood over the ball but Convey took the kick and arced in a Beckham-like free kick that curled into the far post near the top corner and bounced into the goal for Convey’s first of the season. Not to be outdone, the Revolution’s Chris Tierney cut the lead in half in the 84th minute with another free kick, but the Quakes were able to hold on for the 2-1 victory.

The Quakes started the same lineup from the Columbus game with the exception of Opara in place for McDonald, who was sitting out his one game suspension. McLoughlin came on as a sub for Johnson on the left and Ampai subbed in for Gjertsen on the left. New England was playing a 4-5-1 so the Quakes had a tougher time of keeping possession in the midfield. The first half didn’t look pretty as neither team looked good with the ball, but New England had more possession. But the Quakes were able to start stringing passes together in the second half and threatened and got dangerous free kicks like the one that Convey eventually converted. Lenhart again played as he is wont to do, draw fouls in dangerous areas and draw defenders away from the other forward and attacking midfielders.

The youtube subscription that I got all my previous videos from was shut down. So to see goals and highlights you’ll have to head to the team’s website. Occasionally the team will put up videos on their official youtube channel. Here’s Bobby Convey’s goal.

US Open Cup

The Quakes take on the Chicago Fire on Tuesday night at Buck Shaw in the Final Qualifying match for the USOC. Chicago lost their last game agains Philly and drew their last 3 games while the Quakes have won their last 2 and played well their last 3. Chicago defeated Colorado in their Qualifying match with a mostly reserve squad. The Quakes defeated Portland with a mix of reserves and first stringers. We’ll see who Yallop trots out tomorrow night, but I expect to see the same sort of mix like against Portland.

It will be interesting to see how each team comes at this match as the clubs play each other on Saturday in Chicago. With 3 days between games to travel and train, do you play more first stringers for the USOC game or save them for the MLS game? The USOC could be the most realistic shot both teams have at silverware this season. Yallop has said that he takes this competition seriously but you have to wonder when coaches say these things because obviously they wouldn’t say they would rather play a reserve squad and hope for a win because they are focused on MLS. What? Someone actually did say that? Yes, John Spencer, manager of the Portland Timbers said exactly that after his side lost to San Jose 3 weeks ago. So maybe they could say something like that.

Wondo Gets National Team Call Up

Bob Bradley had this to say about Wondo at today’s press conference:

…we watched different games we felt strongly that Chris Wondolowski was in good form. He has scored some good goals, some very different goals and Chris seems to be a player that gets a couple of chances every game.

San Jose’s native (he’s from Danville) 2010 Golden Boot winner got the call from Bob Bradley on Friday that he was invited to play with the USMNT during this summer’s Gold Cup. YAY! Of course Wondo accepted, who wouldn’t? I’ve had conversations with friends and other fans at the recent games, and I’ve heard and read opinions about Wondo’s possible call up. Most of us think that it would be better for Wondo to stay with the club rather than play with the national team. My reasons for this are that Wondo is invaluable to the Quakes while the USMNT has a much larger pool of talent to choose from. The results and attitude that Wondo bring to the Quakes locker room are invaluable. Combined with Johnson’s call up by Jamaica, we’re losing two talented players when they are hot.

Now not to be a downer, but we could potentially get Johnson back earlier than Wondo as Jamaica traditionally doesn’t have a strong team while the US is favored to get to the final. But what will our schedule look like without these two players? Both Johnson and Wondo will be available tomorrow night and Wondo will be available on Saturday against Chicago. So Johnson should probably be playing tomorrow night, while Wondo might want to get some more minutes in as he prepares to head to USMNT camp. From next Saturday to the final, the Quakes play Chicago, DC United, Sporting KC and Los Angeles. Assuming the USMNT gets to the final, we won’t have to worry about seeing Donovan when they play LA, as those two games are on June 25. If the US wins the tournament, it’s possible that Tim Ream and Juan Agudelo would be unavailable for New York when we play them on July 2. It depends on their fitness after the tournament. Of course that means we might not have Wondo back until July 9 as well.

This call up for Wondo also has me concerned as well. I bought tickets to the Gold Cup final back in March but was informed by my girlfriend that it was the same day as the LA game. She said she’d rather see the LA game unless the US was in the final. It’s a tough decision because who knows if the US will make the final? Whereas the LA game is a definite event. But with Wondo getting a call up we’re rethinking the possibility of going down to Pasadena for the final match. Regardless, I think this call up warrants the purchasing of Wondo’s USMNT jersey, which I will then try to get him to sign.