QUOTE SHEET
WEDNESDAY, JULY 28, 2004 -- COLUMBUS CREW 2, DALLAS BURN 1
CREW HEAD COACH GREG ANDRULIS
On the game:
"I thought it was a good solid effort. We had to grind it out a bit in the second half, but we hung on and a great three points at home. Undefeated in the league I think in the month of July. I think so, a bookend with the first game and the last game. Keeps us within striking distance of first place with two games in hand, and I just said to the guys we're heading in the right direction, and we need to build on tonight's game and keep it going when we come back."
On Jeff Cunningham not starting.
"Jeff's (Cunningham) been, as you guys know, he's a tough cookie, and he does not want to come off the field. And for the last couple of weeks he's been playing with essentially a pulled hamstring, and we just felt that it needed some rest. We talked about it before the game, whether or not to even have him available, but he wanted to be there if we needed him, and to his credit, he came out and did some stuff for us. But he needs to get that thing healed for the second half of the season, and constantly playing 90 minutes is not the obviously way to do it."
On why Danny Szetela wasn't available for today's game.
"He's been here for 24 hours, half the guys names he doesn't know yet. But when it's his turn, and when he's prepared, he'll get his chance. If we could dress every single guy on the roster he would have been on there, but you have to do what you have to do. Danny is going to be a terrific player. I think the expectations of him right now are blown out of proportion. We have to keep in mind that he's a 17-year-old kid who's never played a minute at this level, not even in an exhibition. We hope to get a couple of exhibitions between now and our next home game so he can get out there and see what it's like to play with these guys. We also can do some things in practice, now that we have a couple of weeks between games, that we haven't done. We are going to make sure that when he's ready, it will be a successful orientation to the Crew fans, and for him. I think throwing him out there tonight would have not been the right thing to do."
On Edson's performance.
"You know, terrific, and I think also you have to talk about Simon's (Elliot) ball. His second one was world class, but at the same time you have to have someone running like crazy to get on the end of it. I thought Edson was strong tonight throughout the game. When he got that knock to his knee, his leg got dead, and he just couldn't keep going. And again good thing that we have quality like Jeff to bring on to keep it going. I thought Edson stepped up to the plate big time and a good response to a sub-par performance probably from Saturday night but he knew it, and he wanted to go out and make his stamp on the game, and he did."
On starting Kyle Martino at forward.
"Kyle's good in one-on-one situations, and we felt with Clarence Goodson there we could get him in one-on-one situations and see if Kyle could take him on and take advantage of that. I think for the most part it worked. Kyle did get antsy at times and drift back into the mid-field, and what we were trying to do there, we did very well in the first half, is have Manny and Ross run off that to create a little unbalance. It didn't happen much in the second half, but Kyle and Edson have played a lot together, since I think they were 14 or 15, so they know each other. I thought it worked out well. Obviously, you like it when everything works out well."
On finally scoring against Dallas this year.
"Yeah, it was good. Dallas is a terrific team. Colin (Clarke) has done a great job with them. Even from the last time we played them in Dallas a few weeks ago, much improved. Part of it is, I think he had 5 or 6 different starters tonight available that were injured the last time we were there. We knew it was going to be a battle, with Eddie Johnson up top, just a tremendous player, and Oscar Pareja in the middle, one of the best mid fielders in the league, and Cory Gibbs, this is the first time we played against him this season, and so they were able to change things up from the last game, and you know, they were very, very dangerous tonight. (Jon) Buschy made a couple of nice saves, the cross bar helped us once. But when you get up 2-0 you make the other team push a little bit, and that's what we did."
CREW FORWARD EDSON BUDDLE
On the game.
"It was an important game for us. We are not far away from first and it was good to win at home for our fans."
On his first goal.
"It was a good ball from Simon (Elliot). The turnover in the offensive third was obviously key."
On is second goal.
"Simon has a lot of experience and has won a championship. He definitely helps this team. He played a great ball and I was able to get behind my defender and finish."
On his success today.
"Last game I didn't get as many chances. I had a lot more touches today. The guys were really looking for me."
CREW MIDFIELDER SIMON ELLIOT
On the game
"I'm happy to a win at home and ending July unbeaten is great. We were a little disappointed in a couple of the recent draws to not get three points. It was nice to finish off July with three points."
On the first goal.
"I was stepping wide on the man and saw him (Cory Gibbs) put his head down and had an easy ball to play to Eddie (Edson Buddle). Edson took it coolly and made me look good. The goal was a result of our team pressure. Whenever we lost the ball we were pressuring to win the ball back and it paid off."
On the second goal.
"We've been defending well as a team, and when we win the ball we are in good spots to break free. A good ball is an early ball and Edson was able to get behind his defender on his blindside and had a good finish."
BURN HEAD COACH COLIN CLARKE
On the game
"I'm disappointed. I thought we had enough chances to win the game but we gave up two sloppy goals. The boys are disappointed. A strong part of our game is our passing and in the first half that part wasn't sharp enough, especially in the defensive third. And we got punished for it. We created chances and we had opportunities and we didn't do well enough with them."
On what he thought down 2-0 at halftime:
"It was never beyond us. We always felt going out for the second half that we could win the game. I think with the overall play in the second half that maybe we deserved it. We got the goal, had one disallowed, had one hit off the crossbar, Busch pulled off a few good saves. We had a lot of good quality chances the second half and with a little bit of luck we could have won the game."
BURN FORWARD JASON KREIS
On the game
"We're disappointed. We're expecting a lot out of each other right now, which is good. I think we all have high expectations for each other and we all have a lot of respect for each other. We all think that we can do better. So to come here and give up the two goals in the way we did, we're all disappointed. I think we do have to take some positives out of it. I thought we had a great effort in the second half. We really put them under and I think we're unlucky not to walk out of here with a point."
On his goal:
"I don't get a whole lot of pleasure in scoring when we lose. Scoring when you win is the greatest feeling in the world and scoring when you lose is just blah."
