There’s no doubt, the Portland Timbers have come a long way this year.
Five months ago, they were sitting on just five points after eight games and wondering where the form that produced last year’s Western Conference regular season championship had gone. Now, after a 3-0 win last weekend over the Vancouver Whitecaps and heading into Saturday’s away matchup against Toronto FC (1 pm ET; Stream of the Week, TSN in Canada) the Timbers have finally climbed back into a playoff spot as the fifth-place team in the West with five games remaining.
They’re also atop Group 5 in the CONCACAF Champions League following Tuesday’s 6-0 win over Alpha United and poised to advance to the quarterfinals.
“Even though this season’s been trying at times, we have the chance to end on a real positive here, making the playoffs and getting out the CCL into the quarterfinals,” head coach Caleb Porter said prior to their Thursday departure for Toronto. “And if we do that, it’s a successful season.”
Things have certainly been looking up since those gloomy first two months of the season – especially of late.
The Timbers are 3-0-1 over their last four games, including two CCL wins. And they’re unbeaten in five of their last six league games to move two points clear of the Whitecaps for that coveted final MLS Cup Playoff spot with 39 points from 29 games.
Fourth-place FC Dallas are nine points ahead of Portland.
“We need to keep pushing,” Porter said. “We can’t be satisfied staying where we’re at. We need to fight for that fourth spot.”
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Portland will need quite a run to accomplish that, and they’ll start that quest facing a team in a very familiar situation.
Toronto FC are in seventh place in the East, three points out of the fifth spot with six games remaining.
“I think we have to realize that they’re motivated,” Porter said of TFC. “They’re at home. They’re going to be flying around. They’re going to be aggressive. We need to be aware of that. … I think the key thing is to, like I always say, respect them, but for me mostly, perform well. I think if we perform well, the result will be positive.”
Porter said they’ll follow a similar game plan that produced one of their best results of the season against the Whitecaps.
In that game, Porter said they were patient and composed in searching for the first goal rather than recklessly pushing forward and leaving their defense exposed. It was their fourth clean sheet of the season and second for the backline of center backs Liam Ridgewell and Pa Modou Kah, left back Jorge Villafana and right back Alvas Powell – their fourth consecutive game starting together.
Porter also said his starting lineup, with Fanendo Adi, who recorded a brace against Vancouver, at striker as opposed to Maximiliano Urruti, will likely be his first choice for the final stretch. Over the past four league games, using just 13 players, the Timbers have scored 11 goals.
“For us to win recently we need to be patient, organized, composed and pick our moments,” Porter said. “We don’t need to overdo it in the attack; we’re going to score goals. We don’t need to overdo it in terms of getting numbers forward. We need to just play the way we’ve been playing recently.”
Dan Itel covers the Timbers for MLSsoccer.com.
