PORTLAND, Ore. – The Portland Timbers figured something out the last time they played Real Salt Lake.
Namely, they figured out how to beat Real Salt Lake.
In their 3-1 away win June 7, the Timbers put an end to their 11-game winless streak against RSL – the team that knocked them out of the playoffs last year in the Western Conference finals – and won for the first time in Salt Lake. And Timbers coach Caleb Porter said that knowledge is a warm blanket as his team heads into Friday night’s showdown with RSL at Providence Park (10 pm ET; NBCSN in the US, TSN2 in Canada) to begin a daunting two-game stretch to finish out the regular season knowing they must likely take six points and hope for favorable results elsewhere to qualify for the postseason.
“I think it’s big,” Porter said after a training session this week. “We hadn’t had much success in terms of wins prior to that, so I think it’s big in terms of being able to use that to give us belief.”
In that game, the Timbers used a brace from then-newly acquired striker Fanendo Adi and a penalty kick from Will Johnson to down the Claret and Cobalt. Johnson, who broke his leg against Toronto FC earlier this month, won’t be around for this game, but Adi certainly will, as will a diverse Timbers attack that has produced an MLS club record 59 goals, which trails only the Seattle Sounders and LA Galaxy for offensive production this year.
Even more encouraging, the Timbers’ best soccer of the year has come since the end of July, producing seven wins in their last 13 games.
“To know that we can beat them is huge for confidence,” said midfielder Ben Zemanski, who has taken the reins for Johnson in the last two games. “And I think we’re in a good spot right now where we’ve one back-to-back games, and we’re feeling alright. This games comes at a good time.”
And while RSL have already sewn up their seventh consecutive postseason trip, they’ll hardly be on cruise control.
The visitors need to keep putting up results to stave off hard-charging FC Dallas to maintain the third spot in the West and stay out of the Knockout Round. Porter, whose team faces that same FC Dallas team on the road in their season finale on Oct. 25, said he’s happy to be facing two quality teams to end the year.
“I think sometimes when you’re playing teams that are out that can be even trickier,” Porter said. “I like the fact that our guys are going up against two good teams. We seem to play our best soccer against the best teams, and we know we need to get a result. So I like the way it’s set up.”
And just imagine what two wins against RSL and FCD to finish out the year would do for momentum should Portland manage to slip into the playoffs.
“It would be huge,” Porter said.
Dan Itel covers the Timbers for MLSsoccer.com.
