SAN JOSE, Calif. – This was one instance of “pay it forward” that the San Jose Earthquakes could hardly afford.
A week after breaking their season-long winless streak on the road with a 2-1 victory at Vancouver, the Quakes afforded Houston the opportunity to sneak out of Avaya Stadium with a 2-1 win of their own – the Dynamo’s first road triumph in more than a year.
It was a bit of largesse that could come back to bite San Jose as they try to climb back above the Western Conference’s red line. The Quakes (7-7-10) could have been sitting all alone in sixth place with a victory, just a point out of fifth; instead, their five-match unbeaten streak came crashing down despite Victor Bernardez’s first goal of 2016.
“You win this game, you jump Portland, you get a little closer to Kansas City, you still have some games in your pocket,” Quakes coach Dominic Kinnear said. “It puts pressure on teams when they wake up on Saturday morning to see what happened on Friday night. So it’s a big opportunity missed for us.”
There were chances at either end to change the course of the evening. Little miscues by the hosts helped set up Houston for success on their two goals, sabotaging a San Jose defense that allowed multiple goals in only one of 13 previous league matches.
“We made some minor errors – you may look at it that way, but they were big errors when it comes to the game,” Kinnear said. “[We were] punished for our mistakes and punished for not taking advantage of our chances.”
The Quakes seemed to locate some offensive rhythm against the Whitecaps, yet couldn’t maintain that efficiency at home, even as they dominated the raw stat totals. San Jose outshot Houston 17-7, had 12 corner kicks to the Dynamo’s three, drew twice as many fouls (22 to 11) and recorded more than 100 extra passes.
Among the near-misses: Quincy Amarikwa’s full volley off a 75-yard pass from David Bingham, Darwin Ceren’s free kick just before halftime, saved headers from Shea Salinas and Alberto Quintero and a double save by goalkeeper Joe Willis to just keep Chris Wondolowski’s header from fully crossing the line – in the referee’s estimation.
“We just need to finish our chances,” Wondolowski said. “We’re creating some. We just have to execute a little better, have that killer instinct and put them away.”
Even the Quakes debut of new striker Henok Goitom couldn’t turn the tide. The Eritrean-Swedish veteran came on in the 69th minute and had a half-chance with his first touch, but his glancing header went wide.
“It’s like half a meter here, half a meter there,” Goitom said. “We didn’t give up. We were attacking. Sometimes, football is not fair. … It felt good to be playing after a long time, but there’s not much to say. We lost. That’s the only thing that counts.”
