The Houston Dynamo know they’re in a big hole, but they aren’t giving up hope heading into the second leg of the Western Conference Championship series at Seattle on Thursday night (10:30 pm ET; ESPN, ESPN Deportes in the US; TSN1, TVAS2 in Canada).
The Dynamo dropped the first leg of the series 2-0 at BBVA Compass Stadium last week, allowing Gustav Svensson to score an early goal, then losing Jalil Anibaba to a red card before conceding a second.
They’ll have to score at least twice in Seattle on Thursday night to have any chance. That’ll be a tall order for a team that hit the back of the net just 14 times in 17 regular season away games, but the Dynamo know they’ll put Seattle under some serious pressure if they’re able to score first on Thursday.
“If we score a goal there in the opening minutes they’re going to feel the pressure,” midfielder Tomas Martinez told reporter Victor Araiza on Saturday. “So we’re going to stay quiet as we’ve always done, and to have the best game we can to get the best result and quality for the final.”
Veteran defender Leonardo, who won MLS Cup three times with LA before joining Houston this winter, is drawing inspiration from Schalke’s incredible comeback from a 4-0 deficit to draw 4-4 at Borussia Dortmund on Saturday ahead of Leg 2.
“If you score one goal in the first half it’s going to be more pressure for them. It’s important to be concentrated, focused, score one goal in the first half and we’ll see what happens in the second half,” he said.
“A lot of games in history in Europe or South America, a team that won 3-0, the other team comes back 3-3 or 4-3. For example, today I was watching Borussia Dortmund and Schalke and Borussia Dortmund was winning 4-0 and Schalke scored 4 goals in 20 minutes. So we’ll see what happens.”
