Sports

Postgame reaction to Tim Cahill’s brace, Red Bulls’ 2-1 win at TFC

The Red Bulls pulled out a 2-1 win at Toronto FC today, thanks to a brace from Tim Cahill. The Designated Player midfielder finally broke his scoring drought with his first goal of the year, then added a late header off a Thierry Henry cross to hand the Red Bulls their third win in four games.

Thanks to Cahill’s 89th-minute winner, the Red Bulls won their second straight and moved to 14 points off a 4-4-2 record and a tie for first place in the Eastern Conference, pending today’s other results. Here is postgame reaction from both sides, with Red Bulls in bold.

Mike Petke – Head Coach, New York Red Bulls

What were your thoughts on the game?

I thought it was not the most beautiful soccer played from either team to be honest with you. But at the end of the day it’s a tough game to play in two teams that are looking for consistency, battling and it was a hard fought game.

Tim Cahill hasn’t been on the score sheet until today, what were your thoughts on his performance and contribution this evening?

The two goals today were just the cherry on the cake to be honest with you because he does exactly what we ask him to do. He leads in the midfield, he plays very stingy defence and he’s a work horse. He’s an example for our young midielders to be honest with you.

You give up a late tying goal, but then get the three points. How big of a confidence builder is that?

To give up that goal it was tough to swallow, especially the way it was given up but that’s soccer. But to come back on the road and get that winning goal is definitely a confidence booster I’m very happy about that.

Lloyd Sam – Midfielder, New York Red Bulls

You gave up a late goal to tie the match, but how big was Tim Cahill today?

Tim Cahill is a warrior. I’m so happy for him, he’s not had many goals lately. He carried the team today and won us the game. Thierry had a bit to do with that too. They’re so important to us.

How do you think the team managed the game in the 2nd half since you didn’t have much possession?

It’s difficult; we were just trying to weather the storm. They had a big time second half and it was a difficult game being out there. It’s difficult sometimes being away from home, if we had a chance to make it 2 nil in the first half it would have made it easier for us. But they came out and played well to be fair and they got their goal and then to get another goal showed great courage.

Being your first start of the season, how did it feel to out there?

I felt good, it started with the lungs filling up a bit, but then I was alright. Its nice to be out there, hopefully many more (starts) will come. Most importantly it was good to get a win.

Tim Cahill – Midfielder, New York Red Bulls

Take us through the 2nd goal?

Well were down 1-1. I don’t think if were one nil up it would have went, but Thierry (Henry) didn’t even look at me, but I screamed and he heard and I suppose he knew exactly where I was and he put it in the air and from that I suppose there was only going to be one winner, because we need to score and end it. I hit the bottom right hand corner and we’re winning 2-1.

Teams talk about being more consistent. How positive is it getting a 2-1 win in Toronto?

I think the main thing for us is we’ve dropped a lot of points on the road and we’ve played such bad football and today I thought especially in the first half we played some beautiful passing. I set one in there with Eric and pulled Johnny in from the left and had Lloyd breaking was a bit of a luxury today. It seemed really nice but the discipline and consistency has to be there and that’s what we said before the game and I suppose a lot of people are looking at us to see if we could pull this off because Toronto is a good team and we did it. We made it difficult for ourselves. The only way they were going to score was us making a mistake. But in the end we kept knocking the door down and we got the win.

Defensively you seem to be a supreme reader of when the ball comes off the opponents. You made a couple key headers in your own box. That’s something you pride yourself on as well?

Yeah I pride myself on defending just as much as much as attacking. Especially against this team because they’re a dead ball team where they just dump the ball in the box and they really seem to put teams under a lot of pressure. In the video that I watched in the 3rd minute they are lumping it in the box so that tells a lot about the style they play. You know I’m not scared to win a challenge when it comes to defending. I suppose if its passed from me moves forward it’s going to have a good impact on the team.

Ryan Nelsen- Head Coach, Toronto FC

What are your thoughts on today’s game?

It was a disappointing performance from us from the first minute to the ninetieth. It was our worst performance. It’s a real shame because the guys have been doing well, we’ve been moving forward and working well in training, but it was a shame a bit of a disappointing performance.

Do you think you deserve anything from this run?

I think from the performance in the second half I definitely hoped, but taking away the result the performance wasn’t good enough. Teams have deserved nothing coming into here; Houston didn’t deserve anything, LA didn’t deserve anything so it’s not about deserving, but take away the score line, the performance wasn’t good.

As important as figuring out your starting lineup is each week does a thing like an early injury and substitution make you feel like you are kind of chasing what you wanted to do on a given day because you had to switch things up?

Yes, the two injuries hurt us. You have your take on how you want to see the game evolve and the moves you potentially might make and you try and think of if an injury happens here or there that you’ll make these moves. Braun (Justin) has been really great for us and provides a lot of energy and when he went off I think Wiedeman (Andrew) was a bit fatigued from Wednesday’s game and he couldn’t really influence as we’d normally like. But then again he put in a big shift Wednesday night that kind of hurt us a bit. No excuses, there are nine other guys that started the game that looked like they had played on Wednesday as well.

Jeremy Hall- Defender, Toronto FC

What are your thoughts another late game goal?

It’s got to stop. We are dropping points. I think we did a good job of finding the equalizer. Osorio (Jonathon) scored a great goal. I just don’t know what it is but we got to turn it around.

What is the flaw? What do you need to do?

We got to dig deep and be more aware and more switched on in the last five minutes because that is the only part of the game that really hurting us. We know we didn’t come out in the first half and play the half that we wanted to but we were only down one goal and Joe (Bendik) made a couple of big saves for us and we regrouped in the second half and found an equalizer and it’s just these last minutes that are killing us. I don’t know what to say anymore about it but we have to turn it around.

Is it a mental thing at this point?

I couldn’t guess. It’s just something that needs to change for us because its killing us. We are shooting ourselves in the foot right now. We felt that we could have gotten something out of this game and so it is really frustrating.

Darren O’Dea- Defender, Toronto FC

You weren’t able to kick start the game in the first half. You are losing games at the end but there was an opportunity to take the lead and in the first forty five probably wasn’t the best.

No it wasn’t. I think against Houston we were fantastic. You are not going to play well all the time but if you come in one nil we are still right in the game and in the second half we were a lot better. We looked like the only team that was going to score, until we scored. Maybe we are taking a step back once we score and hoping rather than doing. I really don’t know. We really need to look at this because we can’t keep going the way it is because if it does we will never pick up points.

Is anybody pointing the finger at individuals for consistent mistakes?

No, we are very good like that. We stick together as a team. Maybe it’s about time we really go into detail about it, not pulling people up, but to make ourselves better. Maybe we need to really analyze where things are going wrong because you can’t just keep putting it back to its just another one and it won’t happen again sort of thing. It’s happening. It’s happened through last year even though many players weren’t here but it is becoming a thing again this year so it needs to be put right. Maybe we need to go into more detail, the managers have us set up so perfectly it’s down to the players on the pitch and maybe a little bit of mental toughness when it comes down to it.

First loss at home for the TFC, any positives you can take from the first two months of play?

We should be a lot higher than we are. That’s a waste of words really; you are where you deserve to be. This is where we deserve to be, but if you take away the last two, three minutes of games we’d probably be near the top. The last three are just as important as any minute in the game and it’s something we need to put right. I’m a bit lost for words but we’ll figure it out.