Reds fail to convert chances ... again
Toronto FC outshot Galaxy by 18-8 margin at BMO Field
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"I'm starting to sound like a broken record, aren't I?" asked interim head coach Chris Cummins. "A lot of chances again ... 18 of them on target and we haven't finished the chances."
TFC outshot Los Angeles by an 18-8 margin overall (including an 11-4 advantage in shots on goal) and yet in spite of these new season highs in shots and shots on goal, the Reds couldn't leave BMO Field with even a point to show for their efforts.
Toronto has left several goals on the table due to poor conversion even in some of their victories this season, but their current three-game losing streak represents the apex of their finishing woes. Over their last three matches, TFC has just one goal from 22 shots on net, and 44 shots overall.
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The man who scored TFC's lone goal in that stretch, Danny Dichio, took responsibility on behalf of the forwards for the team's problems at putting goals away.
"When it continually happens you have to take a look at yourselves, myself included," Dichio said. "We're not doing our job at this moment in time and our jobs is to score goals. We're there to be praised when we're scoring goals and we're there to be shot at when we're missing goals. That's part of being a striker. You have to take it on the chin."
Dichio's goal in the 64th minute on Saturday capped off a furious 42-minute attacking stretch from TFC where they outshot L.A. by a 14-2 margin. Dichio said that he was proud of his club's determination in coming back after falling behind after just five minutes, but was disappointed that they couldn't keep up the pressure after equalizing.
"I don't think we played particularly badly tonight, but it's just simple mistakes that lose you games," Dichio said. "These are the small details we've got to erase. It keeps happening and we've got to put our finger on it. We've got good resilience on the team here and we know that we don't die when we concede a goal, we've seen that a few times this year when we've gone a goal down and come back. We've got to make sure, especially at home, that we go on and win games from there."
The simple mistakes that Dichio mentioned led to L.A.'s two goals. The first came on an Eddie Lewis corner kick that sailed to the left side of the box and found a wide-open Alan Gordon for the successful header.
Cummins was upset that the Galaxy were able to score so easily on a such a basic deadball play.
"I hate conceding on set plays, everybody does," Cummins said. "If you're given a job on a set play, you do your job. That's what you're on the team for, you do your job. ... The lad [Gordon] just dropped his shoulder, gone in and got in behind. It's a decent ball in, but that's what you're there for."
The second Los Angeles goal came in the 77th minute due to another defensive breakdown. With team captain Jim Brennan forced to leave the game in the 55th minute, the Reds went to a three-man back line, and suddenly the Galaxy had more room to maneuver. This led to Gordon making a tremendous return pass on the left side to substitute striker Edson Buddle, who beat TFC goalkeeper Stefan Frei on a breakaway for the winning strike.
Brennan, after about 10 minutes in the trainer's room, reappeared on the sidelines with crutches and his right foot in bandages.
"I went over on my ankle," Brennan explained. "The ball had gone up in the air, I tried to win it again, but then I went over my ankle on that black piece of [plastic] mat that's right by the pitch. I tried to run it off but it was a nightmare. As soon as I came off I took my sock off, and it [the swelled ankle] was huge."
The defeat cost Toronto a chance to pick up ground in the Eastern Conference, as division leaders Chicago lost on Friday night. TFC's next two league games are against New York on June 13 and 24, respectively, which are sandwiched around a Nutrilite Canadian Championship game in Montreal on June 18.
In that game against the Montreal Impact, TFC need to win by at least four goals in order to win the tournament and advance to the CONCACAF Champions League, a deficit caused by a failure to capitalize on chances in earlier games against Montreal and Vancouver. The Nutrilite Canadian Championship might already be lost due to TFC's inability to convert their chances into goals, and now the challenge for the Reds is to solve the problem before it dooms their hunt for an MLS playoff spot.
"It's another one where we ask ourselves how many chances we need," Brennan said. "We had 18 shots. We've got to be more clinical and we've got to finish. At the end of the day the game is about scoring goals. That's what wins you games. We need more goals and we can't make mistakes like we do."
Mark Polishuk is a contributor to MLSnet.com.
