Waiting on a stadium - 'til the cows come home.

The Quakes didn’t play this weekend in MLS, but did have a much needed win over the Portland Timbers last Tuesday night in the US Open Cup.  This should have been a home game, but our regular pitch at the University of Santa Clara was unavailable, and no other suitable venue could be found in the Bay Area.  The single biggest gripe of the average Quakes fan is that, in our fourth season, it’s more than time to vacate the austere aluminum bleachers and put our new stadium in place. Our plight was only magnified by the extraordinary atmosphere of Jeld Wen Field, though thankfully we kept the flannelled lumberjack Timber Joey and his chainsaw idle for a few hours.   

Significantly, once again, local hero Chris Wondolowski led the team out as skipper over the usual Ramiro Corrales; no one at the club appears to have mentioned this.  While local blogger Robert Jonas has also noticed the switch, his co-host at Center Line Soccer’s Quakescast Kelly Gray tweeted that he would be following it up.  I have no word on whether Wondo was made captain as a result of the players-only meeting immediately after the Chivas game, but the move is consistent with that timeline.   

Other club pundits have played up the cup victory over the Timbers as a turning point for the team whose offense has been underperforming since the away win in Dallas all the way back in week 2.  I’m not so convinced – the Quakes goal eventually came off defender Ike Opara’s head on a corner in the 120^th minute against a Timbers team comprising mainly reserve players.  This didn’t do anything to restore my faith in the current Quakes midfield set up:  Wondo is being heavily marked, and is not getting the kind of service that helped him to the Golden Boot in 2010. 

To further complicate the Quakes’ situation, news came through on Thursday that Spurs midfielder Simon Dawkins would be out for two months after surgery.  It turns out Dawksy has freakishly big calves and the bilateral fasciotomy he underwent was essentially a “letting out” of the muscle sheath, to allow the muscle compartment to expand.  He is the target of some leg pulling (groan) from his team mates being the only player to wear long pants at training in sunny California – looks like it’s time to switch to Capri pants at least. 

Lionel Moossi - outstanding in his field. 

This week will be a busy one for coach Yallop: he will have to rearrange the midfield (again) for the away game on Wednesday in Vancouver.  I just hope they will remember to pack their metric boots, eh?  Just three days later the Quakes will play their next home game against Columbus Crew on Saturday evening.  There’s no word yet on when or where our ‘home’ game against the Chicago Fire in the next round of the US Open Cup will be staged – the game has to be completed by May 28^th.  Perhaps there’s a local dairy farmer who has a pasture we can use – the players can warm up running drills around the cow pats, and there’s all the milk you can drink at half time.  

Full match report on the Timbers cup game at the new look Center Line Soccer here. 
This blog is also posted at MLS_UK in the Eurosnob-free blog at www.majorleaguesocceruk.com