—by Chris Rifer

Osama Bin Laden was killed, Oprah filmed her last show, and the planet survived a rapture prophecy. All of these things have happened since a Timber that isn’t a central defender scored a goal. Usually when a club goes the better part of a month without any of their forwards, midfielders, or outside backs adding to their account, they make a beeline to the bottom of the table. Not your Portland Timbers, however. They have taken seven points out of nine in the midst of such a stretch.

Coming into Saturday, the match between the Timbers and Columbus Crew was billed as a matchup of Eric Brunner against his former team and their prolific scorer, Emilio Renteria. Well, Renteria lasted all of 38 minutes while Brunner scored the winning goal and led his defense to a clean sheet. Advantage, Brunner.

In spite of the storylines, the Timbers’ win was not marked by the dominant, exhilarating play they have showed at Jeld-Wen Field thus far this year. Columbus controlled the first 20 minutes of the match, as Renteria and fellow Crew striker Tommy Heinemann repeatedly sent Portland’s backline scrambling. The Timbers came out flat, lacking any rhythm and not seriously challenging the Crew defense. As they have been for the past month, however, the Timbers defense was up for the challenge.

The Timbers asserted themselves a bit more as the half progressed, but ultimately failed to put anything on frame in the first half. The best chance of the half came from Columbus, as an incredible Andres Mendoza cross found Heinemann at the far post, but a brilliant reaction from Troy Perkins parried Heinemann’s header wide.

As flat as Portland looked in the first half, they looked equally sharp to open the second. Barely 30 seconds after intermission, Jack Jewsbury quickly played a free kick at the edge of the box to Kalif Alhassan. With virtually no pressure, Kalif crossed to a completely unmarked Eric Brunner who nodded the ball through the disorganized Columbus defense and into the net.

Portland’s chances didn’t end there. In the ensuing 15 minutes, both Kalif Alhassan and Jorge Perlaza missed promising opportunities inside the box that would have ended any suspense.

The Timbers couldn’t find that second goal, however, and as the half wore on Columbus began to more urgently search for an equalizer. In the 87^th minute, Crew midfielder Robbie Rodgers hit a shot from the top of the box that skidded past Perkins but glanced off the outside of the post.

From there, however, Portland put on a clinic on how to kill off the waning moments of a 1-0 match. Crisp passing and movement from the Timbers kept Columbus from even sniffing their attacking third in stoppage time, much less coming close to an equalizer.

Even if it was less than aesthetically pleasing at times, the win gives Portland their fifth win at Jeld-Wen Field and perfect 15^th point out of 15 at home.

Match Observations

• At some point the lack of production from the midfield and strikeforce has to be a concern. It seems that teams are trying to pack in against Portland a little bit. That has created challenges, especially for Jorge Perlaza, Kenny Cooper, and Kalif Alhassan, but has also resulted in relieving the defense of a bit of pressure. Eventually teams are going to realize that isn’t a viable strategy against the Timbers. Portland is so good on set pieces that the Timbers are likely to get on the board via the free kick regardless of whether a team packs in or plays a bit more freely. Considering the odds of scoring more than once are slim when a team plays relatively conservatively, this strategy is ultimately self-defeating. As we have seen over the last couple weeks, so long as opponents keep things tight, the lack of production up front isn’t a huge issue. When things open up, though, Perlaza, Alhassan and Cooper are going to have to produce to keep Portland on their torrid pace.
• I don’t usually like to harp on refereeing, but Saturday’s was the worst we have seen all year. The officiating was at best erratic. The referee gave some free kicks that were just flat undeserved, and ignored some obvious fouls—most prominently including Futty’s late tackle on Renteria in the first half which deserved at least a yellow card.
• This is ridiculously early, but the disparity between the conferences is substantial. At this point in the season there are six teams in the West that are indisputably better than the third best team in the East, and with the recent run of form from Chivas you could argue that now there are seven. It is easy to foresee the maximum-possible six teams from the West getting into the playoffs. The most eye-opening statistic: The West is +17 in goal differential.

Timbers Grades

Troy Perkins, 6.5 He struggled in distribution again, but was an absolute stud in goal. His first half denial of Heinemann might be the save of the week, and came up huge with a number of other big stops. Brunner is the sexy pick for Man of the Match, but don’t forget about Troy’s play in goal that preserved the clean sheet.

Rodney Wallace, 6 Didn’t get forward much, but had maybe his best game in defense. Won a ton of tough balls on his left side, and was helpful in controlling Columbus’ movement up front.

Futty, 5.5 Had a nice game in defense even though he was posed with a bit more of a challenge. Columbus’ forwards’ movement was excellent, posing challenges especially for Portland’s center backs. They did well to keep a clean sheet, even if they conceded a few good chances.

Eric Brunner, 6.5 Gets a bonus for scoring the goal, and otherwise rose to the occasion in defense. He was sort of the darling of the week—going against his old club—and he completed the storyline by delivering the winner.

Jeremy Hall, 4.5 Over the last couple weeks he has shown a disturbing tendency to not pick up his marks, and the Timbers were almost punished for that a couple times, especially on Heinemann’s first half diving header.

Kalif Alhassan, 5 He occasionally looked good with the ball at his feet, but had a couple good opportunities to shoot on goal and failed to hit frame either time.

Jack Jewsbury, 5.5 Gets credit for having the presence of mind to take the free kick quickly to set up the goal, and had a decent day in the center of the midfield. Still, didn’t have his best day on set pieces.

Diego Chara, 5.5 Didn’t have many plays that you would consider game changing, but the difference that Chara has brought to the midfield is very noticeable. Before Chara the offense ran almost exclusively up the wings, and while the Timbers still like to move up the wings, the passing and movement in the midfield has improved dramatically since his arrival, to say nothing of the Timbers’ newfound ability to defensively control the game in the midfield.

Darlington Nagbe, 5.5 I was a little surprised to see him come off at half, as I thought Darlington had one of his better halves of the season. His movement was pretty good, and he looked to have a better feel for how to create with his pace.

Jorge Perlaza, 5 As usual, he had a few of his nice runs, but when he gets a chance in front of goal like he got in the second half, he has to put it on frame.

Kenny Cooper, 4.5 Cooper needs to rediscover the disruptiveness that he showed early in the season. Not all of this is on him, as he has become the feature of just about everybody’s defensive game plan, and he is working awfully hard to get the ball at his feet by tracking back into midfield, but he has been virtually silenced in the past three matches.

Sal Zizzo, 5.5 Zizzo wasn’t quite as active as he has been coming on in the last few matches, but still had a nice outing. His vision and passing is still quite a step above Nagbe’s.

Ryan Pore, 5 Was fairly nondescript in his short stint. I must admit, I’m not entirely sure about this pattern of bringing Pore on for Perlaza in the waning moments. Pore probably does bring a marginal improvement in defense over Perlaza, but it’s to the detriment of a lot of offense.

James Marcelin, INC Had a couple nice moments, and another obvious foul that wasn’t called, but wasn’t on for long enough to really make an impact.

Onward, Rose City!