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A 5-0 loss had Phil Neville saying his players quit and Evander firing off tweets.
It’s hard to stink up the place worse than the Portland Trail Blazers did Wednesday night in their season opener, but consider the 19,480 who sat through Portland’s 35-point loss to Golden State didn’t have to sit outside on a cold night.
Sympathies to those at Providence Park, who began the evening optimistic a home Wild Card game could spark a meaningful postseason run, and ended it deciphering tweets from Evander and listening to Phil Neville accuse his roster of quitting.
Said Neville at 9:45 p.m.:
“I’m more determined now than I’ve ever been and tonight I’m going to bottle the feeling of how it felt and that is the motivation when work starts tomorrow — building a roster that can compete, building a roster with players that don’t quit, building a roster with players that want to and can play in this type of game.”
Tweeted Evander at 11:12 p.m.:
“First, I want to apologize to all the fans who, on a Wednesday night, dropped everything to support us. It’s really hard to lose the way we did. The truth is, losing is not in our plans, but we have to deal with it.
“I want to say that we, the players and the entire staff, did everything we could to take Portland as far as possible. However, sometimes we have no control over what happens, and what happens off the field reflects on the field.
“Portland fans do not deserve the people who have power over this club. People who say they are men but do not keep their word. People who are only there when the team wins. Unfortunately, these are things we have no control over.”
Portland lost 5-0 on Wednesday, and that was only the beginning.
The specifics of what Evander was referencing remain unclear.
The 26-year-old Designated Player is in the second year of a four-year contract and put up one of the best offensive seasons in team history with 15 goals and 19 assists. He was unquestionably the best player on a roster that evolved throughout the season, with the club moving on from players such as Larrys Mabiala, Dairon Asprilla and Nathan Fogaça while Neville consistently tinkered with the lineup.
Only captain Diego Chara spoke with the media following Wednesday’s loss, and he mostly echoed Neville’s message about an effort that wasn’t there against Vancouver from the opening whistle.
“Only one team had the desire to play and came out hungry,” Chara said. “And that was Vancouver.”
Not that it needed any clarification — the Portland fanbase had seen enough by the completion of Ryan Gauld’s hat trick in the 59th minute to begin a cascade down the Providence Park stairwells. The five-goal loss was Portland’s largest of the season, came during a game that was supposed to be played in Vancouver, and capped an abysmal end to a season that saw the Timbers score two goals in their final five games and fail to record a win in the last month.
This was a club that, at times, was as fun to watch as any in the MLS, especially during a seven-game unbeaten streak in the summer that brought the team into the thick of the postseason race behind a high-scoring attack. It was also a club that couldn’t keep the ball out of its own net during a nine-game winless streak early in the year.
Things seemed well enough after beating the LA Galaxy 4-2 at home on Sept. 18 in what was likely the team’s most impressive win of the year. They had five games remaining, three of them were on the road, and clinching a spot in the MLS’ first round seemed well within grasp.
And that was it.
Portland ended the regular season winless in its final five games and only got to play at Providence Park on Wednesday night because Canada values motocross more than it does soccer. In Portland, where that’s not the case, a decent — not sold out — crowd showed up on a chilly Wednesday night and cheered for Evander. They stood for Phil Neville when he walked out of the locker room for the first time, and a roar met the announcement of James Pantemis in net.
It was over by halftime. There were boos by the end.
And while the result seemed shocking to everyone in attendance, what Neville said afterward made it seem like the coach knew this loss was within the realm of possibility.
“I have seen signs over the last three or four weeks of one or two players, maybe more than one or two players, just quitting on each other, quitting on the team, quitting on the club,” Neville said. “And that is probably better off finding that out now than in Year 3. I’m here for three years. I’ve got a three-year contract, and we’re going to be successful in those three years. So I’m better off finding that out.”
It’s not the first time Neville’s called out effort or questioned whether someone on the roster had the “qualities to be a Portland Timber,” though he’s never specified who he’s talking about. It is the first time Evander has pointed the blame elsewhere, however. And whether that’s at ownership, the front office or somewhere else will be topic No. 1 at Friday’s exit interviews.
One thing, however, is certain.
“To the fans,” Evander wrote, “you deserve much more.”
— Tyson Alger, The I-5 Corridor
