COMMERCE CITY, Colo. – It’s been an all too common narrative for the Colorado Rapids at home this season: concede in the first half, find an equalizer in the second half.
It happened again against the Portland Timbers on Saturday night. Except this time, the visitors went home with three points on the heels of Jack Jewsbury’s stoppage-time goal, propelling the visitors to a 2-1 win.
“Honestly I don’t think going down the second goal was the most disappointing thing,” said Rapids midfielder Dillon Powers. “The first half we came out with a weak mentality and that’s been the case for a lot of games at home. We wait to wake up until after we’ve been scored on.”
Both teams entered Saturday night’s contest fresh off of Wednesday night matches. Portland carried momentum from a 1-0 win over DC United while Colorado was reeling from a 1-0 loss to the Seattle Sounders and both sides’ varying degrees of confidence showed from the first whistle.
“Before football and tactics the game of soccer runs parallel to life: it’s confidence and it’s momentum,” Rapids head coach Pablo Mastroeni told reporters postgame. “In the first half our sequences weren’t sharp. Our start was slow. I take full responsibility for that performance. I felt like we were prepared, but apparently we weren’t.”
Slow starts and conceding first have been a common theme for the Rapids at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park with the exception of last week’s 2-0 win over Vancouver; Colorado’s lone home win of the season.
“It’s important that we don’t concede first at home,” said Powers. “Honestly I think if we score first at home, we’re winning games.”
Of the nine goals the Rapids have conceded at home, six have come in the first half.
For the team’s veterans, the solution to slow starts at home lies not only in more personal accountability, but executing the simple tasks within the game.
“We lost battles all over the park. We have to be better with the ball when we have it and win our individual duels,” Rapids defender James Riley explained. “We just need men out there from the get go, from minute one to minute 90. You’ve got to battle for the right to play. We’ve got to be men on the ball, we have to compete.”
“I think it’s a collective belief and right now we don’t have it. Once you have that belief it makes you a better team. It starts with individuals, myself included,” added Powers.
Developing that collective belief will continue to take time, with the new additions of Luis Solignac and Kevin Doyle added to the group. But the Rapids will have eight days to do some self-assessment before taking to the road to face their greatest rivals, Real Salt Lake at Rio Tinto Stadium next Sunday (5 pm ET, ESPNNews/ESPN Deportes/WatchESPN).
Continued Powers, “We’ve got to look at ourselves in the mirror and come back next week with a new mindset.”
Marco Cummings covers the Colorado Rapids for MLSsoccer.com.
