A one-two pass in the box between Diego Valeri and Cristhian Paredes that put Valeri through onto goal.

The Chara brothers racing up the field, passing back and forth before Yimmi launched a cross onto the head of Felipe Mora in front of the net.

A ball won in the other team’s half off a high press that turned into a goal.

It is still preseason — the last tune-up match before the regular season starts next week — but this is exactly the sort of stuff coach Giovanni Savarese wants to see.

A 3-1 loss Saturday night to the New England Revolution is not the way the Portland Timbers wanted to close out preseason, to be sure. But it’s all about the big picture, and the Timbers showed hints of what Savarese says will be a more dominant and more exciting team in 2020.

“It’s a little more aggressive,” Savarese said of the Timbers' style in this preseason. “Trying to keep the ball a lot more, possess the ball, move it around, trying to unbalance defenders, and a team that is more ambitious in wanting to win the ball right away.”

It’s not exactly surprising to hear Savarese say this — it appears to be the way he has wanted the Timbers to play since he first stepped foot in Portland. On the day he was formally introduced to local media two years ago as the new coach, he explained: "Those who have seen my teams play know that I'm a coach that likes to have the dominant team on the field, to be the team that has the ball and control the flow of the game.”

He vowed that the Timbers would play a thrilling high-risk, high-reward style — but then reality set in. The team went winless in Savarese’s first five matches at the helm and, without the roster to execute his vision, the Timbers morphed into a counter-attacking team, which sat back and waited for the game to come to them, eventually going 15 games unbeaten and reaching MLS Cup with that formula.

But it was never really how Savarese wanted the Timbers to play — and this year, after a series of compounding factors derailed last season, it appears the Timbers can finally be the team Savarese wanted.

The Timbers’ opening goal Saturday came from a bit of aggression. Mora pressed goalkeeper Matt Turner as the Revs attempted to play out the back and he won the ball, allowing it to fall to Diego Chara, who beat the fifth-year goalkeeper in MLS to score.

There were plenty of other quality chances, even if the final score certainly didn’t reflect it.

The Timbers’ finishing is not yet in the form they will hope to have in the regular season, but the chance-creation was bountiful, which suggests the Timbers are halfway there to racking up the sort of goals they hoped for when they spent big on attacking Designated Players like Yimmi Chara and Jaroslaw Niezgoda.

“The winter window was very good for us to bring in players that we felt are going to improve the team,” Savarese said after Saturday’s match. “Now it’s just about continuing to work. We want to grow into something better.”

Valeri, who played in a more advance position than usual, was caught offside a handful of times Saturday as the players were clearly still working out their patterns of play. He joked it may have been his record for the most times offside in a game — but once the Timbers get their timing down, it’s hard to bet against Valeri finishing one of those.

“It’s obviously not my best capacity," Valeri said. "But sometimes if the rival puts up a high line, you have to do it — not only to create chances from it but to prepare for the next ball too. If you’re running in behind, you can find the ball on your feet.”

That aggressive approach is highly demanding for players like Diego Chara, who has to fill in the spaces left behind as players push up the pitch.

“You have to be fit, I’m talking physical, because it’s a lot of space to cover,” the elder Chara said. “Giving space to Yimmi and (Sebastian) Blanco to be free — it’s going to be hard but we have enough quality to do that.”

If there’s a worry for the Timbers, it’s that its defense, which hasn’t been upgraded from last year in a significant way, won’t be able to handle the vulnerability of such an approach.

Center back Dario Zuparic, the team’s lone upgrade on the back line, hasn’t quite worked out his partnership with Larrys Mabiala yet. The team’s three goals conceded Saturday, and the ones coughed up earlier in the week, followed a similar pattern where space was left open on the back post.

“We know how we want to play, we have an identity, but we just have to fix this problem of conceding in moments we’re dominant,” Savarese said. “Once we’re about to do that, we’re going to do very well.”

How that fix will come — and if it will fit into the new aggressive approach — remains to be seen.

A familiar refrain in Portland is the Timbers trying to evolve in preseason, only to find that they are hemorrhaging goals once the regular season arrives. Then, they revert to a more conservative, less thrilling approach.

But if the Timbers can out-gun teams and find a way to win by 3-2 or 4-3 score lines, surely no one in the Timbers front office would mind — especially not after the doldrums of last year’s record-setting 319 scoreless minutes. And it’s a formula that can work — just ask the 2019 LA Galaxy.

Of course, it’s easy to feel confident and optimistic about the season before a real game has even been played.

But without the wonky fatigue-inducing schedule of last year, and hopefully none of the problems that arose with ex-DP striker Brian Fernandez, the Timbers have no reason not to be the team Savarese always envisioned. At least not yet.

The Timbers’ regular season begins at home Sunday, March 1, when they host Minnesota United.

— Caitlin Murray | For The Oregonian/OregonLive

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