By Niall McCusker

Two clean sheets in a row and a first win in over a month – so what’s not to like? Well some might not have liked the overly defensive approach. Yes, we are coming into the time of the season to grind out wins, but Chicago are near the bottom of the standings and Portland were playing at home.

In the first half Chicago played a high line and the Timbers failed to break it. Adi and Wallace gave it a decent try, but the timing of the runs and the inventiveness of the passing was never quite perfect. Portland looked the better team, but were content to sit deep and try to beat the offside trap as opposed to pushing forward and holding possession in Chicago’s half.

They got the breakthrough early in the second half when Adi’s hard work was rewarded with a little luck, but the home side did not use that lead to take full control of the game. Chicago never looked particularly threatening but could have equalized late on when Maloney was left in space for a shot at the top of the box.

Portland had some opportunities to extend their lead with Melano, but he looked a little unsure of his footing on what was probably his first competitive game on an artificial surface. A 1-0 win was a fair result but it was not pretty viewing.

Here are the individual ratings:

Adam Larsen Kwarasey 5.5: The keeper has not had a lot to do in plenty of games this season, this one included. But that is no reason to create your own work by passing to the opposition directly in front of your goal. He got away with it and only a Scandinavian could have had such a cool reaction to his reprieve. Goalkeeping coach Adin Brown’s reaction on the sideline was slightly more expressive!

Alvas Powell 6.5: The young right-back is getting tidier on the ball all the time and if the offensive side of game improves as much in the next year as his defensive side has done in the past year he will be ready to move to greener (and more handsomely remunerated) pastures. When Accam went out to his side he got some good tackles in and while the way the game played out limited his overlapping runs into attack, he could have had a penalty just before halftime. The shoulder pull as he cut into the box was minor, but softer calls are given most weeks in this league.

Nat Borchers 6.5: Jason Johnson beat him along the end line in the first minute, but that was probably the only time he was troubled all game. He kept Johnson quiet for the rest of the match and when Accam attempted to get at him with speed Powell and Chara provided cover. When the Fire tried an aerial approach Borchers was usually dominant, just one good free-kick from Maloney in the second half found a Chicago head.

Liam Ridgewell 6.5: A quiet night for the Londoner, he was in the right place at the right time to cut out a number of crosses but the other defenders did most of their guv’nor’s work as he floated behind.

Jorge Villafana 7: The left-back was less busy in defense early on and was able to advance and get some crosses in and earn a corner. In the second half he continued that good work, linking with Wallace to fire a sneaky near-post shot and releasing Melano with an exquisite ball down the left. The introduction of Nyarko for the visitors gave him some work to do defensively late in the game and he was not found wanting.

Will Johnson 8: Right from the first whistle he was pressing well and kept that going till the end. This wasn’t trotting around getting into the right ‘zone’ kind of thing it was more unpredictable, biting an opponents ankles when he thought he had a few seconds on the ball. A turnover in his own half after ten minutes was about his only obvious mistake, though between him, Chara and the central defenders someone should have picked up Maloney’s run with 5 minutes to go.

His switch for the Timbers goal was excellent, right where Valeri asked for it. The Timbers will need this form to continue through the end of the season.

Diego Chara 8: If you are going to use this kind of tactical approach (fairly boring) then you need your defensive midfield axis to be fully functioning. In this game they were both in ‘beast mode’. His normal excellent covering tackles aside, the Colombian got to show off his passing range in this encounter, releasing Wallace on the left several times in the first half and narrowly failing to spring Adi from Laurentowicz’s well run offside trap.

Darlington Nagbe 6: If you look at Nagbe’s distribution in the this game (see MLS box-score) you will see why Portland’s attack was limited, he barely has any passes closer than 40 yards to his opponent’s goal. This is as much a criticism of the game plan as it is of the player, in a system with two defensive midfielders does Nagbe really need to sit so deep as well?

He had a couple of runs early on, in the first Valeri is standing next to him as he runs past wondering what the plan is, the second ended in a left footed shot (maybe score a few with the right before employing the ‘swinger’?). Later in the half he drove into the penalty box (more of that please) and crossed to an offside Adi. The striker had actually wanted a through-ball played about 5 seconds earlier so he couldn’t recover position. When Nagbe had another opportunity for a through-ball just before halftime he should have had Valeri in on goal, but the pass was too heavy.

As the season comes to crunch time he will want to sharpen up his passing on the edge of the box and more importantly complete the runs into the danger area looking for the return ball to start contributing on the score-sheet.

Diego Valeri (off in 90′) 7: A quiet first half from Valeri, he and Nagbe never really got their passing game going to full effect. Then a moment of class at start of the second half, taking down Johnson’s long pass very nicely and driving a dangerous low ball at the near post that led to Adi’s goal. As the second half concluded with some end to end stuff (poor game management from Portland) Valeri directed their attacks quite nicely, a beautiful flick to Melano the highlight.

Rodney Wallace (off in 68′) 6.5: The left winger ran his channel well in the first half, getting into good position several times, but looking up to see only Adi in the box surrounded by 3 or 4 defenders. This season, after briefly flirting with an inventive passing game under Fernandez, seems to have come full circle, 6-7 defenders and limited numbers in attack.

At this point he knows he is going to be the first substitute so he used his energy well getting some good attacks going with Villafana before being withdrawn.

Fanendo Adi (off in 86′) 7.5: The striker understandably faded a little in the second after fighting a lone battle for most of the first half. He gave Chicago plenty to think about, their high line held, but his runs to stretch it, while unsuccessful, might have helped make it drop deeper in the second half. He got his ‘lucky’ goal by fighting hard for that position, I like ‘lucky’ strikers.

Substitutes:

Lucas Melano (on in 68′) 6.5: He looked lively and direct and definitely wanted a goal, getting 4 shots off in his limited minutes (though the one that came closest he should probably have passed to Nagbe). He also had a few ‘Bambi on ice’ moments were it looked like the artificial turf was conspiring to trip him up. In the first few games of the season Porter talked about his ‘pace/power component’ – Melano may be the man to add a touch of class to that approach and make it bear dividends.

Dairon Asprilla (on in 86′): He came in late for Adi allowing Melano to go up front and providing more cover to the wing. The game announcer Sandoval referred to his famous father (presumably Faustino) but I’m not sure he has his facts right on that one?

Jack Jewsbury (on in 90′): His introduction wasted a little time (and hopefully earned him an appearance bonus).