In a slow-paced, disjointed performance, Washington Spirit went goalless against the Portland Thorns this afternoon, ending their away winning streak at five matches with a 0-2 loss.

Portland was dominant in the first half, not allowing the Spirit into their half of the pitch for the first 15 minutes. A strong midfield and well-executed high press allowed the Thorns to control the game, while Washington struggled to connect passes.

In the 39th minute, Olivia Moultrie forced a turnover near Washington’s goal area and passed it off to Jesse Fleming. Fleming made a lateral pass through Narumi Miura’s legs to Reilyn Turner, who placed her shot well in the near corner of Washington’s goal.

“I think first half we were defending a little bit deep sometimes,” acting coach Adrián González said of his team’s first half performance. “They did a good job also in terms of attacking, and once we were winning the ball back, I think, in transition we weren’t clinical enough, and I think we lost the ball very quickly.

The Spirit made some adjustments at the half to create more chances, including moving into a three center back formation that allowed Tara McKeown to push high up on the right as a “fake outside back,” as González described it. These adjustments gave the team more options to attack.

The star of the match for Washington was Makenna Morris, who came on in the 60th minute but had many of her team’s best chances. Morris said she saw her role as “coming in and trying to, like, raise the level and just trying to start more attack for us.” With the Thorns playing so high up the field, Morris said she prepared to sit in the pocket and make runs in behind their defenders to create chances.

Her work nearly paid off more than once. In the 72nd minute, she hit a rocket of a shot that hit the crossbar, while her shot in the 81st forced Thorns goalkeeper Bella Bixby to dive and push the ball out for a corner.

Unfortunately, that very corner led to Portland’s second goal. On the transition, the Thorns collected the third ball and moved quickly behind the Spirit’s last defender. Receiving a long pass, Pietra Tordin caught Kingsbury away from the goal line and made a looping shot over her that bounced up into the goal.

The Spirit had a few more chances after that, including a free kick just outside of the goal area in stoppage time but were not able to score.

After the match, González was asked about playing in Providence Park, where the Spirit have never won a match. He mentioned the difficulty of traveling and of playing in front of Portland’s boisterous home crowd but was reluctant to make excuses.

“We know that it’s always a tough game, but we were prepared. I think also we like this type of environment and we knew what we wanted to do,” González said. Again, as I always say, I think it’s a big learning. Every time that we win or we lose, we always want to take something positive, and we will review the game and try to improve what we did wrong and try to keep building for the future.”

Three takeaways 

• Shutting down the attack. The Thorns were particularly successful in stopping progressive carries by Washington’s usually speedy attackers. Rather than challenging players like Rose Kouassi for runaway balls, they would often push the ball out of bounds and seek to regain possession on the throw-in. Overall, they prevented Spirit attackers from spending time on the ball, holding Brittany Ratcliffe to 20 touches in 60 minutes, for example, and Gift Monday to 41 in 90.
• The team’s analysis. In addition to the comments above, González criticized his team’s lack of patience in the build-up and failure to shift the Thorns out of their structure. Courtney Brown also noted the lack of patience, which she thought allowed Portland to create turnovers. Morris’s summary of her team’s difficulties was thorough: “We gave them the ball a lot and just made their jobs a lot easier. I thought we didn’t move the ball around a lot, and I think just kind of a lot of us were standing around, waiting for the ball instead of anticipating and making movements.”
• Injury update. Casey Krueger briefly went down in the first half with what appeared to be a knee injury and was subbed off at halftime. González said after the match that Krueger’s injury was “just a knock” and that the team opted to be cautious with her because she’s had some knee pain recently. Meanwhile, Portland’s Caiya Hanks had to be helped off the field at the end of the first half, and an update on her status was not immediately available post-match.

Box Score

NWSL Regular Season –  Game 12

Portland Thorns FC 2 (Turner 39′, Tordin 82′)

Washington Spirit 0

Lineups

Portland Thorns FC (4231): Bella Bixby; Reyna Reyes, Isabella Obaze, Sam Hiatt, Kaitlyn Torpey; Hina Sugita (Deyna Castellanos 67′), Sam Coffey (C), Jesse Fleming; Caiya Hanks (Peyton Linnehan 46′), Olivia Moultrie (Alidou 67′), Reilyn Turner (Pietra Tordin 67′)

Washington Spirit (4231): Aubrey Kingsbury (C); Casey Krueger (Rebeca Bernal 46′), Tara McKeown, Gabby Carle, Esme Morgan (Kysha Sylla 82′); Narumi Miura, Croix Bethune (Courtney Brown 60′), Hal Hershfelt; Brittany Ratcliffe (Makenna Morris 60′), Rosemonde Kouassi, Gift Monday

Misconduct Summary

Portland Thorns FC:  Coffey 87′

Washington Spirit:  Hershfelt 38′, Miura 73′

Lead image courtesy of the Washington Spirit