Earthquakes Offense Explodes in 5-1 Romp Against Chicago
SANTA CLARA, Calif. - The San Jose Earthquakes exploded with their largest offensive output since 2012 to rout the Chicago Fire 5-1 on Wednesday at Buck Shaw Stadium.
Five different players found the net, marking the first five-goal output at Buck Shaw Stadium since a 5-0 win against Real Salt Lake on July 14, 2012. Shea Salinas, Atiiba Harris, Chris Wondolowski, Yannick Djalo and Cordell Cato accounted for the goals in what was also the largest margin of victory for San Jose since 2012, a 4-0 romp against Chivas USA on Sept. 2 at Buck Shaw.
Salinas opened the scoring just before halftime, beating Fire goalkeeper Sean Johnson with a blast to the upper corner. Djalo sprung Salinas down the sideline with a long pass over the top. Salinas chased it down and beat his defender with a cut into the middle, creating space to pop the net for his first goal of the year.
Atiba Harris doubled the lead early in the second half, tapping in a deflected shot from Chris Wondolowski. Harris dribbled toward the area and then slid a pass across the top of the box to Wondolowski, who took a touch and fired. Johnson blocked the shot, but the rebound caromed toward the goal where Harris knotted the loose end.
Harris returned the favor 10 minutes later, leading Wondolowski into the box where the Danville native capitalized with a left-footed strike past Johnson for his team-leading seventh goal of the season.
The Fire pulled one back three-quarters of the way through the match. Matt Watson found Grant Ward running freely toward goal on the right side of the box and placed a perfect pass in front of the midfielder. Ward one-timed his shot into the lower corner, barely beating Earthquakes goalkeeper Jon Busch to spoil the shutout.
Cato capped the scoring in the 84th minute. Djalo won possession near midfield and sent a through ball to Wondolowski on the right. Wondolowski dribbled into the box and then cut a pass back for Cato. The Trinidadian took a smart touch with the side of his foot and then leapt to finish in midair with his right foot.
The Earthquakes return to action on Sunday, July 27 against La Liga champions Atletico Madrid at Candlestick Park. The game is part of the Copa Euroamericana and kicks off at 4 p.m. PT. Tickets are still available at www.sjearthquakes.com.
MLS Regular Season
San Jose Earthquakes (5-8-5, 20 pts.) 5:1 Chicago Fire (3-5-11, 20 pts.)
July 23, 2014 - Buck Shaw Stadium
Attendance: 10,525
Scoring Summary: SJ - Shea Salinas (Yannick Djalo) 45; SJ - Atiba Harris (unassisted) 52; SJ - Chris Wondolowski (Yannick Djalo) 62; CHI - Grant Ward (Matt Watson) 75; SJ - Yannick Djalo (Cordell Cato) 79; SJ - Cordell Cato (Chris Wondolowski, Yannick Djalo) 84.
Misconduct Summary: SJ - Jordan Stewart (caution) 32; CHI - Gonzalo Segares (caution) 67; CHI - Matt Fondy (caution) 81.
San Jose Earthquakes: Jon Busch, Shaun Francis, Victor Bernardez, Jason Hernandez, Jordan Stewart, Atiba Harris (Cordell Cato 70), Sam Cronin, Jean-Baptiste Pierazzi, Shea Salinas, Yannic Djalo (Khari Stephenson 88), Chris Wondolowski.
SHOTS: 14; SHOTS ON GOAL: 9; SAVES: 3; FOULS: 13; CORNER KICKS: 3;OFFSIDES: 4.
Chicago Fire - Sean Johnson, Bakary Soumare, Lovel Palmer, Jhon Kennedy Hurtado, Gonzalo Segares, Matt Watson, Harrison Shipp, Jeff Larentowicz, Alex, Quincy Amarikwa, Mike Magee.
SHOTS: 10; SHOTS ON GOAL: 4; SAVES: 4; FOULS: 9; CORNER KICKS: 6;OFFSIDES: 0.
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SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES HEAD COACH MARK WATSON
On result:
"I'm very pleased, obviously. Anytime you're scrapping to get wins and points, a result like this at home is always a good performance for us. I thought we played well for 90 minutes. It's a good three points for us."
On attack:
"I feel as though the team has been gelling of late, but it hasn't resulted in goals or wins. I think there have been some positive signs recently. I thought New York was a good performance as well. I thought we did some good things, but we just didn't have that quality in the final third. We continued to do that tonight, raised our quality in the final third and scored some goals."
On Yannick Djalo:
"I thought he was great. That's probably the position he does best at when he's just underneath and gets in those little pockets and turns toward their back four. He's obviously a very dynamic player for us and uses the ball well. I thought it was a fantastic performance."
SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES FORWARD YANNICK DJALO
On win:
"We've been playing more fluidly over the last couple of weeks and we were able to cash in our chances tonight. We played very determined tonight, determined to get the three points. Our form has remained the same and we did not do too much differently, but we got the result. That's soccer. We've seen more chances go our way as of late. If we can continue to play well we are going to start seeing more wins."
On midfield play:
"We demonstrated how good our midfield attack can be. We made good passes [and] got into open space, which gave us a chance to use our speed to beat defenders. The midfield was in sync for most of the night. Shea Salinas' goal gave us the break we needed in the first half. He got us rolling to what was our best team performance of the year."
On team performance:
"Everything went right [for us tonight]. We were going at full speed, hitting on all cylinders and not letting the tired legs kick in from last Saturday. We came out flying. Hopefully we do that for the rest of the season. That was fun."
On scoring first goal of the season:
"It was a 50/50 ball that I lost, but Yannick [Djalo] played the ball back to me over the top. Right when I got the ball I was thinking, 'shoot,' the whole time. Then I saw [Chris Wondolowski] make a run, so I was thinking about playing him the ball. The keeper came up to play that chance, and then I saw an opening and took the shot. It found the back of the net and it was a big momentum boost prior to halftime."
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Foto San Jose Earthquakes
