Everything about last night’s Timbers match against Seattle was fantastic, except for the result. One of the highlights for me was watching a drunk and/or belligerent Sounder customer/fan hog-tied and carried out of the beer garden by a swarm of security and police. Good times.
A League Below, a Class Above
That’s what the banner in the North End stated, and it was true last night.
The MLS Sounders are more talented than the USL teams the Timbers have faced this season, but the outcome could have been different; the Timbers unfortunately let in an early goal, then went down by 2. They fought back and played well, but couldn’t pass circles around this team like they have done against some of this year’s USL competition.
Tonight, the Timbers return to the scene of the crime, to host Bayern Munich II, in a much more friendly game. It’s doubtful that 16,382 fans will make it out tonight, but the atmosphere should be good, as it always is against the European teams. We’ll be arriving to this one late – we’re picking up some first time Portland visitors at the airport. What better way to introduce them to Portland than to bring them straight to a Timbers match on a balmy July evening?
I agree that it was a great game. However, I was disappointed by the fan that threw the water bottle that hit the “injured” Sounders player square in the nuts. That was classless. This isn’t Detroit. Show the players some respect and represent Portland properly. I was surprised that it came from the general direction of the Timber’s Army. They know better.
Jason – I’m not sure what Detroit has to do with anything. But actually the water bottle came from near the Fred Meyer Family Deck, not the Timbers Army area.
Several smoke bombs were thrown onto the pitch from the Seattle fan area during the match. Classlessness is not limited to a water bottle thrower.
Dave – I completely agree. But, just because the Seattle fans are being classless, need we join in? This is Soccer City USA – chants, harsh language, signs, smoke bombs…all to be expected. In fact, I praise the fan behind me who had the decency to ask me if I minded his heckling in front of my daughter – which I didn’t have a problem with (although his heckling could use some work). But, launching projectiles at opposing players – not cool.
And I was 3 rows up from where the Sounders player was down – the bottle definitely came from the Timbers Army. It flew over his head into his grown and his head was directed towards the goal. Therefore, it could not have come from the Family Deck. Not to get all grassy knoll on you.
oh, and the Detroit comment was referring to the NBA incident from a few years back where Artest ran into the stands fist ablazing after someone threw a beer at him from the stands.
About 15800 Timbers fans were in PGE Park (I’m subtracting the 500 or so Sounder fans from the attendance total). One individual, likely a Timbers fan, and arguably classless, threw a bottle. On the throwing-things-onto-the-pitch metric, 15799 Timbers fans stayed classy – about 99.99% of us.
From my view in 108 the bottle appeared to come from the far east end of the north end, not the middle, which is where the Timbers Army stands. I could be wrong. Hopefully a video will surface.
Again we agree Dave. I was disappointed in that one fan alone. Otherwise, we showed how passionate and knowledgable Timbers’ fans are about soccer.
The water bottle came from the upper part of 104 or 105, as I saw it coming from over my head in. While I would never condone throwing objects on the pitch, the shot was one in a million. I saw it coming and in a slow motion that bottle hit him in the nuts. He deserved it and God served it.