Sporting Kansas City Manager Peter Vermes
On the team’s late disallowed goal…
It’s utterly ridiculous that that’s not a goal. If the ball doesn’t enter the goal, then it should be a penalty for the goalkeeper tackling Gadi Kinda and it would be a red card. It’s a goal or it’s a penalty and a red card for the goalkeeper. The fact that it’s not with VAR and everything else, I can not for the life of me understand how that call could be made. I was told explicitly by the referee that the VAR evaluated (it) and also called it a foul on our guy. I’m sorry, but on this one, there’s no chance. If you’ve watched it yourself, there’s absolutely zero chance. First off, the goalkeeper parries the ball down so the ball is live. Our guy hits it, it goes underneath him and he tackles our player. I don’t understand where you get the idea that our player is (guilty of) an infraction or violation. I have no idea. Sad, very sad – points taken away from us for absolutely no reason. You let the play go. You have VAR. If you’re actually watching it and you look at it and you have any clue about the game, you understand that it’s one of those things that I said. It’s simple, simple as can be.
On the team’s performance…
When we’re playing the games that we’ve had to and made the adjustments that we’ve had to with the players, we’re bringing guys in obviously that aren’t playing 90 minutes regularly. They had a week (to rest) and we didn’t. We knew that they were going to have a lot more energy in the game. We were going to try to absorb whatever pressure we could in the first half. I thought we did a very good job. I thought we made a mistake on the goal, for sure. It was a silly mistake from a positional perspective. Even still, we’re in the game. We find a way to get back into the game. We made our adjustments at halftime. What did they have in the second half? I don’t know if they had anything. From that perspective, I think the game went really well for us other than the (referee’s) huge mistake. This is a huge mistake that is a game-changing call. You have both the referee and VAR. Again, I was told that the VAR said it was also a foul on our guy. So, in my opinion, you have now two people that are incorrect in a game-changing play. That’s sad, especially when you have replay.
Sporting Kansas City goalkeeper Tim Melia
On the defensive performance from Andreu Fontas…
I thought we were very solid defensively. Fontas is a very good player playing out of the back, and that’s something that we obviously weren’t doing in the first half, but as we settled into the game and brought a couple of guys in, I thought his ability in possession was really positive. They didn’t really have a lot of opportunities, so all in all, it was a good game for Fontas. It was great to have him back out there and I’m sure he was excited to be back on the field. He’s come back from a difficult, long stretch with an injury and fought to come back into the team. You’re happy when you get to see your teammates out there performing and we hope he keeps moving forward in a positive direction.
On Sporting’s disallowed goal in the final moments of the match…
It’s just extremely disappointing. It’s almost as if our PRO organization does not understand the effort that the players, the coaching staff and the organizations make to put a good product on the field. When you watch things like that unfold and you’re just sitting there scratching your head—where you’ve got a system in place that is supposed to review the rules of the game and then implement them correctly, and they just don’t—it’s so disappointing. It’s disrespectful to the work that’s been going on throughout the entire game.
On his interaction with FC Dallas players immediately following their goal in the first half..
It’s just run of the play, people talking and nothing serious. I make the save, it hits the post, it hits me in the head and it goes in the goal. I need to do a better job getting that ball out and around the post. And then players are just running their mouths. That’s part of the game—nothing to that.
Sporting Kansas City defender Jaylin Lindsey
On the defensive performance from Andreu Fontas…
I thought he did really well. Obviously it’s hard when you haven’t played games, especially in his situation where he hasn’t played because of injury. It was a long period of time, so I think he came in and did a great job. Playing for 90 minutes is pretty amazing honestly, because it’s hard to come back after not playing for a while and then play a straight 90 minutes. I thought he came into the team and gelled well.
On Sporting’s disallowed goal in the final moments of the match…
It’s unbelievable to see how we lost points because of that. For me and my teammates, I think we all see that the keeper tackles Gadi (Kinda). The way that the referee handled it and gave them the foul is atrocious. It’s just disrespectful to us because they took points away from us. I think it should have gone our way, but the game is what it is. The referee called what he called. We’ve just got to move on. We’ve got another game on Saturday coming really quick, so we’ve just got to move onto that one.
On Sporting Kansas City defending deep in the first half…
I wouldn’t say that was necessarily the plan. The plan was just to go in and play our game—move the ball like we usually do. More of it was trying to get them frustrated a little bit and get in their head a little bit. When they came down to our place and we played them, they were wasting all of this time with their tactics. We just came into this game and tried to play the way that we play and frustrate them a little bit.
FC Dallas head coach Luchi Gonzalez
General thoughts on the match…
It was a positive step for us. I know we had a few games without getting the results we wanted. I feel like we’ve been playing better and showing that we want to go for games and push games. We’ve improved in our playing style, of trying to be the protagonists but we weren't getting the results. I thought we had a more complete performance today. Obviously the first half was more offensive than the second, but we knew that with some of the halftime subs and SKC was trailing so we had to be defensively sound. To sustain high pressing and attacking for 90 minutes, that’s the objective that’ll take more work and learning. Certainly proud of the boys to win, that goal in the 44th minute is a great reflection of pushing the game and not just saying ‘let’s go to the half 0-0’ and it proved to be the winner. We’ll have two days here to recover and we have to be ready to go to Nashville because they took points from us here at home and we want to get those points back.
On the shape of the defensive lines…
We worked on having shorter lines and less space in between lines--more compact and we worked on that and did video. But Kansas City can spread you out and they did a few times. But we kept trying to be compact and deny entry passes through the middle and it helped us keep them farther away from their box and our back line. Credit to Bressan and Reto (Ziegler) and the other backs and Jimmy (Maurer) to be vocal about it and do it for the 90+ minutes.
FC Dallas midfielder Tanner Tessmann
On his position in the game today…
I was playing the six, Acosta and I were playing the six defensively. But offensively, we were more of the pivot and the distributor. They were sitting in a low block that first half, so those long balls were on for Fafa and Mikey to get on the end of them. It’s just what the game was asking for. In the second half we had to defend more and I enjoyed playing there and anywhere on the field.
On reading the game…
Reading the game is one of my quality traits, especially in the first half. I was able to connect those long passes and get us on to attack. In the first half I think that is what the game was asking from us. Me, Bryan [Acosta], Andrés [Ricaurte], and our center backs have that in their bag too, so when we need it we take advantage of it.
FC Dallas defender Ryan Hollingshead
On Sporting Kansas City tactics…
Absolutely, I think that was very intentional by them, coming out and time wasting. It ended up hurting them more than it hurt us because of the way the game played out. It was an interesting tactic coming out that early in the first minute and trying to waste time. It was clear that they were trying to send us a message from what they felt was unfair when we beat them in Kansas City with the same sort of tactics. I don’t know, I’m not into that sort of stuff. I want to play the game, so time wasting for me is not something I want to be a part of. It’s a heated rivalry for sure. We want to get three points against Kansas City and I think we’ve proved that over the last two years now.
On his positioning throughout the game...
I think they came out from the first minute not putting any pressure on us. So we just pushed higher and higher until we kind of met their front lines. For me, I was able to get really high on the left side and I know Reynolds was able to get high as well. We dropped a center midfielder into the backline and kept a three in the back. They weren't pressing us at all so we kept going at them. You could tell in that first half we were dominant and had all the chances. It was an interesting tactic from them again to be sitting back so much and not pressing the game. That could be because they were coming off a game three days ago. But it’s not our decision to make, if they’re going to play that style we’re going to press high.
