SAN JOSE -- San Jose Earthquakes coach Dominic Kinnear remains bullish on his defense after Sunday’s 1-0 home loss to Real Salt Lake, despite a mounting injury outbreak that has thinned his backline corps dramatically.
Going into Sunday’s match, San Jose were missing two of their opening-day starting back four with Marvell Wynne and Paulo Renato out hurt, joining defender Jordan Stewart on the disabled list. A half-hour into the game, Shaun Francis had a violent collision of heads with Salt Lake’s Jordan Allen, and had to leave the match.
Victor Bernardez also had a collision with Devon Sandoval as he made a goal-line clearance and later left the game.
Afterwards, Kinnear gave an update on his team’s injuries, saying the situation with Francis is “not good.”
“[Francis] is in the training room right now, lying down in a dark room,” Kinnear said. “He definitely had a good collision there, and I’m sure there’s something going on with his head, so the doctor’s with him. We’ll find out soon. But it was a pretty good collision, and obviously enough to keep him out of the game.”
The team later announced that Francis is being monitored for concussion-like symptoms.
Kinnear said the news on other injured players is a bit better.
“Victor Bernardez is fine,” he said. “I talked to him afterwards in the locker room and he’s good. We took him out to go three in the back and he was the one that was pulled out. It had nothing to do with anything other than we went with a formation change.”
Kinnear said he hopes to have Wynne back in the lineup when his team face the league-leading Vancouver Whitecaps next Saturday (10:30 pm ET, TSN2 in Canada, MLS LIVE in US).
Even with all the injuries, Kinnear is happy with the way his defense is playing, despite surrendering their first loss at their new Avaya Stadium home to a Javier Morales howitzer.
“We’re defending pretty well,” he said. “I don’t think Salt Lake had a ton of chances today. [Morales] scores a wonder goal, but other than that I thought we did okay.”
Center back Clarence Goodson agreed, praising the versatility of converted midfielders like Cordell Cato and JJ Koval.
“I think the guys that came in did fine,” Goodson said. “That certainly wasn’t why we lost the game today. I think Cordell has done a good job at outside back, Ty [Harden] has done a good job in the past, and now JJ.
“I think it’s good that we have guys who can step in and keep the level high. They’re not fullbacks. They’re playing out of position, but they did a good job, especially coming in on the fly. They handled it well; they were calm on the ball.”
The Quakes have now slipped back to seventh place in a stacked Western Conference, but believe their squad is deep enough to compete despite the growing list of missing contributors.
“Of course we’d like to establish a back four that is going to play week in and week out, but the goal [RSL] scored was not from the run of play,” Goodson added. “It was a direct set piece, and that’s a tough one to swallow. I don’t think, going in at halftime, they deserved to be winning, but that’s soccer. We deserved to get something out of this game.”
Regardless of who is healthy enough to play next Saturday, Dominic Kinnear likes his defense, and his team’s chances.
The guys are giving it their all; that for me is a good thing,” Kinnear said. "They’re not giving up during the game, which is a sign of a good group.”
