San Jose 0, Toronto FC 0
Q. How do you feel about the fact that you got a point on the West Coast with a lot of your players missing with international duty and injury, you must feel good about that?
BOB BRADLEY: We're positives for sure. I thought the mentality for the game, opportunity for different players to get on the field, overall way of defending, I thought we had moments where our ability to play through the midfield controlled the game.
I thought those things in some moments were quite good. The reminder at the end to the group was that all those positives, we should also feel like the next time we are in that game, if we're a little bit sharper there's three points for us.
So I think that we see the positives but we certainly see the things that now we feel we can continue to work on and be better with.
Q. You mentioned opportunities for other players to step up. Curious what you made of Alonso's performance tonight, given it was his first MLS start and appearance tonight.
BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, Alonso is a solid player. He played with us throughout preseason. He's smart and you know when you have good football around him, he understands how to play with good players, how to keep it simple. So I thought he did a good job.
Q. What did you learn about the team's depth today?
BOB BRADLEY: I'm happy for Jahkeele. I think that in this last stretch, his mentality every day has been very good. I think he's had a really good -- his way of training every day, the way he comes in, he's doing more in the gym. I think his concentration from the beginning of training until the end of training has gone up.
So all the things that we spoke about at the end of last year, even though he had not gotten an opportunity until tonight, we told him over and over we have seen a lot of these things going in a good direction. It's good to see him get on the field and play well. Kobe comes on at halftime and also does a very good job. We already mentioned Alonso.
So it's nice to see that we've got some guys that are moving in a good direction and that the team understands that on certain days, there are no excuses. If certain guys aren't there -- we prepared for this game the same that we would any other game. We had good training throughout the week, and the idea was to come and step on the field and do the things we always do, and I think a lot of that happened.
Q. Sean Johnson made a very good save at stoppage time. Can you comment just on the presence that he brings to this club?
BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, that was a huge save. Sean is still a guy in the back when you look at different moments tonight in terms of our variety and buildup, how comfortable Matt and Sigurd are at different moments playing back to him and letting him pause and find the right solutions.
He organizes well. He handles high balls well and he really does excellent job of setting himself up to make that big save when we need it.
Q. Your team recorded your second straight clean sheet, and you mentioned that maybe the game was winnable, but do you like the way your team stayed disciplined in the fact that they didn't try to go for it too much in the sense that maybe against Columbus a few weeks back, they got a little bit over-eager and maybe left themselves exposed?
BOB BRADLEY: Yes, there were moments at the end of the Columbus game where I thought we could have done a better job. We discussed it and I thought we had some very good stretches in that game. But late, we had a big chance, but we gave up one or two big chances. You don't want one at the end of the game to just throw the dice on the table and see what happens. You want to still try to get the winner but do it in the right way and I think that part was clear better tonight.
But I still feel that if we're a little bit sharper in some key moments, decisions, what kind of finish do we try to go, do we really go with power; I thought we could have tested their keeper a little more tonight.
There's things that we'll look at and when we go through video we'll look at things and find situations on the field that we think we're doing better with. We'll find situations where we've still got to improve and we'll keep trying to move things along.
Q. The substitution of Petretta at halftime coming out, I'm guessing that was injury-related rather than tactical?
BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, felt something on a sprint. I don't have full information, so we'll see what that means.
Q. You kind of alluded to it before but what did you make of Kobe coming in? It was only his third MLS appearance. How would you evaluate his performance in the second half?
BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, I thought he did well. Kobe has also made strides this year. He has some really good qualities. He's clever with seeing certain passes, and he has a knack for stepping in and intercepting balls.
I think some of his positional play defensively can be better, and I think sometimes when he does go forward, his ability to recover in a faster way -- but he's heard us say that a lot. And I think he understands that those are areas that will be important for him to keep moving along and I thought thrown on at halftime in a difficult situation, he did quite well.
Q. Control has been one of the points of emphasis that we've talked about a fair bit. I thought through the first 50 minutes or so, you guys had this game pretty contained. Where did it get away from you? I know you mentioned the defense dropping off in the past.
BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, I don't think it got away from us. It's just that I think our continued ability to, as we move up the field, make the right decisions, when I say that, what I mean is, is it a time to really push the attack and try to make something of it; in other moments is it a time that now you slow down and there's more passes and your whole team moves up and that you play more in their end.
Somewhere in that, I think we got thrown off a little bit, and then as we've mentioned before, that leads to the other team having a couple of set pieces; that was some of their better chances.
So I think we just have to find smart ways. I think we are a good team with the ball. I think there's a lot of intelligent players on the field. It's just as a team how we handle some of those moments a bit better.
Q. Could you say a little bit what your thoughts were heading into this match with some young players in the lineup and that kind of thing, what your thoughts were tactically going into the match and whether you thought that your players stayed pretty true to what you were hoping they would do?
BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, I sort of touched on it; that we trained this week the way we always do. We looked at the opponent. We tried to take the things that we work on on a regular basis, and make sure they are on the field. So there was no talk that just because we were missing some guys, we had to have a whole different way of playing.
And then, of course, it's how good are you at doing those things, how sharp are you, and so really, many of the comments that you've heard after other games could be applied again; that I think in different moments, our play, buildup play through the middle is pretty good. I think we are still not as sharp when we get into the final third with our ideas, with some of our final passes, some of our touches, some of our decisions.
I think we are doing much better in terms of the way we control games. And it's just doing it in a more consistent way. We talked after the Miami game that I thought the group as a whole was quite dialed in. When balls went out, guys were quick to organize, and I think we did that kind of thing again tonight.
So that's an important part. You don't want to have moments of good play spoiled by moments where you have two, three, four guys at a given moment that aren't connected with the game and connected with the team. Those are areas that I think are improving.
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