Toronto FC Media Conference

Saturday, April 8, 2023

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Bob Bradley

Media Conference


Nashville 0, Toronto 0

Q. Another clean sheet, which of course is a positive but there were some late chances to get the three points. What was your take?

BOB BRADLEY: I thought overall our mentality, our defending, was good. Especially I thought the second half we found a better way to control things, they are very dangerous in transition, but the second half, we controlled more of the game and we started as the game went on to create more and more advantages.

Yeah, that's going to be the next step for us, that days like today that when we can finish off a play or two when we get the opportunities. I thought the overall way we went about the game, the way the second half played out, I thought it was quite good.

Q. Was Matt Hedges leaving related to him taking the ball in the face?

BOB BRADLEY: Yes, so we will keep our eye on him. But yes, it was related to that play.

Q. Lucas came in for his first action. Can you evaluate his performance?

BOB BRADLEY: He did a solid job. He came on and understood the type of game and we talked a little bit about what he was -- we talked about the things we were going through at halftime. He was very focused on the game and as I said I felt the control that we had in the second half was quite good.

Q. What role do you think Alonso played with coming on with about 30 minutes left in the match?

BOB BRADLEY: I thought Alonso found a way to make some good passes but I thought we had control in the second half before that as well. Brandon came off, we felt he was starting to get tired -- he felt find about spots, helped connect passes. I think if you look at the midfield tonight, like many teams they tried to focus to make sure they get around Michael.

Mark did a really about job of now finding a way to be the guy who can get on the ball and connect passes when it was very tight and crowded around Michael, and I thought all of them were part of transition. Mukhtar is a very dangerous player, and again there were a few moments in the first half, especially early, where we lost balls and to really go back and deal with that type of fast transition. But I thought we did a very good job of that in the second half.

Q. I thought I detected a formation change with the sub, a 4-4-2 diamond midfield. Is that how is played out?

BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, we actually played a little bit of a diamond in the first half. There are moments that I would say it was a little bit of 4-3-1-2, and other times it was almost 4-3-2-1. We felt that there were opportunities the way they were stepping up to get players coming off their center backs in those inside spaces and as we started to play in there more, I think it helped.

Q. You had a number of free kick opportunities, especially in the second half, what did you think of the performance of first Federico hitting them but also the performance of Nashville's goalkeeper Joe Willis keeping them out of the back of net?

BOB BRADLEY: Yeah, Willis made a lot of he very good saves, and look, if he had a kept turning up in good places and creating chances for himself and for others. It's a night where it's not like we are creating all sorts of chances, so your attackers have to work hard to make a difference, and I thought Fede did a big job.

Q. Can you take us inside the room? Is there frustration that the guys can't find the final pass or is that part of the process?

BOB BRADLEY: I think I mentioned during the week, if you take the stretch as a whole, there were games we felt like we left points there and there's a mentality that now our next step is knowing how to take three points on one of these days. Today we have a good feeling about the way we went about things and especially the way we went about the second half.

Q. There was a pretty nasty challenge on Richie Laryea in the game. Do you think the yellow was sufficient punishment?

BOB BRADLEY: I need to see it again, but yes, that was a nasty challenge.

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