Montreal 2, Toronto FC 0
Q. I guess just your general thoughts on that game. It seemed like you were quite even in the first half and in the second it seemed to get away from you. Just wanted to get your take on tonight.
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: Yeah, I agree with your analysis. I think the first half we did pretty well to kind of nullify their threats. They had a couple opportunities. But for the most part we were content with the way we were controlling the game and the way we were finding space to move the ball forward.
We just didn't get any final actions to really cause them any stress, even though we were having the ball a lot. I felt like going into the second half, we were going to switch up a little bit in terms of making sure we can try to threaten them from behind a little bit more and still playing our game. I think the game got a way from us a little bit in the first 5- to seven minutes the of the first half. We weren't really connecting passes and breaking them down as much as we were in the first half and we ended up taking some pressure with the corners and they go up 1-0.
But for the most part I'm very proud of how many so many guys stepped into different roles tonight, guy who is have not played a lot of minutes, to come out and really fight in an important game, and it's unfortunate we didn't get the result. Trust me, we are as frustrated and disappointed as anyone else in the world. So we will deal with that first and foremost in our locker room and continue to work and make sure we are ready to go on Wednesday but yeah, there were some good moments in this game, and I'm glad the first half happened the way it did but again it's unfortunate you can't score goals and you can't make those moments mean something more.
Q. Have you ever played center back before, and how did the game look for from you back there?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: I've played center back in maybe one game with the national team in like 2017. It was a friendly.
I was just there to get some minutes. Nothing crazy or serious but I had a talk with Bob this week that there would be a possibility that I would be playing center back with all the injuries that we had, and I just wanted to do my part for the team and make sure that I could be solid back there.
I do think I'm good on the ball and have good passing ability, so to be able to find passes into the midfield, it was a very similar position in the back three that sometimes I drop out of in the midfield into. For me back, there you can already see more passing options. You have a little bit more time on the ball than in the midfield, and I thought in the first half our partnership between me, Richie and Themi was very good considering that we had only a couple training sessions to really try and work on it.
But obviously I'm a competitor and I want to win. I'm disappointed that we couldn't walk away with a clean sheet and three points.
Q. What should we make of the emotions we saw after the final?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: I think it's just frustration. I think it just shows the passion of the players and when emotions are high, it's very easy to see something like that. It's a rivalry game. Both clubs aren't big fans of each other.
So I don't really know what happened but I'm not surprised something like this happened. I just thought everyone got out okay and it's not the time to really get into it after a game because there's not much you can do about changing the result, which is the most important thing.
But yeah, frustration was high and things happen.
Q. What did you say to Jahkeele after getting a red card like that? I think it was a little bit harsh, but do you put an arm around him?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: A hundred percent, I put my arm around him; that's exactly what I did, and came into the locker room and told him that he didn't do anything wrong. It's a harsh call. His first yellow card is very harsh. Everybody is subjective in league, and I guess the ref thought it was a foul and worth a yellow card. Calls go our way and don't go our way sometimes. It's unfortunate he got penalized.
I understand the rules and I understand you can't interfere with the ball when it goes out of bounds, but sometimes you have to read the nature of the game. Definitely he heard us because it's tough to play down a man.
But Jahkeele didn't do anything intentionally to put the team behind the 8-ball, and we have him. He's an amazing person, young player with a lot of potential, so we are not going to let this get him down to the point where it sets him back. You know, he can continue to look forward and just get ready for the next game he's available for, and understand that his teammates have his back.
Q. What are the positives -- sorry. What are the positives that you can point to right now that give you sort of hope that this team can sort of get through this rather frustrating period that it's dealing with right now?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: Well, I think today is a big sign of that, especially the first half. There's a lot of guys who didn't play a lot in the lead-up to this game. You know, me and Richie playing in different positions, but we are just showing that we are willing to fight for each other and we really want to show well for this club. It means a lot to us.
Today I saw a lot of guys play with real passion and guys be connected, and we knew it was going to be a tough game. Nothing comes easy in this league. We've just got to dig deep and push through, and it's going to feel so much better once we get to the other side.
But we just take it one game at a time, learn from what we can and understand the mistakes we made, but today was a better performance in whole when you look at the game before the red card, and we are just going to take that into the training week and hopefully we can start the game like we did today on Wednesday and continue to try and push to create more opportunities so we can score goals, because you can't win games unless you score goals.
Q. I just wanted to ask about Tuesday, because as you know, there's that video floating around of the fan throwing the mega phone on the pitch. Can you shed light? What happened there? What was going on?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: I think, again, it was just a heightened situation of emotions. I know how important our fans are to us. I know how dearly they are invested into this club and the success of the club, and really being, you know, the heartbeat of who we are as a team.
So they feel our disappointment just as much as we do and we have to respect them for that, but I think there's always a level of respect that they need to show in terms of their disappointment. Again, we are all human and we all understand that we are trying to work towards the same goal. Sometimes I think when things aren't going well we feel like we are not on the same team. But we definitely are.
So that situation I don't think is a real representation of out the fans support us, how the fans show up every day, how the fans have our back in every game no matter where it is, home or away. It was just a bad blip in the history of Toronto FC and I hope that never happens again.
From a player standpoint, I just want to say we respect the fans wholeheartedly and we just expect to see the same respect back so we can bring the club back to where the club belongs.
Q. Was there racial abuse involved or --
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: No, not at all. I don't know what people are insinuating --
Q. No, they weren't insinuating that. I wasn't sure in that was the case or not. It was just a case of lack of respect -- when you say that, what was the lack of respect?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: Well, I think you saw the video, right, so you can --
Q. But before that, though, was there anything that was said or was it just the mega phone being thrown? Is that what you mean?
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: There were words being said on the mega phone but --
Q. I gotcha.
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE: Yeah.
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