New York City 2, Toronto FC 1
Q. I know the result was not the one you wanted but I just wondered how it felt getting that start, and also the first goal.
JAHKEELE MARSHALL-RUTT: Yeah, like you said, it's bittersweet. It would have been nicer if we were to get the three points, but I'm very happy to score my first MLS goal. I it's been a long time coming, a lot of hard work I put into. It especially my teammates and my coach, John Herdman, I had a good conversation with him a couple days ago and he basically said -- score, and he gave me the confidence and my teammates fed in. Just gave me the confidence to go out and just be myself and I'm so happy to get my first goal.
Yeah, it's been a long journey but it would have been nicer for sure if we won but it's a good start.
Q. Can you break down the play for us a little bit? I'm curious in terms of especially Coello's pass had you anticipated it coming down the way that it did? Were you just at the right place at the right time? How did that play out?
JAHKEELE MARSHALL-RUTT: Yeah, I would just have to give a shout-out to the coaching staff. All week, we've trained getting in behind. It's a smaller pitch, so we knew the way we like to play in the midfield, what sometimes wouldn't be on.
So just for me and all of our attackers, they were just telling us to run behind and you'll pick up a ball behind them and luckily Alonso is an amazing passer, and I don't know if he tried to play Fede or me but when I found myself in that position, I just tried to stay calm and I took I think two touches and luckily I went in on the goalie and I scored.
It was funny because actually in my head, I was like, shoot it the first time. But I was like, no, let me take it -- it ended up working out. Again just thank you to my teammates for believing in me and thank you to Alonso for that pass.
Q. Looked like you were pretty happy to score that goal. Could you take us inside your mind a little bit as you're peeling off towards the bench to set Braille that? What are you thinking about? What are you seeing?
JAHKEELE MARSHALL-RUTT: Yeah, before the game, I told Kobe and some of the younger players that I have a feel I'm going to score and when I do, I'm going to run over to them because like I said, my teammates are a big part of the reason I scored. I was very happy as you can see. I just wanted to run over to the bench and thank the coaching staff and my teammates and just everyone.
And it was just something that we said before the game, you know, sort of similar Lorenzo's goal, kind of show where we are as a group. When we score, it's like the first thing you want to do is just celebrate with everyone. So I think that's first thick, just go celebrate with all the players.
I know when I score, they are happy and when us young players are doing well, all the young players are happy. So I just wanted to share that moment.
Q. You're such a young guy, it's hard to believe you've been around as long as you have. You've gone through different coaches and things. Has there been frustration on the way in your journey so far, and also, do you find under John a lot of your teammates have talked about clarity, do you find that now things are clear are for you?
JAHKEELE MARSHALL-RUTT: Yeah, for sure. You know, it's been a journey and a ride for me, but I just look at it in a way like I'm 19 years old and my fifth year but I've gone through so much with COVID and different coaches.
I think in a way, it's just made me more mature and I don't look at anything as a negative. I just take the positives, and I think I've learnt so much from all these years. Of adversity and living in different places for months without my family. It's just made me grow up faster.
So I think that was a good thing, and then yeah, with John, I think we're all clear, we all buy into the system and we didn't get the win today but we'll be back at home for Atlanta and then Sporting. But yeah, we all buy into job John and we are all excited for what's to come and we hope we can show you guys.
Q. Thanks, and it was a beautiful goal to open up your account.
JAHKEELE MARSHALL-RUTT: Thank you.
Q. We talk about the small dimensions of that pitch at Yankee Stadium a fair bit but I was wondering if you can give us a sense of how it changes things for you guys. It felt like after New York equalized the game, got really fast and got really hard for you guys to get it under control but how does that all play out?
JAHKEELE MARSHALL-RUTT: Yeah, I think we knew coming into the game that it was a smaller pitch. But like I said, our identity and -- our third-man combos we knew wouldn't be as on as much as we would like but we adapted. Like my goal, I would say, we worked for that all week in training, getting in behind and stuff.
When we conceded, I think we actually played well in the half as a team. We all believe in each other. Even in the locker room after the game, we all came together in a huddle and we just said, this is football and this is our journey. We didn't win today but we'll be back on weekend in sporting. We all believe that. Everything we say and we do, we believe, and there's clarity. So we just have to continue.
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