Rhinos winless, but coach predicts "very, very tight" game with Timbers

USL soccer attendance: Portland up, First Division down

By Steve Brandon

The Portland Tribune, May 30, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (1 Reader comment)

As the Portland Timbers embarked on this weekend’s two-game trip, coach Gavin Wilkinson said his struggling team needed to play like it was desperate for a victory.

Imagine how Rochester Rhinos coach Darren Tilley must feel.

The Rhinos are going into Sunday’s 3 p.m. PT game against visiting Portland with no wins, four losses and three ties. They have scored only two goals and sit last in the United Soccer Leagues First Division.

Rochester coach Darren Tilley says he sees recent improvement in his squad, though. The Rhinos have ties against Portland (0-0 at PGE Park on May 8), Seattle and Carolina.

“We’ve had injuries, but the team is playing very well. We’ve just been a bit unfortunate with the results. We haven’t been blown out by anybody,” Tilley says.

Tilley says Sunday’s game will be between “two very, very balanced teams. I think it’s going to be a very, very tight match. If it evolves into something else, I would not be amazed, but I would be a little surprised.”

The Rhinos have played six of their seven games on the road, and Tilley says their lone appearance at PAETEC Park felt more like a road game, too, because it came three days after away match No. 5, at Seattle. “We traveled back and had to play right away again,” he says.

Tilley says the springtime standings in the United Soccer Leagues First Division often are as much a function of the schedule as anything.

“Teams go through ebbs and flows, especially early in the year,” he says. “It depends on schedules and when each team’s preseason starts. We didn’t have a lot of time together before our (regular) season started.”

• FAN COUNTS: Portland’s average home attendance through six games is 8,153, which ranks second in the league behind Montreal. The Impact have drawn full houses of 13,034 for the two home games in their new, soccer-specific Stade Saputo, which has 13,000 seats).

Rochester, where the Timbers will play Sunday, drew 7,132 fans to its only home game so far this year.

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