Lineups
FC Dallas — Maarten Paes; Marco Farfan (Sam Junqua – 76’), Nkosi Tafari, Ema Twumasi, Sebastien Ibeagha; Paul Arriola, Liam Fraser (Asier Illarramendi – 76’), Paxton Pomykal (Katlego Ntsabeleng – 89’), Alan Velasco (Jesús Jiménez – 89’); Jáder Obrian (Eugene Ansah – 66’), Jesús Ferreira.
Substitutes not used — Jimmy Maurer, José Martínez, Dante Sealy, Amet Korça.
Colorado Rapids — Marko Ilic, Andrew Gutman, Andreas Maxsø, Danny Wilson, Sebastian Anderson, Cole Bassett, Connor Ronan, Calvin Harris, Ralph Priso, Jonathan Lewis (Kévin Cabral – 66’), Rafael Navarro
Substitutes not used — Abraham Rodriguez, Keegan Rosenberry, Lalas Abubakar, Sidnei Tavares, Luis Díaz, Braian Galván, Steven Beitashour.
Scoring Summary:
COL: Rafael Navarro – 25’
DAL: Alan Velasco – 37’
Misconduct Summary:
COL: Ralph Priso (caution) – 2’
DAL: Paxton Pomykal (caution) – 42’
COL: Jonathan Lewis (caution) – 54’
Weather: Sunny, 70ºF
Attendance: 16,014
Stats
POSTGAME QUOTES FC DALLAS
Head Coach Nico Estévez
On the team’s performance…
“We didn’t have the right mindset tonight. We put in a lot of effort; the guys were aggressive and wanted to press, but we struggled with our mindset. We needed to be more patient tonight. We had a lot of turnovers tonight that we don’t usually have, which helped the opponent believe they could pose a threat on the counterattack. We played the game they wanted and didn’t have enough patience to attack the way we wanted. When we showed patience, we arrived in good spots, but the quality of crosses and finishing wasn’t there tonight.”
On the final message before Decision Day…
“I said a month ago that we’re going to be fighting for the playoffs until the very last day. It’s a very difficult league with a lot of good teams that don’t make the playoffs. As I said before, every team plays for something. Colorado has players fighting for new contracts, trying to stay in the team, or maybe even move to a new team. They didn’t have a good result the other day and wanted to do better, so they had a different approach than last week, unfortunately for us. Now is the time we have to work the hardest. It’s been a really difficult season for us because we faced a lot of adversity. Right now is not the time to give up; we knew it was going to go until the last day, and now we have to recover and be the best version of ourselves the next day of training. We need to prepare for this game well because it’s going to be a final. This is how the season has gone for us, and we need to embrace it instead of thinking negatively. We have the opportunity to keep fighting to make the playoffs, so we have to embrace the situation. There’s a great opportunity for the team to come together and make the playoffs.
Goalkeeper Maarten Paes
On the draw tonight…
“Simply not good enough from us. We knew we had to win this game to clinch (the playoffs). We need to convert these draws into wins as soon as possible because we only have one game left and it is in Los Angeles. Now we have to prepare as well as possible and hopefully we'll get a good result there.”
On his saves and effort tonight…
“It's my job to save the shots on goal, tonight we had to take a little bit more risk so they had more space for transition. I think that's where most of their chances came. We are just really disappointed right now.”
Midfielder Liam Fraser
On the performance tonight…
“It wasn't good enough across the board. There were many opportunities for us to score and we gave up a goal that we shouldn't have given up. We just have to go to Los Angeles and get the job done next week.”
On the team’s mentality heading towards next week…
“Just win. We can only control what we do off the field and what we do on the training pitch this week, so we gotta go to the field this week with all intention to win the game.”
Midfielder Alan Velasco
On the team's mood after tonight's draw…
"We are leaving very sad tonight. We knew that with a win tonight we would have clinched a place in the playoffs, but tonight’s result leaves the team with a sour taste."
On what to expect from Dallas next Saturday in Los Angeles…
"We are going to give it our all in Los Angeles next week. We know that our season is in play next Saturday, the team knows we have to make the playoffs, so we are going to go all in on the road in Los Angeles."
Midfielder Paxton Pomykal
On the team’s mentality heading into Decision Day…
“Same as today. It’s tough though because we wanted it really badly but the performance didn’t really reflect that, myself included. So, it’s about how we find that switch. There’s no tomorrow, it’s right now and that’s the most important game of the season and we’ve got to go get a win.”
On the team’s belief of winning on the road in Los Angeles next week….
“I don’t think it matters if we’ve done it before or not, but we need a win. We need the win. Maybe in the back of my mind, it helps to know that we’ve done it before but at the end of the day that’s not something I’m really thinking about. We’ve just got to go there and out-perform them and get on the scoresheet more.”
