Head Coach Jim Curtin
RE: Winning on the road in Los Angeles
“First you do have to speak about LAFC. The team that they are, relentlessly playing at the highest tempo in our league. They put us under a lot of pressure for the 90 minutes. The environment here is second to none. It’s a tough place to play. Having said that, [I’m] incredibly proud of my players. They put in 110 minutes with all the injury time. Scored a lot of good goals but if you start with Andre [Blake] in the back, the saves that he made and the back line working together. You can go through each and every guy. It’s kind of a win that they can bring belief to the team. We went toe-to-toe with the best team in the MLS. I think a draw was a fair result.”
RE: Tactics vs LAFC
“Tonight, we had a situation where we knew LAFC with the high press they have, they do leave their two center backs 1v1 with our strikers so we left two high up. We played a lot of long balls and direct through them and try to put them under pressure. I thought it was successful for the majority of the game. Obviously, you know LAFC is going to create chances but overall we bent but didn’t break.”
Midfielder Alejandro Bedoya
RE: Stadium atmosphere
“The atmosphere was great, I think it’s one of the best stadiums we have in the league. The venue is beautiful, the pitch was fantastic, it’s easy to play, and the atmosphere was great. The fans were very loud and they really drive the game. I think it showed, under the lights on a Sunday night, prime time game, everybody’s into it, it makes for a better flow of the game and everybody’s up it.”
Midfielder Brenden Aaronson
RE: Thoughts on his goal
“I don’t even know what happened to be honest. I got the ball, I was just looking to play for it, I got lucky, I tried chipping it to Sergio [Santos] at first and it got deflected, it bounced and went over one of the defender’s heads and went to Sergio, and he had time to cut it back to me, I was screening and I just turned and hit it.”
RE: Team confidence
“I think that gives us some huge confidence, to come here and get a result like that. I think we could have won the game and I think we should have but things happen and I think we’re really confident after it and we’re going to go into the home opener firing.”
