The San Jose Earthquakes and Colorado Rapids battled at Pay Pal Park in San Jose as the Quakes edged the Rapids in MLS action on Sat May 7, 2022 (photo from the San Jose Earthquakes twitter)
by Marko Ukalovic
SAN JOSE — The San Jose Earthquakes are happy Nathan is back in the lineup.
The Brazilian center back scored the game’s only goal to help his team to 1-0 shutout victory over the Colorado Rapids on Saturday evening at Pal Pal Park.
Off a set piece, Cristian Espinoza sent in a cross inside the box and Nathan, who had a Rapids defender all over his back, finished off the play with a right footed shot past Rapid’s goalkeeper William Yardbrough for his first goal of the season in the 64th minute.
San Jose has won two out of its past three matches since interim coach Alex Covelo took over the head coaching duties back on April 18th. Colorado is winless in six out of its past seven matches.
“I feel very good,” said Covelo. “Just like all of our staff: [Chris] Wondolowski, Steve Ralston, Luciano [Fusco], and the rest of the guys. I think the guys are responding very well. During training sessions many of them are very different, it’s going to take a little bit more time to memorize those concepts, but the guys are working hard. They are improving step by step and memorizing the concepts that we want for the team.”
San Jose (2-5-3) had a good scoring chance in the 31st minute to draw first blood. A long ball from Jamiro Monteiro to Cade Cowell who made a move around Yardbrough but never was able to generate a shot on net. Instead, his cross into the middle of the box was knocked away by Colorado.
Cowell had another chance right before intermission when his shot from 20 yards out hit the right post in the 44th minute.
The second half started the same way as the first half did with San Jose controlling the play and generating scoring chances with many counter attacks.
Colorado (3-4-3) was too busy chasing the ball around in the second half as they weren’t able to generate enough quality scoring chances to score the equalizer.
Jermey Ebobisse had a shot just sail to the left of the net in the 58th minute just before Nathan’s heroics six minutes later.
Quakes goalie JT Marcinkowski earned his first clean sheet of the season and 11th of his career. He made five saves, including his best save when he dove to his left to stop a shot from Rapid’s striker Gyasi Zardes in the 70th minute, to help preserve the shutout.
“I think the clean sheet is a great representation of how well the team defended. I’m just out there to try and help the team in any way that I can, whether that’s a clean sheet or whether that’s a 4-3 victory, doesn’t really matter to me as long as we get a win,” Marcinkowsi said.
Yardbrough made three saves on five shots on target in the losing effort.
GAME NOTES: San Jose finished the match with nine corner kicks. Colorado has three.
The Quakes now hold an 31-24-18 overall record against the Colorado Rapids, including a 18-9-9 record at home.
The Earthquakes won 1-0 for the first time since July 31, 2021 at Seattle, and for the first time at home since July 6, 2019 vs. Real Salt Lake.
Colorado hasn’t won consecutive matches at San Jose since July-August 2003.
UP NEXT: San Jose travels up to north to take on the Seattle Sounders on Wednesday 5/11 in the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup at 7:00pm at the Starfire Sports Complex in Tukwila, Washington.