Inter Miami coach Phil Neville on 1-0 road loss to Portland Timbers: ‘We got robbed’
Inter Miami, running out of time in the MLS playoff race, played with energy and urgency on the road against the favored Portland Timbers on Sunday.
The inspired visitors crashed the box with numbers from the opening whistle, out-possessed Portland for much of the game and shut out the Timbers for 82 minutes. It wasn’t enough.
Portland crushed Miami’s spirit and dimmed its playoff hopes with a 1-0 victory on an 83rd-minute corner kick header by unmarked Jaroslaw Niezgoda 44 seconds after he entered the game.
Miami appeared to tie it up three minutes later with a header by Julian Carranza, but the goal was disallowed by referee Robert Sibiga, who ruled Carranza fouled Portland defender Dario Zuparic on his way up for the ball.
Inter Miami coach Phil Neville was livid at the call, kicked the bench, shouted unsavory words, and continued to fume in the post-match press conference.
“Let’s cut to the chase, we got robbed,” were Neville’s opening words. “I try to give them the benefit of the doubt, but I’m not sure what these referees are doing. Clearly a goal by Julian Carranza. I accepted the decision on Wednesday night (hand ball on Leandro Gonzalez Pirez that led to Atlanta’s winning PK), even though it could have gone the other way. I’m not accepting that today because of the efforts of the team, because this is a professional league and we’ve got officials making such poor decisions like that.”
And he wasn’t done.
“I’ve got to stand up and fight for my team and my football club,” Neville said. “We were robbed of points tonight because of a poor refereeing decision that isn’t just a one-off. I’m seeing it time and time again. I’m frustrated, a little bit emotional. I’ve seen it three or four times, maybe five or six, and not once did I think it was a foul. We spend millions of pounds on VAR to check decisions like that I don’t know what they’re thinking. My thoughts on the game are totally clouded by what was probably the worst decision we’ve had this season, and we’ve had some bad ones.”
Miami had a final chance to equalize in the eighth minute of added time when Gonzalez Pirez got his foot on a cross from Indiana Vassilev, but it missed to the right.
It was the fourth loss in a row for Miami, which has managed just one goal over those four games and has been shut out in 12 of 27 games. Miami remains in 11th place in the Eastern Conference standings, eight points shy of the final playoff spot with seven games to go.
“The gap is becoming big, the clock is ticking, and you can’t beat the clock,” Neville said. “We’re probably going to have to win five or six of our last seven games. We’ve done that. We’ve been on a run like that and that’s the kind of run we need to go on. Our performance levels have been really good, but at the end of the day it’s about scoring goals. We need to score more goals.”
Miami is the lowest-scoring team in MLS with 25 goals over 27 games.
“We lacked that finishing ruthlessness in terms of the final third where we need our big players to stand up and start scoring goals, that’s what they’re paid to do, so there’s no excuses,” Neville said. “We got punished for one mistake.”
Midfielder Lewis Morgan added: “There’s a disappointment from the goal we conceded. Of course the decision went against us at one end of the pitch, but we still need to look ourselves with the set piece, it’s a mistake you can’t make when you work so hard to stay in the game and give yourselves a platform to win. There’s frustration from both sides. We need to eradicate those mistakes.”
Portland has won seven of its past eight games, is in fourth place in the Western Conference.
Defender Nico Figal and midfielder Gregore returned to the Miami starting lineup after suspensions. Midfielder Blaise Matuidi started the game on the bench, as did Kieran Gibbs. Jay Chapman and Brek Shea started in their places.
Shea had an outstanding first half, covering a lot of ground up and down the left flank, nearly scoring in the first minute and making a spectacular goal-saving tackle on Dairon Asprilla in the box. He went down with an injury in the 79th minute and was replaced by Gibbs.
Figal left the game in the 56th minute with a leg injury. He was replaced by Kelvin Leerdam. Chapman was replaced by Matuidi.
Carranza and Federico Higuian came in late in place of Robbie Robinson and Rodolfo Pizarro, and Miami was granted a sixth substitute in the final minutes under a new MLS concussion rule when Gregore went down with an apparent head injury.
Miami’s next game is Saturday on the road against the New York Red Bulls, which beat Miami 4-0 two weeks ago.
This story was originally published October 3, 2021 at 9:45 PM.