The San Jose Earthquakes ticked all the boxes for interim head coach Alex Covelo in a 1-0 win over the Colorado Rapids at PayPal Park Saturday night. It was additional confirmation things are trending the right way following the club’s parting ways with Matias Almeyda on April 18.
“The contribution was fantastic,” Covelo said. “We got a clean sheet at home, won against Colorado, created chances against Colorado who was [the top seed] of the Western Conference [in 2021]. I think the players gave it their all. Obviously, we can talk about certain moments of the game where we could be better offensively and defensively, but in general we are happy.”
Covelo said the performance was also proof of what the club are doing during the week at training, adapting to a new coaching staff with different ideas.
“I think the guys are responding very well,” Covelo said. “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.”
It’s now two consecutive home victories against Western Conference heavyweights Seattle and Colorado. Goalkeeper JT Marcinkowski believes the groundwork is being laid for the rest of the season.
“I think the guys have done a great job during the transition. It’s definitely not easy. We owe a lot to Matias and his staff. A lot of the way that we pressure and the way that we defend can be credited to them for teaching us over the past three and a half, four years,” Marcinkowski said. “But, with San Covelo’s system, I think it’s a little more structured, a little more less-is-more approach, I would say. I think this is a good indication of how we’ll play moving forward.”
And if Saturday’s win over the Rapids is the jumping off point, its nice to do so with the first clean sheet of the season.
“I think the clean sheet is a great representation of how well the team defended,” Marcinkowski said. “I thought we really worked together tonight, and we clicked on a lot of cylinders that we’d kind of been missing. I think having a zero in the back is just a culmination of all the effort the guys put in in front of me.”
