From New York Red Bulls: Head Coach Troy Lesesne
On his thoughts on the match…
I got to say I was really pleased with our first half prior to Sean being sent off. I think that we came out and a really good fashion and there's a lot of times where we're defending really hard. Philly is a very good team, they're obviously going to have their chances and their phases in the game where they test us. But that said, one, I'm a little disappointed with the set piece goal. You know, it's another couple of set piece goals tonight that we have to shore up. But it's one to one and I think it's a really good battle and then you know the game at that point when we go down a man, it becomes difficult and that said we still kept it together. Going into halftime. I think the way we came out in the second half was excellent. had two big chances. And maybe you know that can give us a little bit of an advantage. But it's always going to be difficult when you go down a man here with the quality of Philadelphia so that's my summary.
On the attacking strategy…
Absolutely. I think it's tough because we want to bring on another, we lose Sean, and we want to bring on another defender. You know, the choice is between Kyle and Hassan we wanted to keep the structure of a back four and felt JMi could do the job at center back so it's difficult to take Elias off. It's either Elias or Tom and I think Elias had some really bright moments in the first half, as did Tom. And could we bring Jorge on sooner? Yeah, I think it's a fair question. And I think we you know, it's something that we can look at. I'm really pleased with the minutes that he played under difficult circumstances. So, you know, he's been with us now 10 days or so and he's shown some really good moments. So, we're going to keep bringing them into our team for the remainder of the season and hopefully he can give us some more production.
From New York Red Bulls: Defender John Tolkin
On set pieces…
Yeah, by our standards this is unacceptable considering how much we pride ourselves on them. I think set pieces win and lose games and they have won us games and they have also lost us games. Today, what was it, the first two goals were set pieces right? Yeah, it is just unacceptable from us. We are going to have to look at the film and I think it comes down to just determination there. You cannot take plays off on set pieces and that is what can happen to you.
On his message to the fans…
Yeah, first off, for everyone that supported a huge thank you, you know, giving up time on your weekend to come and support us. It means the world and when we are on the field and see you guys up in the corner, it is a really good feeling that you guys are behind us. Yeah, look, I think for the people watching tonight, you know, it was not the prettiest, the result did not go our way but like said I still think that fight was still there and we were still going for goals even down a man. We are going to give everything to get over the playoff line, the playoff line is a minimunm for us and we have shown that over the last 13 years, so you can expect hard work 100% and yeah, look guys we want to get there too, so just believe in us and we need you guys most importantly.