Swope Park Rangers Head Coach Nikola Popovic
Thoughts on the outcome…
Looking through the stats, it’s unbelievable. Seventy-seven percent possession, more shots at goal, 651 total passes. With these kinds of numbers, you have to score a goal and we didn’t. You make a wrong pass in the second half and they score a goal. They only made two shots at target. That’s soccer sometimes. You play the game, play the best you can and I think we have to give congratulations to our players because they were fantastic until the end of the game. The other team went one or two times for the goal and they scored.
On falling to the league leaders…
They are a very good team. If you look at many of their players, they could be part of an MLS team so this is one of the best teams in the USL. So of course today we fought against a very strong team, but looking through the stats I think we were the dominating team and sometimes in soccer this is not enough.
Thoughts on the rematch…
I think it’s a different game. It’s in one week. There are things for us that need work but overall, with these numbers, it’s not bad for a beating.
Swope Park Rangers Defender Amer Didic
On controlling the possession…
That’s what you’re going to get with us every game, a possession type play. Props to San Antonio for defending and sticking to their game plan. We needed to find ways to break that back line. To create goals and chances, we just need that final product. I think that’s how it is when you’re playing up and keeping the ball. One little play can punish us. Overall, I think that’s ones of our best games this season and I’m looking forward to playing next weekend at their place.
On the home winning streak coming to an end…
It’s been magical. It started last year and led us to the USL Cup Final. It’s frustrating losing, obviously, and breaking that streak, but all we can do is look ahead and bounce back.
Thoughts on the rematch next weekend…
We’ll stick to our game plan and how we play and look forward to hitting the back of the net.
San Antonio FC Head Coach Darren Powell
On the team’s performance…
I couldn’t be more proud of our guys. They had to work extremely hard tonight and earn everything they got. I thought the goal we got was good and it came at the right time, and the players did a tremendous job holding on to the lead tonight.
On the club’s clean sheets…
All 11 players have to defend well, and collective defending and sticking to the task was very important tonight. We were able to frustrate them at times and we were able to get into the right areas when we needed to. We work on collective defending a lot and I’m proud of tonight’s game.
San Antonio FC defender Greg Cochrane
On earning a shutout…
That was a tough game. Swope is a very good team and they like to possess the ball, and we knew it was one where we would have to grind out a win by defending with 11 and trying to catch them on the break.
On keeping the clean sheet…
We really pride ourselves on that because we know if you don’t give up a goal, it gives us the best chance to win the game. We work together and it’s not just the back four. It starts up top and everyone does their work.
