The San Jose Earthquakes scored twice early to knock out local NASL rivals, the San Francisco Deltas, and advance to the Round of 16 in the US Open Cup. Jackson Yueill and Cordell Cato scored within six minutes of kick-off before San Francisco found any footing in the game.
Jackson Yueill found the back of the net in the fourth minute for the Earthquakes, scoring his first ever goal for the club since being drafted sixthoverall in 2017. “I thought had a good game. He moved the ball. He’s a smart player,” said Earthquakes Head Coach, Dominic Kinnear. “This is a good step for him. You can see the guys are happy for him. When he scored, they all ran over to him.”
The lead was doubled less than two minutes later when Cordell Cato cleaned up his own rebound to make the score 2-0. “We went with a 3-5-2. We just wanted to start out the game aggressive. We wanted this game to end in 90 minutes, so we wanted to come out and get an early goal,” Kinnear said following the match.
Cordell Cato made sure there was no way back for the visitors. #ForwardAsOne pic.twitter.com/4ofblIVTYd
— San Jose Earthquakes (@SJEarthquakes) June 15, 2017
The Deltas did not let this get them down however, as they built their way back into the match. Their momentum began when defending NASL player of the week Kyle Bekker forced a big save out of Earthquakes keeper Andrew Tarbell in the 21st minute. “Their keeper was very good tonight. I think a defining moment is when Bekker has the chance to go 2-1, and the ball doesn’t go in,” said Deltas’ Head Coach, Marc Dos Santos.
The Deltas created a few more chances, as did the San Jose Earthquakes. Both sides looked very balanced after the initial six minutes of the game. “I remember some very good chances. We had free kicks. We had corners. We pushed, but unfortunately we couldn’t find the goal tonight,” said Dos Santos. “We didn’t come in with the intentions that we wanted to come in with, and then we were surprised by two goals that they took well. But I think that is the only part in the game that we actually felt inferior. All of the other 83 minutes of the game, we created as many opportunities as they did.”
The man of the match was San Jose goal keeper Andrew Tarbell, who came up with a couple of outstanding saves to maintain his clean sheet as the Deltas tried to claw their way back. Tarbell as well had several powerful punched clearances late to help clear his lines.
“I thought we relaxed at 2-0,” said Kinnear. “I think that at 2-0 we took our foot off the pedal. They stepped their game up because they are behind 2-0. They were creating chances. We were fouling close to goal, which wasn’t a great idea. But Andrew Tarbell, I thought, made some real good saves for us, and he commanded his box well too.”
The San Jose Earthquakes will now proceed into the Round of 16 final 16-team bracket portion of the tournament with the next round taking place in two weeks.