Earthquakes manager Frank Yallop: It was a really, really poor performance by us.

Posted Sunday, April 24, 2011 by YAHOO Sport

SANTA CLARA, Calif.—During the first games of the season, the argument could be made that even though the San Jose Earthquakes weren’t getting results, they were on the right track and playing well. However, after Saturday’s 2-1 home defeat to a previously winless Chivas USA, it would be near impossible to make that assessment.

“I thought Chivas were way better than us to be honest, deserved to win the game, and I thought it was a really, really poor performance by us, collectively and individually,” said head coach Frank Yallop. “It was terrible.”

Despite taking the lead in the 16th minute through Chris Wondolowski, the Earthquakes looked stretched at the back and lacking ideas up front, frustrated by Chivas’ organized defense. In fact, Wondolowski’s goal ended up being the team’s only shot on goal in the entire first half, and the team only mustered one more shot in total.

In contrast, Chivas looked dangerous throughout the first half, and although it took until the last kick of the half for Alejandro Moreno to find the net, the visiting team forced four saves out of Jon Busch, including two very acrobatic efforts.

While the introduction of Anthony Ampaipitakwong early in the second half proved somewhat of a spark for the Earthquakes, none of the team’s three shots on goal tested Dan Kennedy in the Chivas USA goal. The Earthquakes also allowed large areas of space to open up in the back, and Justin Braun and Mariano Trujillo effectively took advantage of it to get the winner in the 85th minute.

“We allowed them to play whenever they wanted to, and they did,” Yallop explained. “They should have scored more goals to be honest, it should've been more than 2-1.”

With Chivas USA totaling 17 shots on goal with nearly half on target, it was easy to see why.

“Our team defending in the past was a lot better,” said Earthquakes captain and center back Jason Hernandez. “I think we looked a bit disconnected on who's supposed to step and be the aggressor on each play.”

Whereas many of last season’s games were characterized by grit and organized, watertight defensive performances, Yallop and many around the locker room lamented the lack of fight shown by the team.

Asked whether or not the team needed to return to that type of play, forward Chris Wondolowski responded, “Yeah, definitely. We gotta do something, we gotta end up fighting for each other, we gotta work hard for each other and we gotta put a full 90 minutes

“I think that’s what we did last year. This year, I feel that we played really well for 60 minutes and then take five minutes off, take minutes off here and there, and that’s never a good thing.”

The Earthquakes have now failed to win in their past four games, with their only win of the season coming on March 26. Despite the team losing to Chivas right on the heels of a 3-0 drubbing by the New York Red Bulls, though, nobody around Buck Shaw Stadium is ready to call it a crisis quite yet.

“It’s not panic mode by any means yet, but the way we’ve approached the past two games is very unacceptable, so we’ve got to make that better,” explained midfieder Sam Cronin.

What the consecutive losses did reveal, though is that Yallop won’t be afraid to chop and change even further to get the results he want. While Scott Sealy was handed his first start of the season, the remainder of the lineup featured many familiar players from the first five games of the season. After today, though things could be a little bit different.

Yallop reserved some positive words for Ampaipitakwong and indicated that considering the way the rest of the team played, “there might be some more [rookies] going in, too.”

Whatever changes Yallop makes for next weekend’s trip to Philadelphia, the Earthquakes will want to solve their problems quickly in order to meet this season’s expectations of playoff qualification. Otherwise, fans in the Bay Area could be in for a long summer.