SAN JOSE – In an up-and-down season, the Earthquakes have had few losses as painful as the one they endured on Sunday evening.
Masked San Diego goalkeeper CJ Dos Santos had slipped on the goal kick while being rushed by recent San Jose substitute Noel Buck on Sunday afternoon. Instead of the ball blasting high into the air, it trickled softly forward and onto the waiting foot of veteran striker Martinez in the 72nd minute.
With a wide open goal in front of him, but pestered on the sides by San Diego defenders, the Venezulean forward did what he has so often done over his decorated MLS career.
Martinez buried the ball into the back of the net, breaking the scoreless deadlock and appearing for a few moments like he had given the Quakes the winning goal.
But it was not to be.
In the 82nd minute, SD sub Marcus Ingvartsen equalized with a header off Franco Negri’s cross, leveling the score. Then Ingvartsen tormented the Quakes in another way, launching a long ball to a star striker Anders Dreyer.
San Jose goalkeeper Daniel had no chance at saving the shot in the 86th minute, and San Diego went on to secure the 2-1 victory.
San Jose entered the match ninth in the table with 32 points, three off Austin FC for the last playoff spot. Its opponent, San Diego, lorded over the West with an astounding 49 points.
The Earthquakes were attempting to keep the momentum going from their 2-1 victory over Vancouver last week, the team’s first victory in over a month. San Jose had scuttled through a winless June.
For most of the game, San Jose gave the top team in the West everything it could handle.
A scoreless first half belied how eventful the initial 45 minutes were, as coach Bruce Arena’s relentless press out of a 3-4-3 formation flustered the usually clinical San Diego into some rare mistakes.
One of the best chances came in the 34th minute, when Vítor Costa and the two Cristians – Arrango and Espinoza – had shots saved or blocked by a mass of defenders.
In the 42nd minute, Cristian Espinoza found space by cutting onto his right foot. The all-star winger then blasted a low shot that skimmed across the PayPal Park grass and went mere inches wide left of the goal.
A few minutes later, Espinoza played a beautiful through-ball to DeJaun Jones, who sped into open space along the right side of the box but had his attempt also smothered by a defender.
San Jose had nine shots to San Diego’s two, but landed one attempt on goal when the halftime whistle blew.
Centerback Daniel Munie had a fantastic individual moment for San Jose in the 69th minute, hawking down a San Diego striker on the breakaway and making what might have been a goal-saving tackle.
Then the madness of the final 20 minutes followed.
