Day Three at Earthquakes training camp and there are plenty of positives as the build up to the MLS season gathers pace.
Under warming Arizona skies, the players were put through their paces following yesterday’s tour opener at the Kino Sports Complex.
Despite a bright performance in the club’s first preseason match in Tucson, two different Quakes XIs went down 2-0 to New England Revolution thanks to a couple of against-the-run-of-play strikes.
#Quakes74 Preseason, presented by @Benjamin_Moore | A little 5v2 action to kickoff this morning's training. https://t.co/tyuFOY5f49
— San Jose Earthquakes (@SJEarthquakes) February 4, 2016
The match saw Simon Dawkins back in a blue jersey and the former Tottenham Hotspur man showed glimpses of the extra attacking threat he is set to provide this season.
Fellow new boy Andres Imperiale also got his first 45 minutes under his belt, wth the Argentine defender performing well in a solid second-half.
Jamaica international Dawkins, who played more than 50 times for the Earthquakes between 2011-12, was happy to be back in action.
“It feels good,” he said. “It’s been a while since I played for the Quakes so it’s good to be back and it’s good to be around the lads again.”
Coach Dominic Kinnear was pleased with his side’s effort – and happy that the squad came through the game unscathed.
“Obviously we fell asleep a couple of times, made some mistakes that led to goals but overall I was pretty happy with the way the guys played and the effort that was put in,” he said.
“The most important thing is to have guys healthy so you’re not racing against the clock for the first game of the season. It was a good exercise. We’ve upped the opponent - and you can’t make the mistakes we did - but overall we created some good chances, there were some good individual performances and most importantly we came out of it healthy.”
