The tight window between games means most of the Portland Timbers who played in Sunday’s win over Houston will not play on Wednesday when the Los Angeles Galaxy visit Providence Park for a Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup match.
Kickoff is at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are available. The match will be streamed live at Timbers.com.
The winner of this match advances to face the winner of Tuesday’s match between Seattle and Real Salt Lake in the Open Cup quarterfinals on July 20. Should Portland win it would host the quarterfinal match, something that coach Caleb Porter noted is usually key to making a run to the Open Cup title.
Porter ranks the Open Cup behind MLS and CONCACAF Champions League in terms of importance, but said the lineup he fields for this match will be a strong one of players who have proven themselves this season.
Rookie Wade Hamilton is expected to start at goalkeeper. Jake Gleeson is dealing with hamstring soreness and Porter said he doesn’t want to risk further injury. Adam Kwarasey could return to training late this week, according to Porter, but will not be ready for Monday’s match at Colorado.
Darlington Nagbe trained with the Timbers on Tuesday, his first session with the team after a month with the U.S. national team for the Copa America Tournament. Nagbe saw little action in that tournament, which Porter said means Nagbe would be fresh enough to play Wednesday. But the coach did not say if using Nagbe is in his plans.
Nagbe said he enjoyed the experience with the national team, including an up-close view of Argentina and Lionel Messi, but that he is happy to be home.
Galaxy coach Bruce Arena has traditionally leaned on reserves for Open Cup matches. Los Angeles is coming off of a 1-1 draw at San Jose on Saturday and next hosts Vancouver on Monday.
CCL schedule – The Timbers open 2016-17 CONCACAF Champions League play by hosting El Salvador’s CD Dragon at 7 p.m. on Aug. 3 at Providence Park. Portland will travel to Costa Rica on Sept. 14 to face Deportivo Saprissa and go to El Salvador on Sept. 27 to take on CD Dragon. They finish group play by hosting Saprissa on Oct. 19. The first-place team in the three-team group advances to the quarterfinal round in February of 2017.
All four are midweek games between MLS matches on each weekend. The Aug. 3 home match is sandwiched by a game at Sporting Kansas City on July 31 and a home match against SKC on Aug. 7. The Sept. 14 trip to Costa Rica is between two weekend MLS home games. The Sept. 27 match in El Salvador is between road games at Houston and at Colorado. The Oct. 19 home game is between the Timbers final MLS regular season home match on Oct. 16 against Colorado and their season-ender at Vancouver on Oct. 23.
