“There was a time the Earthquakes would have been happy to score a point on the road,” writes Tobias Xavier Lopez. “But not after a 1-1 draw Thursday against FC Dallas.” He tells of the “anger and frustration” in the post-game San Jose locker room after a controversial penalty kick allowed Dallas to tie the game late on a handball supposedly committed by the Quakes’ midfielder Francisco Lima.
“I think we got robbed, to be honest,” said Quakes’ midfielder Ronnie O’Brien. “From what I gathered, from people’s reaction that have seen the penalty, I think we’ve been robbed. I don’t think we played great; last week and this week I don’t think we’ve played well as a team — our worst performances of the year. But tonight we did enough to get a win and I think the referee took it away from us.”
Coach Frank Yallop thought his team “did a good job of possessing, counterattacking, and [we] created some great chances.” But his team should have had its own penalty on another incident, and that could have made the score 2-0, he said. “It hurt tonight,” he confessed.