D.C. United Head Coach Ben Olsen
Overall
I think they're a good team, and we weren't as good as them tonight. Early on we had to rely on Bill, but they do a great job of pressing. If you can't deal with that part of them, that's what it's going to look like. If you don't take care of the ball at times, they're well-drilled in punishing you for mistakes in bad areas. Do that once or twice, and you find yourself chasing the game against who I think right now is the gold standard in the East. I give them a lot of credit; we weren't at our best, and they played well throughout their team.
On the defense
This isn't about a player; this is a group effort and I'll take the large amount of blame for this loss. That's OK. I thought I prepared them better than I did.
On the two week break
We've got to recharge. It's been a heavy stretch here so we'll get away from the game for a few days. We'll also hopefully get some guys back and start to work on some of the deficiencies that we've seen over the last couple of weeks. Maybe it comes at a good time to exhale and then get back to work and have a bunch of training sessions where we can try to get better.
On Fabián EspÃndola
We need Fabi out there. He's electric, and he's a handful, but that doesn't mean without him that we should have a performance like tonight. We've taken a few on the chin here, and this is normal throughout a MLS season. We're not used to losing over the last two years so we need to find a way out of this. It's no different than any other MLS team; it's all streaks, good and bad. You have to go through them, and we're going through ours now. We'll use this two-week break to pick ourselves up, get better, get healthy and get ready for the home stretch.
D.C. United Defender Steve Birnbaum
On the loss
It's very disappointing you know. I thought we were ready to go at the beginning of the game. I think losing possession in bad places in the beginning got us. We found a little bit of rhythm and then they had the ball a lot of the game and they were running at our back four and we really didn't have much of an answer for it.
On the reason for the negative results lately
We've got to be better in possession, we've got to keep more of the ball because they [were] running at us, but we've also got to be there defensively and it's not good enough. We've been giving up a lot of goals.
On the team focus going forward
We've really got to regroup and just find our stride again. We want to get some momentum going [before] the playoffs so that's really what we want. Hopefully we'll get away for a couple days, regroup and everyone can start gelling again and get back to our winning ways.
D.C. United Defender Bobby Boswell
On the match
Give them some credit, they came out and hit us hard, hit us early; Bill [Hamid] made some big saves, but we weren't able to take care of the ball. We worked on that during the week, we always focus on that, and anytime you can't do that, especially on the road, you put yourself in a tight spot so we'll learn from this and we've got to put it behind us. I think at this point we need to look at how many games we have left and go out and try and win as many of those as we can. Tonight hurts, it's going to suck for a while, but sometimes that's what happens when you go on the road and you're not the better team.
On the two week break coming up
I think we looked a little leggy out there, part of that was not taking care of the ball. After a series of losses like this, excluding the CONCACAF game, I think we can work on things and improve. At this point we need to look at the big picture and we can't keep dropping points, especially to teams in our conference.
New York Red Bulls Head Coach Jesse Marsch
On the team's performance
The last 10-15 minutes weren't great but overall it was a very good performance. We set the tone right from the start. I thought we played at a very fast pace and our goal is to always try and make the game fast and overwhelm teams.
On finding success quickly after the club's offseason overhaul
It's a credit to our men. It's a credit to the players we've had. It's a credit to Marc de Grandpre, Ali Curtis, and my staff. Everybody shares in this. It's been a total group effort from top to bottom.
On bouncing back from the poor performance midweek in Chicago
I just think that the guys knew this was a big game. They were ready to give everything they had. Playing D.C. early on in the year made us better. We respect the team that they are. Playing games against New York City and understanding the spotlight's on in a big way - how to handle those games - has made us better. We know what these big games are like; we're more prepared and ready to perform.
New York Red Bulls Forward Bradley Wright-Phillips
On the performance against D.C. United
I feel like we are a very difficult team to play at the Red Bull Arena, and playing D.C. obviously makes it an even bigger occasion. I think we showed up today.
On his first goal
It was a great ball. I didn't have to do much. I really just had to make decent connection. I saw Mike coming in, he didn't look and I was just hoping he played it into that area because that was the nearest place I could get to. It was a great ball I just had to make decent connection.
On getting more assists this season
Like I said it was something I wanted to add to from last season to my game. I didn't have nearly as many assists as I should have, I wasn't touching the ball as much as I should be. This season I'm just trying to make it work and get my goals and my assists.
