BEAVERTON, Ore. — Might Will Johnson make his return to the Portland Timbers on the field where he broke his leg in September?
Timbers coach Caleb Porter on Tuesday wouldn’t rule it out, but said it is more likely that the team captain will make his return on May 27 when D.C. United visits Providence Park.
“Do we travel him? Do we bring him off the bench? Do we start him? We do have three games in eight days so there’s some opportunities to use him in these three games. But only if he’s ready,” Porter said.
Johnson suffered a broken leg in the opening moments of the Timbers Sept. 27 visit to Toronto.
The midfielder played his second full match with Timbers 2 on Saturday, and Porter on Tuesday said that Johnson recovered much better from that match than from his first full 90-minute outing with the Timbers USL team.
“He recovered really well this week,” Porter said. “We were really interested to see how he’d recover from this 90-minute game. He looked a little bit better in the game, covered more ground, he was more active.”
Porter will be looking for his team to be more active in Toronto than it was in last weekend’s 3-1 loss at Houston.
Reviewing that loss, Porter pointed to the early Dynamo goal as the game changer because it allowed Houston to sit back and defend and forced the Timbers to atack a well-organized defense in 90-degree heat.
As for that first goal — a open header from Will Bruin off a free kick that came from the left wing — Porter said the Timbers were playing zonal defense rather than man-on-man marking.
It’s a bit different than the way the Timbers defend corner kicks, which is to use three players in zones and the others marking a man.
“I think the decision was fine to zone as long as you attack the ball, and we didn’t,” Porter said.
The other Houston goals came from a cross in open play and from a counter-attack — an area Porter said the Timbers have defended well all season.
“I don’t see that being an issue. Most of the teams we play are trying to counter (attack) us and we’ve managed those really well,” Porter said.
The match at Houston was the first time since that September match at Toronto that a Timbers opponent has scored more than twice. It helps that Porter has been able to keep the same defenders on the field, in contrast to the first half of last season.
That should continue this week, even though right back Alvas Powell did not train on Tuesday.
Porter said the 20-year-old has had hip tightness for about a week and was given extra rest on Tuesday, but is expected to be ready for Saturday’s match at Toronto.
