Altidore, Angel lead rested Red Bulls over TFC

Soccer Betting Lines

08/13/2007 - East Rutherford, NJ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - With an extended break since its last Major League Soccer fixture - a 2-0 loss to CD Chivas USA on July 26 - Red Bull New York went back to the basics, getting goals from its go-to guys to carry the offense in a 3-0 win over injury-plagued Toronto FC on Sunday at Giants Stadium.

Jozy Altidore scored two goals and Juan Pablo Angel once to lead the Red Bulls to the important victory.

"It was two weeks of good work, solid work," Angel said of the break. "We improved on so many things, defensively and offensively. We wanted to win and give ourselves a chance over the next few games and it was a very good performance overall."

"I think the team looked energized, we kept the ball, let the ball do the work," Altidore said. "You saw there was more creativity, a lot more crosses in and it showed in the scoreline."

"I thought our forwards played very well," New York coach Bruce Arena said, "creating chances, a couple chances they helped create for (Dave) Van Den Bergh. They had a good mentality. (Altidore and Angel) have worked well together the last couple weeks."

Altidore, who missed an extended period of time with his participation with the U.S. National team in the FIFA U-20 World Cup, scored his fourth and fifth goals of the season in the second half after Angel scored his team-high 10th midway through the first half. They were Altidore's first league goals since May 24 and Angel's first since June 16.

"It was a solid performance by the entire team, but our forwards certainly played well," Arena said.

Toronto, which was playing without a number of regulars, including starting forwards Jeff Cunningham and Danny Dichio and starting midfielder Ronnie OBrien, generated only three shots on Red Bulls goalkeeper Jon Conway and zero on goal compared to New Yorks 21 and 11.

"We aren't too disappointed because we know what is ahead of us and we know what is still lying on the treatment table in Toronto, some very good players," Toronto coach Mo Johnston said.

TFC used Colin Samuel and youngster Andrea Lombardo up top with little result. Samuel was injured and came out just after the break and Lombardo was ineffective against New York's center back tandem of Seth Stammler and Jeff Park.

"We never had any offense, today was a bad day," Johnston said. "We had a young kid up front and he got muscled off the ball."

With the shutout, New York extended Toronto's goalless drought to 467 consecutive minutes.

Stammler was making the start for Carlos Mendes, who was benched by Arena after he missed the Chivas game with flu-like symptoms.

"Stammler played well in that center back position (against Chivas) and we wanted to keep that combination together," Arena said, "but we certainly still have plans for Carlos playing."

New York opened the game with a flurry of action around Toronto goalkeeper Kenny Stamatopoulos, who was making just his second league start after being signed by the club on Aug. 3.

Stamatopoulos made his first save on Red Bulls midfielder Dave Van Den Bergh on a volley from 15 yards out in the 4th minute. He made another quality save about 10 minutes later on an Angel header after another red Bulls flurry of action in the Toronto area.

It looked like New York suffered a crippling blow just 22 minutes in when team captain Claudio Reyna strained his right groin and had to leave the game, but the player who came on in his absence - Clint Mathis - played a large role in the game's first goal.

After a corner kick was cleared out, Mathis took control of the ball on right flank, fired a cross to the left that was deflected by the Toronto defense to Angel in the box. The Colombian striker made no mistake, hammering the ball into the net from 20 yards out to make the score 1-0 in the 24th minute.

As far as Reyna, his injury is not believed to be serious.

"I think it is just a slight groin strain from what I'm told," Arena said.

New York started the second half like the first, controlling the play in the Toronto end, and it resulted in the game's second goal just five minutes after the break.

Altidore stripped the ball from a Toronto player at midfield and passed off to Angel, who centered back to Altidore in the six-yard box. After the ball was deflected by a defender past Stamatopoulos, Altidore knocked it in just before it crossed the goal line, dangerously close to being an own goal.

"I got that before it went in there," Altidore said with a big smile on his face.

Altidore scored again in 63d minute to make it 3-0 after taking a pass from Angel and cutting inside the box, past Stamatopoulos and a defender, before he deposited the ball in the back of the net.

After scoring the goal, Altidore ran directly toward roughly 300 Toronto fans, giving them a hush sign, which provoked a beer bottle being thrown at his head.

"I almost (got hit), they were yelling a lot of stuff all game and then they were throwing stuff," Altidore said.

"Fans pay for tickets and they are allowed to express their frustration verbally, thats for sure," Arena said. "I don't know if you call that taunting, what Jozy did. I don't think it as anything that drastic that it invites people throwing objects. I think that is inexcusable at any sporting event."

Toronto's Chris Pozniak was given a red card after a hard foul on Dane Richards in the midfield in the 65th minute, effectively ending any comeback hopes TFC had.

"We are team that over the last six weeks haven't scored a lot of goals and haven't been that dangerous and part of it was due to the fact that Jozy was away a little bit," Arena said. "But we haven't played well, lets be clear about that. Anytime you have a team with two forwards that can play off each other that can be dangerous, that can score goals, you have a head start there. I think our defensive woes have been corrected a bit, I think we have been much more solid in that part of the game over the last month, hopefully we are building toward becoming a good team."

"The important thing is it was a lot better performance overall," Angel said. "We looked stronger as a team, we needed three points and I think we did a great job."

New York (9-7-3) is back in action Saturday when it hosts Los Angeles while Toronto (5-10-5) is back in action the same day against CD Chivas USA.