Let’s not be coy about this. Beyond a Player of the Week-caliber performance from Sebastián Blanco, a needed road win and the awakening of an attack that he begun to precipitate doubts, the big takeaway from a 4-1 breakout victory at Real Salt Lake was how well the Portland Timbers performed in the day’s formation, the 4-2-3-1.
It was the first time the team had started with that setup since early June – a 2-0 U.S. Open Cup win over San Jose – but that hardly counts, as a rotated team that featured a number of Timbers 2 talents used to the approach T2 head coach Cameron Knowles has employed for much of the season.