Gotham 1-1 Portland. A point on the road at the team top of the table, and Portland had 26% of the ball to get it.

Jaedyn Shaw scored in the 60th. She admitted afterwards it was meant to be a cross. It still chipped Mackenzie Arnold, who was off her line. Sophia Wilson equalized from the spot in the 75th, her eleventh of the season, after Pietra Tordin got her ankle stepped on inside the box and her shoe came off. Play carried on for two minutes before VAR looked at it.

Marissa's argument is that this was the best the defense has looked all season, and that the reason is boring. Same four as the previous match. Vignola, Perry, Hiatt, Calzada, two games running. Familiarity, not signings.

Her quote of the pod follows from it. She is not a sports analyst, she is drinking well vodka in a bucket hat at 2:45 on a Sunday, but it looks to her like Portland are trading some of their scary offense for that defense. The midfield sits instead of pressing. Sophia Wilson ends up alone on an island up top. Marissa will take the trade and points at Gotham grinding out 1-0 wins all year.

Then the weekend happened. Portland went into it third. Utah beat Orlando on Saturday, Washington beat Bay FC on Sunday morning, and by the time we sat down the Thorns were fifth on 38. One point off fourth.

Also in it: Jayden Perry as the best centerback on the team in her second pro season, Nina Nijstad taking people on one-v-one and picking up a booking for it, Tordin still one assist off the league record, and Marissa's Match Day Roundup.

Five of the last eight are at Providence Park. Portland have not lost there all year.

Adults only. Bring a drink.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Cold open: a point at the best team in the league
03:26 The defense, and why the reason is boring
09:10 The two goals
13:02 Vignola and Tordin, Perry, Nijstad
15:56 The table: third to fifth in one weekend
21:41 Marissa's Match Day Roundup
22:40 What are we drinking
25:27 What's next: five of the last eight at home

WHAT WE WERE DRINKING

Marissa: a shot of well vodka and a big cup of water. She was sent a list of suggestions and had the well vodka anyway.
Alan: a Lagunitas IPA. He ordered every drink a listener recommended that the bar actually had, which came to none of them.

THE NUMBERS

Possession: Gotham 74%, Portland 26%. Portland still had the better of the shot count.
Table: Portland fifth on 38, one point off fourth. Gotham top on 45.
Tordin: 9 assists. The NWSL single-season record is 10, set by Tobin Heath for Portland in 2016 and equaled by Croix Bethune at the Washington Spirit in 2024.
Next: Portland v Washington Spirit, Sunday September 6, 1pm, Providence Park.

Portland 1-0 Denver Summit, and Tobin Heath retired as a Thorn in front of 22,017 people. She signed a one-day contract to do it.

Sophia Wilson scored in the 44th, assisted by Jessie Fleming. It was her tenth of the season and the fourth time she has hit double digits in an NWSL season. Mackenzie Arnold got her seventh clean sheet. Marissa was in the building on a media credential and went to the post-match press conference. Alan watched on his phone because his seven-year-old had the TV.

The bit we care about: we have been asking this club to fix the back line since Episode 6, the 5-1 at Utah. Rob Vilahamn's post-match quote describes a "big, honest meeting" the team held after that exact match, where they changed how they press and asked the back line to step. He has never heard of this show. He just started from the same night and got to the same place. Three wins since.

Plus Tobin's whole career, the new Kaiser Permanente Performance Center in Hillsboro, a table check, and Marissa's Match Day Roundup.

Adults only. Bring a drink.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Cold open, one nil on Tobin's night
02:03 The defense finally shows up
08:07 Denver's side of it
09:25 Tobin Heath night
12:30 From the press conference
14:47 What are we drinking
16:04 The Kaiser Permanente Performance Center
22:53 Where we sit in the table
23:53 Marissa's Match Day Roundup
27:12 What's next: Gotham, then the Spirit

WHAT WE WERE DRINKING

Marissa: Rose City well vodka, water back. Cheap, house pour, genuinely not bad.
Alan: a Lagunitas IPA, chosen mainly so he was not drinking a Seattle beer. He concedes it is an Anheuser-Busch beer now anyway.

THE NUMBERS

Portland are third on 37 points, level with Washington and behind on goal difference. Gotham lead on 44.

Tobin Heath's NWSL co-record is 10 single-season assists, set in Portland in 2016. Pietra Tordin went into Saturday on nine, one away, on Tobin Heath's night. She did not get it. The record stayed with Heath.

Ann-Katrin Berger has ten clean sheets and just became the first NWSL keeper with 10+ in back-to-back seasons.

NEXT

Friday August 28 at Gotham. Sunday September 6 against Washington at home, a day game.

Portland 2-1 Orlando. Caiya Hanks came off the season-ending injury list on Friday, came on in the 88th minute, and won it in the 96th — her first match back after fourteen months out with a torn ACL.

We were in the building on media credentials for the first time. We got in late, we missed the ceremony, we sat in the press box, and Alan asked a question at the post-match press conference. Plus the two knees, a table check, Meghan Klingenberg's whole career, and a vote we need from you.

Adults only. Bring a drink.

🌳 VOTE FOR BELLA BIXBY

Bixby is the Thorns' nominee for the 2026 Lauren Holiday Impact Award. The overall winner's charity receives $50,000 from Nationwide. The NWSL Fan Impact Challenge is how fans back her nomination — one vote per device per day, through August 29 — and the fan-vote winner's charity gets an additional $10,000. Winner announced September 2.

Her charity is Friends of Trees, Portland-based urban forestry.

👉 Vote here: https://g1j9uuaobs1.typeform.com/to/SWulrU2a

CHAPTERS

00:00 Cold open — Hanks wins it in the 96th
02:44 Getting in — credentials, the press box, and the people who fixed it
06:58 The question — our first credentialed press conference
08:15 What are we drinking
09:07 The Two Knees — Moultrie out, Hanks back
15:20 The match — a shaky half, then Providence Park
22:15 Table check — fourth on 34, ten to play
26:05 Bella Bixby — the vote we're asking you for
27:44 Get Klingy With It — Meghan Klingenberg, top to bottom
31:54 Next week — Tobin Heath night

WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT

• Caiya Hanks won it in the 96th minute of her first match back. She tore her ACL at Providence Park on June 15, 2025, was cleared off the season-ending injury list on Friday, came on in the 88th, and hit the winner from outside the box into the bottom corner. Assisted by M.A. Vignola.

• The goals: Deyna Castellanos 58' (assisted by Pietra Tordin), Jacqueline Ovalle 63' for Orlando, Hanks 90+6'. Orlando's equaliser came off Mackenzie Arnold's own punched save and ricocheted in off Ovalle's knees. It is credited to Ovalle, with no own-goal notation.

• Tordin's assist was her ninth of the season — one off the NWSL single-season record of 10, co-held by Tobin Heath (Portland, 2016) and Croix Bethune (Kansas City, 2024). She can tie it next Saturday, on Tobin Heath's night.

• Perry and Obaze kept Barbra Banda quiet, which almost nobody manages. Nina Nijstad continues to impress in midfield.

• Nijstad's substitution was concussion protocol, not a diagnosed concussion, after a collision with Jessie Fleming. Sarah Lowdon called it precautionary and declined a medical answer.

• Olivia Moultrie is out for the season with a torn ACL in her right knee, announced August 11. She's 20, and it costs her the Concacaf W Championship as well as the rest of the year.

• Robert Vilahamn was in the building, near the media room — but not on the touchline, and the club still hasn't said why. Sarah Lowdon was acting head coach.

• Attendance: 19,106.

• The run-in: 10 matches left, six at Providence Park, where Portland are unbeaten in 2026.

• We were outside for the Klingenberg ceremony. Credential pickup ran long and we didn't get in until after kickoff. We're not going to describe something we didn't see — go watch the club's footage. We honoured her our own way in Get Klingy With It.

NEXT WEEK

Tobin Heath is honoured at Providence Park on Saturday, August 22 vs Denver Summit, signing a one-day contract to retire officially as a Portland Thorn. Lindsey Heaps returns as captain of the Summit, and Pietra Tordin can tie Heath's single-season assist record on Heath's own night.

THANK YOU

Alberto and Bryce, who got us in.

LINKS

Club recap: https://www.thorns.com/news
Match highlights: https://www.thorns.com/video/video-u16zoavmfwm
Post-match press conference: https://www.thorns.com/video/video-cw87eybowlu

Boston Legacy 3, Portland Thorns 4.

Portland went three up inside nine minutes and thirty-eight seconds. That is the fastest three goals in NWSL history, thirty-five seconds quicker than the record Portland set themselves in July 2022. They broke their own record and then spent the next hour nearly giving the game away.

Marissa watched it from a bar in Las Vegas where the bartender would not let her touch the remote. By the eighty-second minute she had moved on to a third vodka for medical reasons.

Pietra Tordin got her first career hat trick at twenty-two, the youngest a Thorn has ever managed one. The goalkeeper has an assist. The road drought is over after ninety-eight days. The coach got sent off in the fifty-eighth for kicking a dead ball away, and nobody had told us whether it stands.

Also in here: the back line Marissa wants to talk about for seven straight bullet points, why beating a side that had scored nineteen goals in eighteen games is not the same as beating them well, and what fifth place actually buys you with eleven games left.

Adults only. Bring a drink.

Chapters:
00:00 Cold open, no remote in Vegas
01:40 The result: 3-0 in 9:38, then 4-3
09:16 Tordin's hat trick
18:30 The coach red card
21:25 What are you drinking
23:24 The defense
31:28 Ninety-eight days
35:28 The table
40:00 Look ahead: Orlando, Klingenberg night

Takeaways:

3-0 in 9:38 is a new NWSL record for the quickest three goals, 35 seconds faster than the previous mark. Portland set that one too, in July 2022. They broke their own record and then nearly threw the game away.

Pietra Tordin scored a hat trick at 22. Her first as a professional, and the youngest by a Thorn. She is on seven goals and eight assists, so fifteen goal contributions, not fifteen goals.

Mackenzie Arnold, the goalkeeper, has an assist. She set up the hat-trick goal in the 37th.

Boston had scored 19 goals in their first 18 games and put three past Portland. Marissa's read: Boston are not a bad team, but Portland made them look better than they are.

The road drought is over after 98 days. The last away win was May 3 at Chicago, scored by Olivia Moultrie and Reilyn Turner. Neither was available on Sunday.

Portland are fifth on 31 points, up from seventh, with 32 goals. That is joint-most in the league. The pressure is coming from below, not above.

Robert Vilahamn was sent off in the 58th minute for kicking a dead ball away from play. At the time of recording the league had not announced whether it stands, and we say so rather than guessing.

Next up: Orlando at home on Saturday August 15, Meghan Klingenberg night, with Tobin Heath honored on August 22.

Rose City Red Card is Alan and Marissa on the Portland Thorns and the NWSL.
https://rosecityredcard.com

Utah 5, Portland 1. We recorded two hours after the whistle, Marissa on a mic at her parents' place in Las Vegas, and the argument she has been making for five straight episodes died on air. All season it has been the hole Sam Coffey left at the six. Somewhere in the second half she texted Alan "we need center backs. fuck a 6," and most of this episode is her working out why she changed her mind and then defending the new version for twenty minutes. Portland scored inside the first minute and lost by four. Utah were playing their third game in eight days. Portland had been off for nine. Also in here: the back four that changes almost every week, why Marissa thinks Mackenzie Arnold is carrying blame that isn't hers, what the money is actually for, and why all of it comes back to Sophia Wilson's contract. Adults only. Bring a drink.

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:14 Utah 5, Portland 1 — and it wasn't the road
02:47 Their third game in eight days, and we still fell apart
06:00 "Fuck a six. We need centerbacks."
08:49 The new coach, and five goals
10:35 The FIFA share sale that got scrapped
11:03 The table: sixth, and it flatters us
12:34 Mackenzie Arnold, and a back line that changes every week
14:31 The money is there
18:00 The window, and Soph
21:51 It isn't Arnold's fault
24:39 Klingenberg honored, and Sonnett's season
27:54 Back at Providence Park on the 15th

Takeaways:
- Utah Royals 5-1 Portland Thorns, August 2, at America First Field. Sophia Wilson scored inside the first minute. Delzer got two, then Mozingo, Palacios, and a Kate Del Fava header from a corner on 89. Portland had conceded 20 in the previous 17 matches.
- All season Marissa has said the problem is the hole Sam Coffey left at the six. Mid-match she texted Alan "we need center backs. fuck a 6." Most of this episode is her taking that apart.
- Utah were playing their third match in eight days. Portland had nine days off and scored in the first minute.
- The back four changes almost every week. Marissa puts Mackenzie Arnold's dip in form down to that rather than to the goalkeeper.
- Portland are sixth on 28 points from 18, goal difference +3. They went into the night two behind Utah and came out five behind. North Carolina, Angel City and Seattle all sit below them with games in hand.
- Sophia Wilson is a free agent after this season and still unsigned. The window shuts September 7.
- Portland have the same salary cap as Gotham. The money, the facility and the ownership are all there. No center back has been signed.
- Emily Sonnett ruptured her patellar tendon and is out for the season.
- Meghan Klingenberg is honored at Providence Park on August 15, the first game the two of us watch together in the building.

Next week is Boston away, our last remote recording. Then August 15, back in person.

Portland 2, Gotham 2. A point against the league leaders, an eleventh straight home game unbeaten, and a club record — and none of it is the thing you remember. Emily Sonnett went down non-contact in the seventh minute and left Providence Park on a stretcher, and twenty-one thousand people in a building she doesn't play for anymore stood up for her. We open on that and we close on that, and we don't guess at a diagnosis in between. In the middle: Renee Lyles scoring and assisting in her first ever start, Morgan Weaver back on the pitch after a year and a half and three knee surgeries, and the salary-cap deep dive we've been promising for two episodes. Adults only. Bring a drink.

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:14 Before anything else: Emily Sonnett
02:59 2-2, and 11 straight unbeaten at home
03:38 The game: Purce at two minutes, Lyles' chip, Kerr, and ten men
10:58 Morgan Weaver is back
14:34 What still needs work
20:36 The table: Utah leapfrog us
22:32 The transfer window: still no center back
24:07 The cap, the HIP rule, and how Gotham did it
29:29 Utah away, and one more for Sonnett

Takeaways:
- Portland 2, Gotham 2, at Providence Park. Midge Purce scored inside two minutes off a Reiten cross. Renee Lyles equalized on 21 with a chip over Ann-Katrin Berger — her first professional goal, in her first ever start, in her sixth appearance — assisted by Pietra Tordin. Jessie Fleming put Portland ahead on 53, deflected off Purce, assisted by Lyles. Sam Kerr levelled on 62 off a corner.
- Emily Sonnett went off on a stretcher in the seventh minute, non-contact. No diagnosis has been published and we don't speculate on one. The whole building stood.
- Eleven straight at home without a loss is a club record. Every league defeat this season has come on the road, and the next two are away.
- Perry saw red on 72 as the last defender on Kerr. Marissa's read: nobody wants to call it a good foul, but it was the foul you make.
- Renee Lyles got a goal and an assist in her first career start. Pietra Tordin leads the entire NWSL in assists with seven, and signed through 2029 last week.
- Morgan Weaver is back after eighteen months and three surgeries on the same knee. Two standing ovations in one night — one for a player going off injured, one for a player coming back from it.
- What still needs work: the goalkeeper talking to her back line, and a second minute that went missing. The midfield of Moultrie, Tordin and Fleming is not the problem.
- Portland sit fifth on 28 points. Utah beat North Carolina and jumped us. Nothing on Sunday's card could move Portland either way — fifth is fifth.
- Transfer window still open until September. Nina Nijstad in, Spaanstra sold to Utah, extensions signed, still no center back, and Sophia Wilson still unsigned. No news is treated as good news.
- The cap and the HIP rule: Gotham's president of soccer operations has called the salary cap "a competitive weapon." Sam Kerr isn't even eligible for the high-impact-player rule the nickname suggests — what's actually moving is banked allocation money. The players' union filed a grievance in January over the rule being imposed without bargaining, and it hasn't been resolved. Angel City took a $200,000 fine and a three-point deduction for cap violations in 2024 — the points hurt, the money didn't. Both of us land on the same place: raise the cap.

Next up: Utah away on August 2, and a proper segment on trans inclusion in women's sports.

New episodes weekly. Yell back at us: rosecityredcard@gmail.com

Denver 2, Portland 1. Our old MVP came home to Colorado, pulled on the wrong shirt, and assisted the winner, so we gave it a full night before we sat down. That turned out to be the right call for a Lindsey Heaps homecoming. Portland are unbeaten at home and haven't won on the road all year, and this was the away day that dropped them to fourth. We get into the cohesion problem Marissa can't stop diagnosing, the clash of the North American captains at altitude, an air-quality mess at the Queen's Classic, and a transfer window that still hasn't produced a center back. Adults only. Bring a drink.

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:14 Cold open: a night to become reasonable
00:50 The game: Denver 2-1, and the cohesion problem
07:29 The homecoming of Lindsey Heaps
12:35 The table and the match week
18:14 Air quality at the Queen's Classic
22:19 What we're drinking
23:59 The transfer window: Fleming, Tordin, still no center back
27:31 Wrap and the tease

What we were drinking:
- Alan: Lagunitas IPA. California, pointedly not a Seattle beer this week. His second.
- Marissa: Rose City well vodka. "Easy peasy."

Takeaways:
- Denver 2, Portland 1, at Denver's home opener. Janine Sonis equalized in the eighth minute of first-half stoppage; Natalie Means won it at 86'. Portland were out-shot, out-cornered and out-possessed by an expansion side.
- Marissa's read: not a defensive failure so much as a cohesion one. Midfield, attack and back line moved as three separate units, and Sophia Wilson spent the game marooned up top against four defenders while the midfield jogged in ten seconds late.
- The road is the season. Unbeaten at Providence Park; every league loss this year has come away from home.
- Wilson's 25' penalty was her 51st career club goal, which by their count ties Megan Rapinoe on the single-club list. Said as "by my count," not as a published milestone.
- Lindsey Heaps gets the respect, not the boos. Captain America started at #10, played all 90, and set up the winner. Clash of the North American captains: Heaps for the USA, Jessie Fleming for Canada.
- Portland sit 4th on 27 points from 16. Gotham 30, San Diego 29, Washington level on 27 from two fewer games.
- Air quality nearly stole the Queen's Classic. AQI up around 170, a heat index near 100F, oxygen on the sideline, and 42,000 in the seats anyway. The point the hosts land on: the gate money kept a match on the field that maybe shouldn't have been, and the league's thresholds should move.
- Transfer window: Jessie Fleming re-signed through 2028, Pietra Tordin through 2029, still no center back. Marissa is claiming credit for the Tordin deal.

Next up: Gotham at Portland, July 24, Pride Night at Providence Park, plus the salary-cap deep dive we keep teasing.

New episodes weekly. Yell back at us: rosecityredcard@gmail.com

Seattle 2, Portland 0. We watched the derby, stewed for two days, and then sat down at the bar to talk about it. The short version: the Thorns didn't show up. That's four trips to Lumen Field now without a single goal. Marissa's whole thing this week is that Portland has a Coffey-sized hole in the midfield and nobody to fill it. The transfer window opened the morning we recorded, and Portland still hasn't signed the player we've been asking for since day one. Adults only. Bring a drink.

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:14 Cold open: the apology
00:51 The Derby: Seattle 2-0 Portland, and the Lumen goal drought
08:51 The Coffey-Sized Hole: the midfield needs a defensive six
11:52 The Nijstad signing: a project, not the fix
14:48 What we're drinking
15:50 The Table: Portland stuck on 27, San Diego lead on 28
19:26 The Window: the six they still need
21:29 Next week at Denver, and the sign-off

What we were drinking:
- Alan: Space Dust IPA. Elysian, formerly fantastic, now Anheuser-Busch.
- Marissa: well vodka. "Rose City vodka, come on."

Takeaways:
- Seattle won 2-0 at Lumen. Ryanne Brown scored in the 8th, her first league goal, a defender filling in for the injured Madison Curry. Mercado got the second before half. Portland managed nothing.
- 26 shots. 10 on target. Zero goals. Seattle did it with their backup keeper.
- That's four straight visits to Lumen without a Portland goal.
- Marissa's read, and the reason for the title: Portland has no defensive six tying the back line to the attack. The coach basically admitted it after the game.
- A win would have put Portland top of the table alone for the first time all year. They took zero instead and sit tied on 27 with Washington. San Diego lead on 28.
- The only business so far is Dutch midfielder Nina Nijstad. She'll be great in a couple years. She is not the six they need now.

Next up: Portland at Denver on Saturday, on the road. Denver just drew 2-2 at home with Houston.

New episodes weekly. Yell back at us: rosecityredcard@gmail.com