HOUSTON -- After a disappointing 3-1 loss to the Houston Dynamo on Sunday evening at Robertson Stadium, Toronto FC head coach John Carver found little to be happy about in his team's performance.
"I just thought from the first whistle we were dreadful," Carver said. "We had a spell in the game where Jeff [Cunningham] scores a great goal and we got a little bit of pressure, but no excuses tonight -- we were beaten by the better side."
Goalkeeper Greg Sutton was particularly disappointed with his team's defensive performance after being subjected to 19 shots by the Dynamo's attack, including eight on goal. Dwayne De Rosario put the Dynamo ahead just before the end of the first half, then Brian Ching scored twice in the second to put the game away.
"We didn't react too well to the situation," Sutton said. "We defended like inexperienced defenders from the front all the way back to the back."
The loss drops Toronto's record in road games to 1-4-0 on the season. The team is 4-0-2 when playing at BMO Field.
"In order to be successful in this league, you have to win on the road and we haven't done that year," Sutton said. "That's something that we're going to have to start doing, or we won't be where we want to be at the end of the year."
The Canadian side's struggles south of the border aren't due to the weather, said Sutton and Toronto forward Jeff Cunningham, even though the kickoff temperature in Houston was a humid 89 degrees.
"It's hot in Toronto right now, and we train in hot weather all week," Sutton said. "The third game of the season, it was 102 degrees in LA and we won that game, so the weather's not an excuse. We just didn't play the way we should've played."
Cunningham attributed his team's apparent fatigue in the second half to Houston's play, not the Texas heat.
"They kept the ball and we kept chasing," Cunningham said. "It doesn't matter what kind of weather it is chasing for 90 minutes isn't possible. As a result, they kept the ball and we got fatigued."
Toronto came into the match shorthanded, with midfielders Amado Guevara and Maurice Edu missing while on international duty with the Honduran and U.S. national teams, respectively.
"They're two of our better players," Cunningham said, "and they were definitely missed tonight. But last week, the side that coach put out had a good result against L.A. There's no reason we weren't able to do that tonight."
In the end, Toronto was just "outclassed" by Houston, Cunningham said.
"They looked sharper, they looked fitter, they got closer to the ball, they passed the ball better than us, their finishing was very good and they could have had a few more, so no excuses," Carver said. "We got beaten by the better side, a side that's certainly on the way up."
Said Sutton: "It was a game that we obviously took way too lightly, and we got hurt by it."
Toronto FC will return to BMO Field to face the Colorado Rapids next Saturday, June 14 (7 p.m. ET).
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