I agree that this is a bad issue with the gameplay mechanics, and an unnecessary one at that.
Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any way around this (until the developers address the issue, but they need to work the bugs out of the game first, so it may take a while).

As for the 2 seconds left for your turn, this is probably a lag issue (if your computer is slow, the game will run slower on your computer than the timer on the server).
I suggest turning all the in-game options down to their lowest levels, and see if that improves the problem. Having other programs open at the same time can also make the problem worse, so close any other windows, and do anything else you can think of to speed up your computer.

Also, look at your mechs level in the corner of the shop it will tell you where your mech is at ie lvl 14 or 20. I know for me at higher levels I often fight a level 35 range mech since there are more players in this area. The mech level is determined from the highest piece of equipment you have equipped so if you have one level 20 piece your mech is considered level 20.

In another post here, someone made a good suggestion whish was even though you level up do not buy and equip new weapons until you have a few new levels under you belt. Try keeping all of you mechs equipment inside a 3 to 4 level range. Meaning if you mech is lvl 20 try to have no equpiment under level 17 in your build.

I would love to see the mech lvl determined by an average equpiment level over the peices equipped, rather than how it is now which is just your highest single piece. But I am not sure of the programing needed for this or if it is a workable solution.

They have tried basing the matchmaking level on the average level of all items, but it didn't turn out well
Some people would equip one high level weapon, and have all other items at the lowest level, so their matchmaking level was also low, and they could defeat their low level opponents with one blast from their high level weapon.

I think maybe the minimum matchmaking level should be half the experience level, and caps off at lvl30 or something.

This way, the highest opponent an ecp-lvl5 would face, is an exp-lvl10, and when a exp-lvl19 with a mech at lvl10 levels up, they wont start facing lvl20 opponents, they'll start facing lvl11 opponent.