Sounders take down the Timbers 3-0 in front of 66,452

By Money Mike


After clinching a fourth consecutive playoff berth up in Vancouver and with four games remaining in the regular season, it was important that the Seattle Sounders ended their regular season on a high note, starting with a stretch of three straight at home. And what better way to kick off that stretch with a victory over your arch rivals in front of a record crowd. Last night, the Sounders defeated the Portland Timbers 3-0 in front of a record crowd of 66,452. After a somewhat disappointing month of September, the Men in Rave Green bounced back and completely dominated this match on both sides of the ball from start to finish to kick off the final month of the regular season. The Sounders also move up to third place and are three points behind Real Salt Lake for second position in the Western Conference with a game in hand. These two will square off on October 17th at CenturyLink and if the Sounders can win this match, they will move up to second in the Western Conference. This could be a potential quarterfinal matchup in the MLS Cup playoffs, but we don't know for sure. The Sounders still have three games to go before we find out who their opponent will be.

In the 17th minute, Portland fails to capitalize on some miscommunication. Jack Jewsbury's corner found Rodney Wallace unmarked in the middle of the area but he missed wide of Michael Gspurning's left hand side. The problem there was either Jeff Parke or Brad Evans were supposed to cover him, but they were both marking David Horst.

In the 25th minute, the Timbers struck first. The problem was, they scored in their own net. Ozzie Alonso took control of the ball from midfield. Adam Johansson made a darting run from his right back position. Alonso threaded the ball through and Christian Tiffert made a nice dummy and Johansson had plenty of space to cross after Rodney Wallace tried to break up the play with a sliding tackle and the Swedish international played the ball across looking for Fredy Montero and Mamadou Danso kicked the ball into his own net and the Sounders took a 1-0 lead after an own goal by Futty.

Three minutes later, the Sounders doubled their lead. Brad Evans delivered a very good ball to the middle and right there was Eddie Johnson, unmarked and he made the most of it as he slid the ball home on a half volley for his 14th goal of the season and the Sounders jumped out to 2-nil lead with two quick goals. As for Eddie, he has really improved his form throughout the year since returning to MLS after a dreadful spell in Europe. And earlier today Eddie Johnson was called up to the U.S. national team for their crucial World Cup qualifying matches on the road against Antigua and Barbuda on Friday and at home next Tuesday against Guatemala. I'll talk a little more about that later.

A minute later, the Sounders nearly made it 3-0. Mauro Rosales fed the ball to Eddie Johnson, who then poked the ball to Fredy Montero after he saw there was no room to turn and shoot. Montero took a couple of small touches and went for the floater and Donovan Ricketts got a hand to the ball to deflect it off the post. Did these guys not prepare themselves for this match (the Timbers)? Do they not remember that they've played against this guy before? He's scored three times against this team, they should know that they can not give Fredy Montero that kind of space, because he'll burn you in a blink of an eye.

Nearing the end of the first half, Portland looked to pull one back. Diego Chara poked the ball back to Franck Songo'o, who saw that he had room to shoot and decided to have a crack at goal and was just inches wide.

In the 61st minute, the Sounders would extend the lead to 3-0. A long throw in by Brad Evans found the head of Eddie Johnson who flicked the ball to Fredy Montero who's flick was denied by Donovan Ricketts. The Timbers struggled to clear the ball out of danger and Fredy Montero put home the rebound for his 13th of the season. Both EJ and Montero have now combined for 27 goals this season. And that would turn out to be the final score of the match as the Men in Rave Green sent 98% of the fans home happy with as they struck three times and came away with three points.


Observations:

People have been buzzing about this tifo for quite a while now. As you can see on this picture, it doesn't have the full tifo. I do have a shot of this tifo on my mobile phone, but it's not a great picture. One because my phone is crap and two I was in the nosebleed section. This was shared on the FOX Soccer fan page on facebook (that was the first pic I saw since coming home from the match) and we had a bunch of morons from England saying the same B.S. as always (hopefully you know what I mean).

I was really impressed with performance from start to finish from the lads. Down in Portland, they had a lead in that game and were outplayed since. They were outplayed against San Jose and were outplayed against Vancouver. And although the numbers favored the Timbers, you have to say the Sounders were the better side in this game. This is what we want with the playoffs looming.

As for me, my perfect record in attending Sounders matches rolls on. Since they moved to MLS, I've been to six Sounder matches and they've won all six of them. I've been to a few before that when they were in the USL, and they've drawn and lost a couple during that stretch. And there was no doubt I enjoyed being part of it. Mainly because the entire stadium was packed. CenturyLink Field is a great venue for soccer and the U.S. soccer federation needs to think about making this place a possible venue for any future USA matches. As for you folks out there. If you haven't gone to a Sounders match at all, I would suggest you get your tickets to one of the last two remaining matches on October 17th or the 21st. You would have to be an idiot to deny that Seattle is the greatest Soccer City in America.


Scoring summary:

Seattle Sounders FC - Own goal (Mamadou Danso) 25'

Seattle Sounders FC - Eddie Johnson 14 (Brad Evans 4) 28'

Seattle Sounders FC - Fredy Montero 13 (unassisted) 62'


Misconduct summary:

Seattle Sounders FC - Christian Tiffert (caution; foul) 69'

Portland Timbers - Diego Chara (caution; foul) 72'


Lineups:

Portland Timbers - Donovan Ricketts; Lovel Palmer, David Horst, Mamadou Danso (Eric Brunner 68'), Rodney Wallace; Sal Zizzo (Mike Fucito 46'), Jack Jewsbury, Darlington Nagbe (Eric Alexander 78'), Diego Chara, Franck Songo'o; Bright Dike

Seattle Sounders FC - Michael Gspurning; Adam Johansson, Jeff Parke, Jhon Kennedy Hurtado, Leonardo Gonzalez (Marc Burch 77'); Mauro Rosales (Andy Rose 87'), Osvaldo Alonso, Christian Tiffert (David Estrada 88'), Brad Evans; Eddie Johnson, Fredy Montero

Sounders struggles continue as they fall 2-1 to the Timbers

By Money Mike


The Seattle Sounders still can't find a way to snap their winless streak. The Sounders have now gone seven games without a win after suffering a 2-1 defeat at the hands of their arch rival the Portland Timbers. After starting the season 7-1-1, injuries have really racked up for Seattle along with players doing a poor job communicating with each other. With another pretty big month coming up, it's important that the Sounders end the month on a good note by beating the New England Revolution next Saturday. And let's not forget their Open Cup match on Tuesday against the San Jose Earthquakes.

In the 11th minute, as I said a couple blogs ago set pieces are one of the biggest keys to victory offensively and defensively and the Sounders got lucky here because defensively they sucked on this corner. Franck Songo'o curled the ball out and found the head of David Horst from point blank range and he hit the crossbar and Jack Jewsbury couldn't put home the rebound.

In the 16th minute however, the Timbers would take advantage of some more lousy defending and draw first blood. Steven Smith worked a brilliant give and go with Franck Songo'o on the near side and whipped in a perfectly good ball into the area for Kris Boyd and Andrew Weber was left helpless as Boyd slams it home and the Timbers take a 1-0 lead.

In the 24th minute, Kris Boyd was left unmarked again, this time with a free header and Andrew Weber did enough to punch the ball over the bar. That was twice that Jeff Parke got caught and got away with it.

Straight off the corner kick though Parke gets caught one more time and this time, there was no "get out of jail free" card. Franck Songo'o curled the ball out and found David Horst for a downward header that skips through Andrew Weber and Alex Caskey and into the back of the net and things were going terribly wrong for the Men in Rave Green as they found themselves two goals behind after 25 minutes. I don't understand what has happened to Parke and Hurtado. Both of them just can't seem to communicate with each other very well and have been a major disappointment these last couple of games.

On the stroke of halftime, Ozzie Alonso had a go from a long way out and forced a big save from Troy Perkins. He had too much space on that play and it didn't look like the Timbers read any scouting reports on him, especially the fact that he can hit em' from distance.

In the 53rd minute, Alonso made a cut to his right foot and tested the keeper again, trying to go for the far corner. But again, Troy Perkins was equal to it.

In the 58th minute, the Sounders would find an answer and cut the Timbers lead in half. Zach Scott found Eddie Johnson on the right side. Johnson brushed off David Horst and was looking to square the ball across for Fredy Montero, but Futty Danso cut down the angle. Instead, Johnson cut to his left foot and curled a shot inside the far corner for his fifth goal of the season.

In the 90th minute, the Rivalry starts heating up as tempers flare from both teams. The Sounders had the ball in the Timbers area and looked to continue attacking, but referee Ricardo Salazar stopped play because it looked like Fredy Montero shoved David Horst, who went down easily. This after Horst and Eddie Johnson were right in each others face. Just after the whistle had blown, there was pushing and shoving everywhere. Futty started to go at it with Johnson and then right from behind, Lovel Palmer threw on elbow at Johnson. After all the scrap was cleaned up, it was Fredy Montero and Lovel Palmer who got sent off. This is the third straight game in which a Sounder player has been shown a red card. So we all know that Montero and Palmer will be suspended for their next match, unless appealed. But it looks like there could be more suspensions handed out. Things have gotten out of control for the Sounders once again, especially after another disappointing result.


Scoring summary:

Portland Timbers - Kris Boyd 5 (Steven Smith 1) 16'

Portland Timbers - David Horst 1 (Franck Songo'o 1) 25'

Seattle Sounders FC - Eddie Johnson 5 (Zach Scott 1) 58'


Misconduct summary:

Seattle Sounders FC - Brad Evans (caution; off the ball foul) 18'

Portland Timbers - Diego Chara (caution; foul) 43'

Seattle Sounders FC - Osvaldo Alonso (caution; foul) 48'

Portland Timbers - Kalif Alhassan (caution; foul) 53'

Portland Timbers - Steven Smith (caution; foul) 73'

Portland Timbers - Jack Jewsbury (caution; time wasting) 90'

Seattle Sounders FC - Fredy Montero (ejection; fighting) 92'+

Portland Timbers - Lovel Palmer (ejection; fighting) 92'+


Lineups:

Seattle Sounders FC - Andrew Weber; Zach Scott, Jeff Parke (Patrick Ianni 42'), Jhon Kennedy Hurtado, Marc Burch; Brad Evans (Andy Rose 46'), Osvaldo Alonso, Mauro Rosales, Alex Caskey (Cordell Cato 75'); Eddie Johnson, Fredy Montero

Portland Timbers - Troy Perkins; Jack Jewsbury, David Horst, Mamadou Danso, Steven Smith; Kalif Alhassan (Sal Zizzo 54'), Darlington Nagbe, Diego Chara, Franck Songo'o (Lovel Palmer 78'); Kris Boyd, Mike Fucito (Danny Mwanga 66')

Previewing Round 2 of the Sounders-Timbers MLS Rivalry

By Money Mike:


The Seattle Sounders are preparing for their 2nd Rivalry match against the Portland Timbers at Jeld-Wen Field in Portland. On May 14, these two sides finished with a point each after a 1-1 draw at Qwest Field (now named CenturyLink Field). Alvaro Fernandez broke the deadlock in the 52nd minute with a low left foot drive to put the Sounders up 1-0. But then in the 65th minute Jack Jewsbury hooked up with Futty Danso off a free-kick once again to salvage a point for the Timbers. The Sounders need to avoid mental mistakes if they want to get this win, which would put them in 2nd place all by themselves after FC Dallas lost 2-0 to Real Salt Lake.


Injury report:

Seattle Sounders FC - Some changes here for the Seattle Sounders. O'Brian White started practicing with the team following the LA match. He won't be on the squad today against Portland, but Sigi Schmid says he might at least be available off the bench next Saturday at home against the Colorado Rapids...... you know, the team with that dumb fuck named Brian Mullan. As for Brad Evans, what the hell is going on with this dude? I don't see him playing against Portland.

Portland Timbers - Alright for Rose City FC. Big blow defensively, Rodney Wallace has a left knee injury and he is out. Bright Dike has been out with a ruptured achillies tendon on his right ankle, he's now listed as questionable along with David Horst. Defenders Jeremy Hall and Futty Danso, Midfielders Adam Moffit and Peter Lowry and Goalkeeper Troy Perkins are listed as probable.


Key matchup:

Darlington Nagbe vs Tyson Wahl - Well you're looking at a young playmaker going up against Tyson Wahl in this one. I mean really, have you guys seen his goal last week against Sporting Kansas City, I mean it was everywhere on the news including on Sports Center. Tyson Wahl better keep him from pulling off another goal like that. lol. Seriously though, this is a matchup to look at.

And with all the injury concerns, this is the only matchup to keep an eye on for this one.

Futty's goal sends the Timbers home with a point.

By Money Mike


In front of of 36,593 fans at Qwest Field, the Seattle Sounders saw their 1-0 lead slip away after a 65th minute goal by Mamadou "Futty" Danso off a Jack Jewsbury free kick as the first Sounders-Timbers rivalry match in MLS ended all square at 1-1. The Sounders were without Zakuani, O'Brian White, Mauro Rosales and Erik Friberg was a late scratch for this match. And I didn't like who they had on the bench. Three defenders? Really? Also, where's David Estrada, where's Michael Tetteh, where's Miguel Montano......why are they not giving the young players a chance to play? You draft Estrada in the first round and so far he's only made four appearances, you draft Michael Tetteh who is a very talented young midfielder and he's never made the bench in any of the matches? What the hell is going on here? You're team is banged up with key injuries, you're putting in weak players like Zach Scott, Nate Jaqua, and Leo Gonzalez has also been inconsistent. Look, I'm not saying Sigi has to go, I'm saying the man needs to pull his damn head out and put the young guys, that have worked their ass off everyday, on the 18-man squad and get them on the damn field. I was unhappy about who has on the squad for this match.

Portland had the better chances in the first half, the best one coming from Kenny Cooper who's left footed strike from outside the area was easily saved by Kasey Keller.

The Sounders had an opportunity just before halftime. A free kick from just outside the penalty area by Fredy Montero who curled it over the wall, but it didn't get enough bend on it and hit the side of the net. Some fans thought it was in after the saw the net move.

In the 52nd minute, Seattle broke through. Roger Levesque chipped the ball the top of the area for Fredy Montero. The Colombian outjumped two Portland defenders and flicked the ball out wide to Alvaro Fernandez, who had time to settle before ripping a left footed shot past Troy Perkins inside the near post for his third goal of the season and to give Seattle a 1-0 lead.

The Seattle backline did very well to shut down Kenny Cooper and Jorge Perlaza, but in the 65th minute, there was one thing that they didn't do well. Last week in Portland, Jack Jewsbury's free kick found the head of the big man Futty Danso for the only goal against the Philadelphia Union. And in minute 65, in the same position, the two combined again........

Jewsbury's chipped the ball into the danger area. Kasey Keller came off his line to punch the ball clear, but Futty beat Keller to the ball and headed it into the back of the goal for his second goal in as many matches. It was also Portland's 12th goal of 2011, and their 8th off a set play which leads MLS. Oh and that was the last of the goals.

Seattle will hit the pitch again next Saturday as they host Sporting Kansas City who have not played a home match yet this season. Their first 10 games are on the road, this is the 8th of the 10 games. And you can tell it's been rough, they won the season opener down at Home Depot Center against Chivas USA with goals by rookie C. J. Sapong and two from the Mexican legend Omar Bravo, but since then, they've only managed a point and that was down at Vancouver against the Whitecaps where they blew a 3-0 lead. And the injury to Bravo is prooving costly to Kansas City as well. And I'll talk more about that when I preview that match.

Scoring summary:

Seattle Sounders FC - Alvaro Fernandez 3 (Fredy Montero 3, Roger Levesque 1) 52'

Portland Timbers - Mamadou Danso 2 (Jack Jewsbury 4) 65'

Lineups:

Portland Timbers - Troy Perkins; Jeremy Hall, Eric Brunner, Mamadou Danso, Rodney Wallace; Darlington Nagbe (Sal Zizzo 61'), Jack Jewsbury, Diego Chara, Kalif Alhassan; Kenny Cooper, Jorge Perlaza (Ryan Pore 84')

Seattle Sounders FC - Kasey Keller; James Riley, Patrick Ianni, Jhon Kennedy Hurtado, Tyson Wahl; Brad Evans (Roger Levesque 42'), Osvaldo Alonso, Servando Carrasco, Alvaro Fernandez; Fredy Montero, Nate Jaqua (Lamar Neagle 79')

I'm getting sick and tired reading all the stupid comments from Seattle fans after poorly played games:

So I've read a bunch of comments that a lot of you people made about the match via Facebook, Seattle Times, etc.. and as much as I understand how upset you are, the fact that you deserve better from the team, you Seattle fans, and I'm not afraid to say this. You Seattle fans are just downright stupid. I mean, I'm upset about the result too, but this shit is going way to far. All the comments like "Rivalry??? More like book club", "Pathetic excuse for professional athletes" (What a dumbass comment), "The Sounders are the new Mariners. As long as the seats are filled, go ahead and rool out a crappy play" (This makes no sense), "total clown show, I'm embarrased that the Sounders represent Seattle" (What the fuck?!!)............

These people make stupid comments and you give them a thumbs up. Look, all you Seattle people need to chill the hell out and not make a bunch of stupidass comments like these comments from people who know absolutely nothing about soccer. Again I know how disappointed you guys are about the draw, but I'm more disappointed at you guys for all the negativity.