Not A Fan Of Day Matches

Jennifer Denton - Seattle Sounders/mlsfemale — Official Seattle Sounders Reporter

By Jennifer Denton // @darkwynds

Saturday, May 6: 0-1 Loss

This is the rematch most, if not all, Seattle Sounders fans have been waiting for. So much was made of the MLS Cup ending in PKs versus Toronto FC, and no shots on goal for the Sounders.

True to the hype, this was indeed a “revenge match.” Jair Marrufo was in the center circle. I try not to blame bad matches on the refs because it isn’t only one reason a match goes badly. Sounders’ match started out well enough but went downhill fast.

Let’s go to the video tape: In the sixth minute Sounders got a free kick in a great spot. Roldan took the free kick and it’s a goal! Or is it? Nope, called for offside, no goal. While, I was on the far end of the stadium from the goal, it didn’t look offside at all, but having the luxury of a replay, the assistant ref got the call right. *insert grumble about not liking offside*

So the match moves on and something just seems off with the Sounders. After the amazing comeback against the New England Revolution the week before, the team seems tired. Another observation is that Toronto FC, while not playing dirty soccer, it’s certainly thuggish. To compound the frustration, they are getting calls from Marrufo for their behavior. The offside call was just a heart crushing moment. It was like the air was sucked out of the fans, which leads us to the 22nd minute.

In the 22nd minute, a penalty is called against the Sounders. Roman Torres fell onto Jozy Altidore. When it happened live, it looked soft. Now that I have had a chance to see the replay a few times, it was a soft call. It looks like Torres tripped and fell into Altidore. That is my opinion of course, the ref must make a quick call at the time and I can see where you would think it was a penalty. I will be happy when the Video Ref system comes online (if it does).

Well, from that point on it just got worse and worse for the Sounders. If I hadn’t known better I would have said the Sounders were the team that played a midweek match. The penalty just took the wind out of their match and they were just going through the motions. If you looked at the stats from the match, you would think the Sounders won the match. We were better than TFC in almost every category, except the one that really matters, the final score.

There were some bright spots, though. Stefan Frei was amazing again; he had a save that was almost exactly like “The Save”. There were moments where you could almost feel like they were going to come back, but then they give up the ball and the moment was lost. This loss will be put behind us and we move onto an away match at Chicago, Saturday evening. Chicago has had a remarkable turnaround so this could be a good match. I am looking forward to it.