Photo by Jane Gershovich
By JASON MITCHELL
SEATTLE – A depleted Seattle Sounders’ side rode some unfamiliar names to a big Cascadia Cup victory over the Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday night.
Servando Carrasco scored his first career goal and the almost forgotten Andy Rose added both an assist and a goal on the way to a 3-2 comeback victory in front of 53,679 at CenturyLink Field, the largest crowd in MLS this season.
While lesser-known players keyed the victory, it was a name becoming more and more familiar that scored the game-winning goal: Lamar Neagle.
With the game tied 2-2 in the 81st minute, Rose fed Obafemi Martins a through-ball behind the defense. Martins took a touch deep into Vancouver’s penalty area and fed Neagle as he charged the net. The Federal Way native needed only one touch to beat goalkeeper Brad Knighton and put the Sounders up for good.
It was a hard-earned comeback for a team missing Eddie Johnson, Brad Evans, and Mario Martinez to international duty, Steve Zakuani and Osvaldo Alonso to injury, and Shalrie Joseph to suspension.
Despite employing its 13th lineup in 13 matches, Seattle (6-4-3, 21 points) opened the scoring in just the ninth minute. With the home team already off to a promising start, Rose found a pocket along the back line and took a well-weighted through-ball from Neagle to get behind the defense. The sparsely-used midfielder took one dribble and fired a right-footed shot past goalkeeper Brad Knighton.
“It was good to see Andy get back off the schneid a little bit,” said head coach Sigi Schmid. “It hasn’t been the best of seasons for him so far, so it was good to see him get that goal.”
Vancouver (4-5-4, 16 points) replied before the Sounders’ faithful were even done celebrating.
In the 10th minute, Russell Tiebert sent in a cross from the endline to the top of the six-yard box. Camilo Sanvezzo’s snap header easily beat goalkeeper Michael Gspurning to even the score at 1-1.
“I think maybe the guys just relaxed for an instant and thought this could be an easy one,” said Schimid. “They’re never easy.”
Tiebert and Camilo weren’t done.
In the 26th minute, the pair struck again, this time with Tiebert unleashing a free kick from almost 40 yards out that found Camilo diving between two defenders to send a powerful header into the back of the net.
“There’s lots of things to build on from this game,” said Vancouver head coach Martin Rennie. “Obviously Camilo’s goals and Russell’s assists. Camilo also had a fantastic free kick that was rebounded that we really had a good chance to make that 3-1. At that point it would have been hard for them to get back.”
Trailing 2-1 at the half, the Sounders unleashed a torrent of attacks on Vancouver after the break, putting the Whitecaps’ defense under relentless pressure.
That pressure finally broke Vancouver in the 69th minute, when referee Hilario Grajeda called a penalty on defender Greg Klazura for taking down Lamar Neagle from behind in the penalty area.
Minutes earlier Grajeda awarded a free kick to the Sounders a yard outside of the penalty area. Replays seemed to show a Whitecaps defender tackled Obafemi Martins just inside the area.
“It was Wal-Mart day today so it was 2-for-1,” Schmid quipped after the match. “Two fouls in the box and you get one penalty.”
Midfielder Servando Carrasco buried the ensuing penalty kick to even the score at 2-2 with 20 minutes to play. It was the 2011 draft pick’s first career goal.
Neagle’s goal 11 minutes later capped the scoring and put the match away for the home side.
The loss leaves the Whitecaps winless in Cascadia Cup competition since entering MLS.
The Whitecaps lost defender Andy O’Brien to injury in the 62nd minute, and Rennie blamed much of the loss on that injury.
“I felt we were really comfortable in the game and doing pretty well,” Rennie said, “but the turning point was losing Andy O’Brien. When we lost him the game opened up.”
Rennie’s goalkeeper agreed.
“It is disappointing,” Knighton said. “We were in total control of the game looking to get our first win against a Cascadia team, but then Andy unfortunately goes down with a hamstring issue. That kind of took the wind out of our sails a bit and the game seemed to turn very quickly. It was just a bit unfortunate.”
The victory gives Seattle six wins in its last eight matches, cementing a return to form following a collapse out of the gate to open the season.
Looking forward, the Sounders are off until traveling to Utah to face Real Salt Lake (7-5-4) June 22, while Vancouver hosts the New England Revolution (5-4-5) on Saturday.
Here are the match highlights:
Why not make a sss where the new arena was going to be made. Since for sss you dont need a big piece of land, just look at skc park, dynamo stadium, just saying because sounders fans deserve it. Look at xolos from tijuana, the owner and front office actually wastes money on stadium and players and the team is about 5 years old.
Because the only people who want a “sas” don’t lived in Seattle and are basically clueless. Also, clink is a soccer specific stadium. They changed the design back in the day to allow a properly sized pitch. It’s not a “soccer only stadium”. Then again, no stadium is.
Because the owners of the land still want to build the NBA arena there?
I certainly haven’t watched many Sounders games this year but every game I have seen I love Lamar Neagle. His work rate is great and to me he has to be a shoe-in and Martins and Johnson should duke it out for the other starting spot. Knowing Sigi though that probably won’t happen.
Neagle on the left wing with EJ and Martins up top. it happened one game so far and Sigi said he wont keep Neagle off the field.. so…
Or I suppose EJ could run the wing with Neagle up top or they could interchange. I like the way the guy plays.
Love the fact that Neagle seemed to naturally gravitate towards the guy that fed him the pass following his quick-strike goal.
This guy’s a gamer. A footballer first.
Role with the National team? A bit too early…
I’m sure the USMNT braintrust is watching.
+1, maybe they call him in for training due to the injuries?
I agree, every time I’ve seen Neagle this season he has looked impressive. He turned Morrow inside out for a goal in Seattle. He has excellent speed and skill. No offense to EJ but this guy is the most threatening player up top for Seattle. He looks like he can simply cut left or right and glide by anybody. Maybe he’s been streaky or inconsistent up to this point. He seems to be dialed right now…
what was yedlin thinking on that first VAN goal?! awful defending. lesson learned.
that is an example of why people need to slow the hype a bit, he has blazing pace and skill which he showed off a couple of times. however he certainly loses his mark at times which is to be expected from a 19 year old defender
It looked to me like Leo Gonzales playing the Whitecaps on-side is what caused the confusion on that play.
Outside of Lamar Neagle he was the best player on the field. I’ll take that tradeoff.
Good win for the Sounders but they need to take a serious look at their set pieces. They have given up a lot of goals on set pieces and have done very little with the ones that they have had overall. Those are important plays in a game, you can’t give up about a goal a game from them. Neagle is doing a ton for this team right now, really playing well
Obafemi Martins started to show his class in this game. He’s going to bring a lot to MLS this season.
The photo says it all.. sit down Vancouver
I don’t think the grass made any difference at all. What you saw was the same free flowing soccer the Sounders play a lot of on whichever surface they happen to be on. The atmosphere in Seattle is fantastic every game. There is nothing wrong with the Clink.
Retractable roof in Seattle? Why?
What do the NYC Cosmos have to do with Seattle?
Confused by your confusion. That is all.
Players were quoted saying that the temp grass was an issue. SSFC players said “it could have been worse” while Whitecaps players seemed a bit more outraged by the surface.
I hope no one gets injured because of the rug like Casey did last year..
People were sliding all over the place and O’Brien left hurt. Temporary grass is terrible
Did the grass make a difference? I believe it did, i saw,sounders and whitecap players play better soccer and run with a better mentality towards the ball and the score says it all. Even on tv, the game ran smoother and with the atmosphere, it looked amazing on tv. I gotta wonder, i know everybody says sounders dont need a stadium, but do they need a grass field instead. If cosmos or nyc end up with a stadium in the next 5 years, sounders are gonna have to figure something out. Why put grass for the nats but not your local team, which owns the stadium as well. I just think sounders can have their own 45,000 seat stadium with a retractable roof. Does anybody know if the propose area for new nba arena adequate or good enough for a sss.
Last i checked the NBA arena space is being used for an NBA arena. And where in the political world are you going to find the money for a single use arena. We could go like Philli and build a soccer/lacross arena but lacross certainly does not have the draw to support 45000 seats. Phillies is only 18,500.
Let me get this straight. You want Seattle, which just told the NBA to basically go screw itself(and rightfully so in my opinion) over a new arena just a couple of years ago, to turn around and build yet another single use gigantic stadium just so that some guy in Texas can watch the Sounders play on grass??
Im going to forgo the usual turf/grass debate, for which turf is obviously the best answer in the PNW right now. I could be wrong but there is a reason why Vancouver, Portland and Seattle all play on turf. Lets take a look your other and less talked about logic fail.
We have a perfectly good 67,000 capacity stadium right in the heart of downtown. Pretty much the only complaint people have about the CLink is the beer prices. Why would the Sounders build an entirely new and SMALLER stadium when they cant even fill their own stadium yet? In my opinion its pretty much the best stadium to watch soccer in the nation. Actually now that I think about it ive only ever been to Van, Port, Sea, CO, and DC. CenturyLink is a way better stadium than all of those. You cant honestly tell me that the experience of viewing a match at one of those “newer” stadiums is worth building a completely new building. Heck the CLink is barely, BARELY 10 years old. Is that really the kind of use you want out of a publicly funded building? keep in mind there are only 20-25 home games a year, all competitions included. If NY2 or anyone else decides to build a new stadium, that’s awesome!! Still don’t understand how it affects Seattles stadium situation.
NYCFC will be playing in baseball stadiums (or Jersey) until 2030 at the earliest. The Cosmos will play on college football stadiums until they inevitably fail. I’m not “hatin”, just being realistic about the future of soccer in New York. A stadium is so far away in that city it isn’t even worth mentioning right now.
I’m going to have to disagree. No way The Don and MLS agree to NY2 unless a stadium deal just about in place. NY2 plays in it’s own stadium no later then 2017.
Looks to me like they are planning on Yankee Stadium for the foreseeable future. The guy working on Flushing Stadium for MLS just took a job with Orlando City. That can’t be encouraging.
aint gonna happen anytime soon. the new arena that was nearly built for the nba was entirely private funding, you think an MLS owner is going to do a similar thing? get over it and stop bringing up the same tired arguments, yes turf is not ideal but it isnt changing soon
Agreed, Seattle needs grass. Garber needs to man up and demand every team do this, turf is a joke and injures players.
Every other MLS team save a couple have built their own stadiums with grass, why does Seattle get the special treatment from Garber?
“why does Seattle get the special treatment from Garber?” Why not ask the Don about Portland and Vancouver too? Is he giving them the special treatment too?
get your story straight
Iolz