Photo by Jane Gershovich/JaneG. Photography
By JASON MITCHELL
SEATTLE — The Seattle Sounders are headed to the Western Conference finals for the second time in their brief six-year history.
Criticized for their defense much of the season, the Sounders played FC Dallas to a taut scoreless draw in front of 38,912 at CenturyLink Field on Monday night. Though the two-legged series ended in a 1-1 tie on aggregate, the Sounders advanced thanks to the away-goals tiebreaker MLS instituted for this season’s playoffs.
“I know all during the season,” said Sounders head coach Sigi Schmid, “the pundits were sort of saying, ‘Well, do they have a good enough defense to win it.’ I think we’ve proven over the last three or four weeks that we can play good enough defense for sure.”
Dallas pressured the Sounders down the stretch, but only managed one shot on goal all night, never challenging goalkeeper Stefan Frei.
The visitors earned a corner kick in the waning moments of stoppage time, but Dallas defender Zach Lloyd sent the ball harmlessly out of bounds for a Seattle throw-in.
The result sets up a much anticipated, star-studded matchup between the Sounders and the LA Galaxy in the conference finals.
Clint Dempsey nearly scored twice in the second half. In the 68th minute, he unleashed a shot from beyond the arc that deflected off a defender before sailing just wide. With just five minutes remaining in regulation, he stepped into a loose ball in the penalty area, but sent a volley directly at charging goalkeeper Chris Seitz.
Both teams threatened repeatedly in a closely-fought, physical first half. Seattle consistently worked space between Dallas’ lines in the middle of the park, while speedsters Fabian Castillo and Je-Vaughn Watson terrorized Seattle down the right side without ever finding the back of the net or connecting a game-changing cross.
Seattle nearly scored twice in the first half, but was denied first by an old nemesis and then by Seitz.
In the 28th minute, a Chad Marshall header off a corner kick beat Seitz, but Michel cleared the shot off the line to preserve the shutout. Thirteen minutes later Seitz denied Dempsey’s close-range, one-touch shot off a give-and-go with Martins.
“I had two really good looks at goal,” said Dempsey. “I should have scored at least one of those. I’m frustrated about that, but I thought we looked good.”
Dallas’ best first-half chance came in the ninth minute, when Castillo poked an open shot just wide. That was as close as Dallas came until the 45th minute, when rookie Tesho Akindele — quiet for most of the night — sent a wide-open shot cruising over the crossbar.
Osvaldo Alonso left the game in the 56th minute with a hamstring injury. Schmid said the team would know more about the severity of the injury on Tuesday. Michael Azira finished the match in his place.
Both teams felt entitled to penalty kicks that went uncalled. In the first half Castillo beat left back Leo Gonzalez before being taken down near the endline, while a pair of defenders sandwiched Dempsey to the ground in the area late in the second half.
Looking forward, the Western Conference finals kick off in Los Angeles on Nov. 23 at 5 p.m.
Here are the match highlights:
Hey gang, fun activity! Let’s keep a running tally of USMNT World Cup participants no longer vying for MLS Cup:
Beasley
Beckerman
Besler
Bradley
Davis
Rimando
Wondo
Zusi
Neat! Keep ‘er going team
What a great series. Hats off to Dallas they played tough. Bright future. Now Sounders have a tough test ahead; but theyre the best team in the leauge so lets see what they can do when everything is on the line.
Also, as much as think Tesho is a good MLS player I am not sold on him as USMNT caliber player. Im not basing my opinion based on these 2 games; but rather the whole season. He seems to slow on at turning the corner and dribbling past guys. Its frustrating as a FCD fan sometimes. But I guess youll never now until he gets called up! Hope im wrong
I wonder if the LA-Seattle series will even be close…
This was Fc dallas game since the first second and dallas couldn’t put 1 in. If dallas scored, sounders defense would of open and dallas strong midfield and forwards would have even score about 2 more.
Now will see if Sigi has learned his lesson and make something for galaxy but galaxy will get over them.
Oh and sounders need their stadium sooner than later. First they dont get to play sunday because of the seahawks and their late kickoff was pathetic. Practically fc dallas was playing at 10pm central time. If they had their stadium everything would be easier for the team and league.
Dallas might have had the overall play advantage but Seattle (at least in the first half) looked way more dangerous. They could have been up by at least 2 goals, going into the half, if Clint was finishing his chances.
credit to Seitz MOTM performance, as much as Clint’s blocked shots
Fairly sure you can blame television for the 8pm start, pretty sure Seattle would have been fine starting an hour earlier.
While it was moved to Monday because of football, was it so bad to basically not competing with the NFL. I love soccer, but the NFL is king in this country. My real question is who is the genius that scheduled the MLS cup for noon right smack in the middle of the NFL day, guaranteed lower ratings than normal.
There will never be a soccer only stadium and there doesn’t need to be, This situation allows them to increase attendence when they want to.
Seattle definatly found their match.. Such a close game, 10 more minutes and who knows… Probably the most entertaining 0-0 iv seen in a while.
Bring on LA-SEA
Two ties, and one team advances. I HATE the away goal rule. Make someone win, dammit.
I like away goals, it’s suppose to prevent the away teams from just completely parking the bus. If you can get an away goal in a draw it’s a huge advantage and also forces the away team in the next match to have to go for it.
Right..instead, it makes home teams park the bus. Exactly why they’ve been discussing getting rid of it in Europe. Go MLS…way to jump on a bandwagon when everyone else is jumping off!
+1
If you think Seattle parked the bus throughout that match, then you only watched the last 5 minutes. And if you think that Dallas parked it in the first leg, then you didn’t watch at all.
Gotta agree with you. I thought in both legs that both teams were going after each other hammer and tongs. I think the only concession Seattle made last night was what Martino mentioned. Sigi Schmidt kept his wing backs in instead of having them go on overlapping runs. Yedlin went down field only in the last 5 minutes or so. That meant all the Seattle attacks were going down the middle, which allowed Dallas to clog the middle and do a pretty good job of neutralizing Martins and Dempsey.
“Schmidt kept his wing backs in instead of having them go on overlapping runs.”
Yep, and it’s funny when Dallas fans complain about it. Look, if your team has freakishly fast wingers/outside forwards—and it’s something you’re proud of—then don’t be surprised when opposing teams’ backs tend to stay home.
It’d be like Seattle fans griping that Dallas “clogged up the middle like big babies who hate the fans and want to kill soccer.”
i.e., don’t be surprised when your opponent, you know, does things to make you lose.
From what I saw Seattle went at Dallas in both games. to say SSFC parked the bus last night is not accurate
I can’t speak for Matt, but I for one was not claiming that this happened in this game…I was only “+1″ing the statement in general. Giving extra weight to an away goal creates extra incentive for a home team to defend first and hope for a goal when they’re away.
Dace, sure that will always be a factor. But you can’t come up with any scenario where one team won’t be tempted to “defend first.” That’s the problem. So you try for a system that minimizes that strategy.
Why was Kyle Martino dressed like he was getting ready to make a snowman?
Do you wanna build a snowman?
Dang it, now I have it stuck in my head Ben
The guy hates the Sounders.. the NBC crew last night were a laff
Another game I felt decided by the ref against Dallas, but credit to Sounders for taking advantage of what seemed to be carte blanche from Baldo to forearm and push over our attackers (including the penalty shout in the first half), and we certainly didn’t do ourselves any more favors with our constant giveaways in the second half. I was glad to see Zimm come on to go three at the back but too little too late for Oscar…
All told, I think that considering Ben Olson as his major competition for COTY, and since they were both eliminated at this stage I still think Oscar just edges him out. Going to be a close race for ROTY between Shipp and Tesho (sorry Birnbaum) but considering one helped the team into the playoffs and the other team didn’t, it should be a no-brainer. Plus, all the Akindele national team press has to be a huge boost.
A lot of positives to take from the season, and perhaps I wanted a little too much too fast…but I’m more than optimistic that in two years’ time, we’ll be in the knockout stages of the CCL. Not sure how long we’ll be able to hang on to a few players like Hedges and Castillo but if we can get and keep everyone fit and healthy, the race for the 2015 Supporters’ Shield will be interesting and entertaining.
Is was a very well reffed game. 50/50 penalty for Dallas in the first half denied, 50/50 penalty for Dempsey denied in the second half.
Even foul recognition throughout the game.
You have to be a real homer if you think Toledo decided this match.
That’s a cop-out for sure, I’m certainly not the only one to think that Baldo let way too much go. Dallas pk shout was considerably more deserving than the other, one player got shoved in the back and the other fell over when trying to block off two defenders.
I’m not trying to say that the ref did everything he could to make sure we didn’t win, but there were so many missed calls on both sides of the ball that the game could have taken a completely different direction for either side if even half of them had actually been called.
But whatever, no sour grapes here…MLS hierarchy got the semi they wanted and we’ll be rockin’ next year. Lot of bad luck this year, the past few years honestly, but we seem to be able to keep our heads above water and now that our HG/academy players are starting to make a real impact on the team, the future is bright indeed.
I wasn’t going to say this because i made a comment about “Seattle getting away with Murder” in the running thread, but it really was the truth. The Ref let Seattle foul and harass Dallas repeatedly. The holding, pushing and shirt pulling on the attackers was constant and he let it go without a whimper. Poor game by the official and one has to think if the game was already decided before it started with Seattle’s game plan and the ref.
Again, this is why it should be mandatory that Ref’s have press conferences after games and their should be a transparent scoring of Refs that decide which play the bigger games and how many, and their compensation should be based on that as well. And disclose their salaries after thats all said and done.
They affect the game just as much as managers and players
Funny, I saw Dallas grab jerseys numerous times, and NBC failed to even show a replay of the Sounders’ first penalty no-call.
The ref called the game the same for both teams, which is about the best you can hope for.
Had toledo given both penalties, one for both Seattle and Dallas, then the game ends 1-1 and we go to overtime. So in that sense it is frustrating, but really we didn’t do enough to threaten Seattle and it was a pretty fair result.
Hah, true I forgot about that. The away goals would have been tied up.
It’s not worth being super grumpy over but at least he was consistently bad.
Hypothetically. If Toledo gives half the calls that were deserved to be, commited on Dallas players that Seattle got, we would of had a lot more chances of set pieces in the final third. FACT
Old Man: Dallas plays for the set piece way too much. Get into the final third and the players drop—leaves its fans expecting fouls when there aren’t any.
Toledo allowed a physical game to be physical. He didn’t allow fouls to go uncalled. The same hard shoulder-to-shoulder contact he allowed against Castillo and Diaz was absolutely key for Hedges and Zimmerman collapsing in on Martins to prevent him from busting through and doubling Seattle’s shot total (and undoubtedly, goals).
No way man. Diaz was getting killed out there. Yes, Castillo played for the foul in the onset quite persistently but besides him not many were trying for it. Diaz and Tesho weren’t. Michel and Perez maybe once or twice.
The second half was a different story. I agree a lot of rough challenges were made on both sides. But the majority of no calls were Seattles, IMO
I would be a little grumpy about the calls if my team had been eliminated without losing, while in slow motion replay he could have called Scott for a PK. Just like in slow motion replay PKs could have been called when the keeper didn’t get the ball but wiped out Oba, or when CD was taken down. In live action we can all debate it and if there is a debate the ref shouldn’t call it.
If Castillo tried a little harder to stay on his feet through out the game maybe he would get a call.
As a Sounder fan I was glad to see the Sounders didn’t roll around on the ground for the entire second half like so many other teams would have done.
Your right about Castillo.
Cant say I agree with you about Seattle. Every time Dempsey gets into trouble he falls down and MLS and the refs happily oblige their Million Dollar Man.
Forget slow motion. The Ref and the assistant couldn’t see wether the keeper see made contact because of their angle. It was a penalty. The same cant be said for any of the penalties committed by Seattle though, plain and simple.
And please do have fun being the Bridesmaids this year because of Landon’s farewell party courtesy of MLS
I think it was Castillo about two thirds of the way through the game who spun on Scott in the box and then forced a trip of himself. He should have gotten a card for diving. As a neutral for this game (Galaxy fan) I thought the ref let a lot go, but he clearly wanted to let the players play so that he wouldn’t be deciding the game. You see this a lot in other sports, too, I can think of the closing minutes of important basketball games where refs let a lot of fouls go so that it is the players who determine the outcome instead of the ref. As someone who has seen a lot of MLS almost since the beginning, I think the referring is at least a lot better than the bad old days when it was really horrible at times.
He exacerbated the fact. Im not going to bother beyond the first couple of your lines. He’s guilty of that. It was a plain shove that would of knocked him off the ball regardless, negated the scoring chance and given Seattle the ball, which is a penalty call anywhere, any day of the week
Had Toledo given both penalties, then he would have given penalties for actions that weren’t penalties.
I was impressed with Dallas , especially in the first half. For me Diaz was the most impressive player on the field, clever touches, killer passes, and for a little guy dude really uses his body well.
Akindele did not impress on my first glance as a usmnt prospect but time will tell
To be fair, Akindele was a rookie playing in his first playoff elimination game. At CenturyLink.
You might cut him just a little bit of slack, the kid had a fantastic first year. This experience, along with a USMNT call-up, should give him a good platform to build off of in the future.
So really just a good backup 10 so we don’t have to revert to a 4-4-2 with Michel being the main playmaker.
I think Diaz is a serviceable enough set piece taker if Michel isn’t in the lineup. I Like the idea of Thomas and Ulloa playing in the center allowing Castillo, Diaz and Escobar to get forward more. We know Acosta is being groomed for that CM role too.
You know we’ve never had a really good backup 10 even when we had Ferreira. We had that Brazilian who was ok for a while, but really no one.
As of now we only have Danny Garcia there. which wasn’t enough, so yeah your completely right.
The exciting thing is that Pareja will have a full season to get things going and I’m sure he’ll identify some players that will make our attack pretty devastating nxt year and our center midfield more flexible.
Well, if George John is back and healthy nxt year, paired with Hedges, Dallas will be one hell of a team.
Same for Hendry Thomas nxt to Ulloa.
Forward is a big area of need. Perez is still good for another year but he needs someone to help shoulder the burden sooner then later. Texiera had moments this year but he just wasn’t enough really. We need another number 9 nxt year that can step in and compete with Tesho. Craft and Zendejas should get loaned out. John Top might be gone after preseason cuts if not before.
Hopefully Kellyn Acosta puts on some muscle. But we really don’t need much more. Escobar should be brought back, if they have the option for around 500 thou or less.
Expansion Draft: Luccin, Hollingshead, Brian Span, Keel, Danny Garcia, Top, Benitez and maybe Moffat could all be made available.
Dispersal Draft: Matt Dunn (Dallas), Martin Rivero, Agustin Pelletieri, Kris Tyrpak (Austin), Marco Delgado and Nathan Sturgis could all be solid pick ups. Obviously Torres would be insane.
I would like Escobar. Move on Texeira.(Might be hard he is a DP.) I think we can hold off on a striker for one more year. Akindele is a rookie after all. Agree on Acosta and a lot of that is just him being young. Dallas needs someone who can pretend to be Diaz if he isn’t healthy. Only 1 true playmaker is hoping too much. I think Michel is good for another year. Dunno about after that.
What’s up with Top? I thought that kids was quite a prospect and he is homegrown and young still, no? Why would they cut him?
He’s been on loan, they won’t want to let him go but there are too many other players that we want to protect. Given the expansion teams’ excellent position in every aspect of being able to build their initial squads, I don’t anticipate them wanting to take him. That said, he’d be a very decent third/fourth string strike option for one of those teams.
Dallas undefeated! Woooo?
You’re a good sport 🙂
Gotta be positive. Seattle has rolled over most teams. Not losing is kinda nice in that regard.
Away goals kinda make sense. In the MLS, some teams have a very real home advantage.(Turf, Stadiums in Denver, Canada is cold.) In any case, I like it better than penalties.
Dallas looked dangerous all night. They have nothing to be ashamed of. It was a very intense hard fought game that could have gone either way.