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Friberg leaves Sounders for Malmo

ErikFriberg (ISIPhotos.com)

Swedish midfielder Erik Friberg became the latest Seattle Sounder to depart this off-season, moving to Swedish club Malmo on Monday in a transfer announced by the Sounders.

Friberg played 26 matches for Seattle, recording a goal and assist for the Sounders.

The off-season has been a busy one for the Sounders, who had already lost goalkeeper Kasey Keller to retirement, James Riley and Tyson Wahl in the expansion draft, as well as Nate Jaqua and Pat Noonan in the re-entry draft. The Sounders did add goalkeeper Michael Gspurning, and earlier today added Marc Burch in the re-entry draft.

What do you think of Friberg's departure? 

Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. If Scott is a started, we are screwed. Scott’s style: Boot it! Boot it! That isn’t what Sigi wants in an outside back.

    The worst part about Friberg leaving is that we protected him in the expansion draft when we could have protected Riley. If you protect Riley, your cupboard isn’t bare at outside back like it is right now and/or you could trade him for Braun (instead of Montreal reaping the rewards).

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  2. hes starting a family and wanted the move back to sweden. i would have been happy keeping him. he was a solid player who could fill a lot of rolls, but we got a transfer fee for him, opened up a roster spot and an intl roster spot and freed up a fair bit of salary with plenty of time to find a replacement. not a bad move from the front office. id expect to see alvro and rosales move inside a lot more with stevie z back.

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  3. I’m actually thrilled with all of the moves, save for losing Friberg. That hurts our depth in MF and moves Evans higher on the chart, which displeases me.

    Riley and Wahl were both defensive liabilities, and I’m glad they’re gone. Jaqua and Noonan, well, nothing really needs to be said there. None of these things are bad, in my opinion.

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  4. personally, I thought he was very vanilla. But I guess that’s bound to happen playing alongside Rosales, Alonso and Fernandez. Bummed, but not devastated.

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  5. Can’t believe no one posted this:

    If I leave here tomorrow
    Would you still remember me
    For I must be traveling on now
    ‘Cause there’s too many places I’ve got to see

    But if I stayed here with you,GIRL
    Things just couldn’t be the same
    ‘Cause I’m as free as a bird now
    And this bird you cannot change

    Now let’s hope some team in MLS will sign a guy named Stairway to Heaven…

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  6. tacos

    he was a good player with great vision and a nice touch but he wasn’t used in his best position and the rest of the team was often not on the same page.

    I will miss his funny twitter posts but wish him well.

    tacos

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  7. Zakuani+Compartment Syndrome. Don’t get your hopes up too high. The guy has no feeling in his foot and lower leg and has lost part of his flexor muscle mobility. He will NOT be the same player when he comes back. That doesn’t mean he won’t be even better…. just that he will have to adjust his game to accommodate his new limitations.

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  8. If Zakuani gets back to where he was, that’s still the best midfield in MLS. He was a good player, however. It’s more a question of depth at this point. They played a lot of games last year and may do so again.

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  9. We are going to miss Friberg. He wasn’t flashy but he was a workhorse who was solid in possession and filled the role we needed. We have other kids who can play there, but Evans is now our only starting calibre central mid besides Ozzie.

    It’s frustrating though because Malmo is a pretty big club and may have vivn us a chunk of change for Friberg. Whether this was a good trade or not depends on how much we got and we just don’t know

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  10. Glad to see Noonan and Jaqua move on, not stoked Wahl and Riley are gone, Friberg played his role but probably helps free up cap space especially in addition to what Jaqua was making. With Zakuani, Fernandez and Neagle all preferring the L, it will be interesting to see who if any of them bump to the R. I imagine our line-up looking something like this

    —————–Gspur——————–
    Scott—–Parke—-Hurtado/Ianni——-Gonzalez/Burch
    ——————-Alonso————————
    Fernandez—————————–Neagle/Zakuani
    ——————Rosales—————————
    ——–Montero—————Ochoa————-

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  11. Eric was a likeable guy and good player. I’ll reserve my opinion of the offseason moves until after they’re done.

    Still need RB, LB, CB, and F.

    Now you can add CM to that list too.

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  12. Friberg was good, not great. He had decent touch, but looked like he was running in a soup of molasses. Nice player but not exactly the guy who was going to push the Sounders past the Galaxy.

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  13. Not happy with nay of the moves Seattle has made. I wasn’t a big fan of Riley but I’m certainly not happy that we got Burch. Who’s going to play LB and RB? And Friberg was a great player. Keller’s gone, too. Lots of shoes to fill in Seattle.

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  14. Nice player that filled his role, but he becomes more expendable as Zakuani returns. Seattle needs to add more size in the back and up top.

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