2011 May 25 2011 May 25
Seattle Sounders FC 0 - 1 FC Dallas
Qwest Field, Seattle, WA
Goals:
18' DAL: Brek Shea (Andrew Jacobson)
Seattle: Kasey Keller; Zach Scott, Jeff Parke, Jhon Kennedy Hurtado, Leo Gonzalez; Erik Friberg, Osvaldo Alonso, Mauro Rosales (Lamar Neagle 83'), Alvaro Fernandez (Roger Levesque 64'); Fredy Montero (Nate Jaqua 75'), Mike Fucito.
Substitutes not used: Terry Boss, Patrick Ianni, James Riley, Servando Carrasco.
Dallas: Kevin Hartman; Zach Loyd, Ugo Ihemelu, George John, Jackson Goncalves; Eric Alexander (Bobby Warshaw 74'), Andrew Jacobson, Daniel Hernandez, Brek Shea; Fabian Castillo (Ruben Luna 64'), Marvin Chavez (Ricardo Villar 89').
Substitutes not used: Chris Seitz, Moises Hernandez, Eric Avila, Bruno Guarda.
Match report from Ron Stickney:
FC Dallas added another 90 minutes to their league-leading shutout streak, bringing it to 489 minutes. An early goal by Brek Shea was all they needed to take the three points from the host Seattle Sounders. Kevin Hartman was in goal on his birthday to earn the shutout.
Seattle's Mike Fucito got his first start of the year up top and put the most shots on goal. He got his first chance at 14', working a give and go nicely to go in on goal. He tried to chip a shot over Hartman but bent it away from the top far corner.
18' DAL: Shea (Jacobson). After Dallas won the ball on their back line, Shea let Andrew Jacobson take the ball at the circle and took off on a run up the middle. Jacobson sent a nice through ball for Shea and he raced between the Seattle center backs to put a low shot past the advancing Kasey Keller. It was Dallas' first shot of the match. 1-0 Dallas.
The Dallas defense limited Seattle's chances in the first half. Erik Friberg had a couple of chances soon after Dallas scored. His header from Rosales' service was aimed at the top far corner and headed out for a corner kick. Friberg was served close to goal a step ahead of his marker, but the first touch was too strong and it went to Hartman. The best chance came near the end of the half when Fredy Montero chipped a beautiful pass to Rosales right in front of goal. Rosales chested it down but shot right at Hartman.
Dallas had a chance when Fabian Castillo received a gift pass from Jeff Parke, but with only Keller to beat Castillo missed the lower far corner by a yard. In the final minute before intermission Shea ghosted in from wide and was served for a shot, but bent it wide of the top far corner.
Seattle got their chances to shoot in the second half and wasted a number of additional chances when the last pass forward was hit too hard, a problem also seen in the first half.
The first good chance of the half came at 55' when Shea won a 50-50 ball and earned a cross on the break. Marvin Chavez received the cross past the far post for a shot, but the angle was very acute and Keller only needed to parry it wide and out. Dallas had no good chances after that, content to concentrate on defending their one-goal lead.
Seattle finally increased the pressure approaching the hour mark. Montero left a ball at the top of the arc for Osvaldo Alonso to run onto and he shot low and wide by a yard.
The Sounders came closest on a throw-in play at 67' when the 5'9" Fucito rose between two defenders to snap a fine header at the top near corner off the throw. Hartman made a highlight save, then Fucito got a second chance from the rebound, but Ugo Ihemelu got there to deflect the shot at Hartman for another save.
After that the Dallas defense bunkered in and gave Seattle little opportunity. Left back Leo Gonzalez had a shot from the top of the arc, but he missed just like Alonso had earlier. Parke had one chance to repeat his heroics from the last match when he got his head on a corner kick, but the shot went well wide.
The final 15 minutes were played mostly in Dallas' end, but Seattle failed to break down the Dallas defense in that stretch. Four minutes were added at the end, but no chances were created.
The three-match home stand came to an end with the Sounders taking just four points from just two goals.
Statistics:
SEA DAL
Shots: 19 7
Saves: 2 5
Corners: 9 2
Fouls: 5 12
Offsides: 4 2
Misconduct:
44' DAL: John cautioned for delaying a restart
82' SEA: Scott cautioned for unsporting behavior
Referees: Baldomero Toledo; Craig Lowry, Kevin Duliba; Juan Guzman
Attendance: 36,026
Postmatch Quotes
Seattle Sounders FC
Sigi Schmid - Head Coach
General comments: "So basically the soccer was better, but everyone is more disappointed with the result. Sometimes with bad soccer, you get a result, and better soccer, you don't get a result. The mistake on the goal, where we opened up...I thought we had chances and we certainly went forward. I was very pleased with the effort of Fucito, thought he played very well. I thought Neagle came in and did well, I thought Jaqua came in in this one and had an impact. I thought Rosales had some moments, I thought Friberg had some moments as well. Guys do need to step up. They need to step up and score goals when we get a chance. We can't take extra touches in the box. We've got to get things the first time. Sometimes we can't do a cutback. Friberg had one where he cut back, but other ones, when we try to take two or three touches, and try to get the perfect shot - perfect shots don't happen. You've got to put the ball in the back of the net."
On Fredy Montero: "He needs to score. End of story. He needs to score. That's what he's paid to do. He needs to score. He's a good enough player, and he knows that. He can play-make, he can set things up, Rosales needs to score the goal off Fredy's pass. That was a great pass. That's one that's got to be in the back of the net. How many clean chances did they have? Not many and they scored. It's the difference in the game. That's what you get paid to do. It's a difficult task, but it's the task at hand."
On whether he's disappointed with the outing: "No, we're really happy about it. I mean, we're over-thrilled about it. Of course we're disappointed. We're not happy about the fact that we only got four points at home in three games."
On the officiating of Baldomero Toledo tonight: "No comment. Toledo is Toledo."
On whether he's going to tweak his lineup, and how tonight's game was played: "We tweaked it tonight. We obviously tweaked it tonight and we'll see. We need 11 guys out there on the field who are all going to fight and battle at the same time. And also who are going to make good decisions. Toledo, as a referee, he lets the game go. You're not going to get fouls from flopping around the field. You've got to stand strong, you've got to man up and play through it. Jackson was kicking everybody in sight, but [Toledo] is not going to call it, so obviously [Jackson]'s going to continue to do it. We have to be strong and return it in kind. We have to be strong. We can't expect that we're going to get a call."
On whether Erik Friberg was less than 100 percent, and how his lineup changes affected the game: "No, Friberg was healthy and he was starting before he was healthy, so that's why he returns to the lineup. We thought in this particular game that Zach Scott was going to be a good matchup for Brek Shea, because they like to hit long balls and balls in the air to him. We thought that was going to be a better matchup than Riley, which it was. We wanted to stay fresh on the outside as well, because we have a game on Saturday. Fucito is finally fit and ready to go, and we thought he deserved a chance because we thought his speed would give them some problems and he did."
Nate Jaqua
On the effort tonight: "It felt like we had some good plays but the bottom line is it wasn't good enough. We've got to win that game at home."
On ending the home-stand on a loss: "You want to get points at home. You want to get wins. To lose to a team at home is always frustrating. It's not good. Now we've got to go on the road and get a result, get a win in Salt Lake."
On Dallas packing it in the back defensively after scoring one goal: "I don't know exactly how they've been playing but they did a good job defensively. They did a good job stopping crosses from coming in, blocking crosses, and also putting a lot of guys in the box. There wasn't a lot of space in there. I credit them defensively for really closing us down. At the end of the day, it's frustrating."
Zach Scott
On the effort tonight: "It's just kind of one of those things...to get a win you need to put three things together - effort, quality, and something magical out there. At times we had one or two of those but never all three of that. I think that's what let us down in the end."
On if having a quick turnaround to a road game in Salt Lake helps after a tough loss: "I think so. I'm not someone who dwells on past games. Take what you can out of it and move on. That's definitely the case with this one. There's not too much time to think too much into it, it's just kind of, let's go get into a tough game at Salt Lake."
On Dallas' current shutout streak: "To be honest, I didn't even know they had a shutout streak so I don't think that was the case at all. We knew they were very quick up top. We knew that we couldn't let them get any behind us. To be honest, the one good chance they had all game they tucked away and that's the most frustrating thing."
On if he thought the game was allowed to get too physical tonight: "If you ask me, no. I'm not going to be the guy that tells you the game is physical, that's kind of how I like to play. I'd rather there be less calls than hear the whistle all the time."
Mike Fucito
On the effort tonight: "That's one where I think we should come away with at least a point, definitely three points. We were able to get in behind them a couple times. It's just you got to put one away. I think if we were able to get one then more would have come."
On his scoring chances tonight: "He made some pretty good saves. It'd be nice if one of these times the ball bounced to my left foot. We got close. I thought we were going to get one."
On not getting better results at home during the three-game home stand: "Yeah, very frustrating. We expect to get three points every time we play here."
Fredy Montero
On the scoring opportunities tonight: "Everybody saw that the game was progressing, we were playing well and opportunities were being created but every time that a team cannot score and cannot convert, they put themselves in danger. The opponent had one chance that they converted on and that's what happened."
On the lack of continuity in the Sounders FC lineup right now: "Maybe that will be one of the reasons. Still, we are all professionals and we know the other players, we know our colleagues. What happens on the field needs to be the players' responsibility. The truth is that this doesn't end here. There will be other games to play."
FC Dallas
Schellas Hyndman - Head Coach
General Comments: "It's Kevin's birthday today and we were talking about getting that shutout and to do it in a difficult environment like this with as much pressure on us. I thought it was a very good team performance."
On the defense: "The whole game, especially the last 20 minutes, was really hard. I think they threw everything at us. When Jaqua came in it brought another problem because not only was he able to hold the ball, but he was able to flick the ball on and he was able to connect at the end of it. We had it pretty well in our favor but what we had to do was keep knocking it out. When he came it, it added a different dimension. They are a good team that was very inspired to play at home and win in front of their fans. We don't get this done today if it isn't a complete team effort."
On Brek Shea: "He continues to develop. He just turned 21 and we just signed him to a four year contract so he's a player that we have a lot of faith in. He's going to continue to develop. He broke through and beat Keller when he was coming out. It changed the whole game at that point in time."
Kevin Hartman
General Comments: "It was one of those games where we really have to concentrate. We had to work hard for a long period of time because Seattle was throwing a lot of numbers at us and some quality at us. I thought we weathered the first half pretty easily and they kept throwing bodies at us in the second half. Fortunately we were able to block some shots, save some shots and prevent shots. At the end of the day, we were pretty content to get the three points and get out of here."
On Seattle offense: "It seemed like on occasion they were playing with three on top. I think that their left-sided midfielder got forward quite a bit and put Jackson under a lot of pressure. Their two strikers are very active. Montero is someone you can't give any leeway."
Brek Shea
On Dallas defense: "As a team, we got a goal early. It was a pretty crazy game. Every time we come to Seattle, the fans, the turf, the water. We had to defend a lot tonight."
On goal: "I was able to make a run, saw an opening, and split the defense. AJ happened to find me and I saw Keller coming out and I tried to put it past him."
