MONTRÉAL — For the second time in as many weeks to start the 2017 season, the Seattle Sounders fell behind 2-0. But unlike week one’s 2-1 loss in Houston, the Sounders found an equalizer in stoppage time on Saturday in a 2-2 draw with the Montreal Impact to steal a point in front of 34,000-plus fans at Olympic Stadium.
The mood following the match was one of relief and disappointment, as the club celebrated a hard-fought road point while still understanding they need to stop making life hard on themselves. Montreal is a talented team that loves to counter and attack in droves down each flank, and playmaker Ignacio Piatti burned the Sounders twice, once on a brilliant through ball to Matteo Mancosu and once on a magical half-field run to double the Impact’s lead.
“We don’t want to fight and bite and scratch and claw and have to wait until 30 seconds until the end of the match to score two goals,” Sounders head coach Brian Schmetzer said. “We also don’t want to concede two goals. We gotta stop shooting ourselves in the foot.”
The coaching staff’s messaging to the team every week is to not give up silly goals, especially not in a hostile road environment where coming from behind becomes all the more difficult. All four of the goals the Sounders have allowed over the last two weeks have been different mistakes from different players in difference circumstances, and so the challenge becomes trying to mitigate their multiple causes week in and week out.
“It was tough giving up two goals when you knew how they were going to attack and they did exactly what we thought they were going to do,” said midfielder Harry Shipp, who made his Sounders debut on Saturday against his former club. “That part is frustrating.”
Added midfielder Cristian Roldan: “We let in a couple easy goals and that hurt us… We have ourselves to blame for this, we have to come out cleaner.”
Despite falling behind early again, the Sounders did display many positives. They had 55 percent possession, 82 percent passing accuracy, they won 55 percent of their duels and had 12 shots inside the box. The result on Saturday wasn’t pretty, and it surely wasn’t quite as satisfying, but it did offer Seattle a chance to test its championship mettle.
The Sounders responded well in the second 45 minutes, Piatti’s goal just after the halftime break notwithstanding. There was a greater sense of urgency and the players stepped up on both sides of the ball.
“There’s no panic, I think you saw at the end,” said Shipp. “We were going about our business and staying calm. We have guys who can finish plays and score no matter what the minute is.”
Seattle’s next challenge is not an easy one either. The Rave Green will host the New York Red Bulls during a championship celebration on March 19 in their home opener (4 p.m. PT; FS1, KIRO Radio 97.3 FM, El Rey 1360 AM | TICKETS). The Red Bulls defeated the Colorado Rapids 1-0 on Saturday to move to 2-0 on the young season and are unbeaten in their last 18 regular-season MLS matches dating back to last season, one match shy of tying the MLS record.
The Sounders, though, are just excited to play in front of their home fans and try and earn their first win of the season.
“There’s no place like home, there’s no place like CenturyLink [Field] and our fans,” said Roldan. “We’re excited to come back to Seattle and show what we are capable of doing.”
