By Mazvita Maraire Posted on

Sounders suffer disappointing goal-less draw with Austin FC

A scoreless home opening tie left the  Seattle Sounders winning less ,two games into the season. The culprit in the Sounders 0-0  draw with Austin FC is the same old issue. A lack of creativity in the final third leads to a lack of goals.  Head coach Brian Schmetzer inserted  Pedro de la Vega into the starting lineup and employed a  4-4-2 formation. Once play commenced  Alex Roldan pushed up and played right wing-back rather than being part of a four-man backline. A pushed-up Roldan put another attacking player in the midfield.

DE LA VEGA MOVEMENT

Inserting de la Vega in the midfield made for a more dynamic Sounder attack in the middle of the field.  Leo Chu’s runs from the left side into the front of the  Austin goal added to the Sounder attack. Chu had energy and was active when he had the ball.  Missing from the Sounders attack was creativity in the final third.  When de la Vega ran at defenders he had a lack of passing options due to near zero off-ball runs by his teammates. Jordan Morris struggled to find the right pocket to settle in during the offensive rushes.  Morris had seven touches inside the Austin  FC attacking third and managed just one shot.  Leo Chu had ten touches and two shots on goal. As a result, the two teams went into halftime deadlocked at 0-0 leaving 30, 067 disappointed fans

ACTIVE SUB

The second half started with the Sounders  attacking from the right side with Josh Atencio finding  Alex Roldan and his brother  Cristian down the flank but their runs went begging with no runners in the Austin FC goalmouth

The Sounders attack picked up in the 63rd minute of the second half after de la Vega suffered a knock and was subbed off for Raul Ruidiaz who came on with a vengeance. The Peruvian was active when picking up the ball in the mid-field and decisive when infront of the Austin  FC  Goal mouth. In his 27 minutes played  Ruidiaz had 19 touches,  completed  9 of 10  passes, and had three shots. Ruidiaz had  a golden opportunity to give the Sounders the lead minutes after entering the game  A half-volley from  the top of the goal was just wide. His other chance in stoppage time hit the crossbar and stayed.

SAME OLD STORY

Late-game substitutions saw the insertion of Daniel Musovski for Leo Chu who also suffered a cramp after his shot in the 78th minute.  Stoppage time shots by  Antecio and Obed Vargas were all blocked and the result was a disappointing offensive showing by the  Sounders.

Yes there were some positives today like Andrew Thomas getting his first career shutout at home but in the end, the story is that we must score more goals moving forward,” Schmetzer said in his post-game news conference.

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