Sigi means to break out the 4-4-2 again

Sigi Schmid – Head Coach
(On thoughts on Colorado game . . .) "We have got to keep working away. I don’t want to sound like a cliché or a broken record, but we have got to keep working away. We’re a little bit just looking at highlights of other games and you see [Joe] Cannon and [Jason] Hernandez making a complete mess of the first goal in the San Jose game or you see [Jimmy] Nielsen from Kansas City not being able to hold a soft cross and you’re saying, ‘When are we going to catch a break like that?’ The handball that was on [Omar] Cummings, you compare that handball to the handball that got called on Leo [Gonzalez] last year in New England or the handball that got called on Ozzie [Osvaldo Alonso] when he was in the wall, it’s like, ‘How come we are not catching that break?’ But, at the end of the day, you make your own breaks. It’s not the refereeing that’s stopping us. It’s us that’s stopping ourselves right now. Offensively it’s not good enough. We have got to create more things. Like the reserves today, the times we have played in a 4-4-2 I think, at the end of the day, we scored more goals. For us, whether we stay in a 4-3-3 or go into a 4-4-2 is something that we will definitely decide upon this week. We have just got to generate more consistent attacking play."

(On Sounders FC injuries . . .) "They still got to do a lot of hard work before they come back in. I think you could even see the rust on Jeff Parke and maybe the rust contributed a little bit. But, at the end of the day, I’m not really counting on [Nate] Jaqua until after the [World Cup] break and with [Peter] Vagenas we’ve got to see the same thing. I think we have enough people, we have enough personnel, and we have enough quality. It’s just a matter of our execution and just playing with a good spirit."

(On today’s reserve game versus Kitsap Pumas . . .) "It’s always good when you see people score goals. So Roger [Levesque] in the last couple of reserve games, obviously he got the goal against Boca, he got two here today. The reserve game before he got another one as well. So he is starting to score goals, which he wasn’t doing early on so that was good. I though David Estrada had some good moments. I thought Michael Seamon played well again. I thought [Nathan] Sturgis was good. Taylor [Graham] organized us in the back well. Sanna [Nyassi] had some good moments also. From that standpoint, it’s good. But what I really like most of all is they came out, especially in the first half where they dominated the game, they came out with a really good spirit. They came out with a really good team attitude and work rate."

(On New England Revolution and Shalrie Joseph’s return . . .) "We have got to worry about ourselves. Joseph’s been back now two games for them. Shalrie certainly makes a difference for them. It would have been nice to play them without Shalrie but that’s just the way it is. There are some teams that had the benefit of playing them twice while Shalrie was out – that’s something our league needs to look at. We need to look at within your first 15 games, you play 15 different teams, and then you play 15 different teams in your second 15 games. We have already completed our season series with New York and we’re not even halfway into our schedule. That’s wrong. Then you either get the advantage of a team being injured or you get a disadvantage of a team being on a role. I think we have to look at that as a league. For us right now, our concern has got to be ourselves. We have got to play soccer. We have got to take care of ourselves."

Goal Scorers today in the Reserve Game v the Kitsap Pumas were Levesque with two, Graham on a corner served by Sturgis and David Estrada.

Fucito will undergo surgery tomorrow. His knee looks like Jello, it wasn’t a comfortable site.

Jeremiah talked with Riley. I talked to Parke. Both were in the scrum with Sigi. I grabbed Adrian Hanauer for a quick single topic.

Lastly, Graham, Carlos and Kirsten (who has an open invite to write here) all got wet watching the Reserve Game where Jamal Wallace was in Sounders gear, though a Pumas player.

               Freddy and Freddy
Zakuani
             Alonso Ianni Evans
Gonzalez Riley
                Parke Marshall
                       Keller

Yes, Evans folds in when he’s a RM, and Riley gets forward a ton to make that work, but the fact is it did work. This would be similar to what the Sounders started ’09 running, except without Jaqua

      Montero Levesque
Zakuani Evans Ljungberg
            Alonso
Gonzalez – - – - Riley
        Parke Marshall
               Keller

Montero is at his best as more of a withdrawn striker than a pure target man, and I think Evans is best as a box-to-box type. Ljungberg gets to be on the wing so he can a) have more room to run and b) not get fouled as much so his head doesn’t explode. Levesque is not very good anywhere, but he’s essentially just filling Jaqua’s spot for two games, and would probably get subbed out for Noonan or Montaño around minute 65.

I’m not sure how much stock to put into the 4-4-2 idea since they haven’t really played that way with Freddie in the lineup since, what, the Toronto game? That was six matches ago. None of the reserve games had Freddie and I get the sense that if he’s going to play, he’s best suited for the CAM role.

Rather than a formation change, I’d like to see Graham get some time at CB alongside Parke. That gets you another big body on set pieces.

I really wouldn’t mind seeing Levesque get another shot at RW, even if it’s as a late sub. I think you either start him or go with Montano. I think you have to go with Ianni and Evans at the defensive mid spots.