Men Of The Match v San Jose

We don't do ratings here because we find them a bit arbitrary, a bit too focused on very limited data sets and often rushed. We also don't do Man/Men of the Match here for some of the same reasons. These are two staples of soccer blogs. Maybe we're missing out, maybe we're not.

Yesterday, when I filled in for Matt Gaschk at SoundersFC.com, I had to pick Men of the Match. I picked the following Sounders and I'll share a bit why. They were not submitted in a particular order.

Steve Zakuani - He nabbed his first goal in MLS play in a year and a half. Did he have flaws defensively? Yes. But there were attempts to get him the ball in spaces that CAM uses and his off ball work on offense was nearly perfect.

Brad Evans - Great off ball work in the first half that went unnoticed by his teammates. Several runs that if they were rewarded with a pass would have been on goal. He also showed great positional flexibility and dealt with Lenhart well.

Sammy Ochoa - An assist always helps. Much of his work was with his back to goal. He didn't have many runners to hit and didn't hit them when he did, but the big man was bodied up by one or two most of the night. He tired as the evening went on but continued to win headers.

David Estrada - Also picked partially due to his return to health. Estrada created threats almost immediately. He would move across the attacking band of midfield roles and did well regardless of what space he used.

Osvaldo Alonso - Facing a horde of black clad 'Quakes Alonso routinely found ways to dribble or pass out of trouble. As always he was strong on the tackle. He also didn't let his frustration with the calls change his game.

I don't think there were many standout performances. It certainly wasn't an easy match to lay praise on a player or two or three. Everyone had flaws on the evening. Gspurning and Montero were both close to get mentions with Zakuani being the most likely to getting dropped.