Match Data
SUMMARY
Seattle Sounders FC 3 - Los Angeles FC 1
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
Venue: Banc of California Stadium
Referee: Jair Marrufo
Assistants: Frank Anderson, Logan Brown
Fourth Official: Ted Unkel
Attendance: 22,099
Weather: 72 degrees and clear
SCORING SUMMARY
LAFC - Eduard Atuesta 17’
SEA - Raúl Ruidíaz (Nicolás Lodeiro, Jordan Morris) 22’
SEA - Nicolás Lodeiro (Joevin Jones) 26’
SEA - Raúl Ruidíaz (Nicolás Lodeiro) 64’
MISCONDUCT SUMMARY
SEA - Kelvin Leerdam 81’
SEA - Nouhou 90’+3’
LINEUPS & STATS
Seattle Sounders FC - Stefan Frei; Kelvin Leerdam, Kim Kee-Hee, Xavier Arreaga, Brad Smith (Román Torres 88’); Gustav Svensson, Cristian Roldan; Joevin Jones (Jordy Delem 64’), Nicolás Lodeiro, Jordan Morris (Nouhou 76’); Raúl Ruidíaz
Substitutes not used: Bryan Meredith, Victor Rodríguez, Harry Shipp, Luis Silva
Total shots: 11 (Ruidíaz, 5)
Shots on goal: 5 (Ruidíaz, 3)
Fouls: 12 (Leerdam/Lodeiro, 3)
Offside: 3 (Ruidíaz, 2)
Corner-kicks: 2 (Lodeiro, 2)
Saves: 3 (Frei, 3)
Los Angeles FC - Tyler Miller; Eddie Segura, Jordan Harvey, Tristan Blackmon, Walker Zimmerman; Eduard Atuesta, Latif Blessing (Mark-Anthony Kaye HT), Lee Nguyen (Adrien Pérez 77’); Brian Rodriguez (Adama Diomande 53’), Diego Rossi, Carlos Vela
Substitutes not used: Dejan Jakovic, Mohamed El-Munir, Steven Beitashour
Total shots: 14 (Diomande, 3)
Shots on goal: 4 (four tied, 1)
Fouls: 9 (Atuesta, 4)
Offside: 1 (Rossi, 1)
Corner-kicks: 9 (Vela, 6)
Saves: 2 (Miller, 2)
Post-Match Quotes
BRIAN SCHMETZER SOUNDERS HEAD COACH
RE: Feelings after the victory
“I’m so happy for those fans that are out there. I’m tremendously proud of that group of players and it is fantastic. I’m so happy for this club and for the people that are involved in the club.”
RE: Coming into the match as underdogs
“I think we were the underdog. If I can speak about LAFC now, they statistically had the best record in MLS history, that is a tremendous team. Bob does a great job, Ante [Razov], all the guys, that is a great, great team that we just beat so it’s hard for me to say, “we’re underdogs, we’re not messing with that much, we wanted to play them the way they could.” But, certainly they were the favorites and they were deservedly the favorites because in this new playoff format, they earned the right to host these home games and winning away from home is a challenge, which is credit to my team. They withstood a lot of pressure and a lot of nerves there after LAFC scored the first goal. It was not an easy game, so you have to credit LAFC but you have to make sure you give my team the same amount of credit.”
CRISTIAN ROLDAN SOUNDERS MIDFIELDER
RE: Limiting LAFC’s chances
“We played inside-out, made them go outside, and then, doubled down as much as possible. We put pressure whenever we could when they wanted to deliver a ball and then obviously stop [Carlos] Vela. Double down like I said when we get the chance but I thought, from top to bottom, our guys put in a shift.”
RE: Capitalizing on opportunities
“We had very few opportunities and we had to capitalize on those and, yeah, at the end we could’ve scored another one but that was because LAFC was pushing forward and opening up a lot of space. Our [Designated Players] get paid big bucks to score those goals and we capitalized on three shots and when you’re up 3-1, you just want to defend for your life and make it as difficult as possible for LAFC to score another goal.”
NICOLÁS LODEIRO SOUNDERS MIDFIELDER
RE: Thought on win
“I’m very happy. I’m very happy because we deserved this. I have my family here. The team played like warriors. I like my team and I am very proud.”
RE: Coming back being down 2-1
“We know they have really good players. They can score first but we know this [game] is 90 minutes. After the goal, we played the same. In the first half, we played better than LA [FC]. We fought to win.
BRAD SMITH SEATTLE SOUNDERS DEFENDER
JORDAN MORRIS SEATTLE SOUNDERS MIDFIELDER
RAUL RUIDIAZ SEATTLE SOUNDERS FORWARD
STEFAN FREI SEATTLE SOUNDERS GOALKEEPER
—
BOB BRADLEY LAFC HEAD COACH
RE: Overall thoughts on tonight’s match
“They had numbers back, they clogged the middle, they defended in a compact and strong way and then, if you don’t move the ball quick enough, when you get up there it’s not easy to get shots. I think we had four shots on goal. In those ways... I don’t think we’re good enough on the night, it’s moving the ball the quicker so we get a little bit of an advantage, in some cases, it’s winning the ball a little bit higher so we can create an advantage that way.”
RE: Game plan
“The game plan is the same as any game, we started him as a version of a false-nine, hope that with Diego [Rossi] on one side and with Brian [Rodriguez] on the other side that we can stretch their back four. Then, Carlos [Vela] can come off the central defenders and get touches and if they come with him then that opens up holes in the back line. Then in certain moments, when we win balls, we can play them quickly to him so that he can get some balls on the move. I think as a team we’re typically good at that and also when we move the ball quickly and there’s a chance to find windows between defenders or across the face of a defender that we can make certain passes, but tonight we didn’t create as many of those moments because they had a lot of numbers back and we weren’t able to move the ball fast enough.”
CARLOS VELA LAFC FORWARD
RE: How frustrating the game may have been
“Nobody expected this end for our season but we know in the playoffs it’s one game. If they [other teams] make better plays than you then you’re out. In the end, we have to be proud of what we’ve done all year and learn. We have to learn. We just have two years as a club. We have a lot of things to improve. We have to change some things and get stronger to come back next year and be better. It’s the only way to be a good club.”
RE: Post-game conversation with Bob Bradley and looking forward
“I don’t remember that Bob [Bradley] said to me. My mind was blocked in that moment. I wasn’t thinking about anything. I was just trying to think about what happened on the night but it’s football. These things happen. We have to use all the bad things and bad moments to get better and prepare ourselves for next season. We have another tournament and we want to be important in that tournament. We have to first rest well and come back stronger.”
MARK-ANTHONY KAYE LAFC MIDFIELDER
RE: How the Sounders were able to disrupt the midfield
“First off, losing Latif [Blessing] no one can plan for that. But I think that coming into this game we knew exactly what any team in this situation would try to bring to mess up our game. When you play the type of football that we have then you have a target on your back. The physicality part is something teams think they can bring to screw everything up. It wasn’t a surprise to us at all. We knew coming into the game what it was going to be like and we just didn’t match it enough throughout the game.”
RE: Having broken records but coming up short of the final
“It’s tough, obviously. Throughout the season we were the best team. Throughout the history of MLS, we’ve been the best team. Obviously, those are big accolades. You want win as a club because it shows you are doing something right. We play in North America where playoffs are a thing. Anywhere else in the world, you wouldn’t have anything else like this unless you are fighting for promotion. It’s a different game when you enter the playoffs.”
LEE NGUYEN LAFC MIDFIELDER
RE: Reflecting on the season
“This game, this loss, it hurts. I don’t think we can try to look and reflect now, I’m sure in a couple of days, when we get together, we’ll reflect and see how good of a season we’ve had but today, no. It just hurts because of the season we had and we feel like we deserve more.”
RE: Overall thoughts on the match
“I think we did well to get the lead and at that point, you just have to close the half out with the lead. We went up 1-0 and I felt we gave up two soft goals back to back and you go into halftime 2-1. Credit to Seattle, they came out with a game plan, made it tough for us, but we played the second half a goal down, trying to chase the game. Then we gave up another soft one and you can’t come back after that.”
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