What You’ll Watch

The Seattle Sounders remain at home and will look to snap a rare two-game home losing streak when they welcome the Bruce Arena-led New England Revolution. This is the lone regular season meeting between these two teams.

New England currently sits in seventh place in the Eastern Conference with a record of 9-9-6 (33 points in 24 games played; 1.38 ppg) and the Sounders now sit in fourth place in the Western Conference with a record of 11-7-5 (38 points in 23 games played; 1.65 ppg). Last time out, Seattle lost at home 3-2 against Sporting KC and New England lost 2-0 at home against LAFC.

This will be the 14th all-time meeting between these two clubs. Seattle is just 4-5-4 overall with 18 goals scored and 20 conceded. At home, Seattle is 3-1-2 with 11 goals scored and five conceded.

Tale of the Tape

Seattle

Last Five: L-W-L-W-W

Leading Goal Scorer: Raúl Ruidíaz, eight goals

Assist Leader: Nicolas Lodeiro, 10 assists

New England Revolution

Last Five: L-W-W-W-D

Leading Goal Scorer: Carles Gil, eight goals

Assist Leader: Gil, nine assists

Injury Report, Suspensions and International Duty

New England

Out: DeJuan Jones (right leg injury)

Suspensions: N/A

International Duty: N/A

Seattle

• Out: F - Will Bruin (torn ACL 6/18, out for season); M - Gustav Svensson (left hamstring strain)
• Questionable: M - Victor Rodriguez (left hamstring strain); F - Raul Ruidiaz (concussion); D - Brad Smith (right adductor pain)

Suspensions: Roman Torres (substance-abuse policy)

International Duty: N/A

Match Officials

REFEREE: Dave Gantar

AR1: Chris Wattam

AR2: Micheal Barwegen

4th: Kevin Broadley

VAR: Ricardo Salazar

AVAR: Jeremy Hanson

What to Watch

• If you stopped paying attention to the New England Revolution a few months ago, you may have missed that they’re now the hottest team in the league not named LAFC. Their loss last week to the aforementioned LAFC was their first loss since Bruce Arena took over back in May. They had been on an 11-game unbeaten run and have climbed into the final playoff spot in the East.
• Arena’s hire seems to be the catalyst, but it’s not like he just started barking instructions and everything suddenly clicked. Among the more notable changes he made was moving Juan Agudelo into the center of the midfield, entrusting more of the playmaking duties to Carles Gil and inserting Cristian Penilla into the starting lineup. The team really started to take off with the addition of Gustavo Bou, who has two goals and an assist in his four appearances.
• Arena has done a bit of tinkering with formations, but seems to have settled into a 4-2-3-1 that is so far working wonders. The Revs are 3-1-1 in that formation and taking an average of 17.6 shots per game.
• Like most MLS teams, the Revs aren’t nearly as aggressive when they are on the road and that’s still true with Arena in charge. In five road games under Arena, they’ve only eclipsed 13 shots once and have yet to score more than two goals. Those aren’t bad or surprising numbers, mind you, just something to keep in mind in terms of what to expect from them.
• The key to stopping them seems to be putting the clamps on Gil and Bou, two players who love to be on the ball and are about as dangerous as anyone in the league in the open field.

How to Watch

Date/Time: Saturday, August 10 @ 1:00 PM PT

Location: CenturyLink Feld — Seattle, WA

TV: JOEtv, Univision-Seattle

Streaming: YouTube TV, ESPN+ (out of market, affiliate link)

Radio: 950 KJR AM (English), El Rey 1360AM (Spanish)

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