SEATTLE — With a chance to effectively lock up a home playoff game, the Seattle Sounders instead came out a bit flat and were forced to settle for a 0-0 tie with FC Dallas on Wednesday at CenturyLink Field. The Sounders created some dangerous chances late in the match despite playing the last 15 minutes or so a man down, but couldn’t quite find the winner.

Key moments

• The first half featured the Sounders doing a decent job of pressing and controlling possession, but not much in the way of chance creation. FC Dallas were able to create a couple decent looks on the counter, however.
• The match started to pick up a bit when Victor Rodriguez entered for Nouhou in the 65th minute.
• But the Sounders’ first real chance came in the 75th minute, just after Jordan Morris entered. Jones, who was now playing left back, was able to beat two defenders and worked his way into the box where he found Morris at the back post with a slick outside-of-the-boot pass. Morris’ shot from a very tight angle hit the side netting.
• Although the Sounders had been on the front foot for much of the second half, they were forced to take a step back in the 86th minute when Xavier Arreaga was shown his second yellow card while breaking up a counter-attack.
• The first decent look after that belonged to the Sounders, though. In the 90th minute, Morris broke into the box and found Nicolas Lodeiro at the near of the penalty area but his volley attempt was way off.
• Morris got an even better look eight minutes into stoppage time when Lodeiro put a perfectly weighted ball over the top. Morris was able to get to it first but never had complete control and ended up putting his left-footed attempt from a bad angle into Jesse Gonzalez.
• After more than 11 minutes of second-half stoppage time, the end of the match was further delayed when referee Drew Fischer reviewed what was apparently a potential red card offense on Kim Kee-hee on the match’s final play. Fischer chose to give Kim a yellow.

Talking points

Missed opportunity: This was not a disaster by any stretch and the Sounders did create a tiny bit of extra space between them and Minnesota United, but a win would have rendered the next two road games far less important. Instead, the Sounders likely need to get at least a point from trips to D.C. United and the San Jose Earthquakes and then need to beat Minnesota United at home in the season finale in order to ensure themselves a home playoff game.

At least they got a shutout: The last time the Sounders earned a home shutout was back on June 29. In the meantime, the Sounders had allowed 14 goals in six games. This was definitely a step in the right direction as far as shoring up the defense goes. The Sounders allowed just nine shots, just one of which was from inside the penalty and all three of Stefan Frei’s saves were relatively easy to handle shots from no closer than 20 yards.

But seriously, what happened in the first half?: With the normal caveat that the Sounders had just a single day of training between this game and their last one, they sure did look flat during the first 45 minutes. Joevin Jones appeared to have almost no interest in taking anyone on 1-v-1 on one wing and Cristian Roldan didn’t seem much more inclined. The two outside mids combined for just one shot, zero dribbles and zero key passes in the first half. Jones improved in the second half, especially after moving to left back, and Roldan was considerably more active as well.

Did you see that?!?!

Sometimes you eat the ball and sometimes the ball eats you.

He said what?!?!

One stat to tell the tale

50 — The Sounders reached 50 points for the third straight year and the eighth time in nine years.