Everything you need to know for Sounders-Sporting KC

The Seattle Sounders have won two straight and haven’t lost in seven in a row, and will now face a Sporting KC opponent who is clawing their way out of the Wooden Spoon lead. Although their defense remains as leaky as ever, Sporting KC have found their scoring boots since the signing of André Luiz and have won 2 of 4.

Here’s what you need to know:

Injury news

Sounders

OUT: Snyder Brunell — International Duty; Pedro de la Vega -Quad; Hassani Dotson — Suspended; Dejan Joveljić - International Duty; Nikola Petković — Knee; Paul Rothrock — Hamstring; Jesús Ferreira — Hamstring (Questionable)

Sporting KC

OUT: Or Blorian — Chest; Diego Borges — Adductor; Capita Capemba — Hamstring; Jake Davis — Knee; Moises Mosquera — Hamstring; Ruben Ramos Jr. — International Duty

QUESTIONABLE: Owen Wolff — Quad

Opposition players to watch

Andre Luiz: $18 million is an awful lot of money to pay for a player, but Sporting KC's massive investment in Andre Luiz seems like a pretty good bet. In just five games, he’s already racked up four goals and an assist while causing absolute chaos coming off the right wing.

Taylor Calheira: The forward has effectively taken over for Dejan Joveljić and done pretty well for himself. Over the last seven games, he has two goals and an assist while providing some solid No. 9 play.

Stats to look smart

11: Sporting KC are not good, per se, but they have scored a bunch of goals since André arrived. In their last four games, they’ve bagged 11 goals, which is more goals than they had scored in their previous 10. Now, they’ve only won two of those games – and blew multi-goal leads in the other two – but that does make them dangerous.

3: The Sounders have now scored multiple goals in three straight games for the first time all year. That two of those games were without Joveljić feels particularly important.

Tactics to impress

Sporting KC have been an absolute mess tactically ever since Peter Vermes was fired – and probably before that, too. They don’t exactly have a universal plan now, but they do sure like to get the ball to André on the right wing and let him cook. If the Sounders can deny him service they should be in good shape, but that's easier said than done.
One of the hallmarks of the Sounders over the past few years has been an aggressive re-press that allows them to start possession deeper in opposition territory. Over the last few games, the Sounders have gotten back to those ways to much success. They’ll almost certainly be looking to keep KC pinned back.