In football there is an oft repeated saying that luck evens itself out over the course of a season. There will be points dropped that shouldn’t have been, and points won that were not deserved.
The sounders have had their fair share of bad calls that have cost them points (LA, Chivas and maybe RSL), last night went a long way to balancing out the ledger.
Last night falls squarely into the lucky column, and it was a good night for it happen as games don’t get much bigger than this.
Going into the weekend the play off picture was incredibly tight, 6 or 7 teams chasing the last 4 play off spots. Seattle have had trouble scoring, were travelling cross country to play the defending champions, who happen to have a 22 game unbeaten home streak and Sigi managed them to that championship.
Seattle did not play their best, but winning when you are not playing well is one of the ways to tell a good side from the rest.
Seattle’s defence was solid with a few mistakes (Marshall penalty excepted). The back four were under the gun all night, Keller pulled off a couple of great saves, Schelotto missed a penalty, the woodwork got rattled a couple of times and Marshall acrobatically cleared a shot off the line.
Seattle had few clear chances. The goal was made by Ljundberg battling through two defenders, gave the ball to Evans. Who set up Montero with a very nice through ball. The keeper came off is line to play the angle on Montero and was totally out of position when the ball came to Levesque to put away.
It was a nicely worked goal, and very much against the run of play.
With the other results this week the 41 points they have are probably enough to ensure the play offs. DC, Dallas, RSL and Toronto have to win all their remaining games to push the Sounders out the top 8. One more point is enough to make it mathematically certain that we will see playoff football at Quest Field this year and the Dallas game will be an awesome celebration.
In March the ECS said “Tonight our history becomes legend”, last nights 1-0 win over the defending champions is going to be a large part of the story.