The Sounders U-23 FC fought its way through a rough first 20 minutes of soccer Monday night, May 5, at Sumner's Sunset Chevrolet Stadium. Having just a couple of weeks of practice under their Sounders Blue and Rave Green kits, the team looked a little off-balance and unfamiliar with each other.
Twenty minutes was all it took, though, as the Sounders began a constant assault on the Western Washington University goal and dictated the flow for most of the remainder of the game.
Coming into the game, the visiting Vikings had already played four matches in their spring club schedule and at first-whistle looked sharper and seemed ready to deliver a rough-brand of soccer to the Sounders. There were some hard fouls as the teams tested each other early, yet both clubs maintained their composure throughout the match. No yellow or red cards were pulled from the referee’s pocket for the entire ninety minutes.
After sorting things out, the Sounders found their own groove but just couldn't find the back of the nets as they out-shot the Vikings 18-4.
“This team is a group of trial-list players, so they’re all fighting to get onto the team,” said Sounders U-23 GM and head coach Darren Sawatzky. “So to start out with they were a little bit jittery and they needed to find their feet a little bit. Once they did, we were looking for certain things. We don’t want to just play and be competitive. We want to play in a certain way and I saw that in the second half especially.”
Former Stadium Tiger Jamael Cox showed flashes of brilliance, missing three shots by mere feet. Twice at the thirty minute and the thirty-nine minute mark, Cox shook off a defender, gained entry into the box and pounded a left-footer at the goal. The first sailed just over a foot above the crossbar and the second blast hit it.
“We’re going to need to start finishing,” said Cox. “If we put away some goals it would make it a lot easier on ourselves. Everything else was clicking together for us. We had good movement off the ball and good players to do it. A clean-sheet is good, but three points is better.”
Cox would go on to drive another scorching shot in the 75th minute, a right-footer from 20-feet square in front of the goal that found the left-post and careened back into play.
Goalkeeper Jake Feener started and Jordan Jennings, another former Stadium Tiger, took over at the second-half whistle to complete the clean-sheet shutout for the Sounders.
“We’ve only been training for the last week or two for the most part,” said Jennings, who spent the past season in Australia playing for Sydney United. “They’ve (WWU) been together a lot longer. We’re just gelling together and seeing what fits. We’re going to get a lot of new guys in the next couple of weeks.
“This is a good taste tonight but nothing close to the finished product.”
Former Franklin Pierce standout and PLU Lute Derek Johnson also saw significant playing time for the Sounders. Kurtis Pederson, a former Bellarmine Lion saw considerable action for Western Washington.
The Sounders U-23 play two more "friendly" matches before opening league play in the Premier Development League May 25 hosting the Puget Sound Gunners at 2:00 p.m. at Sunset Chevrolet Stadium.
“There will be kids coming back from college in the next two weeks that really fill-out the roster,” said coach Sawatzky. “The guys tonight are really trying to fight their way into the roster and some of them really made a case for themselves.”
The Sounders U-23 has signed what is considered by many experts to be some of the top talent in the United States this year. When the new blood arrives in the next few weeks to join the club, the team looks to be powerful and exciting.
“You want to be competitive, but you don’t want to just be competitive,” said Sawatzky. “We want to be competitive and play a certain way because most of these guys want to get to the next level.
“To get to the next level you can’t just beat college teams. You’ve got to do better than that, because most of our kids are done with college. I was happy with the game tonight. There are some building blocks here.”
Building blocks with some major upgrades arriving shortly.