The Seattle Sounders are taking on the Portland Timbers on Sunday in their third and final regular-season match. Here is everything you need to know:
WHEN AND WHERE: Kickoff is at 6:30 p.m. PT at Providence Park in Portland, Ore.
WHERE TO WATCH: The match will be televised on FS1 and YouTube TV.
WHERE TO LISTEN: The match will air on 950 KJR AM and in Spanish on El Rey 1360 AM.
2018 RECORDS AND STANDINGS: Sounders: 10-9-5 (35 points, 7th West), Timbers: 10-6-7 (37 points, 6th West)
FORM GUIDE (most recent first): Seattle: WWWWW, Portland: LLLWW
ALL-TIME HISTORY: The Sounders are 9-7-6 all time against the Timbers in MLS regular season play, including a 2-6-3 record on the road.
PREVIOUS MEETING: The Sounders fell 3-2 at CenturyLink Field on June 30, in a back-and-forth affair. Larrys Mabiala opened the scoring in the 48th minute from a corner kick, only for Victor Rodríguez to draw Seattle level three minutes later. Samuel Armenteros made it 2-1 in the 57th minute, but Chad Marshall equalized from a set piece in the 68th. Mabiala bagged his second, which was the game-winning goal, from another corner just six minutes later.
SEATTLE BAGS FIVE: Coming off a club-record-tying 5-0 win over the LA Galaxy, the Sounders attack is finally hitting its stride, with 12 goals in the last four games.
MIDFIELD MAESTROS: In the 3-2 result back in June, the South American playmakers for each team — Diego Valeri for Portland and Nicolás Lodeiro for Seattle — pulled the strings in the attack. Valeri assisted all three of Portland’s strikes, two of them from corner kicks, while Lodeiro assisted both of Seattle’s goals.
SEATTLE’S CATALYST: Since that loss to Portland, Seattle has rattled off a nine-match unbeaten streak, including a club record six consecutive wins. The Sounders now sit 7th in the Western Conference standings, just two points shy of the sixth and final playoff spot.
SCORCHING STEFAN FREI: After the 5-0 win over LA Galaxy, Stefan Frei now leads all MLS goalkeepers with at least 1,000 minutes played in Goals Against Average (1.00) and Save Percentage (77.6 percent).
LODEIRO’S FINE FORM: Seattle’s Uruguayan playmaker has been pivotal to the club’s recent form, with five assists and five goals during the nine-match unbeaten streak. His strong performances of late have earned him a call-up to the Uruguay national team for a friendly in September against Mexico.
NASL TIES: The head coaches for both Seattle (Brian Schmetzer) and Portland (Giovanni Savarese) have links to the NASL. Schmetzer was a high-flying winger for the NASL Sounders from 1980-83, while Savarese joined the Timbers in 2018 after coaching the New York Cosmos for five years.
DEFENSIVE CHESS MATCH: Sunday’s matchup will see two of the top defensive sides in the Western Conference go to-to-toe. The Timbers have allowed the fourth-fewest goals (34) in the West, while Seattle currently enjoys the stingiest defense, conceding just 26 times in league play.
LATE, LATE GOALS: The last two meetings between these sides at Providence Park have featured result-changing goals late in the second half. Sebastian Blanco handed the Timbers a win on May 13, 2018, with a goal in the 86th minute, while Clint Dempsey helped the Sounders steal a point on the road last season in a 2-2 draw on June 25, 2017, with the equalizing goal four minutes into second-half stoppage time.
