This summer was a whirlwind tour of peaks and valleys for Sounders FC.
On one hand, the team endured a ragged stretch of matches that dropped it down the Western Conference standings. On the other, Seattle added four starter-quality international players in the summer transfer window, all of whom will likely help the team compete over the final 10 matches of the regular season as it pushes toward the all-important MLS Cup Playoffs.
Those last 10 matches started with a boom on Sunday with a rousing 4-0 win over Orlando City SC at CenturyLink Field. Nelson Valdez and Román Torres both made their Sounders FC debuts, while Obafemi Martins made his much anticipated return from a two-month injury layoff, which he celebrated with a pair of goals. In more ways than one, it felt like the end of one chapter and the turning of another.
More than the match itself, Seattle’s performance heralded the return of at least part of the team that led the MLS Supporter’s Shield race through May. Now, with the added benefit of four new internationally experienced players, Seattle has more depth than ever. Scary depth. Which has to excite Sounders FC Head Coach Sigi Schmid and his staff.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at some of those formations and take a few swings at how this team might look at full strength in a couple different auspices. In short, there’s a lot to look forward to over the coming few months from Seattle’s perspective.
The Orlando City approach
As a baseline, let’s start with what we saw in Seattle’s bruising 4-0 win over Orlando City on Sunday. Here’s how Sounders FC lined up.
From a comfort standpoint, the most important thing to note first is the return to a 4-4-2. Sounders FC toggled at times between a 4-4-2, a 4-3-3 and a 4-2-3-1 while both Clint Dempsey and Obafemi Martins missed nearly the entire summer. But there’s little question this team was largely built to run a 4-4-2, Schmid’s formation of preference and the team’s bedrock during a dominant run of form in April and May.
Valdez, one of the team’s ballyhooed new signings, looked naturally comfortable with returnee Martins, and both managed to ring up goals. Centerback Torres also slotted in effortlessly next to Chad Marshall, while the jack-of-all-trades Brad Evans scooted upfield to pair with Erik Friberg, another summer signing, in the central midfield. And keep an eye on Oniel Fisher at leftback. He threw down a marker for the future with a steady performance there against Orlando City.
Evans and Friberg developed a fairly easy rapport, combining for passes 14 times in their time on the field together. While Evans’ future at the position is uncertain with so much depth - namely the currently injured Osvaldo Alonso and the available Gonzalo Pineda - at the very least Evans proved he’s anything but a liability as a defensive midfield partner for Friberg.
The flanks, meanwhile, were solid, but Sounders FC lacked some dynamism in the build-up. That said, Lamar Neagle looked rejuvenated with Martins back to facilitate and rope in the wide midfielders with his ability to stay on his feet and keep possession alive. Go back and look at Neagle’s role in Martins’ first goal against Orlando City. Even if he isn’t scoring goals, he finds a way to contribute.
While Andy Rose isn’t exactly a creator from wide positions, he provides so much industry that by arraying him on the flank, you’re endeavoring to shut down that side of the field. Given Kaka’s propensity to drift into wide-left channels going forward, having Rose stacked on top of breakout rightback Tyrone Mears was a masterstroke. Whatever it did or didn’t do for the attack, it completely shuttered that side of the field for business. Orlando City was powerless.
Rose will most likely shift back inside as Valdez swings out with Dempsey’s return, but as another option against dangerous teams that list to their left, Rose is quality.
The ideal
The lineup for the Orlando City match was the team’s most dynamic look since it lost half its starting XI for one reason or another early this summer. But the full cavalry charge has yet to crest the hill. That comes next.
It’s still unclear exactly when Sounders FC will be able to welcome back its full complement of starters, but what happens when, knock on wood, everyone’s healthy? The starting lineup could look something like this.
It will be tough for Sounders FC to win the Western Conference by virtue of the current standings, but this lineup is capable of creating some serious havoc in the postseason. Seattle would immediately become the surging seed nobody wants to face in a two-legged playoff format.
The biggest alteration between this lineup and the one that thrashed Orlando City is out wide. In Rose and Neagle’s stead, we have Valdez and Andreas Ivanschitz, two of the league’s premier summer signings. Valdez proved his mettle on the right flank during the Copa America, where he starred for Paraguay in the team’s incredible run to the third-place game in the most difficult continental competition on earth. On the left, Ivanschitz slots in as the team’s dead ball specialist and deep-lying turret on assists and midfield interchange. It’s hard to overstate how much nitrous those two can inject into this team from wide positions, which have been tough to fill consistently this season.
We’ve kept the back line the same from the Orlando City game (although we’ve rewarded Fisher for his positive play against Orlando City, either Dylan Remick or Leo Gonzalez can do the work at leftback), but the central midfield is key. Alonso and Pineda have one of the tightest bonds in MLS history, and in Sounders FC’s 2-0 win over Vancouver on May 17, the two broke the MLS record (since Opta began charting stats in 2010) for passes among two teammates with 200 at a 93-percent clip.
That said, Friberg has gradually been settling into a rhythm, which culminated in a tremendous game against Orlando City from a defensive and possession standpoint. His work helping to shepherd Evans into his role was notable. Given that, the coaching staff could well see Friberg as slightly ahead, although either could start in this construct and make it hum. A midfield with Pineda will most likely keep more of the ball, while a midfield with Friberg will mostly likely be punchier going forward. Both are quality options, although the latter might make more sense in a 4-4-2, which requires its two central midfielders to cover a bit more ground.
The Dempsey-Martins partnership up top needs no explanation, given their incredible output early in the season. There aren’t many teams in MLS that can line up against this XI and feel good about its chances.
The 4-2-3-1 option
There’s no question the 4-2-3-1 has mostly been a second option to the 4-4-2 under Schmid, who’s only pulled it out at length when absences scuttle his more favored setup. So that makes this formation a more likely candidate in defensive transition as the team shifts its shape to deal with opposing attacks.
Even still, the vast depth this team now possesses gives it a ton of hypothetical options, which is what we’re all about today. So let’s take a look at what, should the mood strike, a 4-2-3-1 could look like under the auspices of the roster’s depth.
The core of the attacking portion stays the same as our ideal formation, with a slight transformation. As we previously established, this tends to be how, at least up the spine, the 4-4-2 is oriented when it shifts into a defensive phase. The two central midfielders drop into a shelf atop the centerbacks, and the falling striker, in this case Dempsey, peels off the forward line to provide an outlet to jumpstart possession when the ball is won back.
The 4-2-3-1 has generated most of its popularity in modern soccer over the past 10 years via South America, which has been able use it widely because the continent possesses a raft of defenders and deeper midfielders capable and willing to play it out of the back. Otherwise, this formation strands the attacking players, notably the lone forward, and becomes stretched kickball.
That’s why we’ve united Alonso and Pineda for this formation. On his day Pineda is one of the league’s finest regista’s, or withdrawn playmakers, and next to Alonso, one of the most dogged yet possession-able holding midfielders in MLS history, this team is perfectly positioned to play flowing, possession soccer. The fact that they have wide players like Valdez and Ivanschitz, both of whom are supremely talented technically, only adds to this formation’s allure.
Further adding to the South American flair, Dempsey is the perfect Enganche, literally the “hook,” for the formation. Neither a pure striker or pure creator, the Enganche is the connective tissue between the attack and the midfield shelf. He creates space for the striker, in this case the eminently athletic Martins, while roping in the playmaking ability of the deeper players. Dempsey tends to do this anyway in the 4-4-2, dropping into the hole to collect possession and then providing those lovely moments of possession at the top of the box. This merely puts a name to it.
In any case, the 4-4-2 will almost certainly remain the Nom de Guerre when Sounders FC is fully fit, but the team’s ability to line up in a 4-2-3-1 and let it rip only underlines how much quality they’ve added this summer.
