NEW YORK – The Seattle Sounders might be more used to playing in adverse weather conditions than your average professional soccer team, hailing from the ever-rainy Pacific Northwest.
But following his team’s 2-1 defeat to New York City FC at Yankee Stadium on Saturday, Sounders captain and nine-year veteran Ozzie Alonso admitted that he had never had to brave anything quite like the torrential downpour that took place throughout the match.
“I think it was in Cuba if I remember,” Alonso told reporters. “In the US, I haven’t played [in conditions] like that.”
Saturday’s weather certainly made for a unique soccer experience for both sides.
Players would frequently tee up passes to teammates only to have the ball stop dead. The pitch often resembled a slip-and-slide as much as it did a soccer field, with substantive chances coming few and far between as the teams struggled to adapt.In the end, a first-half go-ahead goal from midfielder Cristian Roldan wouldn’t be enough for Seattle, as NYCFC star forward David Villa struck twice to give the hosts the 2-1 triumph.
It was a disappointing result, but one that Roldan said should probably be taken with a bit of a grain of salt. Like Alonso, the third-year midfielder told reporters he could only remember playing in one game that compared, a preseason bout against the LA Galaxy that the Sounders actually ended up winning.
“I think you honestly just throw this game away,” Roldan said. “It was that type of game, the weather, the puddles, the short field. You kind of just put this in the back of your mind and try not to think about it. You look forward to your home game and really take it to Orlando [on Wednesday].”
Even so, Sounders head coach Brian Schmetzer was quick to downplay any notion that the weather was the sole factor that played into his team’s defeat.
“The players needed to figure it out, which I think they did for the most part,” Schmetzer said. “The dribbling, the passes had to be crisper and stuff like that. But it wasn’t the field’s fault that we lost. The rain wasn’t why we lost.”
Alonso echoed the sentiment, also pointing out that the Sounders don’t exactly have a lot of time to dwell on the rain-soaked defeat, with Wednesday’s home matchup against Orlando City SC at CenturyLink Field looming.
“It was bad weather and the field was small, but there’s no excuse,” said Alonso. “We have to be better. Now we have to focus on Orlando.”
