City SC Posse – Ep. 5: Matchday 3 Preview vs Seattle – Must Win at Energizer Park

Bright: So I think we have another tough challenge, ⁓ match day three and we have, I mean, it's a tough start to the season. There's no doubt. ⁓ so we're going up against, ⁓ the Sounders, ⁓ of Seattle and our, our history is not great with them. ⁓ right now Seattle owns the all time series record with five wins and one loss. So we've, we've beaten them one time. They've beaten us five, you know, and they're Western. conference powerhouse year over year, right? They're an established team. ⁓ you know, so I think we got, we got a work cut out for us. The only bright spot, I think ⁓ at this point is we're at home.

Kev: Yeah, hopefully that's a bright spot. You love to come away with the win here. You know, you're coming off of a big loss last week. You're not feeling good about the play that you had. We're going up against another solid organization. The history is not on our side. We don't have very many wins recently at Energizer Park, so that's going against us, too. What are we hoping for?

Bright: Well, I mean, I'm hoping for a win and really, you know, you go back to season one and a win was almost guaranteed when we were playing at home. The energy was there. Everybody's standing. Now this is an evening game, which, you know, I think brings a little bit more energy, ⁓ traditionally to the ballpark. People have had more time to knock back a couple of beers. You know, you got the lights, you know, the vibe is a little bit different. So I'm like, maybe that. That helps us out a little bit. Exactly. ⁓ but, but again, yeah, going up against a tough team here, I'm hoping we show some gumption. got to have some belief. talked about that in the last episode. got to go in thinking like we're going to score. have a chance to win this game and we can't just let them dominate the possession.

Kev: Yeah, we need to be able to do something in the middle, start controlling the middle. I'm hoping to have, I assume, Hurtle back. ⁓ I don't know what Luvin's status is.

Bright: I would, yeah, I don't know what his status is. I would agree. I would assume that hardals back, ⁓ toy shirt mentioned that he wants to get 45 to 60 minutes of playing time this game. So, you know, that, that means that either he starts and then get subbed out either at halftime or at the 60 minute mark, or he comes in at halftime basically. ⁓ so maybe, maybe you hope to see that again. ⁓ I think.

Kev: Would love to see it. Yeah.

Bright: Pompeo has to get the start, you know, and I think, ⁓ even coach Demay, he came out and he said, ⁓ that, that he played well in the time that he had, ⁓ you know, against San Diego. So maybe now he gets the, he gets the start. So we'll see. ⁓ I think the same things hold true. think we have to dominate the pace early being at home. ⁓ you know, obviously we can't give up any early goals. think that goes without saying.

Kev: Now, that's.

Bright: You could say that for every game for the rest of the season. So I don't think we'll say that for, you know, every episode of the podcast. Don't give up an early goal. Duh. Right. Naturally. ⁓ right. Don't give up any goals. Exactly. Now Seattle, they won their first game, ⁓ to nothing against Colorado. And then they fell on the road last week, two to one against Rayel salt Lake. So. ⁓

Kev: Naturally, yeah. Don't give up any goals. Ideally, don't give up any.

Bright: Naturally, they're going to come out. They're going to want to get back on track. Now here's what's interesting about their game against rail salt Lake.

Kev: So we should be in the same boat. Look, we've got to get like this is a month. We talked about like episode one or something. We said, is this a must win game? I think it was the preview to game one. This feels like a must win game for us. We can't go out and tie this. We need to win.

Bright: Well sure, I mean we're in- Yeah, I mean if- If you lose or tie again, you know, we're, we're just going to start creating that gap that I don't think we're good enough to play catch up. You know, as I mentioned right now, I mentioned this in the last episode, we're sitting in 14th place. The only other team without a win to this point in the season is Kansas city. Seattle is, is one and one at the moment. Right. So they're okay. Now their last game against rail salt Lake. They, they really kind of dominated at least the stats. didn't watch this game, but they had 13 shots on goal to rail salt lakes. 12. had nine on target to rail salt lakes for they had 57 % of the possession. So again, this is another possession heavy team. So how do we play into that? Do we sit back like we did against San Diego and hope for the counter attack or. Do we kind of play a little bit more like we did with Charlotte and we try and keep the possession or at least try and be a little bit more even with it. Right. So their passes were better. Their pass accuracies were better. ⁓ they had less yellow cards. ⁓ they had twice as many corners as real salt Lake. on paper, Seattle probably should have won this game. So You know, they're pro that's probably what they're thinking. And it's like, Hey, you know, we, let that one slip away. We need to come in to St. Louis, put it to them, get back on track before heading, you know, I'm assuming headed back to Seattle for the following.

Kev: What is it? interested to see if we try to mirror what Salt Lake did. Let them maintain some of that possession. Right? Like, I didn't catch the game, but I'd be curious. We'll see. Right?

Bright: Right, you know, yeah. Right. Yep. Yep, for sure. Now our odds do not look great. So before we get into bets and all of that, I pulled up just the, the win probability for tomorrow night. And then maybe before we get into our bets, we'll get into, you know, we'll get into the atmosphere and the vibe for tomorrow. Some of those details, but right now the, the pundits, whoever is in charge of this, I don't know. ⁓ have the Seattle Sounders win probability at 43%. St. Louis at 31 % and the draw at 26%. So it's never great when you're the home team and the other team has a better win probability. It's not even the draw. They have a better win probability than us, even though we're playing at home. Not, not great. Not great.

Kev: when, yeah. And I understand it. I ⁓ don't disagree with the odds. But I do a little bit. In here.

Bright: Yep, I understand it. Yeah. Yeah. I hear you. But again, the, the game, the game is, at Energizer park. It's a seven 30 start. as I mentioned, maybe a little bit more of a, of a vibe, ⁓ they're going to kind of fall back into their normal pattern. So we'll have the city block party. I'm taking the other brother to this game. So his, his first one of the season, ⁓ John boy and. I don't know what time we'll get down there yet. I mean, probably not like four 30 or whatever, but maybe around five or something. Have a, maybe we'll do Schlafly. Now this is a St. Louis night or STL night at Energizer park, which doesn't necessarily mean too much. They're going to have the, the St. Boogie brass band. So, all right, maybe, maybe a little bit of a high energy band there and then a, yeah, then a DJ, uh, after that gates open at six o'clock.

Kev: ⁓ yeah. All right, nice. Shout out to them.

Bright: First 10,000 fans through the gates will get a three by five ⁓ flag courtesy of enterprise. So naturally I'll, I'll want the flag. So, ⁓ you know, I'm assuming we'll, we'll get into the stadium, ⁓ close to six o'clock, probably, ⁓ go grab some food, take it a little bit easy. Maybe go watch the, ⁓ the supporters, ⁓ do their March. ⁓ that's always, that's always fun and interesting.

Kev: Alright. Are you eyeing up any food this go-around? I know that we have four new spots and we did one of them.

Bright: yeah, we did the Detroit pizza. Yeah. There's the biscuit place. There's a, what the taco place. ⁓ I don't know. I'll just, we'll just kind of, I'll see what, I'll see what John boy's feeling and, ⁓ play it, play it by ear. mean, I could probably do the pizza again. Like it was, it was good and yeah. And I haven't tried, it was easy. I haven't had pizza since that night. So that was two weeks ago. So now.

Kev: tacos. That was good. It traveled well. Mm-hmm.

Bright: The other thing is, so we're on the, we're at home this week. Then we're on the road. Then we're at home again. So a little season preview. Then we have three straight on the road. So going back to your earlier point, like we got to win these early home games. ⁓ you know, I think we have to take the next two, ⁓ to put us in a decent spot because we are away at LAFC next week. We could chalk that one up as a loss. ⁓ you know, then we have, ⁓ New York city FC Dallas. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So then, ⁓ New York city, Dallas, and then back at Seattle. So three away, ⁓ away games, ⁓ before we come back against San Jose, which should be a winnable game, but it, it looks tough. So I don't know. They don't have what the, ⁓ what the actual.

Kev: Stop with that negativity. That's a tie. That's a tie. Those are all tie games. 0-0.

Bright: projected lineup is just yet. ⁓ you know, so we'll have to see, again, Pompeo toy shirt, HARDL. ⁓ I think they all have to get in. I don't know what Totland, ⁓ I don't know what his, his availability is.

Kev: That is what his, he was injured last game, I think.

Bright: Yeah. He came out with a, with a non-contact injury, which is never great. You know, so I don't know. He didn't play that long came in at halftime and was out by this 70th minute. Yeah. So maybe it was more precautionary. Something didn't feel right. ⁓ so I tried looking it up, but I didn't see anything obvious or reliable. So we'll just have to, just have to wait and see if anything comes down, ⁓ down the pipe for, for that. But that's, mean, that's pretty much the, preview.

Kev: Yeah. felt the pull or?

Bright: So I know it's short to the point only, only 10 minutes there, but, ⁓ I don't know what else to say. ⁓ you know, we got to bury our chances, ⁓ whether it's betcher, whether it's toy shirt, ⁓ somebody's gotta, gotta put the ball on the back of the net. I, Hardo got the goal in the, the first game. I don't know that you can rely on him to be our number one goal scorer.

Kev: No, you shouldn't have to, right? Here's the thing I was going to say. I've been scrolling through the social media. On all the FPL channels, I constantly see the memes of ⁓ the couple that are sleeping on the bed, facing away from each other. And the wife's like, I bet he's thinking of other women. And the guy's thinking of... of Klaus, of Klaus, of Klaus, of Klaus. Like just dreaming like, I wish we had Klaus back, right? And I wanna put an end to that. I wanna see some goals. I wanna see some finishing in this game. We need it. We need a big win here. Like you said, we're coming off. ⁓ We're gonna be coming into really four out of what, five games away. And that's not an easy stretch for any team. ⁓ So for one that's, you ⁓

Bright: offense. Klaus. Klaus. Okay. Yeah.

Kev: We weren't able to get a against ⁓ who was a charlotte in the first game. ⁓ You know, coming away with a lot, need to win this game.

Bright: Yeah. Well, I think, I think we need it for a couple of reasons. One, we need it. I'll go back to belief, right? They talked about it on the FS one, ⁓ broadcast. We need to see some belief from our team to, we need some belief from the fans, especially the fans that are at the game season ticket holders, people that have continued to invest to go down to the stadium. You know, it ain't cheap. It's certainly not cheap for the tickets. And then if you're down there, not everybody, I'm sure eats and drinks every, every game, you know, if you're a season ticket holder, but

Kev: Hmm? Yeah.

Bright: For those of us that do, you know, it's a monetary commitment. And when you're not seeing the results on the field, you know, it gets harder and harder to, to swallow that pill. And then we need it for, we need it for Demay. We need it for the coach, you know, like he needs to prove that. You know, he can, he could adjust tactically. I don't think he did that in the last game, you know, certainly not the way that I would have done it. And I'm not saying I'm an expert or that I'm on the level of being a. You know, an MLS coach by any means, but I do know that when you're losing, you have to have the ball to try and score. And, we did not have that. So I think he has to, he has to have a slightly different structure. Now, whether that means a new formation, you know, again, putting some different players in there early, ⁓ or just simply telling the players like we're going to attack the first half, we're going to attack, and then we'll see where we're at. Did we give up some counter attack? Did, did they get a lucky goal? Did we bury a couple, you know, then you can adjust at halftime. Hopefully you don't give up three or something like that, you know, but if you control the play and you give up one counter attack, all right. You know, then, then you're down one, nothing. And yeah, you can come back and you can still put in a strong second half, but let's at least play some attacking, exciting football. You know, and that's another thing that, you know, the owners keep talking about, ⁓

Kev: Yep. You can survive.

Bright: Lutz, Lutz, he kept talking about it. know he's gone. ⁓ we got Ray in here, but we want, we want exciting soccer. Otherwise, otherwise what's the point as a fan? You know, I mean, I guess if you win one, nothing in an ultra defensive battle, you know, all right, that's, that's good every now and then. But if that was, if that was the case every week, I might get a little bored. You know, the games that I remember are.

Kev: Yeah. Feel good? Feel good? Sure. If we won every week, I'd be excited about it. Every time we win, we're excited about it, right? Like, yeah, you might be a little bored throughout the game, but the result, like, you're winning.

Bright: Well, sure. Yeah, I guess so. Yeah. But the games that I remember, you know, the four one win against Seattle where Klaus had two amazing goals, you know, the, the home opener season one, ⁓ things like that, you know, so not, not one, nothing or one, one draws. So we'll see. All right. Well, given where we're at and given the, the odds for Seattle, their wind probability.

Kev: Yeah.

Bright: ⁓ we talked about last week, our bets, our wins, our losses. have some promotional. Bets. So I might go heavy on this game, but what, what should we be doing? What, what are the odds at the moment? Anything that you're eyeing up? I haven't even looked yet. So I'm relying on you.

Kev: So if you're feeling a St. Louis win, it's that plus 200, draw 250, Seattle Sounders 115. Like you said, they're favored to win the game on that three split. I do think we catch some offense because I know the urgency that I think the team needs to have in this game. So I kind of like.

Bright: Okay. Yeah. Right.

Kev: doing a little bit of a two-leg parlay with a toy shirt, shot on goal, a shot on goal, shot on goal, and a betcher, you guessed it, shot on goal, plus 136 right now, you can get it, throw some money down on that one, I think they're going to get one. ⁓ And then ⁓ I ended up throwing, you know, I'm a sucker.

Bright: Shot on goal? That's all we need? Alright, okay.

Kev: I believe that we're gonna come away with a win for some stupid reason.

Bright: Probably I'll probably put money down on a win because otherwise if you're at the game, especially what's the fun, you know, know last time we went to the game and we, put money on the draw, but we were still the, the draw odds were just too good to pass up. ⁓ but not necessarily in this case, I think we're better off putting the money down for a win, hoping for the win and then having something really like we're really cheering for the win, right? Especially I'll, you know, I'll be at this game.

Kev: Yeah, yeah, you know the the ties plus 250 so you're getting just 50 50 points on top of the the city when I'm going to lean on the city when at plus 200 I don't mind pairing it with a with a goal anytime goal scorer better boy shirt. Part of the game you want to roll with him again hoping that he gets another one. I'm OK with that.

Bright: Yeah. Right.

Kev: Any of that combination feels good about it. I'm going to look to avoid the corner kick over under on it. I think DraftKings promoting a three-legged parlay that's got the plus nine and a half corner kicks in it. We're going to avoid that one. I think that one's going to get you, but yeah, that's what I'm riding with.

Bright: Yeah. All right. All right. Good to know. I'll have to do some research and get these, ⁓ get these promotional bets off and I got to maybe put down some real money too, but I haven't done a parlay yet. So maybe I'll, ⁓ you know, I'm new to the sports betting thing. So maybe I'll, I'll get a parlay going here and, ⁓ I. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. But if you hit that, you make you, yeah, you make money too.

Kev: Yeah, plenty of them. Yeah. That's where you lose your money. You lose your money in parlays, you know? That's where they're hoping you put it at. Where you make the money.

Bright: Obviously. I mean, that's how betting works. Now, the last time I was trying to put separate bets down, but it kept attaching it as a parlay. And I was like, no, I don't want the parlay. So I got to figure that out. You know, that's a user error on my port. You know, I did figure it out eventually, but yeah. Yeah. So just to do separate bets and not always the parlay, but well, wish, wish us luck. You know, we'll come back next week, certainly. And we'll, ⁓ we'll do the recap of the match. ⁓ we'll.

Kev: Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah, it's available. Stainless wind. Yep.

Bright: Yep. Yep. Hopefully ⁓ a big win. We'll preview the game, ⁓ against LAFC. Certainly. ⁓ we'll talk about our bets, which one's hit, which ones didn't. Did we win any money? What the vibe at the stadium was like? ⁓ you know, and we'll go for there. Any, ⁓ any closing remarks, Kev. I like silence is a no.

Kev: Let's go get them. Let's bring some energy to this game. Bring some offense. Let's push it. This I think again is a must win game. Let's get out there. Let's bring a win home for the fans.

Bright: I agree. Win for the fans and to our fans, uh, if we have any, uh, we did, you know, we did a decent amount of, listens, uh, to our first several episodes. So thanks for that. Hopefully, you know, again, hopefully you like what you're putting, what we're putting down and, uh, short, sweet to the point. Everybody has time to listen to these. So if you want our insights, uh, you know, former players, season ticket holders, uh, we're happy to give it. And if you

Kev: Must've been mom. Just like to talk about it. Yeah.

Bright: That's right. And if you don't like our insights, screw you. You don't have to listen. We'll see you. Yeah. There's other podcasts. Go listen to those podcasts. Right. We'll see you not next time until then. Here we go.

Kev: Exactly. We'll see you not next time.