He held out Clint Dempsey. Benched Chad Marshall, too. Then at halftime, he subbed Roman Torres out and subbed Magnus Wolff Eikrem in.
In Sunday’s season opener, Sounders coach Brian Schmetzer rolled out an exhibition-level lineup for the 40,070 ticket-buying fans. And it was absolutely the right decision.
If there is anything we can all agree upon, it’s that soccer is weird. Teams play in multiple leagues, participate in midseason tournaments and generally confuse the hell out of your average Dorito-crunching American sports fan.
It might seem odd that a coach would rest so many players for the season opener — a highly anticipated day in most other sports — but considering the Sounders will soon play their third game in six days, Schmetzer had to.