Focus Game: Djimi Traore's Sounders flounder versus Vancouver

MLS: Seattle Sounders 1-4 Vancouver Whitecaps

Highlights here (they refuse to be embedded): http://www.mlssoccer.com/video/2013/10/10/highlights-seattle-sounders-vs-vancouver-whitecaps#ooid=hnMjJuZjq5zO7570mrG2n_voGzheM6Q_

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I'm sure you've all been wondering just exactly what that Premier League journeyman Nigel Reo-Coker is doing with himself these days.

 

This game between Seattle and Reo-Coker's Vancouver side showed that the former Villa and West Ham man still has all his old... class, as he went on a glorious late-game plod up the pitch to score his first goal of the season. 



Seattle Sounders FC pose unenthusiastically

I watched these highlights in a library and, despite the 3-1 scoreline, I was practically on my feet as Nigel went clean through.  Never mind the keeper's helping hand, it was a special moment.

 

The game also featured the familiar faces of Jay DeMerit (Vancouver), Obafemi Martins and Djimi Traore (both Seattle).  Kenny Miller didn't make the squad for Vancouver due to a groin injury; much as I relish the opportunity to have a poke at the former Scotland star it must be said the little scurrier has adapted smoothly enough to MLS life, bagging 8 goals in 20 games for the distinctly average Vancouver in this, his first full season.

Given the esteem in which both Martins and Traore are still held over here, we might be surprised to learn that Seattle are actually well in the race for the Supporters' Shield (i.e. 'top of the league') - although we might be less surprised at this 4-1 drubbing - off the back of a 5-1 defeat away to Colorado.

Here, we don't see Traore (yellow boots, centre-back) do anything quite as spectacularly wrong as he did in his Liverpool days, but when you're as far out of position as he was for Vanccouver's second goal it must be difficult to get yourself on camera at all.  Fortunately for Seattle, it was only through suspensions and international call-ups that old Djimi got anywhere near the team.

 

I think I have exercised admirable restraint in waiting until this point to lazily link in Traore's classic own goal, scored while playing for Liverpool in 2005.  In the interest of fairness however, this video shows that maybe America has changed him... it does also show that brilliant own goal.

 

 

The fact that Traore was manning Seattle's defences in this game might well have you tempering your enthusiasm for Vancouver's hat-trick hero Kekuta Manneh, the 18-year-old MLS rookie.  And you'd be right - Manneh  has only scored twice in 3 starts and 14 substitute appearance prior to this.  We might have to hold off on the Januzaj-style hype for a few weeks yet.

Seattle will now have to wait another game to book their play-off place, if they can recover their nerve after successive hammerings.  With experienced heads like Traore around, who could have any doubts?

Plenty of reasons to keep an eye on the MLS as it approaches the business end of its season.  The full Seattle-Vancouver match report can be found here on the MLS website.

 

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Photo credit: SkotyWA