Since taking over as the Seattle Sounders general manager prior to the start of the 2015 season, Garth Lagerwey has made it clear that one of his main goals is not merely to have the Sounders continue to be a force on the national level. He wants his team to make a mark on the international stage as well.
With Seattle set to take on Club Tijuana in a friendly at CenturyLink Field on Tuesday as a tune-up for the 2015-16 CONCACAF Champions League, Lagerwey says the organization is taking an important initial first step in achieving exactly that.
When Lagerwey took the Seattle job, he stepped into a very different situation than the one he inherited at his previous gig with Real Salt Lake, where he built the club from the ground up and facilitated a long-term rebuilding process.
In Seattle Lagerwey takes over a club that has always been a perennial postseason contender in MLS and is also coming off a 2014 campaign that saw the team bag two trophies and come within a single road goal of advancing to MLS Cup. In other words, he doesn’t really have to change all that much.
“I view my job as coming in and trying to make everyone one percent better,” Lagerwey told reporters at Seattle’s preseason press conference at CenturyLink Field earlier this month. “Taking all the talent and all the smart people that are [already] here and trying to harness it and getting us all to pull in the same direction.”
Since his arrival in Seattle in the offseason, Lagerwey has emphasized his belief the team can still take at least one more big step besides winning an MLS Cup – a step that he says is imperative in establishing that coveted international relevance. That would be winning the CONCACAF Champions League, an international tournament that will pit the Sounders against some of the top clubs from around North America, Central America and the Caribbean.
“Champions League is something that’s critically important to me,” Lagerwey said. “It’s one of the things that I believe in…We need to have a larger presence than just in Seattle or just in the Northwest. And we can. We can do that by playing in international tournaments like Champions League and the preparation for Champions League begins March 24 against Xolos.”
Seattle head coach Sigi Schmid said that he appreciates Lagerwey’s commitment to performing well in Champions League, adding that the mentality of his new GM can only help push forward the commitment already shown by the Sounders. Seattle made it to the semifinals of the tournament in their last appearance in 2012-13.
“I think Garth’s completely correct in what he’s saying but I think we’ve always put emphasis on the Champions League at this club,” Schmid said last week. “That’s why our first experience in Champions League [in 2010-11], we learned from that experience. We changed things because we wanted to be successful in the league in terms of how we traveled. Our emphasis as a club has always been there and will continue to be there.”
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As far as Tuesday’s friendly goes, Lagerwey said that the game serves to prepare his team for the tactics, style of play and environment that they will have to deal with once Champions League play gets started this summer.
“[US-Mexico national team games] are pretty intense and the club level games are equally intense, I can say as someone who has played in and managed those,” Lagerwey said. “I think you’re going to see a really good product on the field in [the friendly] and it’s something that’s really, really important as we think of the Champions League as a 13-month commitment…That’s something that we really believe in and is a priority of mine.”
