TUKWILA, Wash. – If anyone can relate to the challenges that come with being a first-year expansion team like New York City FC, it would be Seattle Sounders head coach Sigi Schmid.
Schmid has been at the helm in Seattle since the team’s first MLS season in 2009 and has been through the same developmental growing process currently being experienced by the NYCFC front office and head coach Jason Kreis. Ahead of the first-ever matchup between the sides set to take place at Yankee Stadium on Sunday (7 pm ET; Fox Sports 1 in US, TSN1 in Canada), Schmid went over some of the parallels that can be drawn between the organizations.
“Building a franchise is never easy,” Schmid said while speaking with reporters after his team’s Thursday training session. “I’ve been through all phases now where I came into the league with the [LA] Galaxy, which was a good team but hadn’t won anything, and we figured out how to win things. Then I went to Columbus, where it was a bad team that wasn’t doing well, and we found our way into a championship.”
But of all the franchise-building Schmid has been a part of during his time in MLS, he says the process of building the Sounders from square one was easily the toughest.
“Now I’ve done it [with Seattle] where you start it with a team a team from scratch,” Schmid said. “They’ve all been interesting projects. They’re all different, they’re all fun, they’re all challenging. But certainly building a team from scratch, it requires probably the most hours.”
The first of three road games for the Sounders, their longest stretch away from home of the young season that also includes games against Columbus Crew SC and Vancouver Whitecaps, also offers another unique aspect: the chance to play at Yankee Stadium. Center back Brad Evans said the chance to play at the historic venue figures to be a highlight of the trip.
“Pretty cool,” Evans said. “You circle certain games on the schedule, and this is one of the away ones that you’re looking forward to. It’ll be pretty cool, pretty surreal. Staying in the city, in the hotel, we’ll get the whole experience on this trip. I think the guys are excited.”
The significance of playing in Yankee Stadium, however, was utterly lost on English defender Tyrone Mears, who is in the midst of his first season in the United States after spending his career in the English Premier League.
“No idea; I know nothing about [Yankee Stadium],” Mears said. “It’s obviously a baseball ground. I’ve heard it’s very tight, so it should be an interesting game.”
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Mears may not be up to speed yet on the historic implications of the field, but his point about the width of the pitch has also been a theme for the Sounders leading up to the game. Seattle adjusted the dimensions of their training field at Starfire on Thursday in anticipation of a field that will be shorter and narrower than the team is used to.
“It’s definitely a little bit different,” midfielder Andy Rose said. “It’s going to be a technical match. Hopefully not too many turnovers on our part, but there will be turnovers. … We have to try and utilize the width as much as possible because obviously it’s not that wide, so you really need to spread it out and use all the space possible.”
