Osvaldo Alonso, a first team All-USL First Division midfielder and league rookie of the year in 2008, has signed with Seattle Sounders FC.

Not surprisingly, all early opinions are optimistic.

I asked Alonso for a self-scouting report on what he can bring.

“He can help a lot in the defense and attacking,” his interpreter said from Alonzo’s response in Spanish. “He’s very equal in terms of being able to attack and play defense. He plays the ball extremely well.”

And this, from coach Sigi Schmid: “He’s a good player, that’s why we wanted to get him.

Read more »

Major League Soccer will release the entire 2009 regular season schedule tomorrow at 9 a.m. Wednesday on www.MLSnet.com. The announcement will include the national broadcast schedule for the 2009 season including times and dates for games broadcast by Major League Soccer’s national television partners ESPN2/ESPN Deportes, Fox Soccer Channel/Fox Sports en Español and TeleFutura.



Meanwhile, the Seattle Sounders FC has announced a handful of preseason games. Unfortunately, none are both local and open — however one open match is as near as Portland, and two others will be in Southern California.



In

Read more »

I just got a first meeting with the newest Sounder, defender Patrick Ianni, who was acquired in a trade with Houston. (See two posts below, and here’s my story from the Tuesday paper.)

“Very happy to be here,” he said. “I got up here no problems. The facilities are incredible. Just ready to get to work here. … (Houston) was a very good three years for me, but I’m happy with this opportunity and looking forward to this year.”

Sounders coach Sigi Schmid seemed happy as well.

“It gives us a little more depth at

Read more »

Coach Sigi Schmid had implied on Friday that roster subtractions were coming, and today they came.

The club has announced that defender/midfielder Nik Besagno, forward Jason Cascio, forward Andre Schmid and forward Craig Tomlinson are all no longer with the team. All played with the USL Sounders last season.

The club also announced a trade for Houston Dynamo central defender Patrick Ianni (see post below).

Seattle Sounders FC has announced that it has acquired Patrick Ianni of the Houston Dynamo, a member of the 2008 U.S. Olympic Team, in exchange for a conditional 2010 MLS SuperDraft selection.

Here’s the release from the Sounders FC website.

Ianni, 23, is a 6-foot-1 central defender who played the past three seasons for Houston. He saw action in 17 matches, starting 10, in 2008. He also played nine more games for the Dynamo during SuperLiga, Champions Cup and CONCACAF Champions League play. Although he did not see action in Beijing, he played in three

Read more »

Sounders FC coach Sigi Schmid canceled practice for today, giving the Sounders a weekend off before reporting back on Monday.

"Early in the week on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we’re going to get some testing done as well,” Schmid said. “Part of testing is to establish their heart rates and so forth. So from a standpoint of fitness, we can get all the numbers and start to compile those things. It will start Monday with obviously the big beat test, which none of the guys like, but is something we got to do. And there will be some other

Read more »

Here’s a news release from the PASL:

The Tacoma Stars of the Premier Arena Soccer League (PASL-Premier) find themselves in the quarterfinals of the US Arena Soccer Open Championships after upsetting the Professional Arena Soccer League (PASL-Pro) Wenatchee Fire 10-9 in overtime on Saturday.



Tacoma is currently the only PASL-Premier team to beat a PASL-Pro team in the 25 team tournament. Led by Greg Howes, the Stars rallied from a 9-6 deficit to send the game into overtime where Howes’ fourth goal of the game ended it in sudden death.



The

Read more »

It may be the most trivial of trival quiz answers, but the Sounders practiced 11-on-11 for the first time today, and the first goal was scored by forward Nate Jaqua, finishing a nice cross from short range past Chris Eylander. (Here’s my story from the Saturday paper.)

Jaqua ended with two goals during the work. Fredy Montero scored on a header. And Sebastien Le Toux scored on a breakaway which just might have drawn an offsides call in a game.

“It was good,” coach Sigi Schmid said. “The guys, you could see that their raised their level

Read more »