There are somethings that can only be learned in a competitive match. Practice can give the coaches a lot of information about players, but only real game time can reveal the whole picture. Ideally these final puzzle pieces slide into place during preseason games or early in the regular season, and a single-elimination tournament is about the worst place to be fumbling those pieces into place. But what has passed has, indeed, passed. There are discussions to be had about how, why, who got the Seattle Sounders to this place, but let’s put those aside for a moment and look at what the 2-1 loss to San Jose taught us.
The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Things learned from Open Cup Loss
