Ontivero a work in progress for the Montreal Impact

After opening the MLS campaign with two wins, the Montreal Impact has now lost two in a row. The team’s second defeat, a 1-0 setback, came on Saturday away to the Seattle Sounders at CenturyLink Field, where a late goal from Clint Dempsey was the difference.

The loss, in many ways, resembled the Impact’s first defeat of the campaign two weekends ago against FC Dallas in Texas, where they were very good defensively for the most part, but struggled to create scoring opportunities. Against the Sounders, the Impact were 11 minutes away from a solid road point—and a draw would have probably been a fair result—until errors from Donny Toia and Evan Bush gifted the home side the go-ahead goal.

Though the Impact will feel disappointed with the game, one which with a little more attacking quality and verve they might have managed to win, there were still plenty of positives.

Here’s what went well:

A proactive approach
Having started the season with three losses in three games, Seattle demonstrated urgency from the opening whistle. Lined up in a very aggressive, attack-minded formation, which turned into a 4-2-4 when in possession with Dempsey playing in a more withdrawn role, the Sounders were immediately on the front foot.

Although they tried to pin the Impact back in their end, they were never really successful in doing so as Montreal was very aggressive themselves, keeping a fairly high line and doing a lot of smart pressing of their own. It’s with a more proactive approach of this kind, where they’re able to match the intensity of their opponents and maintain a good rhythm of play, that the Impact will find success on the road this season.

Almost perfect at the back
Aside from a misjudgment by Bush in trying come out for the corner kick at the second post which led to the Sounders’ goal, and a needless foul committed by Toia, which helped lead to the goal sequence, the Impact were excellent defensively.

Laurent Ciman and Victor Cabrera were superb in the centre, appearing almost unbothered at times as they broke up numerous attacks with well-timed interventions— Ciman’s surgical, sweeping first-half slide tackle on Demspey was one of the finer moments of a game where quality was lacking from both sides.

At fullback, Toia showed a lot more going forward and Hassoun Camara, in his second game back from injury, grew in confidence as things progressed. Bush didn’t have many saves to make, but made one important one on a powerful Dempsey free kick in the second half.

Jackson-Hamel positive once again
A product of the Impact’s academy, Anthony Jackson-Hamel came off the bench for the fourth time this season and for the fourth time made a positive impact. Though not as quick or experienced as Domenic Oduro, who he substituted in the 69th minute, Jackson-Hamel offered more of a physical presence in the attack, helping hold up the ball well on a few occasions. His positive link-up play got Ignacio Piatti more involved in the game, as the Impact pushed for a late-game equalizer.

As for what didn’t go well, it had mostly do with the attacking side of things:

Not enough danger
Just like in their 2-0 loss to Dallas two weekends ago, the Impact failed to get on the score sheet and struggled to create clear-cut scoring opportunities. Making things more difficult was the fact they seldom were able to get many numbers forward, though this was probably due to wanting to take less risk defensively. When the Impact did get into promising positions, the end-product wasn’t there; Montreal’s most crafty attacking midfielders, Piatti and Harry Shipp, didn’t have their best day.

An off-game for Oduro
In what has been a very good to start to the season, Domenic Oduro might be playing the best soccer of his career; against the Sounders, however, he didn’t have as much influence. Leading the line in the Impact’s usual 4-2-3-1 formation, he wasn’t able to offer the right kind of movement to unbalance the Seattle back line; and when he did receive the ball, he often lacked precision or good judgement in his passes.

Ontivero a work in progress
There’s been some flashes of talent and plenty of endeavour, but it’s going to take some time yet for Lucas Ontivero to get acclimated to MLS and to get used to simply playing games on a regular basis. The 21-year-old Argentine, who’s on loan from Turkey’s Galatasaray, has spent the last few years on half-season loan spells with few opportunities to see game action.

At the moment, Ontivero’s game is rather one-dimensional and he has become predictable—from the right side of midfield, he likes to cut into the middle and play onto his left foot. His main problem is that he tries to do a little too much at times, taking one touch or one dribble too many instead of simply giving the ball off to a teammate. But there’s promise for sure, and again, he’s only 21.