Cincinnati holds on for 1-0 victory over Seattle Sounders

CINCINNATI, Ohio (AP) — Brenner Souza da Silva scored in the 63rd minute and Roman Celentano made it stand up as FC Cincinnati blanked the Seattle Sounders 1-0 on Saturday night.

Cincinnati 1, Seattle Sounders 0: Stats

Junior Moreno and Luciano Acosta notched assists on Brenner’s game-winner.

Cincinnati (2-0-1) played a man down after Nick Hagglund picked up a red card in the 83rd minute. Yéimar Gómez missed a header from the left side of the box for the Sounders (2-1-0) in the seventh minute of stoppage time.

Seattle had 12 shots but just one of them was on goal. Cincinnati had two shots on goal and nine overall attempts.

Celentano finished with one save for Cincinnati. Stefan Frei did not post a save for Seattle after opening with two straight clean sheets.

It was the Sounders’ first trip to Cincinnati. Seattle beat Cincinnati 4-1 and drew 1-1 in Seattle. The Sounders this year became the first team to score at least five goals without surrendering any in the first two matches of a season.

Cincinnati is 3-0-2 in its last five matches against the Western Conference after losing five straight prior. Cincinnati had its streak of seven straight home matches with multiple goals snapped.

Seattle entered the match without its newest starHéber, who will miss 2-4 weeks with a hamstring strain suffered while training this week. Heber joined Fredy Montero (2009) as the only Sounders to score goals in each of their first two matches with the team. His seven shots on goal in his first two matches tied the team record set by Raúl Ruidíaz in 2021.

Both teams next play Saturday. Seattle will host defending champion LAFC, while Cincinnati travels to play the Chicago Fire.

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