SEATTLE — With all of their regulars back on the field, the Seattle Sounders were too much for San Jose.
Lamar Neagle scored twice and Mauro Rosales added a goal and an assist to help lead the Seattle Sounders FC to a 4-0 win over the San Jose Earthquakes on Saturday.
Neagle made it 3-0 in the 54th minute with a left-footed kick from just inside the box after he danced around a defender and gave Seattle (3-3-3) its highest scoring output of the season after scoring only three in the first eight games.
“It was great to get a 4-0 win,” Neagle said. “That’s what we’ve been waiting for. We knew only time was going to prevent us from doing it. We eventually got a bunch of guys on the field and we still have more to come.”
A mix of injuries and suspensions has kept Seattle from fielding a regular lineup.
Seattle is undefeated in the last five games after a 0-3-1 start and won at home for the first time in four games this season.
“We had a rough spell and now we are on a good streak,” Neagle said.
San Jose (3-4-5) dropped to 0-3-2 on the road this season. The Earthquakes had snapped a six-game winless streak with a 2-1 win over Toronto FC on Wednesday.
“It’s just one of those things,” San Jose forward Chris Wondolowski said about the road problems. “We’re going to go back and work hard all next week and try to get three points next week. We need to do the little things better. We’ve got ourselves in the hole a lot on the road giving up the first goal and that’s never easy.”
The four-goal effort by Seattle didn’t surprise Wondolowski.
“They’re a great team and we knew that coming in that they’re so dangerous,” Wondolowski said. “They have a lot of guys healthy now that they didn’t have at the beginning. They showed their class today.”
Neagle drilled a right-footed shot from the center of the box to the top left corner for the first goal of the game in the 28th minute. He tallied his first goal of the season off a chest pass from Rosales, who received a cross in the box from Eddie Johnson.
“I saw Eddie going out wide and Mauro was taking the near post so I was just trying to hold back in the holding spot like we were in a PK and Mauro had a chance to send it down and I just kept my head down and ran through it,” Neagle said.
Neagle, who returned after a one-game suspension for a red card, nearly scored in the 47th minute on a header but goalkeeper Jon Busch tipped the ball over the crossbar.
Rosales curled in a right-footed free kick from just outside the box in added time in the first half to put the Sounders up 2-0 at halftime in front of a crowd of 38,880. Busch leaped high as the ball glanced off his hand as Rosales scored his second goal of the year. A foul and yellow card on Rafael Baca set up the goal by Rosales.
Obafemi Martins scored in added time to make the final score 4-0.
The Earthquakes had a great opportunity to score in the 37th minute but Alan Gordon missed an open header in front of the goal.
San Jose had beaten the Sounders four consecutive games, including a 1-0 win on March 23.
Michael Gspurning earned his fourth shutout and has allowed only seven goals. He had three saves.
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