Sounders FC star Freddie Ljungberg earning his money

Once again, in the super-heated hum of Qwest Field, with a game slipping away from them and the frustrations from the missed chances beginning to build, Sounders FC looked to Freddie Ljungberg.

Once again, trailing 1-0 in Saturday's second half, they asked him for a little night magic.

And Ljungberg delivered. Another big night. Another million-dollar match.

This was exactly the kind of game the Sounders had in mind when they chose former Arsenal midfielder Ljungberg as their designated player and paid him to be the engine for their offense.

"You never know how good someone is until you're on the pitch with him," rookie forward Steve Zakuani said. "Growing up and watching him in the telly and then being with him in training every day, he just drives the team. Fantastic player. I'm 21. He's 32. If I can have a career half as good as his, I'll be happy.

"I've told him many times, 'I think you're the most intelligent player I've ever played with.' He knows what he's going to do. When he's going to do it. How to do it. All that stuff."

With the ball on his foot, Ljungberg is like Steve Nash on the fastbreak. His head is always up. His field vision is 20-10. Instinctively he knows how to shield defenders from the ball. And his quick-twitch decision-making is like a Formula One driver's.

Against FC Dallas before the biggest MLS crowd of Seattle's season, in the final half of the final game of the season, Ljungberg was the class of the pitch.

"You know that if you get in the right spots, eventually he's going to get you the ball and you're going to get one of the goals," Zakuani said. "We've had to learn how to play with him. He's someone who, when he's on like he has been, we know that if you get him the ball then he's going to create chances and we're going to score."

Ljungberg was the instigator for goal opportunties for Nate Jaqua and Freddy Montero and Zakuani. When they didn't convert, Ljungberg kept coming.

"With Freddie, you know the ball is going to be there, bottom line," midfielder Brad Evans said. "He just knows. It's kind of hard to explain, but he knows where the keeper's going to be. He knows where the defenders are. He's been in that position a hundred times more than any of us have, so you know he knows what to do."

This is Freddie Ljungberg. Dangerous every time the ball is on his boot. Maybe the best player in the MLS. Certainly the league's best newcomer.

When he possesses the ball, there is a belief that something can get done. Like a champion miler, Ljungberg has a finishing kick.

He makes the Sounders a scary first-round opponent as they begin the playoffs against Houston on Thursday at Qwest.

"He's a guy who's a gamer when it comes time to play," technical director Chris Henderson said. "He has the respect in the locker room that this is a guy who's going to win for us. The bigger the game, the better he plays."

Sure, Ljungberg never hides his frustrations. When one of his seeing-eye services isn't finished, he'll often cover his face with his hands, then lift his arms to the heavens as if to say, "What else can I do?"

Then he does more.

"He gets his head down, for sure," Evans said. "But it doesn't mean he's going to stop fighting. He's going to continue to get you that ball. It's not like, 'You missed it once, you're gone.' That's not the case here. He's committed 100 percent. If you're on, he's playing you the ball."

From the edge of the box he crossed a ball onto Fredy Montero's boot and Montero, from the right upright, slid the ball across the goal to Jaqua for the tying score against Dallas.

And 20 minutes later, on the run, Ljungberg created s sliver of space away from Ugo Ihemelu, chipped another perfect pass to Brad Evans, who one-touched the winner past keeper Dario Sala.

Ljungberg, 32, a former Swedish international who is earning $1.3 million, could have thought of this trip from the English Premiership to the MLS as a holiday. He could have taken the money and strolled through the season. Could have partied hard.

But he has treated this year with the newly minted Sounders as seriously as a Champions League season. He has made this team into something more than an expansion team.

"He came here to work," Zakuani said.

It says something about the makeup of these Sounders that their two most-decorated players, keeper Kasey Keller and Ljungberg, are two of their hardest-working players.

"When guys come over here from Europe, you never know if they're going to take their foot off the gas," Jaqua said. "Freddie hasn't at all. Every time he steps on the field, he approaches it with a lot of energy and passion."

It's winning time, and Ljungberg is going full throttle. In his first season in America, he's playing like a million bucks.

Steve Kelley: 206-464-2176 or skelley@seattletimes.com.

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