Cristian Roldan embraces personal, professional challenges

RENTON – Cristian Roldan is always willing to embrace new challenges, even when it involves unglamorous work.

Whether it’s as a leader on a team that is currently mired in a five-game winless streak to start the season or at home after he recently announced that he’s a soon-to-be father, Roldan understands the work often goes hand-in-hand with reward.

“I’m just proud to finally become a dad and the responsibilities that come with that,” Roldan said when asked about the announcement that he and his wife were expecting their first child in July. “It means to the world for me. I’m stoked to see what comes, the sleep-deprived nights and the other stresses of life. I’m just thrilled and happy.”

As one of the Sounders’ longest-tenured players, Roldan takes a similar “taking whatever comes” approach to his role in helping his team rebound from its 0-3-2 start.

“It’s hard to say again and again, and repeat but this last game I thought we were the better team and created those chances that just didn’t go in,” he said following Wednesday’s training session. “That’s the story of our season. The final product, the final pass. When you go through slumps like this it always seems like it’s just that.”

But Roldan wasn’t about to let he or his teammates off that easy. He understands as well as anyone that the team’s struggles are more than just an inability to score.

“The truth is it’s not just that,” he said. “We’re letting in goals that are very unprofessional of us, they’re very careless. Just following runners, moments where we just switch off. Those are things where we can do better, respond to. That’s the most frustrating.

“We want to be scoring, we want to be an attacking team but that will come. We’re just shooting ourselves in the foot because we’re allowing really easy goals.”

Rather than avoid tough conversations, Roldan said he and his teammates are taking ownership of their collective failures.

“We’re responsible for our actions on the field,” he said. “We’re holding each other accountable. From the outside perspective, it might seem like we’re doing these things or we’re just sad here in training. But the reality is we’re watching film and trying to correct those mistakes. We’re pointing out the negatives, the positives and tryign to take accountability.

“It’s something that doesn’t happen after one game, even though it should. It’s not just one person being a leader, it’s the locker room, the coaching staff, helping correct those mistakes.”

Preparing for CF Montreal

The Sounders’ latest chance to get their first win of the season comes against CF Montreal, a team that’s closing out a season-opening, six-game road trip. After going 2-0-1 in their first three, Montreal is now on a two-game losing streak.

The Sounders see an opportunity to pounce on a team that might be a bit road-weary.

“We’re going to play positive, we’re going to play progressive and we’re going to play hard from the first whistle,” Sounders midfielder Josh Atencio said. “I’m excited for this weekend.”