ST. LOUIS – After consecutive wins in Montreal and San Jose in the past two weeks, St. Louis City SC returned home to Energizer Park on Saturday night, hosting Los Angeles Football Club.
A beautiful night greeted the 22-thousand-plus in attendance, as a warm day gave way for a very comfortable evening in Downtown West. The evening was even better if you were an LAFC fan, as they shutout City 3-0.
Many fans in attendance were wearing jerseys of LAFC’s big summer signing, South Korean star Hueng-min Son, who became a legend at Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League, where he spent the past decade of his career before migrating across the pond to MLS this summer.
To the delight of those wearing his jersey in the stands, Son started as an attacker for the visitors. Unlike other big names that have made the MLS switch, Son has been almost ever-present for LAFC, scoring a glut of goals and opening up opportunities for the club’s star attacker Denis Bouanga.
For St. Louis City and interim manager David Critchley, there were only two changes to the team that won 3-1 in San Jose last weekend. Center back Fallou Fall, who missed last week’s trip out west due to an illness, returned to the starting lineup. Henry Kessler, still not 100% from his hamstring injury, was left out of the matchday squad for the second straight week.
Timo Baumgartl again started at center back in Kessler’s stead. Just like last week, the center backs were flanked by Devin Padelford at left back and Conrad Wallem at right back.
The holding midfield pair stays the same, with Chris Durkin and Eduard Löwen manning the City engine room. The only other change to the lineup from last week is the return of Sangbin Jeong on the right wing, as he faces his South Korean National teammate Heung-min Son for the first time in his career.
Marcel Hartel started on the left wing, and 2024 MLS SuperDraft third-rounder Brendan McSorley earned another start after scoring twice in his first MLS start in San Jose last week. To accommodate Sangbin Jeong’s return to the lineup, McSorley played off of/behind starting striker Joao Klauss.
Over the past few weeks, City have had success against a Montreal team that has already been eliminated from playoff contention in the Eastern Conference and a San Jose team that is on the outside looking into the Western Conference playoff picture.
LAFC are a very different beast, coming into Saturday’s meeting in fourth place in the Western Conference, just four points off San Diego FC at the top. Since the addition of Heung-min Son, they’ve been scoring goals for fun.
So it was no surprise when LAFC started out dominantly, and St. Louis City was forced into a defensive shell early that proved to be quite hard to escape.
When playing against the top talent in MLS, City has to play a perfect game to get a result, and mistakes will be punished by the class that LAFC possesses. In the 15th minute, a City mistake turned into the first goal of the game for the visitors.
Conrad Wallem didn’t get enough juice on his pass intended for Timo Baumgartl on the City backline, and it was picked off by Denis Bouanga, who had a ton of space to run into and a ton of time to pick a spot. He chose the bottom left corner, and Roman Bürki’s dive couldn’t reach.
It was Bouanga’s 23rd goal of the season, trailing just Lionel Messi in the MLS Golden Boot race. Bouanga has now scored in five straight matches, and has scored nine goals in that time.
City were behind after just a quarter of an hour, and it wasn’t getting any prettier. Los Angeles spent most of the first half passing the ball around, waiting for another City slip-up. LAFC waited until first half stoppage time, but doubled their lead thanks to their new star man.
Heung-min Son latched onto a ball in what felt like acres of open space, running at the heart of the City defense. Timo Baumgartl, having to choose whether to step up to Son and risk being blown by, or backing up and keeping Son in front of him, chose the latter.
In doing so, Baumgartl gave Son ample time to pick and choose where he wanted to slot his shot. He chose the same place Denis Bouanga did about a half hour earlier, and LAFC took a 2-0 lead into halftime break. It could have been even more if they wanted.
LAFC had the ball in the City net in the 57th minute, but Denis Bouanga was just a step offside when he tapped his shot home. That one didn’t count, but the playoff contenders only had to wait another three minutes for one that did.
Another spell of Angelino dominance saw St. Louis City hemmed into their own box, watching on as black and gold jerseys ran around and passed through them. The ball came to Heung-min Son near the top of the box.
As City players watched on, legs sluggish from all the defending they’d been doing up to that point, Son hit a shot to the bottom left corner that wrongfooted Roman Bürki. Son’s second goal of the night, and his eighth goal since making his MLS debut on August 9.
The next half-hour plus eleven minutes of stoppage time saw LAFC knock it down a gear or two, and City saw some of their first meaningful possession of the game. Well, meaningful in the sense that they had time on the ball, even if the game felt like it was over for the most part.
Joao Klauss put the ball in the LAFC goal in the 77th minute, a low shot that deflected off an LA defender and into the goal, but the linesman’s flag was raised for offside. Second half sub Celio Pompeu had strayed just off in the build up, waiting for an outlet pass before making a run towards the LAFC 18-yard box.
There was some late game chippiness, a little bit of fight from St. Louis City, but 3-0 would be the final score when referee Victor Rivas blew his whistle for full time in the 101st minute.
On Saturday, the City that we’ve seen over the past few weeks on the road in Montreal and San Jose was nowhere to be found. “Not good enough” and “they were the better team” rang throughout Saturday’s postgame presser.
“I think for us, our performance was not good enough, was not up to our expectations and our standards,” Critchley admitted. “Taking nothing away from L.A., I think that they have a very, very solid roster. The talent in their locker is very high level, and you see that today. We give two goals away in the first half that are too sloppy, too easy. Teams with that quality, with the roster they have, will punish you and that’s why they are where they are in the standings.”
“We have to be honest to ourselves and have to say that LAFC was the better team with the ball and against the ball,” said Marcel Hartel. “So they deserve the win for sure.”
City’s co-captain and star midfielder Eduard Löwen pointed to being “intimidated” by the talent of their opponents on the evening.
“We were just very sloppy on the ball,” Löwen analyzed. “And I feel like the guy on the ball often was the poorest guy on the pitch, because we kind of seemed, especially in the first half, we kind of seemed intimidated. And yeah, a team like that also smells that and takes advantage of that. And I mean, especially when you are down to zero and then three zero, there is nothing to lose anymore. You just have to go after it. You just have to try.
After stringing together wins on the road that kept them technically alive in the playoff race with three MLS games to play, City were officially eliminated from playoff contention with Saturday’s defeat.
“Mathematically, we knew the situation we were in several weeks ago,” said City interim manager David Critchley following the defeat that officially ended any lingering playoff hopes. “It was inevitable it was going to happen. Now it’s just about coming back and seeing how we as a club and the players respond this week in training.”
“When we started the season, we wanted to be much more successful,” City midfielder Marcel Hartel explained. “We didn’t make the playoffs last season, and we started the season to go for the playoffs, and we missed it again. It’s very disappointing for the club, for us as a team, and now we have to go in the last two games to do our best.”
Eduard Löwen pointed to both the club’s desire to be successful, and the platform that’s been given to them to do so.
“Obviously, it’s disappointing, because St. Louis City is a club that wants to be a playoff team, and I think we should be.” Löwen said postgame. “This club gives us all the resources. And I think we, this club, have so much potential. We need to do everything next year to get there [to the playoffs].”
City head to Austin next Saturday, October 4, for their penultimate MLS game of 2025.
