St. Louis CITY SC had an interesting Wednesday evening as they attempted to finish out a match in Dallas that kicked off over a month ago.
There is no blueprint for managing a 40-minute restart that interrupted your longest home stand of the season, but Bradley Carnell tried to have his men ready for anything.
“The travel was on point, wheels up to wheels down was only one hour and forty minutes, which is really good. We had a really good rhythm, got in early, and had a normal Match day routine. […] to play forty minutes and do all this, invest so much in terms of logistics, to not leave here with a clean sheet is the most frustrating aspect to me…”
Expecting his CITY squad to leave Frisco with a clean sheet shouldn’t have been asking too much, approaching the 80th minute, CITY had Dallas on the ropes and had looked dangerous throughout the restart.
CITY’s 0.79 xG over the restart won’t be a great consolation for Carnell, especially given the way their team defense completely broke down over the final ten minutes.
Dallas is at their most dangerous when they can run at you on the counter when they can slip Jesus Ferreira behind the lines, and that is exactly how Dallas struck first.
Ferreira’s goal moves him back into the joint-lead in the MLS Golden Boot race and was a real showcase of how he can be so dangerous in those specific conditions.
Shortly after Ferreira’s backbreaking counter, Dallas would once again take advantage of a stretched St. Louis backline. A late arriving Marco Farfan would arrive in the box completely unmarked, and powered the ball past Roman Bürki at his near post.
It’ll be an effort that St. Louis wants back, but it is hard to find too much to nitpick in these circumstances. Sure, some old problems came back around but Dallas is a very good squad too and it only takes a few ill-timed moments to go down in this league.
“Dallas is a good team, when you give up those moments, aren’t ready to recover, those are the mistakes that you can not make in the MLS”, Carnell would say about his team’s performance in his post-match comments.
“I told everyone in the locker room, forget the game, it’s over, let’s get ready for CITYPARK on Sunday.” Assistant Captain Tim Parker would say, “It was a unique scenario, and obviously one that I’ve never experienced before.”
Roster News and Notes
Bradley Carnell would give great insight into his roster this week, both before and after the match. There have been many questions surrounding John Nelson and his capability as an MLS starting Left Back, especially after seemingly losing his job to, an out-of-position, Kyle Hiebert.
“Johnny Nelson was, and is, a starter on this team”, Carnell would clear up after Wednesday’s contest. That comment isn’t surprising from a manager that backs his players so intensely, but to hear it after a match where Nelson had some dangerous moments is noteworthy.
Meanwhile, Miggy Perez was playing in the Njabulo Blom position tonight, and Carnell stood by his decision to not make the change ahead of the restart. “We back Miggy, he was a starter when this match started and he can be a starter now. Njabulo will be ready for the Galaxy game, and then he’s off to the South Africa National Team.”
Finally, Carnell had some news about injured DP striker João Klauss, saying that he has been “shut down” for the next two weeks and will be reevaluated at that time. It’s rough timing but this is the decision of a club taking their time with a star player, knowing that they’ll need him as they prepare for the playoffs this fall.
St. Louis will be looking forward to moving on from this performance, another road loss that makes it five straight without a win. Home cooking has been much better for them lately as they aim to make it 5 in a row at CITYPARK when the LA Galaxy comes to town on Sunday.
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