St. Louis City SC turning a corner
The inevitable finally came to pass on Saturday night at Energizer Park. St. Louis City SC ran into the buzzsaw that has been Los Angeles FC and was no match for the league’s hottest team. Denis Bouanga and Son Heung-Min, who have become the league’s most dangerous scoring pairing, combined for three goals, giving the two 15 over the past four games, in a 3-0 win that officially eliminated City SC from playoff contention.
City SC has been effectively out for the past two months, so it isn’t particularly disheartening, but it is now official that City SC will be out of the playoffs for the second year in a row. The loss also snaps City SC’s modest two-game win streak and reinforced that LAFC, with Son and Bouanga, is going to be a tough team to beat the rest of this season.
City SC had gone eight games without being shut out, its longest run of the season, and allowed three or more goals for the 10th time this season. But LAFC is also that good. City SC did do better than some other teams however; LAFC had scored four goals in each of its past three games, and either Son or Bouanga had a hat trick in each of them. This time, Son had two goals and Bouanga had one. When it looked like LAFC might have a penalty kick late in the game, Bouanga looked ready to take it, but VAR went against it.
The elimination also guarantees City SC a spot in next year’s U.S. Open Cup.
City SC came out fast, maybe too fast. Klauss played a ball forward to Sangbin Jeong, but LAFC keeper Hugo Lloris came out and beat him to it, but Jeong crashed into him and both went down. Lloris was down for a while, Jeong got a yellow card, and plenty of ill will from LAFC for colliding with their keeper. Lloris got up and finished the half and didn’t have a whole lot to do, making only one save. He was subbed out at halftime for Thomas Hasal.
One of the things City SC didn’t want to do was give LAFC easy chances it didn’t have to work to earn, but that’s what happened in the 15th minute. Conrad Wallem did not get enough on a back pass and put it right in the path of Bouanga, who was able to come in alone and, by the time he ran into City SC defenders, about 20 yards from the goal, he had the space to shoot where he wanted and beat Burki to make it 1-0.
It was the 23rd goal of the season for Bouanga, putting him one behind Leonel Messi for the league lead and his eighth goal in the past four games.
City SC weathered some heavy pressure from LAFC and looked like it would be able to get into the half down only 1-0, but in stoppage time, LAFC showed how quickly it can turn things. City SC had the ball around midfield, but couldn’t control it and in a flash, the ball got to Son, who dribbled it into the box and scored from about 8 yards out, his sixth goal in four games.
Son got his second in the 60th minute, starting the play with a long run and finishing it after some passing in the box by LAFC.
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Tom Timmermann | Post-Dispatch
Soccer reporter
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