Soccer newsletter: LAFC continues to have a charmed season

Hello and welcome to the weekly L.A. Times soccer newsletter. I’m Kevin Baxter, the Times’ soccer writer, and today we look at the Galaxy starting their playoff drive with a stumble, the rising tide of women’s soccer that has helped lift Angel City and Crystal Dunn’s return to the women’s national team. Sort of.

But we start with LAFC, whose remarkable season could end with a substantial rewriting of the MLS record book. How charmed a year has it been? Well, on Saturday LAFC lost for the first time in nearly seven weeks and still became the first team in the league to clinch an MLS Cup playoff berth.

The 2-1 loss in San Jose ended a franchise-record seven-game winning streak in which LAFC had outscored opponents 19-5. Despite the loss, LAFC (18-5-3) leads the Supporters’ Shield race by six points, the Western Conference table by nine and is well within reach of the MLS record for points (73) and the modern-era mark for wins (22).

That makes the playoff berth just the first of many prizes LAFC hopes to claim this year.

“Playoffs are one of our goals. We can check that box,” goalkeeper Maxime Crepeau said. “This is an accomplishment, and we are proud of this. But in the meantime, we have some things bigger in mind and we’ve got to work for it. There are eight more games to get another of these boxes checked.”

Coach Steve Cherundolo agreed while identifying a goal that had little to do with numbers.

“To win as many games as possible. And we’ll start with the next one,” he said. “That has always been the goal of this team: to look one step ahead and no further.”

General manager John Thorrington began building the foundation for LAFC’s remarkable success last winter, shortly after a losing season in which the team failed to make the playoffs for the first time.

When coach Bob Bradley’s contract expired, Thorrington turned over the team to Cherundolo, a former national team player who had gone 6-23-3 in his managerial debut with the Las Vegas Lights, LAFC’s affiliate in the second-tier USL Championship. It seemed an unusual choice given the Lights’ performance. But Cherundolo, a San Diego native who began his coaching career in Germany, returned to Southern California with the idea that he might someday replace Bradley.

As a result, his mission with Las Vegas was to hone talent and not win titles. He did that and developed seven players who are on LAFC’s first-team roster this season.

Thorrington then started building out his team by spending the big pile of allocation money he had squirreled away on defender Franco Escobar, midfielder Kellyn Acosta and Crepeau. He also signed free-agent midfielder Ilie Sánchez and traded for defender Ryan Hollingshead.

The building continued into the summer with LAFC adding former Italian national team star Giorgio Chiellini; Welshman Gareth Bale, a five-time Champions League winner at Real Madrid; and signing captain Carlos Vela to a contract extension. Earlier this month, Thorrington acquired winger Denis Bouanga from French club Saint-Etienne, and on Monday he reportedly was close to landing former Barcelona winger Cristian Tello in a deal that hinged on LAFC’s ability to first move designated player Brian Rodríguez to Mexico’s Club América.

It’s arguably been the most ambitious — and successful — 10-month period for a general manager in MLS history. But it will mean little if LAFC doesn’t win the MLS Cup. The team already has a Supporters’ Shield and it broke the league’s single-season points record in 2019, but that campaign ended with a loss in the Western Conference final.

LAFC is 1-3 in postseason play overall.

“We definitely have a fantastic roster that can go all the way,” Crepeau said. “Everybody has the same mindset, which is win, home or away. We do believe we have the quality to do so.

“We want the Shield and then we’ll focus on the playoffs.”

LAFC never led in the San Jose game, falling behind on a goal by Benjamin Kikanovic in the 14th minute. That marked the first time LAFC has trailed since July 29. Mahala Opoku matched that early in the second half before Cade Cowell scored the game winner with 13 minutes left in regulation.

LAFC plays its next two matches in Texas, against Austin and Houston, before finishing the regular season with three of its final six matches at home, where it is a league-best 11-1-2.

LAFC record watch

Overall wins: 18

Games remaining: 8

MLS wins record (modern era): 22, New England Revolution, 2021, New York Red Bulls, 2018

Points: 57 (2.19 PPG)

MLS record: 73, New England Revolution, 2021 (2.15 PPG)

LAFC remaining points available: 24

Until 2000, MLS games could not end in a draw

Galaxy let one get away — again

Galaxy coach Greg Vanney during a match earlier this season.

(Jacob Kupferman / Associated Press)

Though LAFC backed into its postseason reservation Saturday, the Galaxy began their drive toward what they hope will be a playoff berth by blowing a two-goal, first-half lead to the Seattle Sounders, then rallying to earn a point on Dejan Joveljic’s penalty-kick goal in stoppage time.

It’s hard to say whether that qualifies as good news or bad news. Giving away a comfortable lead at home never is a good thing, but coming back to salvage a point is a positive, especially this late in the season. Coach Greg Vanney believes the race for a playoff berth doesn’t truly begin until the final 10 games of the schedule, and the Galaxy passed that milepost in the draw with Seattle.

To get into the postseason for just the second time since 2016, the Galaxy (10-11-4) must finish in the top half of the 14-team Western Conference and Friday’s draw left them there, tied with Vancouver at 34 points and above the playoff line on a tiebreaker of total wins. The battle for the final three playoff spots will be intense, with seven teams separated by just six points.

The Galaxy have a game in hand on three of those teams and two games in hand on the other three. That’s an advantage Vanney can’t afford to waste, which makes the team’s upcoming trip to New England and Toronto massive.

But the games also will be personally meaningful for Vanney in ways that have nothing to do with the playoffs.

In New England, Vanney will go up against Bruce Arena, his manager with the national team and the most successful coach in U.S. soccer history. Arena has a special place in Galaxy lore as the man who rescued the franchise when he took over a losing, listless team late in the 2008 season and led it to three MLS Cup titles and eight consecutive playoff appearances.

Last year Arena led the Revolution to the Supporters’ Shield title and broke the MLS record for points in a season. The Galaxy, meanwhile, have been to the postseason just once in five years since Arena left.

“Playing against Bruce is great because I played for Bruce and obviously his history with the Galaxy,” Vanney said. “That team was firing on all cylinders last year. That’s always a really tough place to play.”

Three days after that game in New England, the Galaxy will head to Toronto, where Vanney’s place in that franchise’s history is similar to Arena’s in Los Angeles. When Vanney took over Toronto with 10 games left in the 2014 season, the team had never had a winning record or qualified for the playoffs.

Under Vanney, Toronto made five postseason appearances in six full seasons and won the only treble in MLS history in 2017, capturing the Supporters’ Shield, MLS Cup and the Canadian Cup. A year later Vanney took Toronto to the CONCACAF Champions League final, where it lost on penalty kicks.

“To play Toronto in Toronto will be a special occasion for myself, my staff and some of our players who were there. We had a lot of success and won a lot of things with that fan base,” said Vanney, who brought five assistants with him when he came to the Galaxy before last season. Since then he’s also signed former Toronto players Víctor Vázquez, Mark Delgado, Eriq Zavaleta and Raheem Edwards.

“I think it will be a warm welcome. Those fans are knowledgeable,” he added. “It’ll be great to be in the stadium again.”

Vanney left Toronto shortly after the 2020 season to come to Carson, where he was tasked with returning the franchise to the glory he helped establish as a player on the Galaxy’s inaugural team in 1996. Vanney narrowly missed a playoff berth last season and now finds himself in another tight fight — one the upcoming trip could influence since the Galaxy are 4-1-1 against Eastern Conference teams this year.

“Ultimately for our group, it’s an opportunity for more points,” Vanney said.

That’s an opportunity the Galaxy missed against the Sounders, when they gave up a halftime lead for the first time in seven games this season. Javier “Chicharito” Hernández and Víctor Vázquez sent the Galaxy into the locker room at the break with a 2-0 lead, but Seattle erased the deficit less than 30 minutes into the second half on goals from Kelyn Rowe, Raúl Ruidíaz and Jordan Morris.

The Galaxy battled back to earn an important point when Joveljic scored on a stoppage-time penalty kick, awarded when a video review ended with Seattle’s Xavier Arreaga getting called for a handball.

“In the end, it’s a good point because we were losing. We have to understand what it is,” a disappointed Vázquez said afterward. “But again, I said to the guys many times, it’s about consistency. We cannot win one game and then play this second game and go up and down.”

The draw, which followed a win over Vancouver, gave the Galaxy their first two-game unbeaten streak in more than two months, but the team hasn’t won consecutive games since April.

Angel City at the forefront of a soccer revolution

Angel City midfielder Cari Roccaro.

(Kyusung Gong / Associated Press)

Angel City couldn’t have picked a better season to join NWSL. Not only is the 10-year-old league healthier than ever, but women’s soccer globally has reached an important inflection point with Barcelona twice playing in front of crowds of more than 91,000 this year and England drawing a record 87,192 to Wembley Stadium for its European Championship final win over Germany.

That victory and the crowds — the tournament averaged 18,544 over 31 games, more than double the previous record — marked a huge shift in women’s soccer in Europe. It also makes October’s U.S.-England friendly at Wembley, a game matching the reigning World Cup champions with the reigning European champions, one of the most anticipated in recent history.

Angel City hasn’t wasted the opportunity. Its massive ownership group of A-list Hollywood celebrities, world champion athletes and business moguls has brought the team attention it might not otherwise have received, and its pledge to be an agent of change in the community has helped it stand out in an area that has 11 other pro sports franchises.

“Angel City is unique,” said Carmelina Moscato, a former NWSL player and Canadian international who’s now coaching in Mexico with Tigres’ Femenil. “It’s a global phenomenon in the way that they’ve come together and created this club and this institution. There’s a lot to learn in how they’ve gone about it on and off the pitch.

“Especially off the pitch.”

It’s definitely been an up-and-down season on the field, with Friday’s 1-1 draw with the Kansas City Current leaving Angel City (6-5-4) a point below the NWSL playoff line with seven games to play. And again it was a goal in the final 10 minutes that cost Angel City, with Lo’eau LaBonta getting fouled by defender Paige Nielsen in the penalty area, then scoring on a penalty kick in the 82nd minute. That matched a score from Cari Roccaro four minutes earlier and marked the fourth time in six games Angel City has given up the tying or winning goal in the final 10 minutes of regulation or stoppage time.

Goalkeeper Didi Haradic deserved a better fate for a performance in which she made seven saves, matching a career high.

But if the team has been lackluster on the field, it has been spectacular everywhere else. It sold more than 16,000 season tickets, played to capacity crowds in three of its nine league games at home and leads the NWSL in attendance at 18,755, nearly triple the league average and better than half the clubs in MLS. (It’s also higher than eight Major League Baseball clubs and nearly double the league-wide average in the WNBA.)

According to a recent survey from Sportico, Angel City already is worth $100 million, more than double the value of the next-best NWSL team, and its sponsorship deals alone are worth an estimated $35 million. Sportico said the team has benefitted not only from the growing popularity of soccer — especially women’s soccer — in the U.S., but also from the expectation that the NWSL, which is expanding, will continue to appreciate.

Angel City is doing its part to keep the momentum going. Earlier this month it hosted Tigres, the most successful team in Mexico’s Liga MX Femenil, in a friendly and next month it will play the Mexican national team. Friendlies between teams from rival leagues are rare in women’s soccer and games between clubs and national teams are even more unusual.

But then Angel City is no regular club. So while it’s benefitting from soccer’s growth, it’s also fueling it.

“In the absence of a true Champions League here in CONCACAF, these kind of independent partnerships will take this game to another level,” Moscato said after the Tigres’ friendly. “And I think it will inspire other leagues as well to get moving.

“When you start to see the game growing in these ways, you want to be part of it.”

Indeed. Which is why Barcelona president Joan Laporta, whose team has been under such severe financial pressure in the last 13 months it had to sell Lionel Messi and 25% of its La Liga TV revenues for the next quarter-century, said the team will not transfer funds over from his successful women’s team to help the men’s team balance the books.

Despite the controversy swirling around the men’s team, the women went 30-0 in La Liga play last season and outscored opponents 159-11. (That arguably says as much about the uneven level of play in Spanish women’s soccer as it does about the prowess of the Blaugranes, who lost just two matches, both in the final two rounds of Champions League play.)

“We are very proud of our women’s team,” Laporta said. “They gave us a very nice image. We promote the women’s team to the world. We are investing more and more in order to be competitive.”

Under Laporta, the club opened its famed La Masia academy to women residents for the first time, another nod to the sport’s growth. Still, what the club spends on its women’s team — $8 million in salaries and expenses in 2020-21, according to its annual report — is pocket change compared to what Barcelona spends on the men’s program. Promising not to raid the women’s coffers is a nice gesture, but doing so probably wouldn’t close many holes in the budget anyway.

“We are investing in both teams,” Laporta said. “But the men’s team is generating most of the revenues of the club.”

Top 5 women’s soccer crowds in 2022

1. Barcelona vs. Wolfsburg in Barcelona (UEFA Champions League), 91,646
2. Barcelona vs. Real Madrid in Barcelona (UEFA Champions League), 91,553
3. England vs. Germany in London (Euro Championship), 87,192
4. England vs. Austria in Manchester (Euro Championship), 68,871
5. Morocco vs. South Africa in Rabat (Africa Cup of Nations), 51,000

Source: Soccer America

New mom Dunn returns to USWNT

There were no differences in the 23-player roster women’s coach Vlatko Andonovski called up Monday for next month’s friendlies with Nigeria and the one he used last month to win the CONCACAF W Championship in Mexico. But there will be one welcome addition in training camp, with defender Crystal Dunn expected to join just 2 ½ months after giving birth.

Dunn, a World Cup champion and former NWSL MVP, will use the camp to rebuild her fitness but will not play in the two games, Sept. 3 in Kansas City, Kan., and Sept. 6 in Washington, D.C. Andonovski said Dunn could play later this fall.

Among those who figure to play against Nigeria are veteran forwards Alex Morgan and Megan Rapinoe, both of whom are nearing 200 caps with the national team. Among the regulars still missing from the roster are Catarina Macario, Sam Mewis, Angel City’s Christen Press, Lynn Williams, Tierna Davidson and Abby Dahlkemper, who are either injured or returning from injury. Julie Ertz and Casey Krueger, who are on maternity leave, also remain out.

USWNT roster for friendlies with Nigeria:

Goalkeepers: Aubrey Kingsbury (Washington), Casey Murphy (North Carolina), Alyssa Naeher (Chicago)

Defenders: Alana Cook (OL Reign), Emily Fox (Louisville), Naomi Girma (San Diego), Sofia Huerta (OL Reign), Kelley O’Hara (Washington), Becky Sauerbrunn (Portland)

Midfielders: Sam Coffey (Portland); Lindsey Horan (Lyon), Taylor Kornieck (San Diego), Rose Lavelle (OL Reign), Kristie Mewis (Gotham FC), Ashley Sanchez (Washington), Andi Sullivan (Washington)

Forwards: Ashley Hatch (Washington), Alex Morgan (San Diego), Mallory Pugh (Chicago), Midge Purce (Gotham FC), Megan Rapinoe (OL Reign), Trinity Rodman (Washington), Sophia Smith (Portland)

And finally there’s this …

Mexico’s flagging World Cup prospects took another blow last week when forward Jesús “Tecatito” Corona reportedly broke his left fibula and ligaments in his left ankle in training with Sevilla. He is expected to miss four to five months, making him unavailable for the tournament in Qatar that begins in November.

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Podcast

Don’t miss my weekly podcast on the Corner of the Galaxy site as co-host Josh Guesman and I discuss the Galaxy each Monday. You can listen to the most recent podcast here.

Quotebook

“We lost 2-1 because time ran out. … Our situation is how it is.”

Jurgen Klopp after Liverpool’s loss to Manchester United on Monday, leaving the winless Reds (0-1-2) with their worst start since 2012-13