St. Louis CITY SC Winless in 10 Matches After Loss in Minnesota

St. Louis CITY SC got ripped apart on the road. There's no sugar coating that. An injury riddled roster that struggles in the attack and is managing minutes with a congested schedule with sub-par depth did not get a result on the road against a Minnesota side in great form who don't give up a lot of chances. Shocker. With 14 matches played and 20 remaining in the MLS regular season, let's break down what this might mean for Olof Mellberg's team.

Key Takeaways:

There is not much to take away from this match in terms of the play, but here are some quick individual highlights: Akil Watts and Jake Girdwood-Reich really struggled in the midfield. As we know, Credric Teuchert is not good at the solo target 9 striker role; naturally, since he was put there tonight, he did not do well. Marcel Hartel had an off night. Conrad Wallem was alright. Tomáš Ostrák only played 45 minutes, but was solid. Kyle Hiebert was not too bad tonight. Josh Yaro was costly again. Célio Pompeu was alright. Roman Bürki made some big saves, but could only do so much. Off the bench, Xande Silva didn't really do anything. Simon Becher, nothing really either. Rasmus Alm made his season debut and got some cardio in. Now you're all caught up--told you, you didn't miss much if you missed the match.

There is a difference between a cause and an excuse. Rocchio and I dove into this in great detail in the CITY Hub Post-Match Show, which I highly recommend you watch after every final whistle, but this is a majorly important concept with an injury plagued roster. MLS roster rules ensure that every club's depth players are, in fact, depth players, and are rarely capable of being strong contributors in MLS. This shows. Henry Kessler has been the backbone of this club, providing excellent defense as well as the ability to step into the midfield and progress the ball with quality carries or passes. Timo Baumgartl can do this too at times, but he needs his rock there to be at his best. The injuries are causing this team to keep losing, plain and simple. Specifically, they have caused goals against. In the last 4 matches, the back line group including Timo Baumgartl, Josh Yaro, Kyle Hiebert, and Akil Watts has conceded 11 goals. Prior to those 4 matches, CITY had conceded just 8 goals all season.

This was a good scouting opportunity for Wednesday's US Open Cup fixture. St. Louis get to hit the replay button and do it all over again in 4 days in the Twin Cities. Minnesota sometimes get stuck in their low-block defending, much like St. Louis, which can be weaponized against them by utilizing players like Célio Pompeu or Xande Silva to get pace and creativity down the wings and just repeatedly throw an air raid barrage of services into the box, looking for João Klauss in the air and Cedric Teuchert to capitalize on any loose change that is dropped. If Henry Kessler can start on Wednesday, some of the passing issues in the midfield will get resolved, allowing CITY to generate the ball movement necessary to accomplish that attacking goal.

Olof Mellberg's seat is warming up. I have the timeline giving him until May 31st, when St. Louis host San Jose Earthquakes at Energizer Park. If St. Louis have not won any matches by the end of that match, I expect that Mellberg will be relieved of his duties. At the very least, I will deem his hiring a failure. We've seen Lutz Pfannenstiel not hesitate to pull the trigger with Bradley Carnell in 2024, so I would imagine a similar situation is possible; though, I suspect Mellberg is cut some more slack given that he has only been able to play three matches with 8 or more preferred starters on the pitch. The results of those matches? Two wins and a draw. 7/9 possible points acquired. Again, to throw all the blame on him and ignore the fact that his options have been heavily limited by injuries would be ignorant. This is the same reason it would be unfair to say Lutz needs to be fired. Joakim Nilsson, for example, hadn't hardly missed a single match in his entire professional career to injury before joining St. Louis. How could Lutz have predicted his injuries?

Betting Recap:

Eric Sontag cashed again betting against CITY. He has been on a tear lately; if you're into sports betting, definitely check his picks out.

Looking Ahead:

St. Louis CITY SC get to click rewind, playing Minnesota again, in Minnesota again, in four days in the US Open Cup--a tournament fans fought tooth and nail for and is known to mean a lot to the region. A loss there would likely spark widespread outrage amongst the fanbase. Will spicy times lay ahead, or will CITY somehow get some results? I'd be lying to you if I said I truly believed in the latter.