It’s the final CITY Reads of March, as we prepare for Minnesota United FC to enter CITYPARK on Saturday against St. Louis City SC. Last week brought serious challenges to this City squad with international call-ups, injuries and illness putting many players’ availability in doubt. The team looked half asleep in the first half, but quickly pivoted and re-established itself as the most exciting team to watch in MLS so far. Let’s roll into April with a few interesting notes from the past week.
The Leaders
MLS puts out some solid league-wide content. This week, they’ve featured the six teams with 10 or more points on the table, including St. Louis, and given a quick snapshot of what makes each team unique. It’s a long season, and the more we can learn about our opponents, the better. There are clubs out there like FC Cincinnati who show there’s no one way to be successful in this league.
The Gaffer
Another ‘official’ channel to highlight - free to view on Apple TV, head coach Bradley Carnell delivers a fantastic interview that shows how the team mentality and tenacity emanates from him. In his own words, “life moves fast, you know. We’re already in week six now, and we still feel like we’ve achieved nothing.” I, for one, absolutely love this hunger.
The Internationals
Shameless self-plug for this week’s piece on our three players to receive international call-ups. Kyle Hiebert is currently on international duty with the Canadian men’s national team, Njabulo Blom earned a spot on the South African team that he was unable to fulfill due to illness, and Miguel Perez was invited to the United States U-19 squad.
Quick Hits
To answer the tweet’s question: probably. (You’ll want to check your audio levels before you watch this one).
Joao Klauss is made of different stuff.
xG isn’t a complete story, but it can help develop expectations. To me, the biggest story is our defense.
Footage - yes, footage - of professional St. Louis soccer in 1924. Vesper Buick faced Fall River in the National Challenge Cup on March 30 before a crowd of 13,686.
Want to talk St. Louis City SC and all things soccer? Come find @StLFooty on Twitter!