{"id":46443,"date":"2023-04-02T21:45:43","date_gmt":"2023-04-03T01:45:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/?p=46443"},"modified":"2023-04-02T21:45:43","modified_gmt":"2023-04-03T01:45:43","slug":"st-louis-city-sc-lose-minnesota","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/2023\/04\/02\/st-louis-city-sc-lose-minnesota\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cIn My End Is My Beginning\u201d: St. Louis City SC Lose to Minnesota"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>They are the only expansion team to start a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ballysports.com\/midwest\/news\/st-louis-city-sc-wins-fifth-straight-extends-historic-start-with-4-0-win-in-salt\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">season 4-0.<\/a> They are one of the only three teams to start an MLS season 5-0. And on April first, they lost to Minnesota United FC. So what does that mean?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are not superhuman after all,\u201d said head coach Bradley Carnell after the match. \u201cAll credit to Minnesota. Adrian has done a magnificent job. But I\u2019m really proud of my boys. We lost a game. Next week the score is zero. Now we can\u2019t wait to get back to work.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>St. Louis City SC Loses Against Minnesota United FC<\/h2>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Pushed until the end, but that\u2019s full-time.<\/p>\n<p>0-1 | <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/STLvMIN?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#STLvMIN<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/AllForCITY?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#AllForCITY<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/1FOOQ6jDWn\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/1FOOQ6jDWn<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; St Louis CITY SC (@stlCITYsc) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/stlCITYsc\/status\/1642355241336160261?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 2, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h3>Wait, What?<\/h3>\n<p>To review \u2013 St. Louis City SC, the expansion team that everyone had written off at the start of the season (FiveThirtyEight.com had them <a href=\"https:\/\/projects.fivethirtyeight.com\/soccer-predictions\/mls\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">finishing last<\/a>, for example. For what it\u2019s worth, they\u2019ve upgraded that too, um, <a href=\"https:\/\/projects.fivethirtyeight.com\/soccer-predictions\/mls\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">twenty-fifth<\/a> as of this writing), brought their undefeated season home to City Park on Saturday, April 1<sup>st<\/sup>, to play an equally undefeated Minnesota United FC (though to be clear, the Loons had only <strong><em>two<\/em><\/strong> wins to St. Louis\u2019s five).<\/p>\n<p>And to be sure, there were some in attendance who were concerned that this was a trap game. That St. Louis City would be looking past the Loons to next week\u2019s showdown with Seattle \u2013 <strong><em>in<\/em><\/strong> the Emerald City \u2013 and take their eyes off the game at hand. But these worrywarts could not have been more wrong. St. Louis was focused and prepared for Adrian Heath\u2019s side. And, as Coach Carnell admitted, Heath\u2019s side was prepared for them too. Saturday&#8217;s match was closely fought\u00a0 \u2013 full of end-to-end action, hard challenges, and near misses.<\/p>\n<p>The difference was as marginal as the final score indicated. One shot dips goalward a fraction of a second earlier and it\u2019s a different game; A shot hits the <em>inside <\/em>of the post instead of the <em>outside<\/em>, and we\u2019re talking about an entirely different result. And let\u2019s not even begin to talk about how differently some of Minnesota\u2019s chances would have been converted had a certain missing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fox9.com\/sports\/minnesota-united-still-without-emanuel-reynoso-days-away-from-2023-opener\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Argentine striker<\/a> been on the pitch.<\/p>\n<p><strong>READ MORE:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/2022\/11\/12\/jon-bell-draft-st-louis\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">St Louis City SC Claim Revolution Defender Jon Bell in Expansion Draft<\/a><\/p>\n<h3>So What Happened?<\/h3>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Got hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiim<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/STLvMIN?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#STLvMIN<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/MNUFC?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#MNUFC<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/yutUxEVHFr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/yutUxEVHFr<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Minnesota United FC (@MNUFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MNUFC\/status\/1642353819462905857?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 2, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Well, St. Louis got a dose of their own medicine, actually. Minnesota played St Louis the way St. Louis has played Austin and Charlotte and Portland and San Jose and Real Salt Lake. They pressed constantly. When they lost the ball, they swarmed to get it back. They were physical. And then, yeah, they got a little lucky and converted the opportunity when it presented itself. Sound familiar?<\/p>\n<p>The point is \u2013 and the point Carnell was making post-game \u2013 is that they lost 1-nil. They didn&#8217;t get stomped <a href=\"https:\/\/news.sky.com\/story\/liverpool-thrash-man-united-7-0-in-historic-defeat-12826896#:~:text=Liverpool%20have%20thrashed%20Manchester%20United,defeat%20since%20Boxing%20Day%201931.\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">seven-nothing<\/a> like some teams recently. And, as players said after the game, no one expected the team to go 34-0. They lost. They\u2019re not invincible. They are still top of the western conference and still top of the league. It happens.<\/p>\n<p>But they lost! Their historic winning streak is over! And why? Because of a second-half call that was, if not actually \u201csoft\u201d, then certainly \u201cmushy\u201d. Followed minutes later by a spectacular <strong><em>non-<\/em><\/strong>call, when Klauss got himself kicked in the face in the box! No chair throwing? No chasing the refs into the tunnel? No surrounding the fourth official on the sideline and threatening him with all manner of innuendo? There were no post-game press conferences full of rancor and acrimony and finger-pointing? What kind of soccer team is this anyway?<\/p>\n<p>Apparently a frighteningly well-balanced one. Not just on the pitch, but between the ears as well.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Photo Credit: Scott Rovak-USA TODAY Sports on April 1, 2023, of St. Louis City SC&#8217;s Headshot.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>They are the only expansion team to start a season 4-0. They are one of the only three teams to start an MLS season 5-0. And on April first, they lost to Minnesota United FC. So what does that mean? \u201cWe are not superhuman after all,\u201d said head coach Bradley Carnell after the match. \u201cAll [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":991,"featured_media":46448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"1","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[67,119],"tags":[488,5341],"class_list":["post-46443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-minnesota-united","category-mls","tag-adrian-heath","tag-st-louis-city-sc"],"modified_by":"Raheem Bashir, Site Manager","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/991"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}