CITY vs SJ: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

By Cole Sutton

@CSuttonCITY

The first half of the 2025 season has been rough for CITY supporters. From failing to earn three points in either derby match to a 10-match winless streak and finally sacking a manager who only spent 15 matches on the touchline, this year's iteration of St. Louis CITY feels a whole lot different than that magical inaugural season.

While there are still plenty of questions left unanswered about the future, Saturday's matinee matchup against the San Jose Earthquakes proved how much one change can affect the morale and mindset of players, coaches, and fans. "Caretaker" manager David Critchley has stepped up to the first-team level after manning the touchline for CITY2, managing to earn all three points for St. Louis since a 1-0 victory against Seattle back on March 15th. Ironically enough, Critchley is only one win away from tying former manager Olof Mellberg's total of two victories in his brief tenure.

Although the playoff appearance that ownership promised in February may not come to fruition, the 2-1 victory on Saturday felt massively important in keeping spirits high and maintaining a positive outlook for the second half of the club's third MLS season. We recap the good, the bad, and the ugly from CITY's first victory in 77 days.

The Good

Tactics & Style of Play

If you listened to the press conference held by Diego, Lutz, and Critchley ahead of the SJ match, you had a pretty solid idea of how CITY would look once the ball was rolling on Saturday afternoon. All three emphasized the return to the style of play that this club was built on, being aggressive with and without the ball, lots of energy, high pressing, and taking advantage of the counterattack, something that we rarely saw under Olof Mellberg in the early parts of the season. While Olof was pretty straightforward with some of his comments to the media regarding injuries, shifting players around to unnatural positions, and doing tactically what he thought would help the club get results, his 11 points through 15 matches had CITY sitting third lowest in the league table before the change was made. The back five was not working, the offense looked disconnected in attack, and the energy and effort we've come to expect as supporters just weren't there.

Critchley, a former CITY U-16 & U-17 manager, was well aware of how this club should be attacking each opponent, and emphasized entertaining the fans with said play style. While Diego & Lutz claimed that both the data and the "eye test" showed that Olof's style of play would fit into the club's criteria, it just didn't translate over to MLS, and it was time to get back to basics. CITY did just that against the Earthquakes, bringing lots of aggression offensively, pressing without the ball defensively, and playing a higher line defensively than the "low block" we saw under Mellberg.

We also saw a bit of a shake-up in formation, along with personnel inserted into the starting lineup. Critchley shifted back into the normal four at the back defensively with a 4-2-3-1 formation, which allowed more opportunities offensively, and helped the CM pairing of Wallem & Lowen push the attack through the midfield and connect with their forwards up-top. We also saw Joey Zalinsky get his first start in MLS play, Jay Reid make his first start in quite a while at the LB spot, & Celio Pompeu return to the starting XI. It was a refreshing return to the "energy drink" football that we've seen success with previously, confirming that even if the squad doesn't leave a fixture with all three points, they will at least be entertained and see an overload of energy and effort from those on the pitch. Even in hot St. Louis summers!

João Klauss

João Klauss returned to the scoresheet Saturday night after taking advantage of poor goalkeeping by San Jose and basically assisting himself on his stoppage time goal. "Santa Klauss" slotted away the chance directly in front of the rowdy North End, who rightly so, erupted in celebration as CITY took their 1-0 lead into the halftime break.

Despite coming off in the 73rd minute with what looked like a minor knock, or possibly a muscle cramp, Klauss was the most accurate passer on the pitch to play at least 45 minutes, according to FotMob. The Brazilian went 9/9 with accurate passes, had 23 total touches (4 in the opposition box), and of course netted his second goal in league play. His FotMob player rating of 8.0 was the second highest of all CITY players, behind only Eduard Löwen (8.8), who earned Man of the Match honors after playing a full 90 minutes and finishing with an assist and the game-winning goal in second-half stoppage time.

While the CITY attackers have been notoriously poor at finishing chances this season, I'm hoping the goal will be a huge confidence booster for #9 and hopefully lead to a string of positive performances that both casual and die-hard supporters come to expect from the fan favorite and designated player.

Jay Reid

While it's easy to highlight Löwen's MOTM performance, I wanted to mention Jay Reid and how well I thought he played on Saturday night. The former CITY2 starlet earned his first start with the top-flight club since the 1-0 defeat against LAFC back on October 2nd of 2024. With Jannes Horn likely not returning to CITY permanently after his loan spell ends, and Critchley moving back to a traditional backline of four, I think Jay Reid is one of the players within the club who can make the most of the new interim regime and cement himself back into the starting lineup.

The 23-year-old defender played 62 minutes before being replaced by Tomas Totland, who finally made his way back from injury, finishing with a 7.6 rating and going 12/16 (75%) on accurate passing. Reid had 31 total touches, one chance created, two clearances, eight defensive actions, including two recoveries and six duels won.

I hope that Reid continues to get minutes and showcase that he has the talent to be a key player in the club's philosophy and style of play. With Totland slowly getting back to full fitness, knowing that we have two "lineup locks" on each side of the backline will allow for plenty of balance in the attack and allow CITY to stretch the field attacking on both sides instead of focusing primarily up the left flank like we've seen in Totland's absence.

The Bad

Conrad Wallem

I didn't want to highlight too much on negatives from Saturday due to the result and the amount of optimism that came with it, but Conrad Wallem was a clear choice for this category. Regardless of the senseless second yellow card for time wasting that had him sent off in stoppage time, Wallem also lost the most duels (14) in the match, where he shifted from his normal winger or wing-back position to pair with Löwen in the central midfield.

The loanee only had an xG + xA of 0.01, zero accurate crosses, was dispossessed twice, recorded zero tackles won, and was dribbled past four times, resulting in a team low 5.1 rating according to FotMob. Moving forward, I'd like to see him out wide along the wing in space rather than in the center of the pitch. Especially if my next player continues to perform like he did against San Jose.

Xande Silva

The former Atlanta United man was CITY's sole acquisition in the primary transfer window, and his player profile had supporters rightly excited to see what he could bring to the lineup. Many compared the 28-year-old winger to Celio Pompeu, whose flair with the ball at his feet and ability to take defenders on 1-on-1 have quickly made him a fan favorite. While we didn't see Silva get many extended shifts on the pitch under Olof, due to an injury to Cedric Teuchert towards the end of the first half, we saw the Portugal international get a little over a full half to make an impact.

Despite having two shots on target and going 8-for-10 on accurate passing, Silva only notched an xG of 0.08 and didn't create any chances for St. Louis according to FotMob's numbers. The alarming number I came across was 0-for-5 on successful dribbles, which was a major aspect of why the club acquired him before the deadline. We also saw Silva lose the ball in the penalty area, and instead of fighting to regain possession, he attempted an awful dive in the area and stayed down instead of back-tracking on defense.

I think Xande can still bring a lot to this lineup and make an impact on any given match, but his performance Saturday resulted in a 5.9 rating (second lowest behind Wallem) and caused some supporters on social media to ask some questions on how much the winger moves the needle in the CITY attack.

The Ugly

Injury Luck

I mentioned it multiple times throughout this article, but while the club had multiple key players like Henry Kessler, Tomas Totland, and Jay Reid return from varying stints on the injury report, CITY had a few injury scares on Saturday at Energizer Park. Cedric Teuchert, the club's leading scorer, Chris Durkin, who is a staple of the central midfield, and Joao Klauss all exited the 2-1 win against San Jose with what looked like possible injuries. Eduard Löwen also mentioned that he was dealing with a few lingering injuries after picking up a slight knock in training, but was able to both start and play the full 90 minutes. While caretaker manager David Critchley told the media postgame he believed Klauss was okay, he hadn't spoken to the medical team yet at that point and did not have any updates on the rest of the possible injuries.

Lutz did agree with a media member's inquisition at the press conference ahead of the San Jose matchup that the number of injuries in general, and in training, was "alarming," but emphasized that he is behind the club's medical team and believes their staff is one of the best in the country. With St. Louis' current standing in the MLS table, staying as healthy as possible and having players step up in relief of players who do end up missing time will be a huge variable on whether the club can sneak into one of the final playoff spots in the West.

The Boys in Red will have both Monday & Tuesday off this week, so we'll likely get an update after Wednesday morning's training session.

Up Next

After their first afternoon match of the season, CITY will hit the road this weekend to take on the Portland Timbers Sunday night. Once finished with the trip to the Pacific Northwest, the boys will return to Energizer Park for another matinee kickoff at 3:30, taking on the LA Galaxy, who recently earned their first league win and sit at the bottom of the table.