LAFC headed into its eighth MLS season Saturday with more questions than answers, few of which were solved in its 1-0 victory over Minnesota United before a sun-splashed crowd of 22,310 at BMO Stadium.
The only goal came from newcomer Jeremy Ebobisse in the 78th minute. On the other end, goalkeeper Hugo Lloris was called on to make just two saves in recording his 13th shutout since entering MLS last season.
And while that left LAFC a league-best 8-0-0 in season openers, it did little to settle doubts over whether the team is good enough to return to the MLS Cup final for a third time in four seasons.
In another busy offseason, general manager John Thorrington parted with 15 players, including three of the team’s four leading scorers and two of its top three midfielders. As a result, four of the 11 players who started Saturday were not with the team to start last season.
Those new players will have to step up to replace what the team lost — in particular the 16 goals and eight assists Mateusz Bogusz contributed before leaving for Mexico’s Cruz Azul last month on a reported $9-million transfer — if LAFC is to build on the success that has allowed it to win more games, score more goals and earn more points that any other team since it entered the league in 2018.
“When you are selling players because they’ve generated interest, it means they’ve done really well for you,” Thorrington said. “Yes, it’s harder. But we don’t shy away from that.”
What hasn’t changed is the way LAFC plays, often preferring to play defense and attack in transition (although the Black and Gold had the ball for nearly an hour of the 90 minutes against cautious Minnesota). And that’s made the rebuilding job more challenging.
Their model worked last year when LAFC (19-8-7) finished atop the Western Conference and won the U.S. Open Cup. But it failed in the playoffs, with LAFC going out in the conference semifinals, its earliest exit in three years.
LAFC’s rebuilt midfield struggled to slow Minnesota’s speedy attackers in the early going but was bailed out when Kelvin Yeboah’s left-footed shot struck the right post and caromed across the goalmouth in the 13th minute. A minute later an attempted clearance struck Yeboah in the box and ricocheted toward the goal, forcing Lloris to pluck it out of the air.
After a scoreless 70 minutes in which the teams combined to put just four of 21 shots on goal, the game swung decidedly in LAFC’s favor when Nathan Ordaz entered for David Martínez. Ordaz, 21, a product of the LAFC academy, immediately opened up the Minnesota midfield, drawing a yellow card and setting up a corner kick in his first five minutes. His straight-line speed also helped create the space Ebobisse exploited for his goal.
A wide-open Ebobisse, signed as a free agent in December, beat Minnesota keeper Dayne St. Clair with a left-footed shot from the top of the box after Denis Bouanga and Ordaz worked the ball around the penalty area. But it was Mark Delgado, another new player, who made the play possible by freeing Bouanga up the left side with a through ball.