STL United FC Soccer Sunday Hour 2 - 5/05/24

Hour 2 continues with Fox2/CW11 reporter/anchor Daniel Esteve @danieljesteve in studio for the first half hour before he tags in STL Soccer HOFer Ty Keough. Matt Baker from Flyover Footy podcast joins the show to discuss STL City SC's nil nil tie vs Houston Dynamo. Russel with the scores from the soccer world, both LIVE and completed matches.

Episode Transcript

(00:14):
Read a A Butler A Dace wWelcome back to the thirteenth year of STL

(00:34):
United Soccer Sunday on CAFNIS five ninetyThe fan Russell here along with super Ted
Williams running the board, Daniel EstevanStudio, and here's host, mister Thomas
Swarz. But I must first tellyou this show was brought to you by
Mark Neemeyer at n GK Lawfirm dotcom Local Roots and National Results, and
by Tango and Saint Louis and theman you never misses the beat, mister

(00:58):
Thomas Schwarz. All right, it'stime for the man who knows the x's
and o's of Saint Louis City scMatt Baker. Matt, are you there,
I'm here, Tom. How's itgoing? Well? I was kind

(01:19):
of distressed last night, but youknow, I'm my glasses overflowing. So
they got a point on the road, and that's how I'm feeling about it.
I'm not listening to these other doomsayers, how about you. They got
a point on the road. That'sa lost that you can ask for in
MLS, that's for sure. Butwouldn't surprise me if everybody woke up refreshed
this morning because they got an earlynight's sleep after what that offense did last

(01:42):
night. What did they do lastnight? They didn't do much. They
had just over one expected goals total. Throughout the entire game. Klaus led
the team with five shots and weall know, I mean, it didn't
take and then too much analysis tosee the ineffective of Klaus in that game.
And it's it's really a shame becausewe had built this this offense around.

(02:06):
You know, this is the thirdtime in a row that we've run
the same lineup and the offensive beenbuilding to something really nice in chance creation
and uh in finishing at Sporting KC. But they weren't able to carry that
forward on the other side of thebye week. And it the bye week,
I think, I hope we don'tlook at it as derailing our momentum,
but it definitely gave us pause comingout of it because our midfield wasn't

(02:30):
connecting the lines like they had beenbeforehand. Chris Durkin was fifth in the
team and touches Thomas Ostrok not eventhat the progression was occurring just via long
balls, and it's it's kind ofa It's a tale of how you let
Houston dictate the play in a sense, because this team had been pretty adept
at sort of building out of theback but leveraging their midfielders to spray the

(02:53):
ball into different parts of the fieldon the ground. And then in this
game you had you had a Houstonteam that was wanting to possess the ball,
and when they weren't in possession,they were dropping back into more of
a low block. They were pluggingup the spaces that weren't allowing people like
Indiana bas eleven Klaus to do anythingin the central part of the field.
So our attack was coming from thewings in both progressing the ball up to

(03:16):
the final third, but also whereour shots were coming from, and Houston
wasn't giving an inch and we weren'table to take anything from them. Matt
I heard that one of Klaus's shotsjoined Albert Polholz's two thousand and five home
run off Brett Ledge traveling the earth. I'm a novice at watching MLS,

(03:42):
but you know, it seems likeour the players that shoot are trying for
the Goalazzo, instead of just slottingthe ball. And the best goal scorers
in the league do what they needto do to get the ball behind the
keeper, and Klaus has shown thathe can do that, but he seems

(04:09):
to have fallen in love with poundingthe ball. So I'm just interested in
your perspective. Yeah, for me, that really speaks to how his confidence
is and if you're a confidence striker, then you're not going to try to
do too much. And I don'tthink it takes too much analysis into the
XG of Klaus to really see thathe's still not feeling like he's in his

(04:32):
goal scoring for him in open play, and that's why he's trying to force
certain things in certain scenarios. Andwhen he gets an opportunity like that on
the right side of the box andhe has open space, he doesn't try
to slot it in in a partof the goal because he doesn't have that
confidence that he can pinpoint accurate hisshots, and so he tries to,

(04:54):
you know, if you're playing EAFC, he tries to hold in L one
and R one to try to makethat world of a shot. And that's
not what we need from Klaus.We need more of the flicks. We
need more of the kind of prettiershots that he's used to, but he
has to be feeling himself in orderto do that, and he's not there
yet. And he wasn't able tocarry that one goal he had in open

(05:15):
play from Sporting over to this andit part of it is that Houston was
just plugging up gaps their defense.They were dropping bast five, six seven
in the box when we were ableto get the ball into the final third,
and so he was trying to blowit past him. And that's the
scenario that he found himself in whenhe didn't have a chance to think about
it. He just received the balland shot it as hard as he could.

(05:35):
And if you're Klaus leading this typeof an offense, that's not what
we need from you. When you'regiven the opportunity to shoot Daniel Daniel,
you're looking pensive. I am lookingpensive. That tends to happen when Matt
Baker speaks yeah, me too,I start to think, yeah, just
a little extra. And it's interesting. I caught a peek at Matt's notes

(06:00):
ahead of his Flyover Footy podcasts overat the Last City presser uh huh,
and it was like looking at oneof my statistics textbooks from college. And
I'm thinking to myself from an analyticsperspective, I'm reading a book called net
Gains right now, and the bookis all about the essentially the difficulty of

(06:20):
analyzing soccer versus countless other sports,since that's the one you fall asleep do
every night. I actually have beena bit better about that. But yes,
I have fallen asleep once or twice, fell asleep on the beach reading
at one time too, got amean sunburn, but we finally reached like
the modern age in the book.And the only consistency throughout the book and

(06:41):
throughout measuring statistics throughout the history ofsoccer is that it's one of, if
not the most difficult sport to analyzefrom a statistics perspective. So Matt,
for example, missed opportunities, bigchances, x G, progressive passes.
Dale Shilley yesterday was talking about howthe biggest most striking difference at halftime between

(07:04):
the two teams was number of passes, and all respect to Dale, I
could not disagree more because Houston isgoing to keep possession as much as possible.
City in particular prides itself on maybehaving thirty percent of possession but winning
the ball back in the attacking third. If you're gonna look at statistics,

(07:24):
that passes is certainly not the onein that matchup. And I'm just curious,
when you're breaking down a low blockand you're analyzing a game, what
is that statistic that you're looking formost that could differentiate a team in success,
failure, or in City's case,plenty of ties. Well, the

(07:46):
reason that I have my notes thatlook like that, that just look like
there's just an amalgamation and just anoverwhelming amount of stats is because I am
a firm believer that you can't takethat and use it to extrapolate a storyline,
a narrative and look to see,all right, this team is performing
well because they have the most passes, or this team is performing well because

(08:11):
they have the highest possession, ortheir x G is so high. Because
every single one of those stats needsto go with another set in order to
tell a paint of picture. Andand so Houston versus Saint Louis, in
particular, it played out. RomanBurkey said this at the end of the
at the end of the game,and his impressor, it played out exactly
as we thought. Houston possessed theball they had more passes, they had

(08:33):
more more shots, which isn't surprisingbecause they had more possession and they passed
the ball around. So it goesinto what were they able to do with
all of these and what parts ofthe field were they managing themselves on with
all of these. You look atosome of other stats like the average the
average part of the field in whichyou had your first defensive action, and

(08:54):
for Houston, it was very deepand Houston had has very few high turnovers
that they forced. They're not ahigh pressing team. They engage very deep
in their own field, and sothey invite pressure. You know, they're
they're asking you to figure it outwhen we're going to possess the ball on
offense, but when we're give theball up, we're dropping back full speed.

(09:15):
All these things play into the factthat they were plugging up those spaces
that Saint Louis needed. And ifI had to pick like one or two
few sets that I was really lookingto, it's I like the expected threat
sets that we see. There's athere's an account called at MLS stats,
and I've really enjoyed what they've whatthey've been able to produce as far as

(09:37):
looking at passes, passes into thefinal third where they come from expected threat,
which is essentially just if you're passingthe ball, how threatening is the
place that you're passing it to andwhere that person receives the ball of Indiana
Basta Lev Klaus, they've been someof our higher performers in expected threat.
Azy Jackson was far and away thehighest last night. Heck, Roman Burkey

(09:58):
was top six in that set,which is damning for Sorry, it's a
very terrible thing to see for yourteam if your goalkeeper's top six and your
expected threat stats. Yeah, butall that, all that plays into the
fact that Houston, we know isgoing to pass the ball, we know
they're going to possess, but theycouldn't do anything with that. They didn't
end up with an overwhelming XG.So you're seeing all of these pasting possessions,

(10:22):
low expected goals. That's a positivefor Saint Louis's offense. They withstood
all of that and they were ableto effectively manage defensively all of the touches
that Houston had. And on theother side, you look at what Saint
Louis was not able to do becausethey still had a decent volume of shots.
I think they had eighteen total shots, but they weren't able to have

(10:43):
any metric of a single high chance. They put themselves into these chances that
are very low percentage. Using theXG stat on that end to say,
every single shot that they're taking issuch has such a low probability of going
in that you have to rely onon the Klaus shot for instance, as
if this doesn't go in, thenwe're hosed. Hey, Matt, I

(11:07):
hear the music, but I canI can sum it up. I think
in my analysis this year, lastnight, in particular, they're not taking
gifts. Houston gave them flat outgifts of possession turnovers, unforced possession turnovers,
and last year said he was scoringthem. This year they're missing him.

(11:30):
How's that? I'll say, confidencefor me, I'll leave it with
confidence for me has to be therefor Saint Louis, Salio, Klaus,
Indie. They all showed a lackof comedy play. Yeah, yeah,
Berkie's got alemscoring practice. Matt.Alright, alright, Matt Baker from fly
Over forty. Thanks a lot,Matt, talk to you next week.
Take care, just here for amoment to remind you that you I listening

(11:54):
to Soccer Sunday on CAP and isfive ninety the Fan. This segment is
brought to you by n GK LawFirm dot Com Local roots and nationwide results.
Subscribe to the show would you youKnow? On podcasts. N GK
Law Firm Loves Daniels Steve. Okay, before we got not for long.
Actually hold on before we get Danieljust real quickly, Tye shows up.

(12:20):
I'm going to seed my time totie. Kelly O'Hara, US international champion
player, announced her retirement at theend of the season. Kelly was a
Herman Award winner at Stanford. Shelost her last collegiate game against You and

(12:43):
the c and actually got red guardedtoo, yellows. She got a second
yellow late and uh. She hasreally been an adaptive player. She was
a dynamic attacking player in college andwhen she first entered the league, and
she became pretty much anything that anyclub team needed her to be. And

(13:07):
she is a truly underrated player inthe history of US women's soccer. And
congrats to her. She's gonna dogreat things in the media when she retires.
She's really funny and smart and goodluck. Kelly Charity was shout out
to that one uh that one interviewshe did where she was asking random strangers

(13:28):
who their favorite soccer player was,and one of the guys was like Kelly
O'Hara. She's like, wait,what why? And he's like because because
she went to my high school.And she's like, what me? And
he's like you, it's fantastic,ladies and gentleman, you just heard him
our own version of the ant manlike Anthony, Like Anthony Edwards. Oh

(13:52):
wow. I'm still I'm holding outhope that the Mavericks can obviously for the
sake of Mavericks continuing, but specificallyI hope they can beat the thunder and
play the Timberwolves so that I canwatch Anthony Edwards for an extended series.
Because I've seen clips and I hadthis conversation last night. I attributed him

(14:13):
to a slightly more athletic Dwayne Wade. Not the best jumper. I'm super
athletic six five six six, yeah, but just crazy athletic, super personal,
great defender. That's I just said. He was Dwayne Wade and that's
his peak. But the clips I'vebeen watching, he's got the jumper now
he is the He's insane. He'sso good, So I'd like to watch

(14:35):
him for a full series. Similarto the respect from Afar ahead for Kyrie
Irving. But now having gotten NBALeague Pass and watched just about every MASS
game all season, getting to watchKyrie every game is incredible. He's an
incredible I heard an interview with himyesterday and he was talking about his leadership

(14:56):
on this team, and he addressedit if you did like him, you
would be turned off by it.And there are things I don't like about
him, but he is simply anexceptional player. And when he was talking
about how he impacted these role players, because if you listen to NBA guys,

(15:18):
they talk all the time about theplayoffs, in particular do the role
players step up or not? That'swhat changes games, and they mostly do
it at home. They're usually notable to do it on the road.
But listening to him talk about Kyrietalk about how he brought out that it

(15:43):
wasn't you know again if it waspretty cocky, right you when you're talking
about you know is if one ofus came around a said, well,
well how I lead these guys iswell, nobody leaves but a veteran,
so he's got that space and he'sa great player. In Dallas, he's
been able to showcase his uh histeamwork is his leadership and uh. And

(16:07):
it's been a good, a goodsituation for him in his career to be
low key in the in the medialandscape and certainly high key on the court.
It's funny this morning for our soccergame. I told you, guys,
we were shorthanded to start, sowe actually started with just five outfield
players, so six total v eight. And I tell the guys, I'm
like, hey, no, theguys, this is my strong suit.
We've got five on the floor.Let's run a two to three matchup zone

(16:30):
will be great. Or maybe wego one three to one half court press.
It's gonna be great, guys,no worries. Finally, I feel
at home here on this soccer fan. In case you don't understand this soccer
fan, Daniel is just giving basketballreferences. Yeah, so this is I
was like, guys, No,this is great. We took a one
zero lead to one nil, Lee, that's great. It wasn't until we
were full strength that that the wheelstarted to come on it. Yeah,

(16:52):
it was fun, but see that'salso that's a professional transition, right there,
folks, we're right back into soccer. You see what I did there
to That's that's why you're on thisshow. I don't know, tell you,
I'll tell you what though. You'vegot my attention for twelve more minutes,
so wow, yeah, what areyou gonna do with that? Twelve
minutes? Russell? Find out scoressix six? You got my attention for

(17:15):
six minutes time. Come only thenI'm out the door. Oh we're replacing
him with Tye. Yeah. Ohty doesn't like to be here when you
guys like to upgrade. Well,we're always on the lookout. It couldn't
possibly be because Tottenham is about toplay Liverpool. Oh they are, yeah
yeah yeah, yeah yeah. Wellyou can read by riveting Saint Louis city
S performance last night. I meanI was. This is why he was

(17:37):
interested in the fact that's that stonVilla just lost. Yeah yeah, so
Spurs still got a chance to getYeah, by the way before England is
not going to get that extra championship. No no, no, that's official.
Thanks a lot west Ham and manCity for that matter. But I'll
tell you what I'm and Arsenal.I'm totally can tent No I wanted Arsenal

(18:00):
to lose. Well, I'm totallycontent. I hope Matt Baker heard that.
I'm totally content with fifth place fora Tottenham. I totally am content.
But you know, just giving mesomething to really really strive for the
season is always nice. Are theystrong enough to compete in Champions League and

(18:22):
still do well in the Premier League. I think after this summer window we
certainly will be. I think rightnow we probably are. It's just a
matter of continuing to get Ang's systembecause I think we're starting to revert back
to some previous tendencies. I thinkAngebowl looks better in the Champions League anyway.
It certainly does, but you stillneed the players willing to play a

(18:45):
ball, and that's been the problem. I think last game, him yelling
we don't play that way when wekept recycling the ball was pretty telling on
how he wants his team to play. Anybody see Columbus birthday. It's not
ray. I saw Columbus slice throughwas incredible. Columbus is awesome, and

(19:06):
of course you know I followed thisis actually pretty funny. I think I've
talked about it on the show before. But before I got my job at
Fox two, I actually interviewed fora job with the Columbus Crew. I
was I was so bent on workingfor a soccer team. I knew that
that was what I wanted to do, that I was willing to become an
off air talent, so to speak, and work behind the scenes in content
production. You never offered that itdoes I know, I know, I

(19:29):
know it's beat. Yeah. SoI actually was in Columbus interviewing, and
during that time I saw two games. I saw my first US national team
game. It was a qualifier WorldCup qualifier against Costa Rica because Keiler Navas
was in gold, which was reallycool. Jest hit a really real time
goal. Well no, because Iwas thinking I was get confused with Puerto

(19:51):
Rico, but it was Costa Ricabecause you can drink all the liquid down
and call Costa Rica. Wow wow, don't get that reference. But in
that same time, I interviewed inthe middle of this game, and then
I caught a Columbus crew into Miamigame. They won four zero. It
was really good. And my family'sfrom Columbus, my mom's side, and
so I was really excited about thisopportunity. They ended up that week deciding

(20:14):
Hey, we're going to hire fromwithin, but keep our contact. We'll
reach out to you if it everhappens. And on that trip I got
the call from Saint Louis saying,hey, we're interested, we'd love to
interview. And I emailed back,Hey, I'm in the area if you
guys want to interview in person,and they said, yeah, can you
come tomorrow? I said sure,rented a car and drove eight hours from

(20:37):
Columbus and got the job. Andso Columbus Crew will always have a warm
spot in my heart as kind ofthat first MLS team that I followed,
and I'm glad that city's in theWest because I can still root for Columbus
and now with the Patrick Shulty connection, I'm always keeping one eye on Columbus.
So so great to see, veryimpressive, just great to see.

(20:57):
I mean, I always go backto the League's Cup match that city had
against Klubebam edic guy. It wasI don't want to say pathetic because that's
rude, but Roman Burkey quite literallyhad the best quote ever in the mixed
zone that they do with the Leagu'sCup he said, there's just a stark
contrast in the quality between the twoplay the two teams, like there was

(21:21):
just a different level of talent,and so for Columbus to just completely shatter
that mindset and just take it toone of the better League MX teams was
really good to see. And I'msure the MLS looked around and was like,
wait a second, this is youknow, we're coming up. This
is good. Monterrey's finishing was notgreat, Oh no, they had for
sure played well, but boy hewas a magnet. Yeah, let's talk

(21:45):
about that a little bit, becauseyou know, I remember last year a
friend of mine saying to me,well, you know, what do you
think about relative city relative to competitionsthat you watch, my favorite being the
Premier League and the Champions League.And it's like just something you got to
forget, right, because this isnot you know we're watching. It's not

(22:07):
a different sport. It's the samesport, but it's several levels removed from
that stuff. Right. I willleave because Russell's looking at me. I'm
gonna leave you guys with the controversialthought and something I tend to keep quiet
on because we've had this conversation overand over again when it comes to the

(22:29):
Open Cup. I totally respect everythingthat the Open Cup was about and is
about, and I love the ideaof it. I think you can find
a place for it even in oursoccer landscape right But to discount the League's
Cup because of the effect it's hadon the Open Cup, I think is
a little short sighted for soccer fans, because if you want the MLS to

(22:52):
up its brand and more importantly,up its talent and quality of play,
you got to play the best competition. And maybe going up on the border
I got to see firsthand just howhuge legue Gomex is. But to be
able to have a competition year andin year out tied with a league that
is years better than you in termsof talent is only going to help the

(23:14):
MLS, and I think it's importantfor soccer fans to not only get behind
it, but also embrace it andappreciate the ability to compete against that level
of talent and hopefully be be improvedby that level of talent. I think
there's a world where you can haveboth. Maybe it takes time to figure
that out, but I think wecan't discount the quality of being able to

(23:37):
play in the Leader. I knowyou just said a whole bunch of other
stuff, but what I what reallycaught my ear was growing up where you
grew up, on the on theborder, being aware of leg x X.
Okay, talk about that a littlebit about how cross cultural that is

(23:57):
to be aware. I mean me, I was vaguely aware of the Mexican
League, you know, because itwould be on telemundor yeah what whatever it
was. But was that like areference like kids you knew had oh und.
So we had an arena called theDodge Arena and it changed name.

(24:18):
This is no this that arena specificallywas in a town called Hidalgo, and
Hidalgo they built it the stadium literallyright on the border in the US,
in the on the US side,okay, and we never got concerts,
but we would get massive concerts.Selena and later on Shakira Bad Bunny I
think came down there one time.Massive because the people from you know,

(24:41):
in nuebl Larate, not in NuevelLoreto Reinosa or Ya Matamotos would come over
and you would get these two worldsto pack those stadiums. We had the
RGV Toros, which no longer exist. They built a beautiful stadium called ATIV
Park, which hosted plenty of Women'sWorld Cup qualifiers. I got to see

(25:02):
Christensen Claire play in that stadium.Beautiful. I saw it sell out once
and it was standing room only.I mean, they couldn't find parking in
that place. And it was Monterrey, degress in a friendly, just in
a friendly. And they had flares, banners, flags, I mean,
making even like the Luligans look likeyou know, casuals. It was incredible

(25:26):
and you just wouldn't believe after spendingso much time in that stadium and seeing
them play in pretty good crowds,the level of support when those teams came.
And that was on the US side, That was in Edinburgh, Texas,
which is well into the border thirtyminutes you know, from the border.
Think about Monterrey, or in MexicoCity or in Toluca, wherever you

(25:48):
are. It is life over there, much like you would see in England.
And they compensate because of it.You know, the base salary of
one of those players is monument higherthan your base salary for an MLS player,
and it's because the level of talentand the support were you hip to
the Mexican League before your hip tothe Premier League. To the Premier League.

(26:10):
Yeah, I probably wouldn't say thatjust because of the notoriety of the
prem I think they did a greatjob in my lifetime, right, I
mean twenty ten was probably when itreally hit. Kind of the Ted Lasso
Tottenham Hotspur commercial was kind of whenNBC Sports really cemented its status with with
bringing Premier League football to the US, and that's when I was old enough

(26:30):
that I was watching consistently. Myfirst introduction besides wearing like a Thegres from
Monterey kit with youth soccer because allthe teams were named after Spanded, I
played for a team called Athletico.When I was a kid, I was
a goalie. Was just Spanish footballor even Brazilian football. Because my cousins

(26:53):
are from Sapalo. They would comeover, right, they would, you
know, they'd be like, yeah, I'm not very good, and then
do some incredible things. They wereall Flamenco fans, even though they're from
which doesn't make much sense, butthey were diehard Flamenco fans. And then
my cousins from Spain were Athletico Madridfans, so I had friends who were
Montre fans, fans or Pumas fans, whatever it was. But that was

(27:15):
just more Hey, it's always onon. It was just I watched prem
games on those channels too to ajump, so we had and that's what
I always say. I'm the firebaby from Narcos, Oh god, from
a little ominous scores on the otherside of the commercial break, I know

(27:36):
we're not sure we're in. We'rein scores, all right? Why did
I said Oklahoma or whatever? TheyI'm running the I'm running the flair right
out this building. Get out.So Daniels, where's Tottenham hots for luck?
Brilliant gents. You guys are frienda great game. Unless Tottenham loses,

(28:02):
then wrestle is no longer in myheart. All right. You are
listening to stl United Soccer Sunday KayFines five ninety the Fan. This segment
was brought to you by n GKLaw Firm Local Roots and Nationwide Results,
and by Tango in Saint Louis.We will be right back touch that dial.
The drones are up, time upand gas behind y lines on the

(29:02):
last one. Welcome back to thelast half hour of today's show. In
the thirteenth year of stl United SoccerSunday on KFN S five ninety the fan
Russell here along with Superhed williams Our, Host Tom Swarz and just in the

(29:23):
studio we have Taye Kio with us. You could say fresh from the fields,
but does that look a real freshright now? Different meaning to the
word. So we're going to doscores now, well shall we? I
don't know if I can get thisthing to work. Oh scores brought to

(29:51):
you by Tango in Saint Louis.You're listening to Independencia, recorded in nineteen
fifty three by Orchestra One that heDoadienzo was known as Eldre del Compass,
the King of the Beat. Jointhe growing local tango community next Saturday,
May the eleventh, twenty twenty fourfor the Tango Lounge Malonger at Convergence the

(30:11):
Montibus Stowe at eight pm with acover of ten dollars the growing tag growing.
We do have people, new peoplecoming in. It's great. That's
Tango Lounge starting at eight pm Saturday, Made the eleventh, a Convergence Body
and Dance eighty forty four Manchester Roadin Brentwood, and now for something completely
different. The scores at three pointthirty three pm Greenwich mean time in the

(30:33):
English Premier League and a make upgame on Thursday was Chelsea two Tottenham Hotspur
nill. On Friday Lutontown one,Everton one. Yesterday's games Arsenal three,
Born Miss nil, Brentford nil,Fulham nil, Burnley one, Newcastle United
four, Sheffield United one, NottinghamForest three, Manchester City five, Wolverhampton
Wonders today, Wanderers one. Today'sgames Brighton Hove Albion one, Aston Villain

(30:56):
nil, Chelsea five West nil.Just under way in the fifth minute,
it's Liverpool nil, Tottenham Hotspur nil. To tomorrow's game, it's Crystal Palace
against Manchester United and the German Bundesliga. Earlier today it was Union Berlin three
Blockom four. That game just finished, just started in the fifth minute.

(31:18):
Its Eintrack Frankfurt nil, Bayer leverCuzen nil. Later today Heidenhein takes on
Mainz Italians. There we are.The early game today was Calgary one,
let Jay one. The other gamesthat finished Empli nil, throzanone nil,
Alas Farona two, Fiorentina one.Later today ac Milan against Genoa and Roma
against Juventus. MLS. Yesterday's gamesAtlanta United one, Minnesota United two,

(31:41):
Charlotte FC two, Portland Timbers nil, DC United two, Philadelphia Union two
into Miami six, New York RedBulls two, Orlando City nil, FC
Cincinnati one, San Jose Earthquakes three, Los Angeles FC one, Toronto FC
three, FC Dallas one, ChicagoFire nil, New England Revolution one,
Houston Dynamo nil, Saint Louis Citynil, Nashville SC four, CF Montreal

(32:05):
one, Real Salt Lake one,Sporting KC nil, Vancouver white Caps nil,
Austin FC nil. Games later today, New York City FC take on
Colorado Rapids and Seattle Sounders against LAGalaxy NWSL. On Friday, it was
Utah Royals one, Angel City FCtwo, Seattle Raine two, San Diego
Wave one. Yesterday's games New Jerseyand New York Gotham one, North Carolina

(32:28):
Courage nil, Portland Thorns two.Washington Spirit won. Today's games three on
tap Houston Dash against Kansas City Current. We'll land a pride against Racing Louisville
BFC against Chicago Red Stars. MLSnext pro. On Friday, it was
Minnesota United two one Saint Louis Citytwo two. Saint Louis City two climb
back up the second in the West, one point behind leaders of Ventura County
FC. It's the Wrexham League TwoReport, brought to you by Piazza di

(32:52):
Pasta. Tomorrow's games. You knowwhere this is going. It's the playoff
semi finals first leg. Crawley Towntake on MK Dons Alexander against Doncaster Rovers.
First leg of the playoffs to seewhich of those four teams joined Stockport
County and Wrexham in League One nextseason. And that concludes that. The
second legs are on Thursday and Friday. But did you see that Wrexham is

(33:13):
going to expand their stadium from twelvethousand to fifty five thousand. It's a
long term plan, but yeah,yeah, yeah, I mean the goal,
the goal is to climb all theway. Those guys they're hoping to
do a Hoffenheim I guess and getall the way up to the Premier League.
So they I do sell their investment. I bet there's some Arab prints.

(33:34):
Well they're taking on some smaller fivepercent well God bless them. Yeah,
absolutely, Old Green Bay Packers,Man Town owns it. They already
they already let go. I thinkeight of players from this year they have
to upgrade. Yeah, absolutely,yeah, I mean you have to.
Right, they're going to here,They're going to come over and play in
the d try to win a milliondollars. Yeah, all right, that

(33:59):
concludes this report to by a tango, one another quick thing and then we
can get to tie. Mentioned afew weeks back, you know that Portland
Thorns were really struggling and they madeit a switch. Their head coach got
moved to technical director and the assistantwho was a really energetic dude. The

(34:20):
players love him. They probably lovedhim as assistant. He has taken over.
The Thorns are soaring and Becky's playinggood great, I think she's finally
fit. And the other thing aboutit is, I'll say it again,
it's good for the NWUSL when theThorns are good that atmosphere, and Portland

(34:44):
is the best in the league saveour new club over in Kansas City with
their new stadium, but twenty thousandat Providence Park versus eleven at the stadiums
in kans City. I hope thattwo of them are battling for years to

(35:05):
come. And then someday we'll havea team and we'll be in that mix.
We'll have a team. We willhave a team. Hey, Ken,
I hope it's I hope. Letme ask Russell something because I've been
following Siria b Como because Nico,oh yeah, I want to go to
Como and man oh man. Ithink they're right there. It's a beautiful
looking stadium and right, jo Ken, he has not been getting many minutes.

(35:30):
I don't think, not a lotof minutes. But you know he's
Russell researched that for him a moment, Ty, because I got a question
for you. Did were you awarebefore last night that uh uh Thomas Ostrakt
has changed his name to Thomas Oustrak. Well here we go, folks.

(35:50):
Well you know I'm used to listeningto British announcers for decades. Yeah,
they don't give them, yes,one who'd about well, that's their own.
The thing didn't note is okay,the broadcast was a little rough.
It seemed like the prep work wasn'tgreat. I saw somebody post something about

(36:15):
the video quality that who has workedin video production in the past, and
he was saying the picture itself itkept changing because they were using cheaper cameras
at field level. Oh and it'slike it went and he goes, he
goes, hey, man, Ididn't pay three thousand dollars, well,

(36:36):
he said, he goes, Ididn't pay three thousand dollars pay for Apple
League Plus to have video quality.That sucks. No, it's disappointing because
you can sense, hey, we'renot a big market team or we're not
a glamour team, even though wewon the West last year. It's it's
weird that the broadcasters come in andI think it was pretty evident they didn't

(36:59):
do much homework terms of what's wasLouvin mentioned. I know my buddy.
My buddy texted me and goes,hey, any updates Louvin. They haven't
talked about him all night. Yeah, yeah, I mean it's crazy.
And then misidentifying players. All yougot to do is watch our previous match,
you know, from ten days agoor two weeks Yeah, and you

(37:19):
know we had three lineups in thesame no exactly, and you'll you'll know
the players not so much by theirnumber, You'll know by what part of
the field they're operating, brilliant intosome degree, their physique and you know,
and how they play. It's over. You know, all you got
to do is watch one match toprepare. It's nineteen minutes. It was
pretty evident that the play by playRon Gandino or whatever whatever, he didn't

(37:42):
know half our players. But otherthan that, how do you do it
was brilliant. Oh, here's ayou got the update, I've got the
Como report. So today's report.Today's game was Mode and and nil Como.
Nil Como is in second place withseventy two points, is one game
left. There are two points aheadof Nancia and they're the top to have
the automatic slots. And there's noplayoffs. There's no this playoffs for another

(38:02):
SPID. The next six teams arein some kind of playoff for one spot.
But Nico hasn't been playing or sayinghe's been getting in like the last
fifteen eighteen minutes just on some games, some games, say some games he
isn't Yeah right, he didn't playtoday. Yeah, So, ty,
I kind of have an idea ofwhat you felt during the match last night,

(38:23):
because I'm on a text chain thatyou are rather bold and so,
but the rest of people don't reallyknow what you thought about last game,
or we haven't talked in a whileabout city, tell us what you think
is going on. Well, Ithink we need to score goals. Obviously,
that's a problem. You know.It's it's not bad to go into

(38:45):
Houston and get a point, right, there's nothing wrong with that, except
we haven't had enough three point victoriesobviously, and the place to take care
of that is at home. Right. So, even before yesterday's match,
I was speaking with some other fanand basically they go, what do you
think? You know, what doyou think? I'm like, well,
we got to start getting some threepoint victories at home and we'll be fine.

(39:07):
If we don't, we're in bigtrouble because, yeah, you got
to get a point here and thereon the road, for sure, but
if you're not capitalizing at home,that becomes a big issue in terms of
accumulating points. And not only thatwe're the reason we're not doing it is
we're not scoring goals. Let meinterrupt you. Yeah, how much of

(39:30):
that is not having living I thinkit's integral to how we create more consistent
chances on goal. We're still creatingchances here and there, we're dangerous on
corner Cacks and so forth, butmoving in there by holding the ball at
times and waiting for those runs todevelop. By Claus by alm Al wide

(39:53):
or I mean, you just yousee the thing start to generate its own
energy because people know he's not goingto lose the ball, right, so
they make better runs. Yeah,because they know it's on. There's not
a chance of the ball turning over. I'm thinking about the Bill was talking
about. Bill McDermot was talking aboutit earlier the Champions game, League game

(40:15):
this week where Tony Kruz hit onepass and Modris too, but Tony they
scored on Tony. That was theonly goal I think, wasn't it all?
Right? One pass put an offthe ball run by Venetius too,
and that ball was right to thespot he was going to weight. It

(40:36):
was a thirty forty yard pass.It ripped the opposition up the gut,
right, And we don't have anybodywho's even maybe they're trying to make those
passes, but they're there. Theyhaven't pulled any of those passes off.
Yeah, they're deadly passes to dissectthe opponent's back line. And the mental

(40:58):
toughness that Luvin Burns and Jesse he'sa tough he doesn't look like a tough
guy. But how about set pieces? Yeah, set pieces. I think
that's a big difference. Yeah.So I mean so again to go back
to the broadcast and they don't mentionthat, you know that we haven't had
him for the last month. Yeah, we have to do a station break.
Ye. Yes, folks, youare listening to soccer Sunday on KFE

(41:20):
five ninety. The fan in thissegment is brought to you by n Gtable
from dot Com, not Tango anda Tango and by Tango and Tango.
So ty uh, I am ofthe belief that it's not as nearly as

(41:43):
important how you're playing now as howyou will be playing in August and September
in this league. Because the weirdthing about this league you can't call it
a season because it played in allfour seasons. It starts in winter in
INDs in winter, the climate isan issue, particularly in the middle part

(42:04):
of the country where we are.Yeah, but uh, yeah, I
see that, and I see interms of what city's trying to do.
Uh their style of play also,can they get momentum towards the end of
the season or are they starting torun out of gas because they play such
a high energy, high pressure,demanding, physical, physically demanding style of

(42:28):
play. Uh And to me thatmeans it's critical what they do in the
next signing window because you're gonna makethat. You know, it's usually in
early July, I think maybe evensooner, Yeah, because I think especially
you know, if a guy likeLouvin is it's still questionable whether he's going

(42:50):
to really be able to contribute overI mean, you need just because it's
a long season, but just becausethere's injuries, just because of the climate
factor and our style of play,we need a couple more a deeper roster
frankly, because you know you're goingto be in a situation where all of
a sudden, you're you're playing atCity Park and it's ninety seven degrees ninety

(43:15):
nine percent humidity, and you're gonnaneed guys that aren't depleted. Yeah.
Yeah, sorry, Daniel Liverpool onetalking. Wow, that was quick?
Yes? What's the time of teenthminute? Sixteenth minute? Oh and not
too early? Well that's good,I guess. Is that on peacock?
Yes, it's on peacock. That'swhy I pull it up on my iPad.

(43:36):
Yeah, so then I'm trying toyou're somewhat dismayed by the performance of
the team. You're not. You'renot the glasses half empty year. The
glasses kind of still three quarters full. Well, I mean we're in a
playoff spot if the season ended it, Yeah, right, so you can't

(43:57):
beat that negative people got spoiled lastyear's don't you think that's the biggest issue.
I mean, I would give usthis this record last year. Everybody's
over the top exactly exactly. Sothe expectations I think got a little distorted.
Yeah, and and a lot ofit was Burkie's performance. I kept
us in so many games we probablyshould not have been in without a doubt.
And you know, and even lastnight, he makes it incredible.

(44:20):
Oh my god, we're really downright. So yeah, he's he's been
the difference maker. Obviously Louman isalso a difference maker. But we need
more goals, we need to createmore opportunities. We need it just a
little bit better finishing too. Yeah. Yeah, the problem, the biggest

(44:40):
problem I see is this stupid appthat you got to watch the game on.
I mean, I just said wewere talking about before the show.
It's like if there were only ifthe games were on. Just think if
they would have local coverage of thegame, then you could watch the game
and you could flip hit the letthat's channel button and you could switch over

(45:01):
to the NBA. Because, man, last night was a snoozer, I
thought, yeah, it was not. Well, think about it. Usually
in games on the road, especiallylast year, Burkeye made five six seven
death defying saves Superman Spider Man.Yeah, yeah, he had the cape

(45:21):
on and as I said, butyeah, so he's he's doing. He
might have won us a point lastnight, Oh clearly, But it wasn't
like he had to stand on hishead, right yeah, right, well
just or are we just getting usedto the quality of his table? Well
that too, I mean that wasa big time save, but because you
know what, and I wasn't evenlistening to the analyst anymore. But it

(45:45):
came through traffic too. It's notlike it was absolutely hammered. The guy
took about two and a half stridesinto it, and there's a lot of
velocity on that shot. Thank god, it was in Burkie's wheelhouse, right,
and he snatched it out put itover the bar. But the fact
is there were two or three defendersand at least one attacker in the line

(46:06):
of sight for burkeiy So for himto be able to see it and track
it and still react, it waspretty incredible. So, Ty, we
don't have a lot of time left. Anything that you want to talk about
other than City. You want totalk about the Champions League at all?
Well, it is what it is, the quality. I heard you guys
talking about the quality earlier. Imean, it's just stunning, it really

(46:30):
is. Some of the stuff thatthey do is use e Columbus Monther Ray
this week. I did not.I did not, but yeah, and
that's the discussion of you know howfar is MLS and you know what MLS
needs. They they need a situationand American players that are in playing in
MLS need situations where there is promotionand relegation. We've talked about it before

(46:51):
and when Russell was going through allthe scores of MYMLS, I go,
yeah, that's right. We havethirty teams and why wouldn't you put it
in two divisions right right? Apremier league. We were talking earlier about
the situation with it was yesterday,Yeah, with a winning promotion. It's
so foreign to the concept of America, to team ownership. Team ownership is

(47:15):
right, but team ownership is veryimportant, right, and all our promotion
relegation are the playoffs. If youdon't make the playoffs, you con Yeah.
I think you can solve this problem. By the way, I think
you can have two halves of theseason. The first half you figured out
who's in the top half in thesecond half, because you figure out the

(47:37):
second so long, right, youcan do it. You could do it.
You could do like South America doesexactly Mexican Mexico. Yeah, exactly,
you could do it. I don'tthink they'll ever do it, not
expecting it. Yeah, well,the inment continue to be ramped up right
to even enter. Yeah, soyou get paid, Yeah, half a

(48:00):
billion dollars and the second Yes,that and I've I've read and may have
hurt somebody talking about that. Theybelieve that the roster construction restrictions in MLS
are holding us back. That theway the levels of player and the well,

(48:23):
the concept is that basically the NASLspent itself to death. So the
whole idea, the whole concept ofa Major League Soccer starting in its first
year in ninety six, was thatthe player contracts are owned by the league,
so there's a control on teams,not overspending. You're talking about options
for teams to spend as much asthey like, which is kind of there

(48:45):
anyway. I mean, look whatthey did to bring Messi in. Yeah,
yeah, and Beckham you know,the last last time around. So
uh yeah, I see it.And as far as I'd like to see
City by two three quality players inthe next signing period, if we really
want to be a contender, uh, if we want to just make the
playoffs and and and maybe get pastthe first round, not get passed the

(49:07):
first round, run out of gastowards the end of the season, well
then don't sign anybody. Well,because the the league championship doesn't mean not
the the regular season. Yeah,it doesn't mean anything. The chair what
what I mean the supporter Shield.I'm thinking of the charity Shield, the
supporters Shield. I think it meansa lot. I mean, uh,

(49:30):
I'm giving the Kio Award this yearat the Saint Lous Soccer Hall of Fame
to Pat Noonan for his accomplishment ofwinning the Supporter Shield in Major League Soccer
as the coach in Cincinnati. Yeah, but I'm talking about the fans.
Yeah right, yeah, I meanthe the like you're not mean everything and
you and US sports the playoffs matterfan. You then enjoyed some really good

(49:51):
soccer to get to get the leaguesupporters shield. I mean, well,
no, I'm I'm I'm simply justsaying what it is. I mean,
not soccer. People know I knowwhat it is and want to accomplish it.
It really is. But yeah,the casual fan is they want to
know how did you do in theplayoffs? And you got to have the
casual fans. And by the way, you're having a hard time getting casual

(50:13):
fans when you got Apple TV,when you got to pay a hundred bucks
to watch the games, and thenexcept for the free nights like last night
it was last night free. Yeah, but you still have to go looking
for you you have to know togo look for it. Yeah, and
you have to spend three minutes?How do you measure the time. I'm
talking to my son about it,he'd probably be like, Dad, just

(50:35):
do this. I was on themenu page for at least three or four
Yeah, trying to find the SaintLuis call right, yeah, right.
The app isn't great but the justthe ability to go from streaming to either
over the air or streaming table thereis. It's got to be a subtle

(50:57):
trick to it. I haven't figuredout. No, Well, if you
haven't figured out, there's no wayI'm going to. Hopefully it's not like
you guys heard lear Field Sports.He does a lot of college sports.
They have this advertisement or a thingcalled sink your Game. They go go
sink your Game dot to learn more. Well, you know what the secret
is to sink your game? Youbring up their app to listen to the

(51:22):
game, You bring the game onyour TV, and then you use your
TV remote to get your your videoto the exact spot of the audio.
Manually, it's all going to bestreaming at something right, right, Yeah,
so it seems to be it is. Yeah, so, but yeah,

(51:44):
as far as Major League Soccer,yeah, they've got a lot of
things to solve. They have solvedthe major thing in terms of people being
able to aesthetically appreciate the sport,and that is soccer specific stadiums makes all
the difference in the world because that'swhat soccer did not have in the previous
year. We're almost there. Wedon't have old gross fields yet. No,

(52:06):
that's true, that's true. That'sanother tweak. But the fact that
we're playing on standardized soccer specific stage, right, I mean, it's it's
awesome. It adds to the qualityof play, and then if you can't
competitively you know, also tweak therules of the game so there's not the
time wasting and all that, thenthen you're gonna have something that's worth watching.

(52:28):
Yeah. Has the new MLS rulechange about staying down for a certain
amount of times that coming to playyet? Have you seen that forced?
I've seen it in force, butthey weren't situations where to me it didn't
make that much different. Okay,yeah, but it's not like I've been
taking notes and studying it either.Yeah, but I just remember that was
something that they were going to tryto employ and then they work stopped with

(52:52):
the fish. Yeah. Yeah,but I think in terms of the team
city, everyone seems to be inagreement. That's something. Got to figure
out what's going on. You gotto get louve and healthy and on the
field, we have to start finishingour chances because we don't make that many
of them. Last night was brutalon the Tom. Tom, you nailed
it. The gifts that we weregiven last year, boy, they were

(53:14):
putting. We were they were daggeredbecause we had a couple of gifts last
night and it did at least threejust flat out gifts. And in my
mind, I'm like, oh,we're back to last year. But it's
like, what would you say theguys wear in the invisible suits? Cloak
yep, Okay, we're about outright now. We know we're going to

(53:37):
go up to about ten fifty eightbecause all we have is ten fifty seven
right now. So for those whoare following the unbeaten season in the twenty
seventh minutes currently Iron Truck front footNeil Bayle Becuz one, Wow, that's
just and all starting to close thatout. It did. That's crazy,
It is crazy. But it wasabout fourteen degrees. Yeah it was cold.

(54:02):
Well I remember earlier in the seasonI said it was gold in the
press. Back, I go,it's cold tonight, but it's not Leverttus
cold. Yeah, that was November. That was them bringing us their weather.
Okay, Ty, give us yourfinal thoughts because Ted says we still
got thirty seconds left. Well,we have a team and they're competitive people.

(54:27):
Are into it. You know,it's something we dreamed about for how
long? And it's great we're havingthese conversations. Yeah, no doubt,
no doubt. That's what if you'rebeing critical, that's what the fan is
about that guy. Oh he lookedhappy at the end of that game,
by the way, Brad Bradley Carnelllooked really happy. Yeah, because he
understands how important those points are.All right, Yes, sir, we

(54:49):
got to get out of here.Why because that time's up man, and
Ty's going to leave. So youhave been listening to STL United Soccer Sunday
on KFE and its presented by Mycan He at mgklawfilm dot com Local Roots
and national results and by Tango inSaint Louis right here on Kfans five ninety
The Fan. You can subscribe toour show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify It

(55:12):
and so forth it wherever you canfind us do it. Would you check
us out at cafanness dot com.Where is ed Mundo? Where is ed
Mundo in Dallas? Tommy doing Tommy? What have you you hear? One
more word for us? I doI reckon, I reckon, I reckon.
He has y'all Oh no, it'sbrother loves in Texas. Okay,
okay, So if I stretched itout and you're still good. Got another

(55:32):
thing. Oh, I'm going hometo see Felix. Are you how's it's
hoops? Felix is a he's aballer, let me tell you. I
mean he's no ant man, butmaybe he's an ant baby. All right,
folks, thanks for tuning in.We love you. Bye bye takes

(56:04):
show, no mo times take out. Also, you said you sh