Soccer <\/p>\n
The new kids in town, San Diego FC<\/a>, take their first-ever trip to San Jose this weekend, making their Bay Area bows against the San Jose Earthquakes<\/a> for our Matchday 29 Sunday Night Soccer presented by Continental Tire clash at PayPal Park (7 pm ET | MLS Season Pass, Apple TV+<\/a>).<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n San Diego have figured things out as quickly as any expansion team in MLS history, and currently lead the Western Conference with 49 points. They\u2019ve exhibited a level of tactical clarity that’s remarkable in any side, let alone an expansion team.<\/p>\n The hosts are looking for the same. Bruce Arena has done good work trying to reboot the Quakes during his first year in charge, but they are still a chaos engine at times.<\/p>\n And that makes them fun! Fun is good.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n San Jose Earthquakes<\/strong><\/p>\n San Diego FC<\/strong><\/p>\n Points. That\u2019s the whole thing now for the Quakes, who are desperately trying to claw their way back into the playoffs after last year\u2019s Wooden Spoon disappointment.<\/p>\n They are much-improved over last year, of course, but that won\u2019t matter much to them if they don\u2019t get across the finish line in the final whistle blows on Decision Day two months from now. And it\u2019d be nice, to boot, if they managed to climb into eighth place \u2013 because that would mean they host the Wild Card game, and that would be the first-ever postseason game at PayPal.<\/p>\n Which was built a decade ago! The Quakes need a break, man.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n The greatest expansion teams in MLS history:<\/p>\n Only two expansion sides have ever won a trophy. No expansion team has ever won the Shield in their debut season.<\/p>\n San Diego are playing to make history.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n San Jose: Beware Preston Judd off the bench!<\/strong><\/p>\n The 26-year-old Cali boy has some Goonie genes, with five goals in 690 minutes this year.<\/p>\n Two of the last three goals have come at a \u201c90+X\u201d time for the Quakes, getting San Jose a win against Vancouver<\/a> last weekend and a point against the Timbers<\/a> in Portland.<\/p>\n Judd<\/a> is not a particularly complicated forward, but he\u2019s a dangerous one because of how single-minded he is about being in goal-scoring positions and putting maximum pressure on opposing backlines with his movement and effort. If the Quakes need a goal in the second half, you can bet Judd will be sent on to sniff one out.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n San Diego: How much will they miss Milan Iloski?<\/strong><\/p>\n Listen, any real criticism of the expansion boys is nitpicking\u2026 HOWEVER, nitpicking is par for the course when you\u2019re a true Supporters\u2019 Shield contender (the favorite, according to my MLS Season Pass colleague Dax McCarty).<\/p>\n I have but one personnel concern (probably too big a word) with San Diego: center forward.<\/p>\n Against Sporting KC<\/a>, Onni Valakari<\/a> played up top \u2013 on the lineup sheet at least, as he frequently drops deeper as a creative fulcrum in midfield to let Dreyer and Chucky Lozano<\/a> find space in wide areas and challenge the depth behind opposing backlines \u2013 but, as technically brilliant as he is, the Finland international has just four goals in 26 MLS matches. Tom\u00e1s \u00c1ngel<\/a> battles his you-know-what off, but the box-score production (3g\/2a) hasn\u2019t been there. Marcus Ingvartsen<\/a> hasn\u2019t played since June because of injury.<\/p>\n Which brings us back to Iloski<\/a>, who was a human microwave for head coach Mikey Varas: 10 goals in 471 minutes before his loan was terminated and he signed permanently with the Philadelphia Union<\/a>, for whom he scored in a Union US Open Cup<\/a> win on Wednesday.<\/p>\n Iloski scored in six games for San Diego. They won five of those games, 15 critical points in the race for the Shield and playoff seeding. Far fewer points will decide the Shield. What happens when the vast majority of the goalscoring load is on Lozano and Dreyer\u2019s backs? Will San Diego have a third goal threat that flips a couple of results their way down the stretch?<\/p>\n We\u2019re going to find out.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n The Quakes, as mentioned, are a chaos engine. Arena has \u2013 much to my surprise \u2013 had them playing primarily out of a 3-4-2-1 this season, with flying wingbacks and a weirdly empty midfield.<\/p>\n That doesn\u2019t lend itself to much pitch control, but it has lent itself to a high-powered attack. High-powered as in 49 goals to this point, which is fourth in the league (and one goal off of first place).<\/p>\n A lot of them have looked something like this:<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Cristian’s goal, a great layoff by Josef Mart\u00ednez pic.twitter.com\/jC7J8pOTj8<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 San Jose Earthquakes (@SJEarthquakes) April 13, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n Espinoza plays as a sort of inside-right playmaker rather than a true winger, which means he spends more time in and around the box, combining with the likes of Arango and Josef Mart\u00ednez<\/a>. Josef, of course, is much more of a poacher than a playmaker, but that doesn\u2019t mean he can\u2019t set the other guys up: he can, and does.<\/p>\n The interesting part comes with the positioning of the wingbacks. Usually, they play high upfield, as you can see from this network passing graphic I picked from a random game this summer:<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Of late, though, they\u2019ve been a little<\/em> bit lower, probably as a result of how fragile they\u2019ve looked defensively.<\/p>\n When that happens, the 3-4-2-1 can end up looking a lot like a 5-4-1, and the Quakes are less of a chaos engine at that point than a sit-and-counter proposition.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n They play the most compact soccer in the league, and have been committed to that no matter the game state. You can crack them open, but you have to be brave and precise:<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n The Crew are so good at using width to crack open compact teams and get access to Zone 14. They gave San Diego \u2013 who play as compact as anyone \u2013 a real lesson on this goal pic.twitter.com\/YIVZUgpe0p<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Matthew Doyle (@MattDoyle76) March 16, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n That\u2019s their plan when they don\u2019t have the ball: compress the field and make you string together several special plays in order to get them into rotation. I\u2019ve written before how they remind me of nothing so much as the great Real Salt Lake<\/a> teams of 15 years back (we\u2019ll count this as my second Beckerman reference of the column).<\/p>\n But that\u2019s me burying the lede. What makes San Diego remarkable is how committed they are to getting on the ball and using it to control everything about the game. They\u2019re at or near the top of the league in possession, passes per possession, passes into and within the attacking third, field tilt and all the rest. Varas told us in preseason that this is how they\u2019d play, and he\u2019s been good to his word.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a paragraph from John Muller\u2019s recent feature<\/a> on San Diego\u2019s approach that ran in the Guardian:<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n True to his promise, Varas\u2019s goalkeepers have refused to play it safe this season, launching just 8.6 percent of their open-play passes more than 40 yards. According to the stats site FBref, that\u2019s not just an MLS record \u2013 it\u2019s lower than Barcelona, Man City or any other team in Europe\u2019s top five leagues going back at least as far as 2017-18.<\/em><\/p>\n The whole goal is to get the ball onto the foot of Dreyer or the other DP winger, Chucky Lozano, entering the final third at speed. And they have hit on that goal basically all season long.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Last week was their first win in forever, so there’s no chance Bruce will change the XI. That means it\u2019ll be the typical 3-4-2-1.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Varas is still juggling an injury-plagued backline and midfield, and he\u2019s got a potential new No. 9 with the arrival of Corey Baird<\/a>. I\u2019m expecting changes from last week, but your guess is as good as mine \u2013 though we know it\u2019ll be their usual 4-3-3.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n
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San Jose Earthquakes<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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San Diego FC<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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