St. Louis CITY SC have reached an inflection point.

St. Louis CITY SC needs a miracle as they welcome Minnesota United to Energizer Park this weekend. They will be at least 11 points out of the final play-in spot by the time the match kicks off on Saturday night. The playoffs are looking more like a daydream vs reality, but there is still a lot of season left, and CITY SC needs to, at the very least, build a strong foundation to compete in 2026.

The loss in Dallas stung. A squad that needed to show progress wasted the opportunity for back-to-back wins and failed to progress the ball through Dallas’s low block.

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Zero big chances from just two shots on target, despite 16 total attempts, tells the entire story, and it’s a story that has haunted the club since its inaugural season.

“They wanted to just drop very deep into that box, three-back or five system. And once they get into that, they're organized.” David Critchley reflected.

Critchley’s analysis was spot on, CITY SC didn’t find the execution needed to expose Dallas, and once Kaick scored the opener, Critchley’s side couldn’t grab hold of the needed pace to open up their opposition.

“The objective for us was to try and attack those back three before becoming the back five. And we just missed those moments today.” Critchley continued. “And then when it became a back five, we just needed that little bit of spark, a little bit of creativity and magic from some of the players, and we were missing that today as well. So overall, just wasn't good enough with the ball to be honest.”

Minnesota will bring a similar element to Saturday’s match.

CITY SC were similarly unsuccessful in Minnesota earlier this season, but that was a different manager and vastly different approach.

Critchley is confident that his squad heard the message. They have to find success after a loss that caused Lutz Pfannenstiel to call the performance “disgraceful” on his ‘Sports on a Sunday Morning’ hit this weekend.

Critchley found a calmer resolve reflecting on the performance.

“You'll have moments that we celebrate a good performance and a win, and there'll be moments where we celebrate or not celebrate, but we have a bad performance and a loss. But the most important thing is you don't get too excited, and you don't get too disappointed.” Critchley said in his pre-match comments. “You find that even keel. So, we were able to move on from the Dallas game pretty well. We've had a good week of training for the guys.”

St. Louis has lost four straight to Minnesota heading into Saturday, and will need to finally unlock their ability to change the pace of their attacks. Luckily, the roster has seen some improvements.

Where the roster stands:

St. Louis is inching closer to full strength this week with Edu Löwen eligible to start and Chris Durkin’s return to the lineup. Only Henry Kessler, Alfredo Morales, and Joakim Nilsson remain completely unavailable, while they add Devin Padelford and Jeong Sangbin from Minnesota. Padelford and Sangbin will be available from the jump, with newly acquired Fallou Fall still on his way, and will immediately face their former teammates.

The important addition here, and the one with the most duality, is Sangbin. Critchley has been forced into a setup that forces Tomas Totland high into the right wing without an out-and-out winger to hold down the right side of the formation. Sangbin offers Critchley the flexibility of a pacey winger who can attack the fullbacks directly, something the club has desperately missed with Rasmus Alm’s season-ending injury troubles. St. Louis purposely doesn’t have balance in the formation, but the potential to swap sides on their overload or even to have the opportunity to utilize Sangbin’s extraordinary pace can be a boon for the squad.

Sangbin became available because he couldn’t find his game in Minnesota, but it’s easy to argue that St. Louis’s desire to play more expansively, especially in transition, could help the U22 player find his game. It’s why Lutz Pfannenstiel has inquired about Sangbin each of the last three transfer windows.

“I had a Zoom meeting with Lutz [Pfannestiel] and [David Critchley] before I came here, and I felt like he had been pursuing me since last year,” Sangbin said through interpreter – and CITY SC first team admin – Bomi Park. “So, Lutz and Critch were very interested in me, and they were very knowledgeable about my style, and they were very informed about how we are pursuing what kind of style that we would like to play. So, I felt very well informed, and I am excited to be here.”

Transfer odds and ends.

St. Louis CITY SC officially transferred Njabulo Blom to Vietnamese club Thep Xanh Nam Dinh FC this week following his loan stint with Kaizer Chiefs. It had become clear that Blom’s time in St. Louis was done, but his time with KC saw him fall out of favor over the back half of the season, meaning that they became uninterested in pursuing their buy option. St. Louis found the best solution, freeing up the possible roster spot and retaining a small sell-on fee if Blom can find his game with the Vietnamese champions.

Lutz Pfannenstiel is still clearly active in the market as the front office looks for answers, but the rumors of an impending João Klauss transfer have to be treated as that, a rumor. There have always been inquiries for João Klauss, but St. Louis has no interest in selling unless the offer is well above what they see as his value. The offer has to make sense for Klauss as well. He feels at home in St. Louis, and I’m skeptical that an offer from anywhere outside of Europe or Brazil would sway him.

Of course, that could change. He’s very important to that locker room, and there’s added value with his DP tag expiring when the club option is exercised.

Elsewhere, AZ Jackson recently signed with Jagiellonia Białystok for an undisclosed fee from Columbus. St. Louis held a sell-on percentage if AZ was to be sold outside of the US, but it’s unlikely they will receive much from this move. Still, it’s nice to see a young player bet on themselves.

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Academy highlights.

Midfielder Lorenzo Cornelius and Defender Owen Jorgensen appeared in the MLS NEXT All-Star game Monday evening, where Cornelius recorded an assist on the Western Conference’s lone goal of the evening. Cornelius and Jorgensen are the fourth and fifth CITY SC players to appear in the MLS NEXT All-Star game, joining them are Fritz Volmar, Caden Glover, and Tyson Pearce.

Both players also represented the USYNT earlier this season. Cornelius took part in the U17 World Cup qualifying campaign, where he scored two goals across two call-ups. Jorgensen has been called into the U15 setup five times this year, where he also scored a goal against Argentina last May.

Meanwhile, U15 attacker Eddie Niles was named MLS NEXT MVP this past week for his performance during the 2024 - 2025 season. Niles scored 31 goals this season and helped the U15 squad reach the MLS NEXT semi-finals.