Full Transcript for Igor Jesus Returns After a Year Out — LAFC 2-0 Red Bulls Recap + SKC Preview

the ⁓ the ⁓ it's gonna be a battle for right right wing between him him and the Brazilian guy that are coming in, so we're kinda right back at a battle for right wing. For Robert. Yeah, sorry. ⁓ and and one of the things that I liked about this game that I've been saying for a long time is to get ⁓ Shaffelberg on the left making crosses and Celso Oliveira: Robert. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Denny should have converted. Shuffleberg should have had an assist with an absolute gorgeous cross on the left hand side. And ⁓ also crossing in from the right hand side. It's like when those guys are in and those guys are able to make really threatening crosses, it totally opens up the back line for the other team and it starts creating gaps that when they play compact, those gaps aren't opened up. But when you have good crossers. Celso Oliveira: Yes. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Somebody has to come out and close them down, or else you're gonna have a dime late on, and you can't take that risk to have that ball thrown in there like that. So having having some guys crossing, and again, you know, a shuffle burge started on the right, but he made those crosses from the left, is which is where he naturally needs to be. Like we did kind of see that open up, and I and ⁓ I I felt a little vindicated on that. Celso Oliveira: I s yes, we saw that. We saw overloading of Sunny and Buanga right next to one another, something else that I asked for. So we did see some more creativity, some different concepts versus this flat line of three that we've just been saying, My God, like you guys just can just rotate around. It gives me Bob Bradley, like ⁓ you know, vibes where you guys just though the the creativity of the office is limited to to the two wingers changing sides. I I I just like that. So we did see some different things, of course, and then on the twenty first minute, the most important thing happened in the game. We got the lead, which we know that we play with the lead much better than When we play from behind, and who else but Jude Terry, right? Twenty-first minute, first go at Bimo. Gets the gets the banner, right? Man of the match. Second MLS career goal. We've been asking for this. This guy seems like special dude that just makes everybody around him better. And ⁓ is this just yeah another solidifying step in his way to become just a de facto starter for LAFC Eric? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: I hope so. I mean, we've we've seen the kids' quality all the way from LAFC two two years ago. And last year when I started calling for him to get more senior first team minutes, which didn't really happen much under Dolo, but it's good to see it happening under ⁓ Mark DeSantos and hopefully that performance and that goal, you know, and and it's not even just that goal, he played pretty well all game. You know, hopefully this will give him some more looks. He's a young guy, he's gonna have ups and downs, you know, with every good game he has, he's gonna have some bad games in him too, where he has some bad, bad giveaways, but that's part of being a seventeen year old player. Celso Oliveira: Yeah, and playing a tough position too. Is to playing that six eight role that is is is a harp role to play and it's easy to make mistakes on and we'll talk about of course by Igor Jesus returning because he was sort of the big star there of that position and actually gave Juteri, you know, came in for Juterry in the second half. Before that, let's talk about the other new guy that scored the other goal scorer, Armindo Sep. Seeb, I hope that's right. Armindo, ⁓ first MLS goal of course. And ⁓ you know, it takes about a month for these guys, once they're announced, you know for them to be ready to go. So ⁓ August thirteenth was when he was announced from ⁓ Bayern Munich and here he is in September already scoring goals for us. That's exactly what we want. We want guys not named the Nibowanga and Sanyaming to make contributions in goal for us. What do you think of Armando like now two games for us and you know finding the back of the net? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, I think they were saying that ⁓ it took him 40 minutes of playing to score his first goal. And ⁓ that's ⁓ that's an insane production. Not a production he can really keep up. Came in a circumstance where we were basically playing an eleven on nine because they had ⁓ pretty much two injured guys that were out at that point because they were out of subs. But nonetheless, I mean that was a banger of a shot. It was actually I think the build up to that play was was really one of the nicest build ups I've seen. And again. The caveat is it was eleven against nine, but I mean that that was a rocket from outside. He he played his shot, controlled it with the first touch, and launched it in the corner. It the goalie never had a chance at that shot. And ⁓ it was kind of the example of a good strike will beat the best goalie. And there was no stopping that one. So I mean, if he can start rotating in the front with Denny and Sun, things things might look different. You know, you gotta keep in mind the Red Bulls are also a very, a very low team right now on the Celso Oliveira: Yes. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: in the standings, but we've also been struggling against low teams in the standings. So, you know, i this is a win we needed and there's a lot of positive to take away and hopefully they can build on this. Celso Oliveira: Yeah, we could keep the ⁓ I our third Position in the West, which is very important. 40 points now, 11 wins, 7 losses, 7 draws, 40 points. Again, six games without a win. We really need it. That's almost a month, man. So let's hope that we can now build momentum with SKC, which is going to be the end of our show. We have to talk about that game in the weekend, of course. And ⁓ a couple other things. Google these man. 12th clean sheet this year. 13th team shutout of the season. I think that was one from CCL, bro. Like, what a season he's having

defensively, these guys. Have been locked down. And I always wonder, like, look, if you're gonna ask for Marcus Santos to resign, you gotta address the fact that he's built a bini a mini forestress desk that is really there that is really hard to penetrate, you know, starting with Hugo Loriz, like the guy is just like found of youth Lugo. I know we have this weekly segment here where we just talk Ugo up, right? But I I do like to just point it out that how impressive we've been on that side of the ball, which is defensive. It's really hard to score against us. And you know, once again, ⁓ Twelfth personal clean sheet for us this year. ⁓ how did you see the defense playing against yeah, a very young side, right? But fully rotated almost. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: It was another four center back lineup. And ⁓ you know, luckily the four center back lineup yeah, it worked. It worked. We had what ⁓ you know, and this is with Portius injured, which hopefully Portius is ⁓ not injured too much longer, but he is out and it's a pretty pretty big absence. But yeah, Hugo Loris, he's been the best player we've had all season. And we've had some good players on a team with Denny and Son. Hugo Loris has to be the MVP for twenty twenty-six for LAFC. Celso Oliveira: Yes, right. We talked about this too. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: And I will point out those are 12 shutouts through regular season play. It's not across all competitions. He has more. He is four away from tying Tony Miola's record of s of ⁓ 16 shutouts, which was in 2000 with the Kansas City Wizards. So he is he is ⁓ he is ⁓ in distance to make a go at that. And that would be man, how great would it be to see Hugo Loris mm. possibly able to tie a ⁓ twenty six year old record in this league. Celso Oliveira: Yeah. Tony Meola and Ugalo's in the same sentence. I would not he started a show and did not think I was gonna hear that. And that's true. That's an impressive record for him. And honestly, I I it could be early to talk about it, but if he gets another title with us, right, which I think it's kinda what's missing on his resume since his arrived here, it's hard to make an argument against him not being in that ring of fire, right? You gotta put him up there because he's just been in such an intricate part of this organization and you know, what other opportunities will you have to put a goalkeeper there, a guy that just kind of accomplished was accomplished everywhere else, right? And now just gets a chance to just do what he's doing at the end of his career with LAFC. So I I I consider him already one of us, right? So I I don't you know I know he's been at taught in him. I know he's just a French legend, but now Ugo is just one of us. He's definitely the most prolific goalkeeper pos ⁓ persona that we've had since we started as a club. So ⁓ I'd like to see him win a yet another title Eric so that this it's not even a discussion here. Of course he's gonna go into Ring of Fire in the ring arms Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ yeah. Celso Oliveira: Do you disagree with me here or is it too early to say that? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ no, no. Hugo deserves everything, man. I think something important to remember is when he came to LAFC, he basically had sat on the bench for a year and kinda just came here because he wanted to play. And he basically came here for the league minimum. I mean a little bit more than that, but I think his his first year he made a hundred and twenty five thousand dollars to play for LAFC. So he he basically paid us to play here, you know, essentially. When you call Hall's living cost is Celso Oliveira: Yes. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Family coming in and you know, educations for his kids. Like Hugo Lee Lore is basically paid money to come to LA and play for our team. Like to me, how how do you not love a guy like that? I mean, that shows love for the badge as well. And so, man, I I hope Hugo stays for another year. I hope he stays for another two year. And we I think, you know, if this is a fair world, which it's not, but this club owes it to Hugo to really get a trophy for him. Like Hugo needs a lift trophy. In Los Angeles, hundred percent. Celso Oliveira: Well he he lifted the open cup, which is ⁓ it's something, right? But it's Also something that we all know that is below some of the other things that we want to win, right? I'm not it's not a knock on what we won there, but we all know that there's bigger fish to fry and we definitely need to get another title. It's been a couple of years. We've too we're starting to get title hungry here. We have to continue to win titles, in my opinion, in order to continue to be a relevant club. Hardware makes a whole bunch of difference and I would like to see Ugalo's raise a few. And this roster, by the way, I don't think it's as bad as people are ma main maintaining it to be. And that was exactly what JT, let's move on. But JT was talking about to us with us, the media, last week before the game, that first off, it was an extremely difficult window to navigate because of the World Cup. And again, I don't know if you had a chance to listen to him, but that was one thing that caught my attention. And the other thing was that the inter the international markets, particularly the EPL, had a very busy internal internal session, meaning players moved a lot between the teams. And that meant. LAFC could not really move on their targets that they really wanted, Eric. So we started seeing like a little bit of a yeah, it's not as good as we want it to be, but here's why, right? So he's kind of giving it to us that the roster construction is a little bit quirky this year, giving you the reasons that was it's the World Cup year and EPL was really really hard. There was another one, and we'll talk about it. But what did you think of JT's points about rust construction for LAFC during this window? And ⁓ I think Josh was the one that was like, Hey, what did you think of? the window like

and he said everything but it was great. You know what I mean? It was just obviously not great for him. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, no, I I you know, and I've I've been on this last week and the year before. I'm no JT apologist, but I do think that just because of the cap space, I don't think there's very many moves he could make. He kind of had to let a guy go and then he could bring a guy in and you know, it's no coincidence, they're almost all U twenty twos that we got rid of and brought in. So ⁓ that's just that's just kinda how things are gonna go. ⁓ this was gonna be a tough window. I do I do think J T kinda made the best of it that he could this window. It If Sieb can continue to play like he did, I mean, that's our answer at right wing right there. ⁓ and then it's a matter of ⁓ MDS utilizing the roster and the bench to its potential, you know. Putting Riposo in positions where he can make crosses on the right hand side, putting Shaffelberg in position where he can make crosses on the left hand side, this is going to make our attack multidimensional, which I've been harping on this for a month on this show now at this point. But I think we kind of saw it starting to bear fruit last week. And so if they can expand on that and do that without making themselves vulnerable defensively, because we know if we give up the first goal, we pretty much don't have much of a way to come back. Then ⁓ then then that should work. ⁓ you know, and I I will I will also make point that we didn't play a bobacy last game, which probably helped and ⁓ you know, Boyd kinda came in to kill it off at the very end of the game. Which, you know, I I'm o I'm okay with I'm okay with them coming in the ninety first minute, so Celso Oliveira: It was good, right? It was good. It was like Yeah, it was it was it was it was refrigerating to see the right guys play the right minutes and you know and then the others not and I I I know I and I I by the way I love this. If Larry Berg Ross rules go through next season he's our bigger biggest transfer we know ever. So I have a theory about that. Maybe it was what Eric and I say. We already know and knew that this was gonna be tough. We know how this stuff works. We gotta go easy by like one or two windows, right? And then you go big, right? And guess what? It's gonna be a brand new season with different inspir ⁓ aspirations because it's gonna be beginning in the middle of the year. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Let's hear it. Celso Oliveira: JT personally said for the first time I get to build a team in the beginning of the season and not in the middle. That was powerful things for that a powerful thing to for him to say, right? Because I've always felt that we built the team in the middle of the year. You know what I mean? We just have a completely different roster than we started with. You know what I mean? For those of same freaking championships. So ⁓ it's it's hard sometimes for me to to to to to to to to get get over all that, but Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, we have. Celso Oliveira: Again, it's it's our league. This is how it's constructed, but I think it's up to here, man. Maybe this is the year that we just put the foot off the gas, sold Avi Martinez, right? Sold everybody. Get some new young guys to play for. And then we're gonna go big next year. Let's see what happens this season. It doesn't seem that bad. We're in third in the West. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, I I think I think counting on the roster rolls to raise before the sprint season starts is is kind of wishful thinking. It could happen, anything could happen, but you know it's I guess in the case that it does happen, of course, we can start going really big on that. But I do think that if we start playing the kids now, we start laying the groundwork. The other part of the roster rules changing comes a collective bargaining agreement with the MLS Players Union. That probably is gonna have to happen for them to do this. And just looking at regular businesses and how they deal with labor, I don't see how MLS will benefit by negotiating early. Because if you look at when this was done, which was back in like 2021, you know, inflation has kicked a lot, which means that probably the the the baseline salaries are gonna go way up. So it's not in the ownership's interest to renegotiate this now. They'd rather play their players. pay their players less if they can. ⁓ and I could be wrong. Maybe they're more altruistic than that, but generally people aren't. So I'm not sure if if if it will necessarily go up. And I think we will see a sprint season with very similar we're relying on youth. And the allocation money that we get will start banking it. And I think when we do hit the first full season coming after that. Then we'll be sitting on some rollover money, and then we'll start looking at kind of building up with the goal of really pushing the year after that. Like if if I was if I was looking at it as a salary cap guy, like that that's kind of how I would be targeting this over the long term. And ⁓ lean on the youth until then, and we got some good youth to lean on. So I I don't think it's all bad. Celso Oliveira: Yeah, it's it's not all bad and you never know. Maybe we'll go on a run. We still have so much talent. Palencia's coming back. ⁓ Segura now it's hurt too, so he didn't play. ⁓ Marky Delgado took some time off. I do believe that was just purely rotation. Just take the day off. Let's give someone else another chance. And but you see that we're not like super trying hard to be at the top of the West, just managing minutes now and really trying to go into the playoffs with as much gas in the tank as we have. Because he looks like some of these guys, especially our main guys in Denis and Sonny, they look without any gas. And as much as we Denny didn't play the World Cup, but he was playing. Really hard to get to the World Cup, right? So he's got some extra mileage right there. And Sonny

played the World Cup, so he does definitely have the extra mileage of not taking the time off. So the dude looks exhausted. His dribbles, his dribbles are not crispy. Here we go. This is the time that we criticize Sonny and everybody kills us in the pod. But this is what's true. Even the commentators last night were saying he's off tonight. And even though he was off tonight, he almost scored and like almost had a beautiful like pass that turned into a goal, right? Initiated the goal itself. So That's Sonny for you. Even when he's having an off night, he can still be a difference maker. But again, as I said in the beginning of the broadcast, very important that two guys not named Sonny and Denis were able to score. Because if they're not good, we cannot be zero-zero. We have to find a way to score. So Ju Terry, it is, Seeb, it is, and whoever it is that's coming. You know, there's more players coming. Hopefully they can be fighting the back of the net as well. We can't just rely on these outside shots like we were in the beginning of the season. That's just not gonna fly in the playoffs at all. So tough, tough, tough. But we get the dub brother brother and we have to talk about who else? No one else but this man. Number six, Igor Jesus comes in. Mark said he was gonna go, right? I thought he was gonna get garbage minutes. Matt, thought he was getting eight minutes at the end there. You know what I mean? The the typical eight, just get eight, you know, loosen up and get out. And no, no, he puts him in there in the 60th minute. ⁓ Jute Terries out, and there is Igor back, man. And I wanna I want you to talk to everybody here that the fact that we saw his injury, you would want to the first one is to actually point it out. How did you feel to see him come back? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ it was great to see him back. You know, I I love we all love Igor. ⁓ he's just he's just such a nice, sweet, like humble kid. And ⁓ you know, it always ⁓ you know, for those who haven't really dial dove too deep into it, you can just see he's just he's he's a very young kid that just kind of got thrown into the United States to play this game. And you know, you can tell he's just a very very humble kid from a very humble background. It's very common amongst footballers in Brazil. And so He's a hard guy not to really want to cheer for, like, you know, and ⁓ he he has a really great smile as well. Like you can just see he has a lot of joy in him. And you can see he's very shy as well. So ⁓ all these things together, you know, for me. He's just very enduring for me. And ⁓ same with my wife, my wife, Maria Claudia, she she loves Igor Jesus also. And we saw him on the ball last night and he he started doing what he did before. We were really excited for him as ⁓ playing the single pivot number six for us. Really changes the dynamic of the team. He is a steady hand on the ball. You know, he can kind of do that where when he gets the ball, he can hold it. He can draw in

like two d two ⁓ defenders onto him and then he can outlet the ball somewhere that it's gonna be able to progress up the field. And we just don't have that with anybody we've had and that's something we've really struggled with. And ⁓ the injury sucked. We were at that game in Dallas when he got hurt. I saw it happen and I was like, ⁓ I was like he that's bad that he Celso Oliveira: You're like year off, year out. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: That's what I told you and you're like, ⁓ you're just being dramatic as I was like, No, man, no man, this sucks. But ⁓ yeah, so it's it's good to see him back and a year out, you know, I'm I imagine as a player you gotta be wondering if ⁓ you're ever gonna play again at that point, especially when you're that young and like the world the world moves a lot slower when you're a younger guy. So really happy to see Igor. I after the game you could see all the other players were super happy for him to go out there, so ⁓ Celso Oliveira: She's Yeah I was like stop You were right? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: You know, hopefully he is ready to start against sporting Kansas City and and Igor Jesus and Jude Terry Midfield along with you know one of the other guys. Yeah, I'm excited to see that. I I think it's gonna be it's gonna be really nice and it's gonna add a dimension or midfield that we haven't gotten. So, you know, I'm ⁓ I'm I'm starting to feel excited again for this team after the last month of feeling very uninspired by it, you know it. Celso Oliveira: Excited. Yeah, bro, like I'm it's good. Very right. It's usually there's always a stinky month for us. It's always a stinky month and then we start kinda going back to form, which i it it's natural. It's a it's such a talented team. You know, and and MLS has some bottom feeder. So we we SKC is it. Like we have to keep it up, right? We have to keep it going. But like ⁓ he comes in the 60th minute, by the way, August twenty third, twenty twenty-five. That was over a year since we caught that game in that it was hot. But it's not as hot as in California right now. God damn it's hot right here. Dos Santos said the possession Visibly improved once Igor Jesus came in. And he called him a potential top three player at his position at in the league. At his best. At his best, right? Because it's very clear that he's the start of a process. Still getting his feet under him. So it's gonna be a while. I would say next year, perhaps we're gonna start seeing the Rio Igor. And always always the risk of a reinjury. That's the biggest thing, right? Do not get reinjured right now. Go easy. And I think that was the call for him just to be shut down for this season so that that would do. We do not want that to happen. That would be the last thing. And it happens too often. The second reinvent. Good job. ⁓ If they hear this stuff, good for him. Good for him. One thing on the JT thing that I would say, right, is look, we didn't talk about Davi Martinez. And what came up was the fact

that Davi was adamant about leaving. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah. Celso Oliveira: Which complications in the relationships between Venezuela and the United States not being great prevented his family from coming here. Which created an issue for him. So he did not want to be here anymore. Which is the reason why we decided to move him fast. He was an unhappy player. So any questi anything you wanna say about that? Because I like, Man, why are we selling this guy right now? This is insane. What did you think of that? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, I mean it's ⁓ I got I it's understandable if that's the reason behind it, you know, it make it makes sense. Again, he came here as a young kid not really knowing anybody, so you know it's it's hard to go to a new place as a kid with no ⁓ with no family around. ⁓ what's up, Juan? So ⁓ you know, I I love David Martinez and you know, I I wish him nothing but the best. You know, unlike some other players that have wanted to leave, you know, I feel like Celso Oliveira: That's cool. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: He really kinda stuck it out, you know. He he didn't create a bunch of drama. He didn't put social media posts saying that he wished he was somewhere else or anything like that. Like he handled everything very professionally, so you know, I I'll continue to be a fan of him for sure. And You know, with the guys coming in, it looks like, you know, we got we got the next man up right there. We got some new young guys ready to come in and take that role at right wing and battle for the position. So, you know, having Seeb score that goal definitely kinda took the stun the sting out of Martinez leaving, so Celso Oliveira: Seeb yeah, see I thought he was gonna be a good addition when I saw the prospect. People were like, Yeah, he hasn't scored a goal in Bundesliga for a long time. I was like, No, I think he's gonna be pretty good. I don't think they're the same player though. The ability to create its own shot and some of it it's not there but see. It could be with Robert, I think, and but beyond that we don't have the one guy that can take on three players and suddenly find their own shot. I don't ha we don't have that guy. It was Brian Rodriguez was that guy at some point, right? We just don't have him. David Martinez was the closest dude of this guy that I can think of. But there he is. Davi Martinez on his way to Denmark. Rodriguez, I'm sorry. ⁓ Martinez on his way to Denmark. ⁓ JT even said yeah it wasn't as much money as we should have gotten for him, but it was clear that it was a player move, right? And something that sort of ran its course and we had to let him go. And he also said that look, he left us with three days to make a move and we could not. And unfortunately, you know, we tried some things, it did not work out, right? So he kind of just mentioned the way he said it, he said, hey, kind of put us on a pickle. And John To say face, maybe right? But basically saying, look, I just trying to do something good for my player here, and you know, the market wasn't as sweet to us as we wanted it to be. And that was where those comments about you know EPL for example came through. So ⁓ do you buy any of that or is this bullshit? That would be the last on this, but Erik Hultstrom Section 128: I mean, you know Yeah, yeah. Almost everything GMs say you gotta take with a grain of salt. Like ⁓ there they're he's old enough Fox that he you know he knows how to play the game and ⁓ you know so so we'll see. I think that I don't know, I part of me part of me thinks that it even even let let's put aside the drama with Martinez, he w kind of ran hot and cold. Celso Oliveira: Course. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: He would have great games, but he c he always did kind of have this attitude where he didn't really hustle as hard as you would hope somebody would. So, you know, if if he had an extended downstretch, which I don't think any of us can look at and say, ⁓ that's impossible. Martinez would never have a down stretch. Like if he did, I think all of a sudden the market gets even worse for him. So we did basically double up. We paid four million for him. We flipped him for eight. So, you know. Bringing in some new younger 18, 19 year old kids now to see see if they can give us a little more production. I think I think ⁓ I mean when Diego Rossi came here, I think he was nineteen. And I think he's probably still like the best pure nineteen year old that we've had here as far as like what they've done for the club. If we can get a guy to kind of give us that Diego Rossi production again, like I mean, how special would that be with a guy like that? Celso Oliveira: Very young. True. Sure. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: You know, ⁓ and then and then with Buonga and Sun up front, it'll just cost fits for every Celso Oliveira: They could be real birth, you know, again it's a loan, so he he's gonna have to go through the process of proving to us that he d he belongs so that we can ⁓ purchase him first, right? So i I really hope that we see some some flashes of this kid, like some things that we've been waiting for and everybody in Brazil that watches SEDI a bit and watch his team said that and him was the only good thing that they had going for them. So they got some cash for it and they can get even more for the loan you know, if the loan goes through, right? So I really think this would be ⁓ a good win-win for everybody if he goes through and Davi, yeah, he's going to Denmark, but that's probably good enough for him right now. And from there, you know, maybe he comes back for Liga Backis one day or comes back to MLS, which seems to be something that happens all the time with our players. So we'll probably see him in another roster, like ⁓ you know, like any I don't know, the Red Bulls have Kate Cowl, so he probably's gonna end up with the Quakes, you know what I'm saying? Something like that. And there we are seeing David Martinez playing against us because

we're that good of a p a team Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah. Celso Oliveira: that goes after the right prospects and put them on the ⁓ you know, the radar for major league soccer. If the Dee Bolonga had not come from MLS, he would still just be a dude playing, you know what I mean? In a shitty team in France and now he's the idol of L AFC, essentially, right? So that's just the kind of mentality. And that's why I do believe in giving JT just a little bit of leeway, right? 'Cause the dude has a lot more dubs than he has to conquer. So let's just hope it works out. Just hope we get out of here with some dignity and put up a good playoff run and Again, the the worst of the worst that we've seen from this team is past us. That's what I hope for. So let's talk about the next game, Eric. We got another clunker into SKC, a team that does not have any direction. They just signed a Brazilian of their own for as much money as they could think of. But they also got rid of the basketball prolific scorer by trading them to the Sounders. So I don't know what the hell they're doing there. I thought they were like, ⁓ look, they finally got that dude some help. And then they shipped his ass off. I don't know how. But tell me a little bit about what you think of. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah. Celso Oliveira: This game. Another easy win for LAFC on the road. I thought you were gonna go there. What happened? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Well, I I I did a con I I just worked in North Carolina for sixteen days straight and I've got home like at eleven o'clock last night, so I think I need to work and the weekend just to kind of chill. It is a five hour drive from where I live, and so it's super tempting, but ⁓ you know, I think next year I'll have to head out there. But as far as this game, this game's gonna be kind of a tough one because sporting Kansas City Probably had, I I would say, aside from Chicago pulling Lewandowski and Orlando with Griezmann, they probably had one of the most under-the-radar really, really good transfer windows. They they just blew a lot of money on a lot of guys, and if they don't pull an Atlanta United and have all these guys bomb out or a Toronto, like Kansas City could legitimately be a team that's top five next season. Like they seem to have the ideas to build it, but you know, we'll we'll see where that goes. Cause we've seen this story with teams of four where they open up their checkbook, they put down a lot of money, and the guys don't really work out well in the league. They don't really work out together. And Kansas City's been such a basket case for the last ten years that it's it's hard to take them seriously. But That said, this is this game's gonna kind of be a tricky one because there's a lot of guys that we just don't have a lot of tape on. We just don't know how they play together. So it's gonna be a difficult one to game plan, I think. Celso Oliveira: Okay, let's go through these guys here. Come on, who do they have

and what do we have going on here? ⁓ you're you're talking about new signers. So of course we have the Brazilian kid, which again I can't remember his name. I don't know much about him. I think I think someone asked if I know much about him. I don't know anything about him because he was playing abroad for so long that I had not seen him play too much in Brazil itself. and also the fact that, you know, again he's playing in the kind of an obscure league, I believe, so I just don't know exactly what to expect of them. I know that they're just bottom feeders of the West and they're probably not trying to do too much. This year, right? But outside of that, I feel like it's a team that is just trying to survive right now, which gives us an opportunity to get three points on the road. And I do believe we're gonna see an LAFC that will be very aggressive in trying to do so. I hope to see we'll see more tomorrow because we'll probably hear from the coach on who's available, who's not. But I hope to see at least one more face back from the injury list. ⁓ maybe someone like Eddie Segura that was just maybe broke. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah. Good. Celso Oliveira: Rotating and just had extra minutes on his legs, or someone like Palencia perhaps start to at least be questionable, right? So we have an understanding that he's maybe ready. Because when he comes back, I think we'll be a complete team. Right now, Palencia les, even though Chaburco's been great, you know, what do we gain if we have a Palencia coming down the bench? I think that's that's exactly what we're missing here in terms of death, right? So Do you feel like the yar ⁓ the starting eleven for this next game should be much different from what we saw this past Wednesday, right? Well yesterday, right? Do we need to rotate players back into this or did we find a winning formula here that we may wanna continue with? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: I think you have to reward the players that played good. I I think Jude Terry should start again. I think ⁓ I I think Kenny Nielsen on the left side was also not bad. I mean I you know look, these guys play good. I think you need to reward them again. So ⁓ I'd like to see that. I guess Delgado had a rest. Maybe maybe Delgado comes in instead of Shonier. ⁓ and and ⁓ I'd love to see Jesus. in there as well, like a J Seuss, Terry Delgado midfield is something I could get down to. And ⁓ but but yeah. Celso Oliveira: Okay, so one thing on the shownier because I was impressed with him yesterday. I was like, holy shit, the guy's just kind of just firing all cylinders, and he's the kind of guy that the more he plays, the less tired he gets. So if I was gonna rotate anyone, it would not be him because he just seems to have that kind of lung. That dude is just the pace of the game he plays and how he plays. And because he's just doesn't need to be explosive, he's just more of a cadence player. I actually feel like this is a guy that you don't rotate. If you look

at the grades of the players on Sofa Score yesterday, He was the best of them. He had more plastic volumes, more throw balls, more defensive ⁓ awareness than all the other guys combined. So I do believe that he's the guy that you don't take out of this lineup going forward. And now that we have some leeway with Igor Jesus coming back, he's the one that comes back. Marky Delgado probably overs ⁓ overused minutes-wise can probably sit a little bit more, right? But we're starting to see some rotation here. We'll file you don't have one and a half midfielders anymore, right? And we're starting to see some attrition as well. So ⁓ I like your midfield, but I don't like taking Shonier out there, and that's the whole point of saying it, just because of how effective it's been since he started. By the way, a guy that we got on loan and we made the purchase on. It did work out with Shonier big time for us. He's been great. He's been great. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: I said, well, so we bought the team he played on, which was Grasshopper F C. Once we owned the team, we loaned him to us, we purchased him, and then we sold Grasshopper F C. So that's that's kind of funny, but Celso Oliveira: Hehehe. And I think they hate us too. Weren't they the ones that put the bast the bad nasty like LAFC you nasties? Yeah, they were not happy with us. Well your team's name is a grasshopper, so I Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ yeah. Yeah, they were like fuck LAFT or something like that. It's like, ⁓ fuck you guys too. Yeah. I guess I guess you know they they really they really wanted they they thought we did ⁓ dirty by stealing Shonier from ⁓ I think ultimately. Celso Oliveira: Look, I like I like what C s was ⁓ was Juan said here, the SKC as you said earlier, you know, it's just the kind of motor is not afraid to spend. ⁓ and when it starts to cook, you know, they could be a top t top five team. It's a team with a ton of a ⁓ of tradition and success in their past. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: They're original. Celso Oliveira: and an unbelievable following. Kansas City is truly a soccer city in America, so you don't expect them to be down for too long. ⁓ you know, they had Peter Verme's desk for a long time, right? And even with Peter and that warm ass team, they got they got dude, they got to the final and almost beat us, right? We had we needed extras to beat those guys out of a US Open Cup. And that was Peter Verme's on his AL without like too much money spent. So it's a good organization. We have to receive Erik Hultstrom Section 128: A little too long. Celso Oliveira: back them. We need three points here, but we cannot think it's gonna be easy just because they're not going through a good time, Eric. So did you give me your starting lineup? I know we talked about the midfield. Did you talk about the defense as well? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: No, not yet. All right, let's let's do it. It's gonna be very similar. Celso Oliveira: Okay, alright I know you're manning the ⁓

I know you're manning the two devices here with the with the chat. we're on a new platform and Eric has always been very active as a as a chat manager. So it's a bit harder for him to do that, but maybe next week we can basically fix this for you. But ⁓ yeah, let's ⁓ let's go ahead and ⁓ get out of here. There's you Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah. What's up chat? Also can fix it for you 'cause I ain't doing shit. Celso Oliveira: Well, exact we we as me and me. ⁓ but yeah, I mean the the Rams game just started, so our audience is probably going to shit. ⁓ but if unless you're not a Rams fan, of course, but That's true, it's starting. ⁓ Kevin Show. Yeah, they had Kevin Show. The things they had. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: No, no, chat's going strong right now. ⁓ but anyways, yeah. Let's go Yeah, he ⁓ he had a baby and retired from influencing, apparently. He just wanted to influence his own offspring instead of all of us in the internet land. Yeah. No, he was awesome. He was off and he came on our show way long ago. He he's a he's a sweetheart. ⁓ Celso Oliveira: That's good for him. I mean Twitter's Twitter's tough these days, but I I totally understand. Yeah. Good dude. Good dude. I'm glad glad that he you know this this happens. But yeah man. SKC Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Back line. My back line. Hugo Loris going for shutout number thirteen to get closer to Tony Miola's record. Gotta happen. He's got to tie Miola at least. If he can beat him, ⁓ St. Hugo deserves it. So we're gonna go with ⁓ Hugo and goal. We're gonna go with Hallingshead. ⁓ it's gonna be Tefari and Long because Porteus is still gonna be injured, I think. And then ⁓ I want to go with Nielsen again on the left. So Celso Oliveira: Third team, baby. Tony Meola. So no Chabirko off the bench once more. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, yeah. And maybe ⁓ you know, maybe I could yeah. They'll probably put your mark on the lap. Celso Oliveira: No, that's good. That's that's that's that was a rotation there. I d I don't think Newson gets the min gets the nod, but I I think he's very competent everytime he's in there, so it's crazy that he doesn't. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, I think Sh realistically, Shaburko is probably back in the left. Yep. So Schaberko's gonna go back on the left. I would love to see Igor Jesus start. I'm not sure if that'll happen, although they'll probably work him in. ⁓ so I I said I said the lineup I would like to see in midfield. The lineup I think we will see is ⁓ it is gonna be Shonier. I think ⁓ Delgado will come in. And I think they'll I think they'll keep Jude Terry out there because he scored a goal and I think you keep playing the guy that scores a goal. And then up front, up front, I think we will have ⁓ Shaffleberg, Boonga, and Sun again. I think no no real surprise there. Although ⁓ maybe we get Sieb up there. Like Sieb, Buonga, and Sun, like I'd be kind of psyched on that. But ⁓ but we'll see. I could see sh Yeah, I could see ⁓ Shaffleberg and Raposo coming into subs to try to put some crossing into there. But ⁓ yeah, let's go with Sieb. Let's go with Sieb, Buonga, and Sun, because Celso Oliveira: The SBS baby. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: He also got a goal and if a guy scores, like you gotta reward him by putting him in the next game. Celso Oliveira: That's good. Alright, I'm gonna go a little bit unorthodox. So in the defensive side, I'm gonna go Raposo, ⁓ Tefari and Long, with the left side being ⁓ Hollingshead. In the middle on the sixth position. I don't think we see Igor starting yet. So you're right. That would give Juterry another try. I don't think we see Segura just yet. He might act need an extra game off. That would be good for him. Which means Marky Delgado comes back. I know that was probably rotation, not injury. And the other one on the other side. Tillman probably doesn't look good. Tillman does not look like he's gonna be ready for a while. I don't know. Who did I put in that other midfield? Yeah, Junier, like I said. Just don't take Junier out of the game ever. You know, let him always be the kind of the pacemaker of the team. Up front, Sonny and Boonga. You know, maybe you give one of those two guys the day off. I think that they both looked exhausted. The weather was no joke. And if I know Kansas City, the weather's probably not going to be any joke this weekend as well. A date. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: It's probably cooler than LA, honestly. Celso Oliveira: Yeah, it's true. The humidity is also something. But we're humid here as well, so who knows. But yeah, that's the issue, right? We pay a taxing game, we played min ninety minutes. They they played basically they played the whole game. The Nibonga played ninety plus, you know, came out of the end for for garbage. He he they might be a good Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ it's it's it's gonna be it's gonna be eighty degrees at kickoff. Celso Oliveira: You you might wanna say one of those guys. I'm not gonna lie. 'Cause it's not the easiest flight. Still four hours that way. You just played on Wednesday. Why why would you play Sunny? He looks exhausted. He doesn't look happy. He looks just too much like in his head a little bit. Just give him the time off. I don't even think maybe maybe don't even travel like we used to do with Giroux. Stay home, buddy. We'll get you on the other side of this. Go see your ⁓ you know, go go go eat some good Korean Korean food on K Town. Don't even get on this plane. So I wouldn't even put on this plane and I would give Jeremy a boba see the start just to fuck with. I'm what Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ man, I mean he's gotta you gotta take him to Joe's barbecue there at the gas station. I mean Kansas City's like one of the is the best barbecue city in the country. Celso Oliveira: Hmm. Yeah, well I don't know, that's true, but like you know, if he wants the day off, I think he should have it. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: He knows he knows his Korean barbecue, but he doesn't

know Kansas City barbecue, I don't think. Celso Oliveira: I I I think that if Massey can take like one game off every month, he should be able to take one game this season and this would be a good one for him. But more than likely it's not gonna happen because, you know, they love to show the Korean fans everywhere following him, it's a big part of the brand, yada yada yada. So there's likely there's gonna be there and we'll see him in the bench, right? And that would still be very good for me. And I do believe that God damn it. Sorry, man, I'm trying to make a show here and you just you just come up with this cob, it's just kills my my seriousness, bro. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: He's horny f ⁓ own he forgot he'd have been put own goals in there. Celso Oliveira: Yeah man, and ⁓ yeah, apparently Cavincho is not dubbed influencing his back. LAC VETS LED I know that he's doing some ⁓ conspiracy theory videos. Alright, man. I'm glad you I'm glad you just quit sports to just go to the dark side. I'm glad. Happy for you. And ⁓ yeah, that's it on that place. That's it on that, man. But last piece of our show always. We just try to predict what's gonna happen. We've been pretty damn good at this. by the way, is it 4433 that you just gave me? That was the information, right? 433, I guess SK. Yeah, I'm four through three as well. I like that. He did play the three back on the weekend game we didn't get to talk about, which it was kinda cool to see it play three in the back, like we've been yelling at him for. But he did went back to the to the flat four on the midweek game. So you think he's gonna go back to the flat four again with the midweek on on the weekend game and ⁓ what's gonna happen? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: No, I don't think so. I think it just the three in the back got exposed defensively way too much by a team that shouldn't have exposed them defensively. Celso Oliveira: That's a good point. What do you think is gonna happen in terms of the ⁓ did you give me your score or what? Erik Hultstrom Section 128: No, I've been waiting. I think I think it's a two zero. Hugo Loris climbs up to ⁓ he climbs up another shutout and closer to former Kansas City Wizards goalkeeper Tony Miola. Celso Oliveira: ⁓ hold on. So I'm trying to figure it out here, hold give me a second. Who do they play last? Just just for fun here. I'm trying to see what was the ⁓ the result. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: ⁓ they played Dallas, I think it was four or three. Celso Oliveira: Okay, so they ⁓ they seem like they can score. You know, Dallas is a is ⁓ you know high scoring team, you know, I and you know that because they're leading the golden boot with their guy. So ⁓ high ⁓ I don't know, man. In Dallas, four three. I don't know if we're gonna get another shutout on the road against a team that like Sura had a monster game for Dallas and you know could have been a lot more. Cleveland is a really bad goalkeeper. He's not very good. ⁓ Luis is the guy that we were thinking

about. Again, now I'm looking at their starting lineup a little bit better. Luis is pretty good. He plays like a right wing. Behind a free fight, and you kind of saw him. He's probably gonna start and play his first full game against LAFC. So you're right, it's just him starting to get together, but the goalkeeping is really bad. And you know, I think I think the middle of the defense with Muscara and Ballorean is really, really bad as well. And three-one? Three-one sounds good to me. Three-one LAFC really just finds its way. Goals from guys that we were not thinking about, and also guys that are accustomed to sc to score. Or like the D. What's missing, however, not a lot of penalty kicks right now, not a lot of corner kick goals. ⁓ you know, the set piece goals for LAFC basically non-existent. So it'd be good to go in there, get an early penalty kick or something. Just kind of change the strand a little bit because it seems like we have to work really hard for a goal every game, right? Whereas I just want to know like the one goal that just it's very easy. A penalty kick, ⁓ a handball. Shit that usually ⁓ happens to us, right? I feel like it has to happen, you know, against ⁓ y towards us instead of against us. But who knows. Three to one is my prediction. Two zero is yours, so we're ⁓ we're always on well we're gonna be on the win side, both of you, on this show. Fifty minutes already, Eric. Kind of rambling now. I'm tired. And it's extremely hot in this room. So I apologize. It's been a really hot, hot show. It's about 100 degrees in this damn office. So I'm gonna wrap it up here. Appreciate everybody that showed up. Eric, you're ⁓ always a good podcast mate. And ⁓ you know, hopefully you're gonna be Yeah. Hopefully, ⁓ you know, we're gonna be talking about a win on Monday, our regular time. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Right. Yeah. Wash ups. Celso Oliveira: ⁓ hopefully you're not going ready. Crazy work assignments and there's no holiday. So we're gonna be back with our regular schedule Monday and it's usually a little bit more prepared show. This one's just shooting the shit. And we also want to make sure that we talk about every game. We said we were gonna do this in the beginning of the season and here we are. We're doing it so ⁓ we don't have a v ⁓ we don't have an intro on ultra either. Yes, baby. We don't have an intro on ultra either, so I apologize for that. ⁓ we're on a new thing, so it's a new life, it's a new day. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, let's get to z win, let's get toin. Yeah. It's a new it's a new service. I don't know but chat was it is it laggy chat or does this look good on your end? It looks laggy for me. Celso Oliveira: Bit laggy, but ⁓ we're gonna evaluate this and yes, if if art quality is shit, please let us know. First off, it's riverside, right? It's pretty dope. Second off, it's about fifteen bucks cheaper. So I was like, ⁓ shit. Let's see why. Now we know. So we'll see what's up. Alright, thanks everybody. See you guys soon. Erik Hultstrom Section 128: Yeah, we might be back to StreamYard. This one's called Riverside. Riverside motherfucker. Did it