Angel City wrapped up the first half of the 2025 NWSL season with a loss on the road to the top seeded Kansas City Current.
Despite the result, I think there are some positives and interesting tidbits to take away from this match.
The Current lead the league in Goals For and are tied with the Pride for least amount of Goals Allowed. They’ve mainly accomplished this by scoring, usually multiple times, in the first half and then pulling up and keeping it tidy through the end of the game. They have not been held scoreless in the first half at home all season, until Friday night.
The starting lineup telegraphed Straus’s intentions for the game: defend. Alanna Kennedy dropped into the backline with Sarah Gorden, Megan Reid, MA Vignola, and Gisele Thompson. More defensively-minded Macey Hodge and Madison Hammond accompanied Julie Dufour in the midfield with Alyssa Thompson and Riley Tiernan up top.
Angel City put together one of their most organized defensive performances of the season. Without the ball they sat in a 5-3-2, while in possession they took on more of a 3-5-2. However, the absence of players like Kennedy Fuller or Katie Zelem for most of the game contributed to putting up their driest offensive performance of the season with a measly 0.1 non-penalty xG and only one shot on target not including the penalty.
I am curious as to whether Hammond was meant to play a more progressive role. When she has come into games as a substitute this season, she has looked that way. However, against Kansas City she seemed to revert more to her 2024 self which was characterized by a lot of negative passing and unfortunate giveaways. This led to hopeful longballs to A. Thompson being one of the only ways to get the ball upfield in a meaningful way, which wasn’t particularly effective as the Current’s defense did well to lock her up and put her in jail for a lot of the game. Hodge had a pretty solid performance and it was nice to see her back in the starting XI. She did a good job of slowing down traffic in the midfield and breaking up play, while also contributing a bit to the attack later on in the game.
The beginning of the second half showed signs of life though. Moriya Miyabi came in for Vignola at the half and the team put together a few good combinations to get the ball upfield. A cross from Dufour into the box led to A. Thompson drawing a penalty in the 56th minute, but it wasn’t struck with quite enough juice and Kansas City’s goalkeeper, Lorena, came up big to keep Angel City’s only big chance out of the net.
Not too long afterward the NWSL 2024 MVP and Golden Boot winner, Temwa Chawinga, broke out into a sprint with the ball at her feet. Angelina Anderson made a great close-range save but the rebound fell to the feet of an unmarked Bia Zaneratto in open space and she was able to put the second ball away. It appeared as though Sarah Gorden may have strained her hamstring in trying to catch Bia, and she left the game a few minutes later.
Despite having to change shape a bit with Vignola, Gorden, and G. Thompson all off the pitch during the last 15-20 minutes, Angel City managed to bend but not break again and kept the Current to one goal at home.
So what can be taken from this game?
Angel City can execute a defensive game plan against a tough opponent. We saw this in the first 70 minutes of the game against the Orlando Pride, but this game against the Current felt like an improvement from that. Even without the typical starting backline at times, the defense took on the pressure after the first goal without letting all Hell break loose. The team’s ability to adjust their formation and execute gives me hope that they can address some of their defensive shortcomings and inconsistencies during the international break.
Angelina Anderson proved why Angel City are betting on her as their #1 and why the USWNT seems interested in her. This was probably her best performance since King went down in the game against the Royals. No fatal unforced errors, big saves, and continued composure even after letting in the Zanerrato goal. It’s safe to say that Anderson is a big reason why Angel City was able to keep Kansas City’s inevitable attacking unit to a single goal. Despite the loss it was a nice moment for Anderson. The last time she played at CPKC Stadium the team conceded four goals with at least one, if not two, being a direct result of mistakes she made. That performance led to her being dropped from the starting XI for the rest of the 2024 season. It was great to see her have a great game in Kansas City.
The optimal midfield still seems to be up in the air. The changes in personnel for this game appeared to be tactical, but the past five games have seen a different starting midfield combination. Two of those games were still under Interim Coach Sam Laity and three were under Straus. I’ll be curious to see if Straus lands on a preferred XI the way Laity did at the beginning of the season, or if there will be more game-to-game tinkering from a tactical perspective. In these past three games, Straus has shown that he can be flexible and make changes. I’s exciting to have someone at the helm who can be adaptable when last season it felt like former Head Coach Becki Tweed was stubbornly attached to a play style that just wasn’t working for the team.
Angel City now gets a 41 day break from regular season games to play a bit with their national teams, rest, and regroup. This will be Straus’s chance to spend extended, mostly uninterrupted time with the team to lay the foundations of their system, learn the players, and figure out what’s going to help them move forward. The remainder of 2025 may be more like the prologue for what is likely to be another three to four year project with Straus. I look forward to seeing where he starts to take this team.