Wilfried Zaha delivers, San Jose's seismic shift & more from Matchday 2 | OneFootball

By Matthew Doyle

We’re off and running on MLS’s 30th season. As usual, we had First Kick fireworks (I will always call Matchday 1 “First Kick”); as usual, that was followed by a much more cagey and conservative display on Matchday 2, with most managers around the league adjusting their risk sliders to prevent another torrent of goals.

The first two weeks of the season follow that pattern almost every single year, and it’s kind of comforting that 2025 has been no different.

Ok, in we go.

The You You Are

Charlotte FC have had maybe the strangest roster-building hit rate in league history. A late SuperDraft pick like Andrew Privett turns into a written-in-pen starter, while No. 1 overall pick Hamady Diop becomes spare parts and is eventually shipped out. Journeyman Brandt Bronico? Basically irreplaceable in central midfield. Serbian international Nikola Petković, who cost $3 million and takes up a U22 Initiative slot? Can’t get a game.

They spent a lot of money on Tim Ream to make him a left back. They spent a lot of money on Bill Tuiloma to make him a reserve. And the DP hit rate… coming into this season, with apologies to Liel Abada (who might still turn out to be good, but has been just an average MLS attacker so far), Charlotte’s hit rate on DP signings was effectively zero.

Enter Wilfried Zaha. He was invisible in the first half of the game, but then stole the show in the second half for the 2-0 win over Atlanta United:

Zaha was as advertised: a guy with the tools and talent to be one of the very best attackers in this league. I honestly can’t imagine him not succeeding here, and so with him out there, this felt like a typical Charlotte win – only moreso, because of the top-end talent they finally have in attack. And a “typical Charlotte win” means they traded both possession and field position for space to counter into, and Zaha’s built for that, so he did the same stuff they’ve always done, just a good bit better than they’ve ever done it before.

In short, he raises the ceiling. “He’s the type of player we were missing last season for sure,” head coach Dean Smith said afterward. “We’ve seen in one performance today he can produce moments of magic.”

Here is the next step for the Crown: I need to see them produce those moments of magic in different phases of play. Right now it’s still counter-and-set-pieces, even with Zaha (who is much more than just a runner) on the field and Pep Biel playing as a true No. 10.

I was having this conversation with Andrew Wiebe, who argued that Zaha’s presence alone is enough.

“They’ve never had a guy who CONSISTENTLY does those basic Charlotte things at this level. If he’s consistently a guy who just makes two high-level plays per game in the final third, that’s better than they’ve ever had.”

He’s not wrong! But like I said, I need to see more variation in how they create danger before I’m completely bought in on this team jumping a level to join the true contenders.

By the way, Atlanta left money on the table here as they were the better team in the first half. But they couldn’t make it count as Emmanuel Latte Lath was non-existent, which can happen to any forward who’s reliant upon service. They need to figure out how to get him into good spots against a low block.

Which brings us to the elephant in the room: Alexey Miranchuk once again struggled to impose himself on the game, on either side of the ball. We’re now up to a 16-game sample size with the Five Stripes, and it’s pretty clear that if he’s not getting room to hit through-balls, he doesn’t do a ton.

Who is Alive?

Six points from two games. Bruce Arena has clearly worked some magic with the San Jose Earthquakes.

Last week it was a 4-0 win over a jet-lagged RSL team (Arena, to his credit, pointed that out in the post-game presser). This week they went to Sporting KC, got goals from their two star forwards, and then held on for a 2-1 win despite playing a man down for the final 40 minutes.

I can’t quite bring myself to read too much into it because of the quality of competition San Jose have faced over these two games: RSL and Sporting were both coming off of midweek Concacaf Champions Cup action, and I’ve got both teams pegged for finishing in the bottom third of the Western Conference. San Jose haven’t exactly encountered prime Barça out there.

But still, this has been good in ways the Quakes haven’t been good since… 2012? I’m not saying they’re going to win the Supporters’ Shield – they will not win the Supporters’ Shield, folks – but they're solid, balanced and hard to break down. The lopsided 3-5-2 they’ve played has protected Chicho Arango and Josef Martínez defensively, and young Beau Leroux at d-mid has been the biggest surprise contributor of the season, league-wide:

Leroux (34) sits and protects the three center backs. Jamar Ricketts (another surprise contributor) at left wingback has the speed and endurance to go endline-to-endline all game, and so plays a little deeper than Cristian Espinoza, who’s more of a pure attacker at right wingback.

It’s asymmetrical, but it’s not unbalanced. And weak schedule or not, six points is six points.

“The soccer wasn’t delightful on our end in the second half due to the fact that we were playing shorthanded, but the determination the guys had and the defensive mentality was outstanding,” Arena said in the post-game. “I thought our last 10-15 minutes was extremely good defensively. So I’m proud of our guys, but we have to get better. There were a lot of mistakes made today, and hopefully in another week we can eliminate some of those.”

Sporting boss Peter Vermes needs some of that from his squad, which looked a little worn out given they’ve played four games in 11 days to start the season. They will get a week of rest now, and with it, perhaps some of the cohesiveness they need to begin creating some danger.

“Let's say that the team is new and we need to make the connections. It will take some time, but I think that we should take that as soon as possible,” is how DP forward Dejan Joveljić, who scored his first goal for his new club, put it. “Nobody wants to wait that long. We need to start taking the points as soon as possible. It needs time, but it has to be fast.”

A few more things to ponder…

13. The Philadelphia Union look unstoppable. They went down to Florida last week and hung four on an Orlando City side that’s in some amount of flux after rebuilding a bit of their central midfield, and while playing without their best (BY FAR) center back. The Union blitzed ‘em and it worked. A useful data point.

Matchday 2, at home, against a Cincy side everybody thinks will be in the Shield race all year? Four more goals, and an almost comically dominant 4-1 win:

Folks, that’s a trend. The forwards have been amazing, and Quinn Sullivan’s leveled up on the ball (his turn in midfield to start this sequence rolling downhill is excellent).

They’re giving up a ton of chances, but I’m pretty sure that’s a trade-off they’re willing to make. Taken all together, it’s produced 180 minutes of must-watch soccer.

Cincy will be fine in the long run, by the way. But two more midweek matches over the next two weeks (they have a CCC home-and-home with Tigres) will take a lot out of them, win or lose.

12. RSL dominance vs. Seattle in Utah continues, as it’s now been 14 years (!!!) since the Sounders have won a regular-season game in Sandy. An early and pretty spectacular Nouhou own goal set the terms for this one, and from there RSL grinded it out until Forster Ajago (two goals this week! And kinda lucky not to get a red!) finished things off late for the 2-0 final.

Notable from RSL’s perspective: Diego Luna has spent most of his time in MLS – like 95% of it – as a sort of false left winger in Pablo Mastroeni’s 4-2-3-1. In this one, he started and went 90 as the No. 10. I thought he was good.

Even so, this was an advertisement for how hard it is to balance CCC with regular-season play. This was not the beautiful game from either side.

I'm not concerned about the Sounders yet, but this lack of urgency at the end was bad:

Check back on them in two weeks.

11. The Red Bulls jumped all over Nashville from the start in a 2-0 win. Special Armchair Analyst Correspondent Calen Carr was the man on the scene:

Also, I’d like to report a murder:

10. Speaking of those Revs, they were held to just five shots with a grand total of 0.2 xG as the Crew left Foxborough with all three points thanks to Jacen Russell-Rowe’s second goal of the season. It was a 1-0 final.

Along the way, Caleb Porter gave us our Face of the Week:

New England spent a lot of money this winter to put together what’s basically a whole new team, and thus far the lack of chemistry is pretty apparent. Columbus, meanwhile, lost two of their starting attackers from last year’s team (including the guy I voted as league MVP), but their chemistry through midfield and at the back is still intact.

Wilfried Nancy is a hell of a coach, man.

9. Pass of the Week goes to César Araújo, not just for the weight on this through-ball, but for the way he splits the Toronto defense with his eyes. He completely sells that he’s playing this to the wing, Zane Monlouis bites, and then it’s a sprint for Martín Ojeda:

(Note: Monlouis is actually not on loan, but was a permanent acquisition by TFC).

The good news for Orlando: Four goals (they won 4-2), three points, and they were just clearly the better team.

The bad news for Orlando: They allowed two goals despite limiting both the quantity and quality of TFC’s chances all night, but continue to get subpar performances from their goalkeeper and center backs. They're not good in their own box, so at what point does academy CB Thomas Williams, who was excellent in MLS NEXT Pro last year, get onto the field? Seems especially timely given how well fellow academy product Alex Freeman has played at right back so far.

As for Toronto, I’ll be kind and say it’s a work in progress. This week’s work: rest defense.

8. Chicago could use some work on that same thing, which is probably not surprising given both the front-to-back overhaul and how they were missing two starting midfielders and a starting center back for Saturday night’s date with D.C. United, which turned into a bitterly disappointing 2-2 home draw for the Fire.

Here are the silver linings:

It’s not the structural stuff that’s killed the Fire through two games, though: It’s the simple execution stuff. They went down 1-0, then fought back to take a 2-1 lead, and couldn't lock it down even before Jacob Murrell scored what might be the AT&T Goal of the Year.

“I think we could have been much better toward the end of the game – just being calm, moving into our positions, being hard to break through centrally and then defending crosses,” head coach Gregg Berhalter said afterward. “And you saw a number of crosses that they got on the end of, which is disappointing. I know they have big players, but this is what it's about, being able to defend late in the game. And tonight we weren't able to do that.”

D.C. deserve a ton of credit for how hard they play, and how much pressure they put Chicago under all night.

7. Portland and Austin looked headed for a stalemate right up until the 89th minute, when new DP David Da Costa put in a perfect ball:

That was the only goal, as it ended 1-0. Just a nightmare for any goalkeeper. Poor Brad Stuver.

For Portland, the early returns on Da Costa are very promising, as he’s been active (on both sides of the ball, crucially) and clearly has that final ball in him (early days, but he’s among the league leaders in xA/90).

For Austin… they sure seem to need a guy like that. Obviously early days with this team as well (Myrto Uzuni isn’t starting quite yet), but through two games the midfield has looked functional rather than creative. And so, through 180 minutes they’ve got zero open-play goals, and zero players in the top 50 in the league in any of the relevant chance creation stats.

Uzuni’s not going to help that directly – he’s a goalscorer, not a chance creator – but in theory his movement and the threat he presents both in behind, and in running off of Brandon Vazquez, should open up more space for the likes of Dani Pereira in the middle.

6. Minnesota United’s social media team has been cooking all year, and while I don’t usually weigh in on officiating decisions in this space (the call is the call, man), I’ll say that I, too, thought this was a DOGSO red and that I, too, thought “ball don’t lie” when Kelvin Yeboah scored the game’s only goal five minutes later:

The Loons were much better than visiting CF Montréal, out-shooting them 14-3 and controlling the game despite having little of the ball. And as for the goal itself… more teams should just huck it into the box when they’ve got the chance. It’s basically a free set piece!

5. I don’t know if I can do justice to Colorado’s 3-3 home draw with FC Dallas. Topline, I think there are two big takeaways here, one for each team:

That goal is both a special play and one that’s emblematic of who Dallas are quickly evolving into. Fully 33% of their passes into the final third, and 33% of their passes into the box, came from that central channel (s/o MLS Analytics on BlueSky for the data).

This is The Lucho Effect. When he’s in that central channel, playing off a center forward who knows how to combine with back-to-goal, he’s almost impossible to contain (The issue, of course, is keeping him in that central channel – Lucho will wander if he’s not getting enough touches, and that kind of wandering is not good for the team’s overall structure).

For Colorado… Djordje Mihailovic as a playmaking left winger and Cole Bassett as a pressing 10. This will become even more effective once they have an actual left back to provide width when Djordje pinches inside.

4. I feel like I’ve seen Ryan Hollingshead rescue all three points for LAFC with an opportunistic late goal my entire life, which is to say that Saturday night’s 1-0 win over visiting New York City FC gave me some serious déjà vu.

The Black & Gold went to the 5-2-3 from the start for the first time all year, and effectively deadened the game. As for the Pigeons, I’m not sure why manager Pascal Jansen chose to start center forward Mounsef Bakrar on the left wing, but yeah, that trick rarely works. And it didn’t on this night.

3. Full credit to San Diego FC head coach Mikey Varas and sporting director Tyler Heaps for their post-game words on the crowd at the club’s inaugural MLS home match, a pretty lackluster scoreless draw marred by an early injury (looked like a pulled hamstring) to Chucky Lozano.

San Diego – I’ve decided I’m calling them the Niños, btw – were once again exceptionally compact, looked very well-coached, and looked like they were missing a bit of creative magic in midfield. That issue was compounded by the early injury to Chucky, who came off at the half-hour mark.

As for St. Louis, they’ll need to show better than this next week for a Sunday Night Soccer trip to Carson to face the Galaxy:

2. Of course, it won’t be a full-strength Galaxy St. Louis are facing. Following injuries to Emiro Garcés and Lucas Sanabria in Sunday evening’s 2-1 loss at Vancouver, here is LA’s current butcher’s bill:

We know those first two guys are out for a while. We don’t know the status of any of the next five for next weekend, and while it’s too soon for panic for the reigning MLS Cup champs, it’s definitely not too soon for concern. Basically everything, through 180 minutes, has been a slog.

Not so for the ‘Caps, who got an early goal from Sam Adekugbe (who later went off injured, and yeah that’s a concern because the attacking width he’s offered on the overlap makes it much easier for Ryan Gauld to be influential) and a late winner from Brian White.

Early returns on the ‘Caps under new head coach Jesper Sørensen: They’re playing more with the ball through central midfield, and the center backs are being asked to be more adventurous with their distribution and their ball-carrying. And – this is key – he’s been more willing to play some of the younger guys.

1. And finally, Sacha Kljestan made the point at halftime of Inter Miami’s 4-1 destruction of Houston that while you lose so, so much without Lionel Messi, you actually gain quite a bit against the ball.

And Herons head coach Javier Mascherano, to his credit, weaponized that by adding two worker bees (Yannick Bright and Benja Cremaschi) to the XI, and then having the front line press higher. They knew the Dynamo would commit to playing out of the back, and knew they could change the game by causing turnovers in bad spots.

Within five-and-a-half minutes, Cremaschi’s pressure led to Miami’s first goal. Just before halftime, Bright’s pressure led to their third. In between Tadeo Allende scored a banger and Houston never really took control of the game or threatened much at all. By the time it was all said and done, Luis Suárez had a goal and three one-touch assists, but it looked more like the playbook from his Atleti days than his Barça time.

People aren’t gonna want to hear this, but Miami’s better than they were last year. (And Houston are, at this point, much worse.)