Reus makes first start as Galaxy fall to St. Louis City

September afternoons in Missouri are not for the weak, as the LA Galaxy quickly found out in a 2-1 loss to St. Louis City on Sunday.

The elements, mental mistakes and general lack of effort all blemished Marco Reus’ first start in an LA Galaxy uniform. 

“It’s a tough first start to be mid-day in St. Louis and just, really hot out there," Galaxy coach Greg Vanney said. "The tempo of the game was kind of at a moderate pace for a lot of it. 

"They started off pretty fast but the game pretty quickly found a moderate pace."

Reus struggled to settle into his first start for LA, but the heat wasn’t the only thing slowing the Galaxy down.

“It was really tough for me to play at this time," Reus said. "We lost, I think, too many balls in areas where we should not (have) many mistakes and then we lost control of the game."

Reus reunited with his former Borussia Dortmund teammate and current St. Louis goalkeeper Roman Bürki, but he was missing one of his current teammates in action.

Riqui Puig missed Sunday’s encounter due to card accumulation and even though it was just his second match with the team, Reus said Puig’s absence was noticeable. 

“Players like Riqui will help us, it doesn’t matter which position," Reus said. "My second game was not good enough today, but like I said, my last game was three months ago so I need some time to adapt with the team.”

St. Louis got on the scoreboard early thanks to Cedric Teuchert’s effort inside 10 minutes.

The hosts stayed ahead through halftime and LA made one change that had an instant impact following the break.

Miguel Berry entered to start the second half and assisted Gabriel Pec’s equalizer moments after subbing on.

“I was happy to be involved early," Berry said. "It’s a space that we discussed attacking all week, so credit to our coaches for pointing that out. 

"It happened kind of like we said it would. I think between (Joveljic) and I, I think (Pec) has scored that goal 25 times in training all year.”

The score would stay deadlocked for about 20 minutes before a mistake within the backline gave St. Louis the perfect opportunity to go back ahead.

St. Louis’ Marcel Hartel received a cross from Jayden Reid and had plenty of space to let a shot off his right foot and into the back to the net to put the hosts back ahead.

“I felt like we were just we weren't at the right speed of things," Vanney said. "We were we weren't moving to support each other. Were casual. Our decisions were sometimes ones that put us in trouble.”  

Frustration would begin to build-up for LA and in stoppage time, Joseph Paintsil had a costly back-and-forth with the official which resulted in a yellow card. This means Paintsil will miss El Tráfico due to card accumulation.

While Puig missed the match against St. Louis due to the same type of suspension, Vanney doesn’t view the situations as equal.

“For Riqui, that was last week, he got his trying to recover a ball in transition," Vanney said. "I have more patience for that than one that is having a conversation with the referee and not in the run of play and doing nothing that is really helping the team.”

Next, the LA Galaxy will have next week off before returning to DHSP to host LAFC for another rendition of El Tráfico. Reus knows a thing or two about derbies and he’ll get his first taste of what they can be like in the States.

“A lot of guys were talking about the derby," Reus said. "I know derbies from my past in Germany. 

"I think if we stick to our plan… then I’m not worried about the next game.”