SAN DIEGO -- San Diego FC played to a scoreless draw against Sporting Kansas City on Saturday night at Snapdragon Stadium.
San Diego defeated Colorado Rapids 2-0 at the Mission Valley Fortress this past Wednesday, May 14. SDFC was on a huge three-game winning streak heading into this match and were second place on the Western Conference table.
Head coach Mikey Varas only made one change to the lineup that defeated Colorado as Oscar Verhoeven replaced Willy Kumado. Varas has switched up the fullback positions all season long and this was Verhoeven's first start.
There was not much excitement in the opening 45 minutes in a match that seemed like a deadlock at the Snap'. San Diego's backline was very effective in neutralizing the visitor's attack, especially Paddy McNair and Christopher McVey, who combined for four clearances.
The clearest scoring opportunity for either team came towards the end of the half when a header by Jeppe Tverskov was saved by Kansas City goalkeeper John Pulskamp. The second half started out quite slow as well as both teams were struggling to generate offensive play.
However, that changed throughout the half as both teams were close to breaking open the score line. One of the clearest opportunities came in the 65th minute when a shot by KC's Shapi Sulemanov hit the woodwork.
Mikey Varas made his first change in the 60th minute when Onni Valakari replaced Anibal Godoy. This was quite an aggressive move given the defensive coverage that Godoy brings for SDFC.
In the 72nd minute, Varas made two more adjustments as Willy Kumado and Milan Illoski came on for Luca de la Torre and Oscar Verhoeven. This was another aggressive move as "Chucky", Andres Dreyer, Alex Mighten, Iloski and Onni Valakari all pushed forward now. This left Jeppe Tverskov pretty isolated in the midfield, but he also pushed up as Kansas City was clearly defending the scoreless result.
In the 81st minute, Varas made his final two substitutions as Tomas Angel and Emmanuel Boateng replaced Hirving Lozano and Alex Mighten. It was not the best game for Lozano as he only had one shot in the match and was really shutdown on that left flank.
The final minutes of the game consisted of SDFC pushing everyone forward for that elusive winning goal. While the visitors were clearly satisfied with trying to maintain the point in this road match.
That goal never came with a tremendous defensive effort by Kansas City. Robert Voloder was the standout in the backline for the visitors with seven clearances, a blocked shot and an interception in the match.
While the undefeated streak for San Diego is now at four games, this was a very underwhelming result at home. Especially given how much Kansas City has struggled this season and how SDFC has played recently.
San Diego's schedule has been very busy recently and there are still three games left in the month. This includes two home games, with the next match being against LA Galaxy at Snapdragon Stadium on May 24.