Ten-man LAFC’s two-goal lead slips away in wild draw with San Jose

SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- For nearly an hour, LAFC had every reason to believe it had done enough to leave Santa Clara with three points. Then, with seconds left in stoppage time, San Jose took them away.

LAFC played roughly 65 minutes with 10 men Saturday night at Levi’s Stadium, built a two-goal lead and absorbed wave after wave of San Jose pressure before Reid Roberts’ 30-yard strike in the eighth and final minute of stoppage time forced a 2-2 draw.

For Marc Dos Santos, the frustration afterward was less about the circumstances LAFC faced than the fact that his players had fought through nearly all of them.

“I think that overall, it was a team, a very team-oriented performance from Sonny,” Dos Santos said of Heung-min Son, who scored LAFC’s opener and later assisted Denis Bouanga’s record-breaking goal. “A team that's very united and work for each other could have the fight that it had until the last minutes of the game.”

That fight was necessary almost immediately after Son’s 34th-minute goal. The forward took a pass from Mark Delgado near midfield, drove toward the San Jose defense and curled a low shot from 25 yards inside the post. Two minutes later, Aaron Long was sent off for denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, forcing LAFC to spend the rest of the match down a player.

Instead of simply retreating, LAFC found another way forward.

In the 53rd minute, Delgado found Son in space, and Son carried the ball toward goal before sliding a pass across to Bouanga at the far post. Bouanga finished the counterattack to put LAFC ahead 2-0 and, in doing so, moved past Carlos Vela for the most regular-season goals in club history with 79.

Bouanga barely wanted to discuss the accomplishment afterward.

“I don't want to talk personally because honestly, I want the team glow up and win this game before myself,” he said.

That response reflected the mood inside the LAFC locker room. The milestone mattered, but so did the fact that a match LAFC had controlled despite being shorthanded ultimately slipped away.

San Jose began to wear down the visitors as the second half continued. Hugo Lloris kept LAFC in front with saves on Preston Judd, Timo Werner and Jack Skahan, while Nkosi Tafari and Ryan Porteous helped protect the lead in front of him. Judd finally broke through with a 70th-minute header, leaving LAFC to defend a one-goal advantage for the final stretch.

Dos Santos acknowledged what playing a man down for so long does to a team. The problem, he said, was not necessarily the shape or the willingness to defend. It was the fatigue that eventually comes with asking players to keep making those runs and covering that much ground.

Even so, LAFC continued to create opportunities in transition.

The equalizer came after what Dos Santos called a clear foul on Jacob Shaffelburg before San Jose’s final attack. He said he had watched the play repeatedly before speaking to reporters and was particularly frustrated that the same standard was not applied to an earlier foul that had wiped out what would have been LAFC’s third goal.

There was little time left to respond. Roberts’ shot found the inside of the post, and LAFC’s two-goal cushion was gone.

The draw leaves LAFC at 11-8-8 with 41 points, while extending a road stretch that has become increasingly important with the playoffs approaching. The club has won only once in its last six away MLS matches and has not won outside Southern California since July.

Dos Santos does not view those road games as pressure so much as an opportunity to show what his team can become.

“We wanted to get the three points, but we come out with one,” he said. “We don't lose many games, but the problem we have is many draws.”

That was the part of Saturday’s result that lingered. LAFC had already done the difficult work of surviving a red card, building a two-goal lead and defending for long stretches with 10 men. One final San Jose attack turned all of that into a point.

And with LAFC’s next road match coming against FC Dallas on Sept. 26, the question now is whether performances like Saturday’s can eventually turn into the wins Dos Santos believes the team needs.