LAFC secured its first road win of the season with a 2-0 result against St. Louis CITY SC in front of a hostile crowd at CITYPARK in St. Louis, MO on Wednesday night. Denis Bouanga's second-half double combined with an early penalty-kick save by Hugo Lloris gave the Black & Gold the edge they needed in an evenly contested match.
LAFC is now 6-4-3 (21 points) in regular-season play, and at Wednesday's final whistle sat in third place in the Western Conference.
Lloris gave the Black & Gold an early shot of confidence by stoning CITY SC's star striker João Klauss in the 16th minute after a handball call against Omar Campos gave the home side an opportunity to take the lead from the penalty spot. Lloris then made an impressive kick save to deny the rebound chance for Tomas Ostrak in the aftermath of the PK save.
The teams battled to a stalemate through halftime and into the second stanza until Bouanga's moment arrived just before the hour mark. Mateusz Bogusz clipped a perfect ball over the defense that Bouanga finished past CITY SC goalkeeper Roman Bürki.
Fifteen minutes later, CITY SC's Anthony Markanich was issued his second yellow card, reducing the home side to 10 men. From there, the LAFC defense secured a second consecutive shutout for the Black & Gold.
Bouanga capped the scoring with a chip over Bürki in the fifth minute of stoppage time to seal the 2-0 victory.
LAFC has the weekend off before returning to action next Tuesday, May 21, for a U.S. Open Cup Round of 16 contest against Loudoun United (Division II - USL Championship). Tickets for the win-or-go-home match are $20 for general admission seats and $15 for the Supporters’ Section. Visit https://www.lafc.com/tickets/ to purchase tickets. Kickoff for the game is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. PT and fans can watch all the action on usopencup.com, MLSSoccer.com and uslsoccer.com.
NEWS & NOTES
- With tonight’s win, LAFC snapped a five-game winless streak away from home to start the MLS season. Including last week’s 3-1 win over Las Vegas in the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, the Black & Gold have now won two straight games away from BMO Stadium in all competitions.
- Since the start of April, LAFC is 5-1-2 in all competitions and has taken 17 of a possible 24 points in the league in order to move up to third place in the Western Conference.
- Hugo Lloris tied his season-high with six saves en route to his fourth clean sheet in MLS play this season. Lloris and the LAFC defense have not conceded a goal in the last 211 minutes of MLS action, dating back to the 59th minute of the loss to San Jose on May 4.
- Lloris saved a penalty kick for the first time since joining LAFC. He is the first LAFC goalkeeper to save a penalty in a regular-season game since Maxime Crépeau saved a Ryan Gauld penalty against Vancouver on October 21, 2023.
- Denis Bouanga now has three multi-goal games this season, having also scored twice against Nashville SC and the New York Red Bulls. This is his first multi-goal game away from home this season.
- Prior to tonight, all of Bouanga’s goals had been scored at home.
- Bouanga’s opening goal was the eventual game-winner. He now has 10 game-winning goals in an LAFC shirt, joining Carlos Vela as the only players in club history with 10 or more game-winning goals.
- Mateusz Bogusz was credited with an assist on Bouanga’s first goal. It was his second assist of the season and first since the 2-1 win over the LA Galaxy on April 6.
- Bogusz now has six goal involvements on the season (four goals and two assists), leaving him one shy of equaling his total from last season.
