LAFC looking to shake season-long struggles on road
LAFC forward Diego Rossi, left, collides with Dallas FC defender Bressan during their June 23 match.
Los Angeles Football Club coach Bob Bradley cannot explain why since the middle of last year his team has struggled away from Banc of California Stadium.
“It’s something that we know and talked about,” Bradley said on Thursday. “Can’t honestly put a finger on exactly what’s happened but we’ve got to continue to try and find the right way in away games.”
Winless in four tries on the road in 2021 with three goals to their opponents’ seven, LAFC’s woes compounded during a 2-1 loss to Sporting Kansas City one week ago.
That match, the first of three consecutive away dates for LAFC, turned bad after defender Tristan Blackmon was red carded in the 58th minute.
In eight of the LAFC’s 10 games this season they scored first, however an inability to add goals — LAFC only has 12 through 10 matches compared to 22 in 2018, 26 in 2019 and 21 in 2020 — coupled with mental and physical mistakes keep undercutting quality stretches of soccer.
While preparing to travel to Real Salt Lake this week, Bradley was hard on the whole team — in a positive way, he explained — over the lapses that resulted in LAFC giving ground to Western Conference foes instead of climbing up the standings following the weakest start in club history
“It’s been a very important topic since after the game because we never would have built the team and played some of the