Last ones in. First ones out.
Such is the story of the Los Angeles Football Club’s unlikely trip to the FIFA Club World Cup, which effectively ended Friday with a 1-0 loss to Espérance de Sportive Tunisie in Nashville.
Following a performance that fell well short of the expectations, the 8-year-old Major League Soccer franchise set for itself upon claiming the final spot in the 32-team field by beating Club América, LAFC gets one last taste of the month-long competition before returning home when it meets Brazilian power CR Flamengo in the final match for Group D in Orlando.
“We want to win one game in this Club World Cup,” LAFC defender Sergi Palencia said. “As I said the first day, we don’t come here to say we participated in this Club World Cup. We wanted to show a little more. To win games. To go to the next round. We know this is not possible right now, but we want to give our fans one win.
“Even if it’s going to be a tough game and a very good team, we want to win for us, for our fans and show the people of the world what we’re capable of.”
On Matchday 1 in Atlanta, LAFC managed to do that against English Premier League power Chelsea FC, playing with courage, creating chances and keeping it competitive for 80 minutes before succumbing 2-0.
LAFC head coach Steve Cherundolo described that result as one his staff and players could build on. But whatever belief the Black & Gold brought into the match with Chelsea was nonexistent versus a Tunisian squad that appeared ripe for the picking.
“We expected more from the team,” said goalkeeper Hugo Lloris, easily LAFC’s best player on Matchday 2 with three saves. “We expected more from our performance. I think at this level, we lost the ball too easily. We gave them too many chances. Of course we had our chances. We had, I would say, a good first half. In the second half, I don’t know, we lost our structure. We played the game that they wanted.”
Curdling the disappointment into something rancid, LAFC star forward Denis Bouanga’s opportunity for a miracle penalty in the final moments of the match was saved off the line, leaving the man who’s been a menace against MLS opponents with next to nothing to show for his time on the world stage.
Having little to play for except personal pride and representing MLS, the youngest team in the competition now comes face to face with the fourth oldest.
Founded in 1895, Flamengo, one of the six CONMEBOL representatives in the tournament, earned its way in by winning the club’s third Copa Libertadores in 2022.
Like their three Brazilian counterparts, Flamengo has been fantastic through a pair of group stage matches, beating Tunis 2-0 and Chelsea 3-1 to become the first competitor to advance to the Round of 16. Already winners of Group D, the result in Orlando has no bearing on what happens with the runner-up, as Chelsea plays Tunis for the right to move on at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.
With none of that occupying their attention, LAFC “will field the strongest team possible that we can,” Cherundolo promised. “I still think it’s still important for us to show well in this tournament. I was very pleased with the performance in the first one, obviously not the result. I was halfway pleased [against Esperance] and not with the result. So we’re going to look to try and tie the two together against Flamengo, which will be very difficult.”
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