Analysis: Bongokuhle Hlongwane again shows his ability to create offense for Loons

Minnesota United began the year with one striker, Teemu Pukki, who was one of the team’s high-paid designated players. The Loons have since added another DP forward, Kelvin Yeboah, plus one of Major League Soccer’s breakout young players up front, Tani Oluwaseyi.

Saturday night, the Loons were reminded: When it comes to the options up front, don’t forget about Bongokuhle Hlongwane.

The South African forward added two more goals in a 2-1 victory at San Jose, giving him nine MLS goals this year, a career high for his league tally, and enough that he’s now leading all Loons in scoring in 2024.

Last season, Hlongwane scored 17 goals in all competitions, but only eight came in MLS games, with nine more in the Leagues Cup and U.S. Open Cup combined.

Hlongwane missed the first two games of the season but has since played in every one, including starts in 14 of the past 15 games. For most of the year, he has played as one of the team’s wider forwards, with responsibilities to be an offensive creator as well as being a focal point for the offense.

“I hate to keep referring to this middle period of the season, but we were very reliant on Bongi at that point to create, almost overly so,” coach Eric Ramsay said after Saturday’s victory. “It was nice to see him today playing in a team that wasn’t so reliant on him to produce on the counterattack.”

With Hlongwane playing as a center forward, he got a chance to use his speed and quickness to run in behind the defense. Combined with an excellent through-ball from Robin Lod, those skills gave the Loons their first goal.

Ramsay even briefly took the team out of its usual two-wingback formation, solely to add Oluwaseyi off the bench while also keeping Hlongwane on the field.

“I was very keen to keep him on because I thought he was in a good place,” Ramsay said. “We now are in a position where we’ve got some nice tools at our disposal on that front line, and we can do a couple of different things. I’m excited to see what we’re able to get from the team and what those guys are able to produce.”

For a few minutes, the Loons were lined up in a 4-3-3, with Jefferson Diaz playing as a traditional right back, Oluwaseyi as a central striker and Yeboah and Hlongwane lined up as wider forwards. Hlongwane’s second goal came almost immediately after the change, meaning the formation switch lasted for only a few minutes before Ramsay changed back to a more defensive, lead-protecting setup — but those moments showed that, with the new additions to the roster, he has something he’s been looking for all season: flexibility.

“I do now feel like we’re back to that point where we can think about the team looking a number of different ways,” Ramsay said. “I think in that sense, we’ve made a couple of nice strides today.”

Minnesota United’s shift to playing with three central midfielders instead of two has also coincided with a renewed sense of dynamism from Hassani Dotson, who’s started the past two games playing as one of the two more advanced midfielders.

The position frees Dotson from some of the defensive responsibilities that come with a two-man midfield, where both midfielders are tasked with protecting the center of the defense, and enables him to get forward more often and combine offensively with the forwards.

Dotson was as responsible as any player for the game’s first goal. He was the one that picked off a wayward San Jose pass to recover the ball in the offensive half. And then, when Robin Lod’s first touch on another pass was heavy, it was Dotson who crashed into a 50-50 challenge, winning the ball back and deflecting it back to Lod, who then applied the final pass to Hlongwane for the goal.

“He’s been very good in the last two games,” Ramsay said. “He’s been really dialed in. He’s obviously very athletic, very capable defensively as well as what he brings on the ball with his level of energy, his capacity to steal the ball in the middle and drive, and to give the team a really dynamic look. I’ve been really pleased with him.”

Right wingback Matúš Kmeť, one of the Loons’ summer signings, was on the matchday squad for the first time. He didn’t make his debut as one of the subs, but it does show that the Slovakian is getting closer. That said, at least according to Ramsay, don’t expect to see all that much of him the remainder of 2024.

“He’s on a different time scale to everyone else here, so it’s very difficult in that sense to take that risk, for want of a better word,” Ramsay said earlier in the week. “He’s a good player. We wouldn’t have brought him in if that wasn’t the case. He’s training really well. He wants to use this as a step to really take his career on, and I’m sure we’ll see him sooner rather than later. But I think in comparison to [the other players signed this summer], to be honest, we’re probably likely to see less of Matúš between now and the end of the year.”