Minnesota United’s stretch of absent players coincides with five-game losing streak

Minnesota United might say that they’re not using player absences as an excuse during their five-game losing streak — but they sure sound like they can’t wait for it to be over.

Asked what the club needed to change, manager Eric Ramsay said, “To be honest, I think it’s as simple as welcoming players back from injury, welcoming players back from internationals, and getting back to how we felt prior to all this having taken place. And that’s, I think, a very realistic take on the situation. Obviously, we look at this period with real regret and real disappointment that we haven’t picked up points that perhaps we could or should have done. But ultimately, there’s a big set of circumstances around that, which has made that really difficult, and those set of circumstances are about to come to an end.”

The Loons are beginning to turn the corner, in terms of player availability. Midfielder Alejandro Bran, who played the final twelve minutes for Costa Rica last night in Austin, Texas, caught a flight and was in the starting lineup on Wednesday night. Minnesota is targeting Sunday’s game against the LA Galaxy for the return of Teemu Pukki from injury.

Canada, which plays Venezuela on Friday, could be the final domino to fall; if the Canucks lose Friday, Minnesota could get Dayne St. Clair and Tani Oluwaseyi back for Sunday’s game as well.

Even beyond that, the MLS transfer window opens July 18. One new player, forward Samuel Shashoua, has already been training with the team for a few weeks, and the Loons will clearly be looking to bring in others as well — hopefully for them, as quickly as possible.

“I’m sure Eric [Ramsay] would like some decision headaches on who he’s putting in the lineup,” defender Michael Boxall said.

Ramsay came in preaching defense, and for a few months, it worked. In his first 14 games in charge, the Loons gave up more than two goals only once.

Over the past four games, though, the Loons have given up twelve goals — including five against Dallas, three against Portland, and three more against Vancouver. It left the manager frustrated, and ready to go back to the beginning with the team’s defensive focus.

“It’s back to basics, to an extent,” he said Tuesday. “When we were at our best this year we were very well organized, very disciplined, very hard to play through, in particular. And whilst we’ve seen that in spells, we’ve just started to look uncharacteristically easy to pull apart.”

The Whitecaps might have scored three goals Wednesday, but oddly, it did look like one of Minnesota’s better defensive performances this month. One of Vancouver’s goals was a defensive mistake from Boxall, one came from disastrous set-piece defending, and the third was a world-class strike by Sebastian Berhalter. Apart from those, Vancouver had only one shot on target.

“I don’t think we gave away nearly the number of chances that we have done in recent weeks,” Ramsay said. “That is partly to do with how we attacked, how we sustained attacks, how we played the game. We were largely in the opposition’s half, which has obviously been a problem of ours over the course of the last four or five games.

“I think you’ve got to take the game as a whole, in that sense. We haven’t given up really good quality chances in any sense today. Obviously, each of the three goals you look at as being very, very avoidable. So that again is a step forward.”

With St. Clair at Copa América and Clint Irwin out injured, it meant a first-ever MLS appearance for goalkeeper Alex Smir. The University of North Carolina product has played 18 times for the team’s MLS NEXT Pro affiliate, MNUFC2, but Irwin’s injury put him in line to be the third Loons goalkeeper of the year.

Smir said he’d found out he was starting a few days prior to the game. “It’s been a wild couple of days,” Smir told the team’s radio broadcast.

Prior to Wednesday’s game, Smir was probably best known for winning the “Goalie Wars” competition that was part of the All-Star Game festivities at Allianz Field in 2022. And despite that he’s now an MLS goalkeeper, he was still willing to have that claim to fame. “It was a great experience,” he said. “I love that that’s kind of my catchphrase, so it’s awesome.”

Minnesota had to work quickly on Wednesday to fill in the rest of the club’s goalkeeping roster, too. The club signed Oscar Herrera, a former Augsburg University player, to be the equivalent of an NHL emergency backup goalkeeper. At the same time, they signed Francesco Montali as a keeper for MNUFC2.

Montali, who was taken in the third round of the draft by Philadelphia in the offseason, has the higher profile — but since the Union drafted him but did not sign him, they still hold his MLS rights. And so unless the Loons acquire those rights, he can’t be signed to a short-term agreement as a first-team backup — opening the door for Herrera, also technically a MNUFC2 signing, but one who was eligible to also sign a temporary contract with the first team.

Montali made his debut for MNUFC2 on Wednesday as well, giving up four goals in a 4-0 loss to North Texas SC.