Bradley Carnell preaches humility as St. Louis CITY earn fifth consecutive win
By Alex Windley
St Louis CITY has made its presence in Major League Soccer known with another flawless victory against Real Salt Lake.
The new expansion team heads into week six with their fifth consecutive victory, defeating Western Conference rivals 4-0 with goals from Joao Klauss, Nicholas Gioacchini and Rasmus Alm. But as St. Louis CITY continue to break records, head coach Bradley Carnell urges his players to remain humble.
"It's our job to keep humble, remain grounded, and just look for the next game, no more."
Joao Klauss, in particular, is having a fantastic start to his MLS career. The Brazilian now has five goals through five matches and is only two behind Jordan Morris in the golden boot race. When asked about his mentality, Klauss simply stated, “Either my mother cries or your mother cries, and I don’t like to see my mother cry.”
“He's another guy that's fully committed and you can see he's getting stronger, he’s getting healthier. He’s getting fitter and he's becoming a real menace,” added Carnell of Klauss.
Goalkeeper and captain Roman Burki has always had faith that St. Louis would wreak havoc on the league, going as far as to say that even before a full team was assembled, he saw the foundation of something great.
“To be honest, I knew that we will have good qualities as soon as we played our first game, first preseason game. But I mean 5-0 is, even if you are like not just a new team, you’re a team who's already used to playing MLS, it's a big achievement.”
St. Louis joins the 1996 LA Galaxy and 2012 Sporting KC as the only three teams to gain 15 points in five matches to start the season.
“It's memorable. It's something that I think every player will remember for the rest of their lives,” said forward Nicholas Gioacchini after the match. "It hasn't happened yet, five wins from an expansion team. Even five wins in a row in a league for teams that have been here for a while. It's not easy as you can see in past seasons.”
St. Louis will continue their record-breaking MLS campaign this weekend at home against Minnesota United.