Despite a man advantage, Sporting Kansas City falls to San Jose in MLS home opener
After a few slow starts to begin the 2025 season for Sporting KC, Saturday night’s regular season home opener against the San Jose Earthquakes featured an eventful first half.
Falling behind early Sporting KC got a goal back and even held a man advantage for more than 40 minutes. But Sporting couldn’t find the net again, losing its second straight match in MLS play 2-1 at Children’s Mercy Park.
“We just didn’t find enough,” Sporting manager Peter Vermes said. “At this point as a team, we just didn’t find enough.”
San Jose opened the scoring just three minutes in and doubled the lead at 2-0 by the 20th minute. Cristian Arango ripped a shot past John Pulskamp for the first goal, after Sporting’s midfield was momentarily carved apart.
The second goal came from a set-piece situation. The ball bounced around in the box, and Pulskamp was crowded out. Josef Martinez put the loose ball away.
Vermes said the team worked on defending that exact set piece this week after San Jose scored on a very similar set piece a week prior. Pulskamp took the blame for the goal.
“I know I have to come for this ball,” Pulskamp said. “At the start, I just got caught up wrestling with him too much and then didn’t effectively get him out of the way.”
Dejan Joveljic scored his first goal for Sporting to keep the game within reach. It was 2-1 at the half.
Joveljic’s penalty kick in the 27th minute was the first penalty kick Sporting has converted since September 23, 2023. The spot kick was earned after Manu Garcia’s shot struck the outstretched arm of midfielder Ian Harkes.
The chemistry between Sporting’s new-look attack took another step forward in the first half. Sporting responded strongly after conceding the two goals. Sporting took 10 shots, and three hit the target.
Joaquin Fernandez nearly tied it up with a header off the crossbar on the last play of the first half.
Sporting was handed a lifeline six minutes into the second half when Hernan Lopez was shown a red card after receiving his second yellow for a nasty challenge from behind on Erik Thommy. That gave Sporting a man advantage for 44 minutes, including stoppage time.
Despite the advantage, Sporting struggled to find a breakthrough. San Jose’s lines sat deep and Sporting didn’t ever find a second gear to pin the visitors back. Sporting only took five shots in the 44 minutes with a man advantage. None were on target.
“For me, it looked that it would be better if (San Jose) stayed with 11 players,” Joveljic said “Somehow they closed the space and we didn’t know what to do — either cross or to play in behind.”
Some of that could be chalked up to the fact that this was only the second match in which all three marquee signings for Sporting shared the field together. However, it’s not something Joveljic wants to be a “reason” for why the attack stalls or struggles for much longer.
“Nobody wants to wait that long,” Joveljic said. “We need to start taking points as soon as possible. So yeah, (we) need time. But it has to be faster.”
Up next: Sporting KC heads to the nation’s capital next Saturday, with a matchup against D.C. United slated for 6:30 p.m. Central.
Daniel Sperry covers soccer for The Star. He can be reached at sperry.danielkc@gmail.com.
This story was originally published March 1, 2025 at 9:50 PM.