Austin FC 1, St. Louis City SC 1: First impressions from the last preseason match we'll get to see

So, my first late-game rewrite of the 2025 season just happened in the preseason.

I was two minutes away from officially being about to gush about a complete Austin FC performance against St. Louis City SC in their second Coachella Valley Invitational match of the preseason, and Tomas Totland had to go ruin the narrative with an equalizer.

Even though Jáder Obrian's goal just 45 seconds into the second half didn't hold, Verde still looked generally good in Saturday's 1-1 draw at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, Calif., in a repeat scoreline of Wednesday's match against the Galaxy.

As Austin FC's going to go back behind the curtain for its remaining two preseason matches, this is the last glimpse we'll have before the season opener two weeks from today.

I've got a few thoughts.

Who is 2025's breakout player?

This past Tuesday, MLS's Matt Doyle called it "borderline irresponsible" to call Dani Pereira his Austin FC breakout player of 2025, given that Pereira is a No. 1 SuperDraft pick with 113 appearances, 20 goal contributions in his first four MLS seasons, and regular call-ups to the Venezuelan national team. You could argue that Pereira's already broken out, or that the freedom that he'll get as a more free-ranging No. 8 in Nico Estévez's system is going to unlock an additional level for him.

But I'm going to call out a similarly-tenured player, with 86 appearances and 11 goal contributions in his first four season, as my early pick to make the leap in 2025 based on what we've seen at Coachella: Owen Wolff.

On his assist for Austin's lone goal on Saturday, he dribbled in toward goal from the end line, made a Purina Gang player miss, and chipped in a perfect pass to Obrian before being toppled over.

On the pass into the goalmouth that led to Bukari's goal on Wednesday, the Galaxy got to set its defense on the short corner and Wolff was still able to create discombobulation with his ability to cut inside toward goal. Opposing coaches are likely already instructing defenders to not let Wolff have time and space from that spot on the field, seeing what he can do there.

(Speaking of Bukari, I'm hard pressed to call a designated player a breakout player candidate, because by definition they're already supposed to be broken out, but Bukari's already showing signs that a much better season is in store for him compared to what limited flashes he showed in '24.

Once the rest of the European arrivals settle in with the squad, Wolff and Pereira may find it challenging to find the minutes they're accustomed to playing. (They were, on Saturday, part of a full squad of starting-caliber players that played 60 minutes.)

But if they're pushing for minutes and earning time on the field once the season really kicks into gear, that's going to bode well for Verde's 2025 prospects.

It's apparently all about grit

You might recall when Will Bruin took to Twitter watching an early 2024 match after a few Coronas at a wedding and talking about the team's "soft mentality." It appears that's going to be something Estévez will address this season.

Estévez was fairly sanguine about preseason preparations in post-match comments on Saturday, saying, "I think we can see a lot of progress in preseason ... the seasons are long. It's a lot of work, a lot of thinking, a lot of ideas, discussions with the players, trainings, games, revealing and getting into an idea that shapes well for the team.

"And I think we're in the right way," he added. "I think we can see a lot of progress every game, and it is just understanding when the competition comes, the line [between] winning or not winning is very thin, and we just have to capitalize on all the things that we create in order to to win games."

Goalkeeper Brad Stuver addressed the mentality issue more directly.

"It's going to be about heart, it's going to be about energy, it's going to be about passion," he said. "One of the things that we've really harped on this preseason is just the grit, the mentality that it takes playing in this league. Skill and nice soccer can only take you so far, but you have to have that mentality, that grit, the ability to duel against these teams. So that's something that we talk about ... and that's something that is going to carry over throughout the year."

Sometimes, goals just happen

I guess we've got to talk about the goal that St. Louis scored. On Wednesday, it was from a Galaxy overload to Austin's right flank followed by Gabriel Pec making a deft near-post run that the team collectively failed to pick up.

On Saturday, it was a simple cross-field switch, coupled with a near-post run, that caught out two defenders. (And, sadly, it happened about a minute after Diego Rubio skied an open shot that would have put the match away.)

Here's the goal from one angle.

I went ahead and froze the stream at the moment that Totland receives the cross-field pass from Indiana Vassilev.

A tip of the cap to the Purina Gang for making this goal happen. It would have been nice to preserve the clean sheet and get the win, but save for this moment, it was an encouraging outing.

A single moment like this can ruin a whole match's worth of effort, of course. But better to see this and get it sorted in preseason than suffer it in the regular season. (There's no guarantee it won't happen there too, of course, but on the bright side, they've now got something to work on.)

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