The realities of punching above your weight can be fertile ground for learning.
After spending 12 days lodged in five hotels to play games in three cities across the southeastern United States, it could be said that Los Angeles Football Club’s FIFA Club World Cup excursion found land to till.
“I think tournaments like that stress you in ways,” LAFC co-president and general manager John Thorrington said Friday. “And when I say ‘stress you’ I don’t mean we got stressed out, but rather they stress-test your systems, your team, your process. And I think we had a lot of learning moments when I felt we weren’t quite up to the challenge of a tournament like that. And that’s on the field and off the field.
“I think we can say it was respectable. Was it the best version of LAFC? No.”
Saving the lone goal of its tournament for the 84th minute of the final group stage match against Flamengo, a Brazilian power boasting a loaded roster with Designated Player-level contracts numbering in the teens, LAFC was eliminated from the group stage with one point out of a possible nine following defeats to Chelsea FC and Esperance de Tunisie.
Thorrington, like LAFC head coach Steve Cherundolo, saw five decent to good halves. But the sixth, after the break in Nashville, knocked LAFC out of the tournament with what felt like a body blow from ES Tunis.
“When the margins are so thin and you have to punch above your weight, a second half like that is just not acceptable,” Thorrington said.
Whatever value is cultivated from the positive and negative Club World Cup moments for the rest of 2025 – that’s 18 MLS regular season games, a potential postseason run, and the Leagues Cup – completely depends on the players, Cherundolo said.
“We have done our best to talk about the games, review the games, what was good, what wasn’t so good, and what is feasible to use in MLS play,” the coach said. “Having said that, I think we learned a lot. I think players learned that there is another level out there. The faster you have to play, the higher you go up, the less mistakes you can make because mistakes are punished a little quicker at the highest level. And the moments you have in front of an opponent’s goal are less. So that really increases the importance of each action out there.”
During the team’s first practice in two weeks at their performance center before returning to league play Sunday against the Vancouver Whitecaps at BMO Stadium – Olivier Giroud’s final game with LAFC after mutually agreeing to part ways – nobody on the roster or the staff felt immune from the effects of the travel or challenges associated with competing on a global stage.
For Thorrington, being back at the training grounds on the campus of Cal State L.A. felt similar to the first day of preseason.
“I’m sure guys’ bodies don’t feel that way,” he said.
But on Friday, Cherundolo saw a group that was “physically and mentally in a great spot.” The upcoming schedule won’t take it easy on them. LAFC plays eight games between Sunday and July 29.
With no less than two and as many as four matches in hand on conference foes after postponements to accommodate the Club World Cup schedule, LAFC (7-4-5, 26 points) is positioned to rocket up the standings.
A point behind San Diego for the top spot in the west, Vancouver (10-3-5, 35 points), runners-up in the 2025 CONCACAF Champions Cup to Cruz Azul, will miss seven players Sunday, including midfielder Ryan Gauld as well as 2025 MLS-All Stars and current U.S men’s national team call-ups Sebastian Berhalter and Brian White.
VANCOUVER WHITECAPS FC AT LAFC
When: Sunday, 6:30 p.m.
Where: BMO Stadium, Los Angeles
TV/Radio: MLS Season Pass on Apple TV/710 AM, 980 AM
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