St. Louis CITY SC had a strategy. Before the first ball was kicked in their first MLS season, the entire org chart – from owners to front office, coaches to players – appeared to be aligned on a club identity on and off the field, and they weren’t afraid to share it.
In public, sporting director Lutz Pfannenstiel raised eyebrows by declaring that “the team needs to be the star” – language that could be interpreted as front-office spin for the club’s comparatively low roster spend. As head coach Bradley Carnell revealed during an end-of-year press conference following the team’s elimination from the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs in early November, players were privately embracing the same ethos in the locker room.
“[Joo] Klauss approached me following his appearance with Apple in San Jose. ‘I feel like we’ve been playing together for a long time,’ he returned. We must have been together for three years. “I feel like everyone doubts us,” Carnell said after returning from MLS’ Media Marketing Day before the 2023 preseason.
“And Klauss was almost the catalyst for all of the narrative that we drove, the ‘everybody’s nobodies.’
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Klauss and company weren’t the first in MLS history to adopt a “nobody believes in us” mantra, but they were mostly correct – not just about perceived media slights, but also about the club’s approach to year one.
“[Joo] Klauss approached me after his appearance with Apple in San Jose. ‘I feel like we’ve been playing together for a long time,’ he said when he returned. I feel like we’ve been together for three years. “I feel like everyone doubts us,” Carnell said of his DP striker’s takeaway from MLS’ Media Marketing Day before the 2023 preseason.
“And Klauss was almost the catalyst for all of the narrative that we drove, the ‘everybody’s nobodies.'”
Klauss and company were not the first in MLS history to embrace a “nobody believes in us” mantra, but they were mostly correct – not just about perceived media slights, but also about the club’s approach to year one.
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