6th placed San Jose Earthquakes play host to 2nd placed LA Galaxy in an all-Western Conference clash at the Avaya Stadium in California on Saturday night with both teams looking for an important three points in their bid to strengthen their play-off spots.
San Jose sit in 6th place on the Western Conference ladder and their current league position has been boosted by a recent 5-match sequence without defeat and includes wins over Chicago Fire, Toronto and Houston Dynamo.
In addition, San Jose have picked up points against DC United and Dallas in 1-1 and 2-2 draws respectively, so the hosts will be hopeful of extending this unbeaten run in the MLS when high-flying LA Galaxy come to town this Saturday night.
It hasn’t all been plain sailing though for San Jose as they started the season with 3 defeats on the trot on home turf at their Avaya Stadium with losses being handed to them by Montreal Impact, Minnesota United and Los Angeles, scoring just 1 goal but conceding 10 in reply.
The hosts have since recovered by winning 5 of their last 6 on home turf.
LA Galaxy are currently flying high in 2nd place in the Western Conference but trail the leaders and local rivals, Los Angeles, by a 6-point margin ahead of this weekend’s action in the MLS.
The visitors head over to San Jose having won 3 of their last 4 matches overall with wins picked up against Orlando City, Sporting Kansas and Cincinnati, all of which were registered away from home.
Having lost their last 3 home matches on the trot at their Dignity Health Sports Park in California, LA Galaxy won’t mind hitting the road again for this Saturday night clash against San Jose Earthquakes as they’ve won their last 3 away matches on the trot in recent weeks.
The visitors seem to have recovered from their recent back-to-back defeats at New York Red Bulls and Columbus Crew in 3-2 and 3-1 losses on their travels, and with the likes of prolific striker, Zlatan Ibrahimovic (11 goals from 13 matches) in their attacking personnel, LA Galaxy should never be written off.
The visit of LA Galaxy will certainly be a good test to see how far San Jose home come, but LA Galaxy could sneak the victory here.