Arena seeking defensive solidity with San Jose leaking goals

San Jose Earthquakes are struggling to defend, while the LA Galaxy are lacking goals, setting up an intriguing clash in MLS on Wednesday.

Bruce Arena acknowledges the San Jose Earthquakes' defence has been poor of late but insists he is not worried about the league table ahead of facing the LA Galaxy.

The 'Quakes have won just one of their last nine MLS matches (D3 L5) and have conceded 12 goals in their last four matches.

This comes after a very strong start to the season in which they lost just one of their first 10 games, which put them in a strong position in the Western Conference.

San Jose remain fourth in the table, just four points behind the leaders, the Vancouver Whitecaps, and though Arena is looking for improvement, he is not looking too closely at the standings.

"Collectively, we've been very poor at the defensive end of the field," he said. "No question about that.

"[Against St. Louis City SC], first goal, we're not tracking players.

"Second goal, probably get ahead on that or the goalkeeper gets on the end of that. And the third goal was an absolute miss by our backline and goalkeeper.

"We deserved a good beating. We're not panicking [about the standings] yet."

The Galaxy, meanwhile, are struggling at the other end of the West, sitting 13th with 22 points after 20 games.

They are winless in six matches (D3 L3) and lost 1-0 to the Houston Dynamo last time out without managing to direct a single one of their shots on target.

Head coach Greg Vanney is coming under increasing pressure, and his hope is to see a more efficient showing against the 'Quakes.

"It's about the efficiency when we get into the final action," he said.

"We get into some good early spots through the game, but I felt like we weren't efficient at those moments. And once we go down a man, it only gets more difficult."

PLAYERS TO WATCH

LA Galaxy – Kyogo Furuhashi

LA Galaxy failed to hit the target with any of their nine shots in their defeat at Houston, with only Kyogo attempting more than one (three).

Those shots were worth 0.3 expected goals (xG) at the weekend, and he is still seeking his first goal since joining the Galaxy from Birmingham City.

San Jose Earthquakes – Beau Leroux

Leroux scored his eighth career regular-season goal last Saturday, in their 3-1 loss to St. Louis, and his sixth from outside the box.

Since his MLS debut last season, only four players have scored more goals from outside the box: Evander (16), Lionel Messi (12), Martin Ojeda (seven) and Sebastian Berhalter (seven).

MATCH PREDICTION: DRAW

The LA Galaxy have lost only one of the last 11 editions of the California Clasico (W7 D3), though San Jose are unbeaten in the last three (W1 D2).

The Earthquakes have not played four straight matches against the Galaxy without defeat in all competitions since doing so from May to November 2012 (W3 D1).

The Galaxy's winless run extended to six matches (D3 L3) with a 1-0 loss to the Dynamo on Saturday. They have just four wins in their last 18 matches in all competitions, with just one of those wins coming at home, a 2-1 victory over Real Salt Lake on April 26.

As for San Jose, they have won only one of their last nine regular-season matches (D3 L5) after opening the season with nine wins in their first 10 games (L1).

The Earthquakes, who kept clean sheets in five of their first six matches this year, have conceded at least once in all 13 regular-season matches since.