Photography courtesy St. Louis CITY SC
On Monday morning, first-year St. Louis CITY SC coach Olof Mellberg led his team through its first workout of the 2025 preseason.
It was a long road to get there.
In the weeks and months after CITY fired Bradley Carnell on July 1, the team’s front office, led by president and general manager Diego Gigliani and sporting director Lutz Pfannenstiel, sifted through data compiled on 25,000 candidates under consideration for the job in St. Louis. CITY’s brass pored over filtered information, such as experience level, value added, game models, and much more.
“It was a really great combination of being able to combine the use of data with the incredible knowledge on the sporting side from Lutz, the incredible network and familiarity with head coaches all over the world, and we got to the decision that we got to,” Gigliani said.
The decision, ultimately, was to hire Mellberg.
Although the 47-year-old Swede is still better known for his playing days with Aston Villa of the Premier League, Mellberg built an intriguing coaching profile during recent stints leading Helsingborgs IF and IF Brommapojkarna in Sweden. In Mellberg, CITY found a coach who can play a high-intensity brand of soccer that treats possession with more care than the traditional Red Bull approach. Under Mellberg, CITY expects to be a bit more pragmatic with the ball than it was during the franchise’s first two seasons.
In other words, get ready for CITY 2.0. And if Mellberg can quickly tackle the club’s 2024 Achilles’ heel—its back post coverage—then the club’s fortunes should turn around in short order.
“I think we can have more quality on the ball.” Mellberg said, reflecting on what he saw from the club’s play last season. “I want to win football games. I would say I would like for us to be a little bit more in control of the games. We’re a little bit too open at times. I would like us to be an attacking team to try to play the ball forward, looking for fast attacks but to be able to do so and still be in control of the game. You really need to be disciplined in the balance and moving the team—pushing up.”
The process began earlier this week when CITY opened its training camp with 34 players. The group includes the team’s latest draft class, its Homegrown players—Miguel Perez is back after his season-long loan to USL side Birmingham Legion FC—and a contingent of players from CITY2.
The homegrown contingent—it includes Perez, Caden Glover, Mykhi Joyner, and Tyson Pearce—will be of particular interest. Glover spent his 2024 training with the first team before finding a more consistent role on the CITY2 roster, while Joyer and Pearce were two of the most promising players in MLS Next Pro last season. Joyner finished second in the league in goal contributions while Pearce found his own niche after the promotion of Jay Reid to the first team.
A new manager means new opportunities for players to prove themselves, and Mellberg promises to put the players to work. “I want to build non-stop players in my team.” Mellberg said. “I think if you look at the highest level of football in the world, you see the teams are constantly switched on, physically and mentally. They don’t take any breaks, obviously, at halftime or maybe on some other occasions. But apart from that, they are constantly switched on.”
