Sporting Kansas City scored twice in the final 20 minutes to turn a two-goal deficit into a 2-2 draw against host St. Louis City on Wednesday.
Second-half goals from SKC’s Tim Leibold and Dejan Joveljic offset first-half goals from St. Louis’ Celio Pompeu and Cedric Teuchert.
Both teams left plenty of chances on the pitch.
Sporting KC (3-8-2, 11 points) had 17 shots, but only five were on target. Fortunately for the visitors, two of those were converted late.
St. Louis (2-6-5, 11 points) had 16 shots, putting seven on goal, and now has a nine-match winless streak (0-6-3).
Pompeu nearly gave St. Louis City a three-goal lead 15 seconds into the second half, but his crossing shot attempt went just right of the post.
Both keepers saved point-blank shots early in the second half. St. Louis’ Roman Burki stopped Joveljic’s attempt at close range in the 54th minute. A minute later, SKC’s John Pulskamp stopped a breakaway attempt by Marcel Hartel.
Sporting got on the board in the 71st minute on Leibold’s second career MLS goal. Manu Garcia drifted left before chipping it to Leibold, who tipped it to Daniel Salloi, who headed it back to Leibold for an easy goal.
Joveljic leveled the match in the 77th minute on a soaring header off a long free kick by Shapi Suleymanov.
St. Louis grabbed the lead in the 15th minute on a brilliant goal by Pompeu, his first of the season. Coming off a corner that caromed off the back of SKC’s Erik Thommy, Pompeu bended a right-footed shot from outside the box into the upper right corner of the box.
It was St. Louis’ first lead since an early 1-0 edge in a 4-1 loss to the Seattle Sounders on May 2. The goal was just the team’s 10th of the season.
St. Louis extended the lead to 2-0 in the 44th minute. Tomas Ostrak collected the ball and fed Teuchert, who deflected it past John Pulskamp. It was just the third time this season that St. Louis has scored two goals in a match.
Sporting nearly pulled one back in the first minute of first-half stoppage time when Joveljic attempted a shot from just outside the 6-yard box, but Burki deflected it away.
–Field Level Media
