Red Bulls blitz San Diego in half an hour, cruise to 4-1 win despite less possession

Fourteen minutes. That's all it took for New York Red Bulls to blow the game open, and by the 26th minute they were already up 3-0, making a mockery of any pregame prediction. The final score was 4-1 in favor of Michael Bradley's side, who routed Mikey Varas' San Diego at Sports Illustrated Stadium in an MLS match the home side had essentially decided within half an hour.

The story is a surprising one, because San Diego controlled the ball for most of the match, finishing with 63.1% possession to the Red Bulls' 36.9%. But the ball counted for little against the hosts' ruthlessness in the opening minutes.

A dominant first half

The match began evenly, with San Diego even looking the sharper side early on: Oscar Verhoeven and Marcus Ingvartsen both tested the goal in the first ten minutes without finding the net. But in the 14th minute came the blow: Julian Hall finished with his left foot from close range after an assist from Jorge Ruvalcaba to make it 1-0. Five minutes later, in the 19th, Devin Padelford rose to head home and extend the lead after a Cade Cowell corner delivery. And before San Diego could respond, in the 26th minute, Jorge Ruvalcaba capped a counterattack with an angled finish to make it 3-0.

San Diego had a chance to get back into the match: in the 41st minute, Julián Bazán fouled Marcus Ingvartsen inside the box for a penalty and picked up a yellow card, but two minutes later Anders Dreyer missed from the spot. The first half ended with the 3-0 scoreline intact, the Red Bulls having settled the match in barely half an hour.

The second half and the finishing touches

San Diego pushed harder in the second half, as reflected in their control of possession, and it paid off in the 59th minute: Cédric Bakambu, who had come on at halftime, finished with his left foot after a Dreyer cross to make it 3-1. It was the visitors' best moment of hope, but the Red Bulls were never seriously threatened, and in stoppage time, in the 92nd minute, Eric Choupo-Moting finished with his right foot off an assist from Matthew Dos Santos to make the final score 4-1.

The numbers tell an odd story: despite having less than half the possession, the Red Bulls doubled their opponent's shot total, 28 to 14, and their shots on target, 12 to 5. Our estimate of expected goals generated in the match, calculated from the shot data, has the hosts at 3.19 against San Diego's 2.05, a gap that backs up what played out on the field: home-side efficiency against fruitless visiting possession.

The result also runs completely counter to our preview projections. Before kickoff we gave a 35% probability to a home win, 26% to a draw and 39% to a San Diego victory, with expected goals of 1.57 for the Red Bulls and 1.69 for San Diego, a combined total of 3.26. Reality ended up far from that balanced script: the Red Bulls not only won, they did so by three goals and with a ruthlessness nobody saw coming.

The takeaways

For New York Red Bulls, who entered the match in eighth place in the Eastern Conference with 36 points from 28 games (10 wins, 6 draws and 12 losses) and a goal difference of -14, this rout is a welcome boost in an up-and-down season. For San Diego, the loss makes clear that controlling the ball counted for little against a rival that knew exactly when to strike, and the Red Bulls ended up celebrating one of their most emphatic nights of the year.