Score First, Win Sooner for Los Angeles Galaxy

As Bruce Arena's Los Angeles Galaxy prepare for Saturday's match with the Chicago Fire at Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Illinois, the mindset has been one of the straightforward variety: Score First.

“We’ve given up way too many early goals this year,” Galaxy midfielder Chris Klein said after Saturday’s 2-0 loss to the Kansas City Wizards. “What that does to us is it ends up making us chase the game and allowing teams to sit in and counter against us.”

Los Angeles is 0-5-1 when they allow the first goal this season. All of the six first-half goals allowed this season came in the first 20 minutes of each game.

Galaxy defender Todd Dunivant gave a concise explanation regarding the goals given up early.

“A lot of it’s coming from the midfield, we’re up and they’re breaking on us and it’s some freak play in behind,” Dunivant said. “It’s not like [opponents] are getting in behind and breaking us down so we need to adjust to that. It is the common theme.”

For Klein, Los Angeles's nasty habit of chasing the game is simply unacceptable.

“It’s more indicative of our style of play and when we go down early and we have to chase the game and chase the game and chase the game, it allows teams to sit in and be tight against us,” Klein said on Saturday. “Usually teams have to come out and spread themselves out and that’s when we can catch them.

"When you give up that early goal you’re not able to do that.”

Midfielder Landon Donovan was quick to note that the difficulty for teams to come from behind after getting scored on early was a common theme in Major League Soccer.

“In this league, it’s hard to chase any game because we don’t have enough talented players,” Donovan said. “There aren’t enough talented players around the league to do the things to make plays when the other team has 10 guys behind the ball.

"When you see Chelsea or Man U or Arsenal or Barcelona play, they have enough quality players where they can play against 10 guys behind the ball and still create really good chances. That’s always going to be hard for us. We need to get back to the things we’re good at and if we do that, we’ll win.”

Los Angeles is 13-0-0 when they score first. They will look to make it 14-0-0 when they take on the Fire.

Kickoff is scheduled for 1:00 p.m. PT and will be televised by Fox Sports Prime Ticket and TeleFutura.

INS & OUTS

Solving the complacency dilemma:

“I wish there was a simple answer,” Donovan said during training this week regarding Los Angeles's complacency issues. “If there was, we’d have figured it out. We’re doing our best to get back to basic things again.”

After a 11-1-3 start, LA's skid has hit a decrepit 2-4-1, with consecutive defeats for the first time in what has been a forgettable couple of months.

“We have to figure out who we are and what we’re all about and if we can do that we’ll have a chance,” Dunivant said. “If not, and we continue getting through these games like this, we’re not going to win the championship—and that’s obviously our goal this year.

“We haven’t responded well enough," he said. "I think that’s something we did very well last year, coming back. Especially in a lot of the early results, we were coming back and getting draws, fighting and scrapping. Our mentality has to change a little bit. We have to be more of a scrappy team. We have to be more of blue-collar team.

“Maybe we’ve listened to too much of the hype about being in first place and gotten a little complacent and thought maybe we could change our style of play or whatever. All that feeds into your mentality and you’re seeing the results and it’s not good.”

Donovan knows this all too well.

“There’s a natural tendency in sports when you get a big lead to take your foot off the gas a bit,” Donovan added. “We’re certainly at fault for that. But now, we’re right in the thick of it.

"Now, that doesn’t mean we’re not going to be in the playoffs, it doesn’t mean that we’re still not going to have a good year, but if we’re going to be as good as we can be, we need to be a lot better.”

And if it starts with the first match in September, more power to both Donovan and Dunivant. So the story goes.