In this week’s First Touches, we dive a little deeper into the numbers once more, finding statistical oddities with the teams’ first two matches of the season, a somewhat-crazy Bongi stat and some warning signs of New York’s potent offense thus far.

MATCHUP QUICK FACTS

• This is the first meeting between the Loons and the Red Bulls since April 2019. The clubs missed each other in both 2020 and 2021 after squaring off in each of Minnesota’s first three MLS seasons.
• This fixture has never seen a draw. New York took home all three points in 2017 and 2018, while Minnesota secured the W in 2019.
• Including Sunday, each of the last three meetings between these two clubs will have occurred within the first five match days of the MLS season. Only in 2017 did the teams play later in the year than April 7.
• New York has ten assists on their seven goals thus far this season; both numbers rank second only to Austin FC in the entire league. No team other than Austin or New York has recorded more than four assists this season.
• Minnesota is one of three teams in MLS to draw both of their first two matches (Portland and Chicago).
• Minnesota is one of four teams in MLS to record identical scorelines in their first two games, along with Chicago (two 0-0 draws), LA Galaxy (two 1-0 wins), and Seattle (two 1-0 losses).
• Of Minnesota and New York players with a statistically-significant number of passes, the highest pass completion percentage on the season belongs to Michael Boxall (82/94, 87.2%), followed by Wil Trapp (53/62, 85.5%) and Bakaye Dibassy (98/116, 84.5%).
• Dylan Nealis of New York leads all players in MLS with nine successful tackles this season; his teammate Frankie Amaya is tied with several others for third place with six.
• Patryk Klimala is tied for the league lead with five shots on goal; however, he has just one goal from those five shots. His teammate Lewis Morgan has four shots on goal, and has scored with three of them.
• Emanuel Reynoso has completed 14 successful dribbles this season; only two other players in MLS have completed more than seven.
• Bongokuhle Hlongwane is one of several players tied for fourth in the league with seven dribbles. However, he’s done this in just 57 minutes on the pitch: not a single other player in the league has completed more than four in less than 90 minutes.

MINNESOTA CONNECTIONS

• The easy answer is, of course, Caden Clark. The Medina, MN native joined New York in late 2020, after playing for the Minnesota Thunder academy as recently as 2016. He transferred to Red Bull Leipzig of the German Bundesliga in June 2021 but has since been loaned back to RBNY for the second half of 2021 and the 2022 MLS season. Clark has appeared off the bench in both of New York’s games thus far, notching an assist in their opening victory over San Jose. If he appears in Sunday’s game, it would be his first professional appearance against Minnesota. Have I mentioned that he’s still only 18?
• Oniel Fisher played for the Red Bulls U23 team between college seasons at New Mexico in summer 2013 and summer 2014.