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Angel City Football Club faces Portland looking to snap 4-game losing streak

May 16, 2026

After its third consecutive win to start the season, Angel City Football Club sat in first place in the NWSL.

Heading into the eighth game of the season, Angel City is now on the other end of that hot start, looking to snap a four-game losing streak.

“We’re having literally seconds of lapses of concentration,” defender Emily Sams said. “I think we play such, like a strong 85 or 80 minutes and then there’s just like those couple of moments that we’ve kind of let our concentration slip … kind of like doing it to ourselves a little bit.

“We’ve been focusing on that in training and we know once we fix those things and play a complete 90-minute performance, we’re pretty confident that we will be successful.”

In a league where the margins between winning and losing are ultra-slim, Angel City is in a difficult spot.

One area where ACFC could help itself is on the attacking end. Angel City had nine goals through the first three games, but just just three during the last four.

“I think we create a decent amount of chances and to be fair, also, it’s where we are at the moment. We’re not going to create 14-15 chances against teams like San Diego and Portland, top, top teams,” ACFC coach Alex Straus said. “So we need to execute those chances. That’s the main thing. So we need to do that on that end of the field and also protect those areas where there’s high xG (expected goals) against us.

“We don’t let a lot of chances against us, but the chances that we let (in) against us is becoming too big, and that is something that we need to figure out. A lot of things, we put that on ourselves. We give away the ball because we are not good at retaining it, we are a little bit sloppy in the execution of the pass or we are not precise enough in our decision making in those high-risk areas of the field, then we become a little naive and then the opponents will put themselves into good positions to score. If that happens two, three times in a game, teams will hurt you.”

For the first time this season, Angel City will face an opponent it has already played. Just three weeks ago, Portland came into BMO Stadium and left with a 2-1 win. The Thorns scored the first goal in the 75th minute. Sophia Wilson made it 2-0 in the fourth minute of stoppage time before Prisca Chilufya put Angel City on the board in the seventh minute of stoppage time.

“We didn’t get what we deserved from that game,” Sams said. “We’re excited to go there. I think that we match up really well against them and we’re ready to go there and get the win that we’ve been working for a couple of weeks now.”

Busy stretch upcoming

Angel City faces a busy stretch to close out May before the NWSL breaks for the men’s FIFA World Cup. After Sunday, Angel City returns home for its first midweek game of the season, facing the Kansas City Current. It will be a quick turnaround after that with a trip to Houston (May 23) and then the final game, May 31, at home against North Carolina.

ANGEL CITY FC at PORTLAND THORNS FC

When: Sunday, 3 p.m.

Where: Providence Park; Portland, Ore.

How to watch: ESPN2

Orange County Register

News Details

Angel City Football Club faces Portland looking to snap 4-game losing streak

Busy stretch upcoming

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