This was always the fear for an expansion franchise that has yet to start its youth academy and doesn\u2019t have a reserve team or doesn\u2019t partner with a club in the USL Championship: Get bit by the injury bug \u2026 before the MLS summer transfer window to find reinforcements \u2026 while facing three games in eight days.<\/p>\n
Help could be on the way, but not before Saturday night\u2019s first-place showdown at Snapdragon Stadium against the Vancouver Whitecaps, who ominously sit one point behind in the Western Conference and are hell bent on revenge after a 5-3 SDFC win up north last month.<\/p>\n
The transfer window opened Thursday and lasts through Aug. 21, allowing teams like SDFC (13-7-3) and Vancouver (12-5-5) to replenish rosters for the stretch run to the playoffs.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re actively looking for three or four bodies,\u201d Heaps said. \u201cWe\u2019ll be active in the next couple of weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Luca](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/SUT-L-sdfcxol-0617-023.jpg\")
Luca Bombino #27 of San Diego FC and Hirving Lozano #11 react to a foul called during their match against the Toronto FC at Snapdragon Stadium on Wednesday, July 16, 2025 in San Diego, CA. (Meg McLaughlin \/ The San Diego Union-Tribune)<\/p>\n
Seven players missed Wednesday\u2019s game due to injury, including striker Marcus Ingvartsen, midfielder Anibal Godoy, defender Paddy McNair and several key reserves. Two players \u2014 midfielder Alejandro Alvarado Jr. and defender Andres Reyes \u2014 have undergone season-ending surgeries.<\/p>\n
The club also jettisoned German defender Jasper Loffelsend, who signed with a second-division club in Poland. He was replaced by Aiden Harangi, a 19-year-old outside back who has been a member of U.S. youth national teams and had been playing with Eintracht Frankfurt\u2019s reserves in the fourth and fifth tiers of German soccer. Harangi is a short-term loan.<\/p>\n
![\"Tyler](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/SUT-L-SoccerXOL-012.jpg\")
Tyler Heaps, sporting director and general manager of San Diego FC, speaks during a press conference at the team headquarters in Little Italy, Wednesday Jan. 22, 2025, where San Diego native and midfielder, Luca de la Torre, and winger Andres Dreyer were introduced, Howard Lipin \/ For The San Diego Union-Tribune).<\/p>\n
One player who hasn\u2019t been replaced is striker Milan Iloski, whose loan term from Danish sister club FC Nordsjaelland was set to expire later this month. Iloski and SDFC couldn\u2019t come to terms on a loan extension or multiyear contract, and the Escondido native and San Pasqual High School alum is returning to Denmark after scoring 11 goals in a mere 471 minutes for SDFC, including four in the landmark victory at Vancouver.<\/p>\n
It amounts to the biggest \u2014 and most controversial \u2014 decision of Heaps\u2019 tenure as GM, one that might make financial sense for the future but won\u2019t be popular in the short term given Iloski\u2019s scoring prowess and local ties.<\/p>\n
The issue wasn\u2019t with FC Nordsjaelland, which is also part of the Right to Dream empire and has sent several other players to SDFC. The issue was with Iloski, who was making $156,000 this season and wanted a healthy raise that SDFC wasn\u2019t willing to grant.<\/p>\n
\u201cDisappointed, for sure,\u201d Heaps said. \u201cHe\u2019s a fantastic person. I know he was disappointed as well, and it\u2019s not an easy one to lose somebody from here. \u2026 We were a long ways away. I think if it was close, it would have gotten done.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the difficult parts of my job as well. But it\u2019s one that we need to protect the long-term process of this league. It\u2019s obviously a salary cap league, so it\u2019s very difficult to start to project into the future. It\u2019s just something that didn\u2019t make sense for us to do right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Jeppe](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/SUT-L-sdfcxol-0617-034.jpg\")
Jeppe Tverskov #6 of San Diego FC looks to pass against Jonathan Osorio #21 of Toronto FC at Snapdragon Stadium on Wednesday, July 16, 2025 in San Diego, CA. (Meg McLaughlin \/ The San Diego Union-Tribune)<\/p>\n
SDFC managed a 2-1 win at Chicago last Saturday without Iloski, but the offense went cold Wednesday night against a Toronto FC team that employed a tactic of man-marking with an extra free defender at the expense of an attacker that captain Jeppe Tverskov admitted \u201csurprised us a little bit.\u201d Toronto got a first-half penalty via a VAR review and converted for the game\u2019s lone goal; SDFC didn\u2019t get a PK via VAR on an apparent handball in the 87th minute and suffered its second straight home loss.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s football,\u201d Tverskov said. \u201cSometimes you get it, sometimes you don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n
Coach Mikey Varas was asked about the call. He preferred to focus on his own team, on the controllables.<\/p>\n
\u201cListen, I think I could sit here and talk about officiating,\u201d Varas said. \u201cI can talk about all the things that went against us tonight, or that we feel went against us. But at the end of the day, we weren\u2019t good enough tonight, we know that. We know, no matter what is outside of our control that doesn\u2019t go our way, what we can control is our performance.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of us know that we could play better than that, and now it\u2019s an opportunity to bounce back in three days. \u2026 It\u2019s just looking in the mirror knowing that it wasn\u2019t good enough.\u201d<\/p>\n
San Diego FC (13-7-3) vs. Vancouver Whitecaps (12-5-5)<\/p>\n
When:<\/strong> 7:30 p.m. Saturday<\/p>\n Where<\/strong>: Snapdragon Stadium<\/p>\n Streaming<\/strong>: AppleTV<\/p>\n Radio:<\/strong>760-AM (English); 1700-AM (Spanish)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Major League Soccer teams are allowed 20 players on game-day rosters \u2014 11 starters and nine substitutes. Wednesday…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":74011,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,1582,276,1370,3549,15520,7264,221,62,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-74010","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-latest-headlines","12":"tag-san-diego","13":"tag-san-diego-fc","14":"tag-sandiego","15":"tag-soccer","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114877063726082557","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74010\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}