Monday, October 6, at 7:30 p.m., Angel City FC hosts the Kansas City Current for the club’s Celebración de Culturas game. The match will be broadcast on CBS Sports Network and regionally on FanDuel Sports Network. Radio broadcasts will be available in English on iHeart, and in Spanish on KFWB. You can buy tickets here.
Match Up
Angel City’s last regular-season game was a 0–1 loss on the road to Racing Louisville on September 27. Forward Sarah Weber scored the winner for Racing.
Kansas City’s last result was a 4–1 win at home against Chicago, featuring goals by midfielders Debinha and Lo’Eau LaBonta, and forwards Temwa Chawinga and Bia Zaneratto.
ACFC’s last match against the Current was a 0–1 loss on the road on June 20. LA is 3–3–1 (W–L–D) all-time in this fixture.
Angel City are in 11th place with a 6–10–6 record. Kansas City lead the league at 18–2–2.
Scouting Report
Kansas City, who clinched the 2025 Shield several weeks ago—the earliest any team has ever secured the top spot—are comfortably the dominant team in the league by any metric. They currently sit 16 points above second-place Washington, with 18 wins and just two losses.
They also lead in both goals scored (44) and goals conceded (11), compared with the next-best in those two stats at 37 and 18, respectively. Although they don’t seem likely to beat the all-time NWSL record—57, set by the 2024 Current—with a goal differential of 33, there’s still time for them to beat the 2018 Courage’s record of 36 in that statistic.
A substantial portion of the credit for the club’s success goes to forward Temwa Chawinga, the 2024 Golden Boot winner who once again tops the league in scoring at 14 with four games remaining. Chawinga, the first and still only Malawian international to play in the NWSL, has been the defining player for the Current since her arrival last season.
However, Chawinga has had plenty of help on the scoring front. Four other players—midfielders Debinha and Lo’eau LaBonta, as well as forwards Beatriz and Michelle Cooper—have at least five goals, and six others have gotten on the board at least once.
Midfield Upgrade
Angel City made a big move this week, acquiring midfielder Hina Sugita in a trade with the Portland Thorns. Sugita, a Japan international, has been one of Portland’s most consistent and important players since arriving in the league in 2022.
Sugita signed with the Thorns in 2022, following a transfer from INAC Kobe Leonessa in the Japanese Nadeshiko League. In her debut season, she helped Portland win the NWSL Championship, recording five goals in 23 appearances in the regular season. She notched 13 goals and 14 assists total in her three seasons with the Thorns; before being acquired by ACFC, she had made 22 appearances and earned three assists in the 2025 season.
Internationally, Sugita made her debut for the senior Japan team in 2018. She represented her country at two World Cups—2019 and 2023—and at the 2020 Olympics. Before joining the senior team, she was a standout at the youth level, winning the Golden Ball at both the 2014 U-17 World Cup and the 2016 U-20 World Cup.
