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Among the many black clouds that hung over ��ѿ��ý City SC last season, the most persistent may have been the team’s inability to win a game on the road.

It took until the 15th road game of the season (out of 17), at league-worst San Jose, before City SC won a game away from ��ѿ��ý, and that would be the only one. City SC had a few games in which it got late goals to get a tie, and more in which it gave up a late goal to end up with a tie. The team went 1-8-8 on the road, which by historical standards is a good number of points for a team that cursed outside of its own stadium, but it’s a scenario the team is in no hurry to repeat.

City SC goes on the road for the first time this season on Saturday to face the only team newer than it, San Diego FC, which will be playing its first home game. San Diego got everyone’s attention on Sunday when it won its first game on Sunday, beating the defending MLS champion Los Angeles Galaxy on the road. Now City SC has a chance to put a quick end to any thoughts San Diego might have of topping City SC’s record five-game win streak at the start of a franchise’s life.

It figures to be a celebratory day in San Diego, though if it’s up to City SC, the party will end with the opening whistle.

“That has to be our goal,” City SC captain Roman Burki said. “We are not going there and shake hands and, ‘Congratulations, you finally made it. You did it.’ We want these three points.”

Getting three points on the road is another matter. Last season, if not for the San Jose game, City SC would have been just the 11th team in MLS history to go winless on the road in a season.

“I noticed some things that were different from game to game,” said new City SC coach Olof Mellberg, who sat down and watched every City SC game from last year, of last season’s road struggles. “So I wouldn’t say was it was a pattern, or just one or two things that was not working and if we changed that, we will win every game on the road. I mean, we also have an opponent that is usually strong at home as well. So it will be important with the game plan. Also now it’s a game we will play a team for the first time at home. That will also, I think, affect their energy, of the team. So we’ve got to be aware of that as well.”

“Now, I think we shouldn’t do too much different compared to home games,” Burki said. “I think last year it was made too big of a deal playing away, like, ‘Oh, that’s an away game.’ It’s always hard. I mean, you go on the same field. This field looks the same like at home. There’s a stadium with people inside, and you just have to play against a different opponent. For me, I always want to win. It doesn’t matter if it’s away or home. I expect to win, to be honest. And so I think we should not make it too big of a deal of it just because it’s an away game. It’s a soccer game, and obviously we have to travel, yes, but I think we are professional enough to push the other things away and just focus on the game and be able to win away games.”

City SC could have won its first game had it finished its chances better, and Mellberg started practice on Tuesday by having teams play games on a very short field so it was just one scoring opportunity after another. Mellberg should have more offensive weapons available for this game, starting with Cedric Teuchert, who arrived back from Germany having gotten his green card about 30 hours before the game. Mellberg reported progress among other players coming back from injuries without naming names. (The only player he was specific on was that center back Joakim Nilsson will miss a second game.) Mellberg said just because City SC did well defensively last game that he’s locked into the same lineup.

“It’s a balance,” he said. “You want to bring in the things that were working from the last game. But also, it’s a new game now, new opponent, new game plan. I don’t necessarily feel that I have to, just because we have a good game, or if we win that, I have to keep the exact 11. We also have a quite big squad. We have players coming back from injuries, and not that many players on the injury list, either. So, we have quite a few choices in various positions. I haven’t decided yet for an 11, and there is good competition for a starting place. And you can see that in training as well. We’ve had a good training week and good energy.”

Even after six preseason games and a month of practice, the first regular season game (a 0-0 draw with Colorado) showed the team some things about itself.

“First of all,” Burki said, “the fact is that we defend really good with the ball. We also have quality if we play like we did against Colorado, and also offensively, it’s good that we created a lot of chances, but maybe the same thing that we had the year before was difficulties to score a goal. You could also say last year you would have lost that game, like you were clearly the better team, it’s 0-0, always a dangerous result. The only thing missing was the goal.”

Three years ago, it was a party here when City SC played its first home game and beat Charlotte 3-1 with goals by Eduard Lowen, Klauss and an own goal. Burki knows what it will be like at Snapdragon Stadium.

“It’s something special, obviously, for the home team,” he said. “You go into a new locker room. It was a new stadium, everything was new, and you’re just excited to be here. And then you’re welcomed with such a crowd, that’s obviously amazing, and there’s nothing better. We expect the same, I think, in San Diego or similar, and maybe the weather is going to be a little better than when it was here.”