Chattanooga Football Club made it two wins from two to begin the 2025 MLS NEXT Pro campaign following a 1-0 victory over Southeast Division rivals Huntsville City FC on Saturday afternoon.
Daniel Mangarov scored his first professional goal in the second minute of the match that ultimately proved to be decisive for Head Coach Chris Nugent's side to start the season with six points.
Mangarov continued the trend of fast starts for CFC this season as he needed only 88 seconds to give the hosts the lead. Last week's opening scorer Keegan Ancelin slotted in a pass to Mangarov's feet inside the penalty area and the winger found the bottom corner.
Ancelin and Mangarov linked up again shortly after and created a big chance but Mangarov's shot went just wide of Huntsville keeper Erik Lauta's post.
The Boys in Blue nearly found another goal in the second half when Mangarov fizzed in a free-kick to the far post. Ethan Dudley's header on the back post bounced across the Huntsville goal but was ultimately cleared.
Once again, Eldin Jakupović was called upon to make crucial saves late in the game and the seasoned keeper collected his first clean sheet of the campaign for a valuable three points in the Scenic City.
"The result and resilience is the big thing takeaway today," said Head Coach Nugent in his post-game press conference. "We know we're not always going to be perfect, so show some resilience, especially against a very good team and see the game out—that's huge for us. We would be naive to think that we are just going to dominate every team and play beautiful. Eldin [Jakupović] had a great game and made some big saves. Nathan [Koehler] came in and had a huge impact as well.
"We tried to make some tactical adjustment that we couldn't quite get right, so it was good to see the flexibility of changing some personnel and the shape, so there are some positives."
CFC will be back at Fort Finley on Wednesday evening to host Corpus Christi FC in the first round of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. Kick-off is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. ET