Analysis: Predicting Huntsville City FC's starting XI

Huntsville City FC are set to begin their third season in MLS Next Pro in 2025. This comes after a 2024 season marked by inconsistency and instability led the club to finish ninth in the Eastern Conference, missing the playoffs for the second consecutive season.

Nashville SC's reserve side cycled through four head coaches, and opened the 2024 season with 10 consecutive losses. Frankly, it's quite the accomplishment they finished as high as ninth given the circumstances.

But 2025 may be different. Former Inter Miami Under-17 head coach Chris O'Neal was hired to be Huntsville's manager on August 5th, and of the nine wins the Rocket Men logged over the course of the season, five came after O'Neal's arrival.

O'Neal and sporting director Matt Cairns have had a busy offseason once more, retaining only four players into the 2025 campaign–defender Kessy Coulibaly, forward Jordan Knight, along with midfielders Patrick Amarh and Ethan O'Brien. Forward Maximus Ekk has also been named on Nashville SC's preseason roster, and currently appears on Huntsville's roster page on their website. It's unclear at this point if Ekk has signed on for another year in the Rocket City.

Beyond those players, everyone else is new. The club has since signed seven players to MLS Next Pro contracts. Those players being Real Gill, Moisés Véliz, Alan Carleton, Tyshawn Rose, Erik Lauta, Christian Koffi, and most recently Blake Bowen.

So let's start building our lineup. Since O'Neal's arrival, Huntsville has generally played in a 4-2-3-1 in possession that folds back into a 4-5-1 without the ball. This is also one of the potential setups we expect out of the first team in Nashville, so it makes sense to have some continuity there.

You'll notice I have Maximus Ekk placed on the left wing, even though he has not been announced as returning as of yet. This is true, however, he does appear on the club's official roster, so he's going in the lineup.

Joining Ekk in the final third will be new signees Alan Carleton and Christian Koffi, along with homegrown Adem Sipić. Sipić only scored four goals in 19 appearances in 2024, but he's a year older and a year wiser, and more importantly, he doesn't have Forster Ajago ahead of him. For the first time, Sipić will likely have the opportunity to be "the guy" up top.

In the midfield, I've got Moisés Véliz and Ethan O'Brien for now. Other players could be put here, most notably homegrown Isaiah Jones who appeared 24 times for Huntsville in 2024, but these are the two at the moment in my opinion. O'Brien seems to be a favorite of Chris O'Neal, playing a full 90 minutes in each of Huntsville's final three games in 2024, and only playing less than 60 minutes once since arriving from Indy Eleven.

Véliz, 20, arrives highly rated from Panama, and perhaps it's new toy syndrome, but I feel he deserves a solid look early in the year.

At the back, we actually have three familiar faces. Jordan Knight arrived from Columbus Crew 2 last season, and is very versatile, able to play both at left back and on the left wing. I've got him at left back here just to fit Maximus Ekk on the field, but if Ekk isn't available, you could see Knight move up the field. Kessy Coulibaly and Chris Applewhite both return from 2024, but coincidentally they never played together.

Of Coulibaly's three appearances in 2024, he was actually subbed on for Applewhite in two of them. However, they form the back two to start the year, though you could also see new signing Tyshawn Rose in place of Coulibaly.

In goal, Huntsville has typically gone with goalkeepers on Nashville contracts, such as Ben Martino and Elliot Panicco, so that's why I've put Xavier Valdez in the sticks here. However, Erik Lauta could see time here as well.

After all that, here's your projected Huntsville starting lineup heading into the 2025 MLS Next Pro season.