Chivas USA visits San Jose for the first of two final-week clashes that must pass before club brass start looking in earnest and what went wrong. The Goats (8-16-4) are missing the playoffs for the first time since its premiere-year disaster in 2005, and one thing that’s clear is they don’t have the depth nor talent to compete with the best teams in Major League Soccer.

That’s for club president Shawn Hunter, director of soccer Stephen Hamilton and head coach Martin Vasquez -- yes, he’s not going anywhere, we’re told -- to solve, and it’s not going to be simple. Needed is a true goalscorer, a la Ante Razov, a fluid playmaker and a upgrades on the backline. Expect a busy offseason.

The primary talking points heading into Wednesday’s game against the Earthquakes at Santa Clara University’s Buck Shaw Stadium (FSN Prime Ticket, 7 p.m.; KWHY/Channel 22, 7:30 p.m.):

1. THIS GAME MATTERS: To the Quakes far more than Chivas. San Jose is sixth in the Western Conference and can overtake Colorado and Seattle for fourth, although why they’d want to finish fourth is beyond logic. Better to be fifth and head over into the milder Eastern Conference bracket, with a first-round series likely against Columbus, which is in poor form. That’s more easily doable with a victory here -- and after two successive shutout losses at Buck Shaw, they could use a home win.

2. OUT OF THE CELLAR: The Goats are used to battling Houston at season’s end, but usually it’s for the Western Conference crown -- not to avoid the bottom spot in the conference, like this year. The Dynamo’s win at San Jose last weekend left Chivas in last place, two points back but with one game -- this game -- in hand. Win here, and it comes down to Saturday’s finales, with the Goats home against Chicago (in Jonathan Bornstein’s and Brian McBride’s farewells) and Houston visiting red-hot Seattle.

3. BRAUN MIGHT BE BACK: Justin Braun, the frontrunner for Chivas’s team MVP, even if he has cooled off the past month or two, could be back on the field after missing last weekend’s loss at Seattle with a concussion. Alan Gordon is gone, serving the second game of his suspension, which is too bad, because he and Braun had a little chemistry, something Braun and Venezuelan forward Giancarlo Maldonado have struggled to find.

4. MVP … GOLDEN BOOT?: There was some thought Chris Wondolowski might catch the Galaxy’s Edson Buddle in the Golden Boot race after he reached 14 goals, but Buddle’s strike in Saturday’s 3-1 loss to Colorado, his 17th, almost puts that out of reach. But if Wondolowski can score three or four in the final two games, his nascent MVP candidacy, a popular topic among the San Jose faithful, might gain some real traction. As it stands, there are too many names ahead of Wondolowski’s -- Ferreira, Donovan, Saborio, Montero, Buddle, Le Toux, Hartman, Cummings, Lindpere -- to take him seriously.

OTHER MIDWEEK GAMES
Thursday
New England Revolution (9-15-5, 32 points) at New York Red Bulls (14-9-6, 48 points), 4:30 p.m., ESPN2 (ESPN Deportes, delayed, 5 p.m.)