Sporting Kansas City allowed fans to have hope of a potential turn around for about 3 days after dispatching a terrible San Jose team on the road last Saturday.  Unfortunately they followed it up by closing out this very dense stretch of the schedule with a loss in Vancouver and a 1-1 draw at home vs the Pink Dog Food CITY SC team on Saturday night.  The good news is, this means Cody is sufficiently grumpy about this team again so you will get the entertainment you expect from this podcast.

The secondary transfer window is open and while there is a lot of generalized talk about Sporting KC making a signing or two this summer, very little news of anything concrete has appeared as of yet.  We’ll discuss what the potential is for additions this summer, and what we should reasonably expect from the team the rest of the year.

Tactical corner will be a look into a nuanced, but important change to the shape SKC and Vermes are employing with Pulido and Agada on the field at the same time.  It has its positives, but it also has some dependencies that could be impacting the ability to use other players effectively.  

In Potpourri the KC Current sign a new Center Back, and kick off the Summer Cup with a 3-1 drubbing of Houston in a game that saw both teams reaching deep into their rosters to complete the game.  Finally, we look into the beginning of Leagues Cup play as Chicago comes to town on Sunday night.

Sporting Kansas City’s performances were apt to be described best by Genarro Gatusso over the past week, but did reside mostly in the “sometimes maybe good” department, getting 2 consecutive wins at home over FC Dallas including a weather-interrupted Open Cup quarterfinal last night that went the full 120 minutes.  This had the effect of somewhat washing out the sour taste of a frustrating final 30 minutes in Colorado on the 4th of July that erased what was a fairly well executed, if unexpected, game plan for the first hour.

I don’t know if it’s fair to say SKC are making a turn, but we have seen more solid performances from certain players, and the coaching staff appearing willing to move on from some others that continue to make significant mistakes.  This all taking into account the level of the competition, which in the case of Dallas, candidly isn’t very good.

Tactical corner this week will be a look into how Vermes both looks to use his midfielders and fullbacks, and what kinds of dependencies that creates as well as the traits it requires to succeed.  

In Potpourri, we discuss Tactical Manager’s favorite news release of all time, Gregg Berhalter being fired by US Soccer.  What realistically can the fanbase expect from a replacement coach? Are people’s expectations way too high?  Who do we like for the position.  Finally we will each give you one thing to look for with two more games coming up in the next 6 days.

Is that a light at the end of the tunnel we see?  Sporting Kansas City finally announced the hiring of their long awaited Sporting Director on Friday, former long time New England Revolution GM Mike Burns.  Then they followed it up with a comprehensive beat down of Austin FC at Children’s Mercy Park on Saturday.  Both of these stories have caveats, as they often do, but it was nice to have some semblance of positivity around a club that has had very little for some time.

On Tuesday we got to hear from both Peter Vermes and Burns in person as well as commitments from ownership about upcoming investment in the roster.  There is a lot to unpack about this situation, from the choice of Burns, the reporting structure, the decision making matrix, how much actual money they have and what their freedom is to spend it, and what other areas the club is looking to invest in to enhance its ability to be a more effective technical department in the future.  As you can all imagine, we have a lot of thoughts on this and will do our best to share them in a meaningful and informative manner.

SKC has a ton of games coming up(there will probably be 3 between now and the next time we record this podcast), including a pivotal matchup in the US Open Cup should Sporting want to try to extract any kind of positive vibes from this season.

Outside the SKC news, the USMNT got bounced from Copa America so of course everyone is having an exceptionally rational response to that and apparently calling for Jurgen Klopp to coach the team, the KC Current smothered Houston on Friday night, and CPKC stadium is going to be the home of the NWSL Cup Final.

Every time we think things can’t possibly can’t any worse, Sporting KC finds new depths of despair to plummet into and that was on full display in Columbus last Saturday.  Peter Vermes tried a new formation, but the players seemed ill equipped to execute the positional responsibilities it entailed, and they candidly got dog walked out of the stadium in a 4-0 defeat.  What a wonderful homecoming game for Aidan Morris though.

The result left a number of fans asking when any substantive change would actually happen.  This was the kind of defeat that has gotten many an MLS coach, even those with storied careers like Sigi Schmid fired.  On Monday, Sporting KC did release communications about someone leaving the club, but it was not the droid the fans were looking for.  It was instead Brian Bliss.  

This roster is in desperate need of the overhaul that Mike Illig and Peter Vermes have been open about discussing in the press, so we will take a look at what realistically that “overhaul” could look like and how much substantive change might actually happen given how significant the financial investment will likely need to be to accomplish it.

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Things are rotten in the state of Missouri(or Kansas), and a predictably hard portion of the SKC schedule has produced two more frustrating losses making it 10 losses from the last 12 games.  But, look on the bright side, at least the San Jose Earthquakes exist.  While both of the games did end in losses to very good teams in the LA Galaxy and Real Salt Lake, there was actually some semblance of positivity due to the significantly improved chance creation over those games.  They also tried some alternate tactics and players that have at least in moments appeared to breathe some life into the attack.  The team still struggles to defend in transition, but at least they aren’t as depressing to watch in possession.  Either that, or things are so bad that fans will find anything that appears the least bit positive to latch onto.

American Soccer Analysis released their annual league survey addressing the analytics departments of every team in MLS, and unsurprisingly, Sporting KC was 5th from last in the league in the survey.  It is hard not to correlate their poor run of form lately with the limitations(perceived or valid) of their analytics practice, and continue to think that this club is falling further and further behind its rivals in multiple areas.  We will dive into the information from this survey, what it really means, and how it’s not as simple as saying “do analytics” and things all of a sudden get better.

Finally, a number of topics in Potpourri, including a rumored acquisition from Norway that now appears to be incorrect, some sad news regarding Felipe Hernandez, our update on the fun soccer in KC being played by the Current, and a quick look at both continental competitions happening this summer before we do a quick preview of Aidan Morris’ farewell match vs. SKC.

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It finally happened, after almost 2.5 months, Sporting KC won another MLS game.  They certainly got some help from their opponent to do so, but it is 3 points nonetheless, and the vibes were good for at least Saturday evening in Children’s Mercy Park.

Mike Illig sat down with Sam McDowell of the KC Star for what is becoming an annual event where the relationship between fans and Peter Vermes had once again become so tenuous he had to address the questions about whether Vermes should remain at the helm.  In a decision that certainly left a significant portion of the fanbase apoplectic, Illig made it clear that the team would not be making a change at this time, and that they would rather be making a significant roster overhaul over the next 14-ish months and Vermes would be entrusted to help oversee it.  We will spend some time chatting about this decision, why we think it was made, and what this means about the rebuild we have been saying has been coming.

Finally the Current keep rolling, the USMNT gets pantsed by Colombia, and things do not get any easier for SKC as they head to LA to take on the Galaxy this weekend.

It’s been two weeks since we’ve last recorded the pod and not much has changed!  Sporting KC have lost 3 more games since that time taking the total to 7 in a row, and are now legitimate Wooden Spoon contenders given their measly 2 wins on the season from 16 games.  You heard that right, after Saturday’s game against Seattle, the season will be half over, and the best case scenario is Sporting will have 3 total wins.  And given their performances to date there isn’t much optimism that it will actually increase to that number, either from the fans or the oddsmakers.

Given the state of the club and the fact that Cody and I have gotten a bit worn out talking about the same old problems every week, I posted to both social media and the H&A Discord asking for questions from you, the listeners(this is your reminder to join the H&A Discord server if you want to interact both with us and listeners of the pod, link is in the show notes).  We will spend much of this week’s pod trying to answer those questions as best we can, and interweaving our thoughts on the current state of the team and how they’ve reached this level of futility while we do.

Finally, the USWNT finally gets a couple matches with Emma Hayes on the sideline and while it’s hard to take a ton from two friendlies, early returns were pretty good.  Venezia makes it back up to Serie A but not without potentially damaging our hopes for seeing Gianluca Busio in Children’s Mercy Park next week with the U23’s, and we do a quick preview of this weekend’s upcoming match vs. Seattle.

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Sporting Kansas City went down to Austin this weekend and lost their 4th straight game and pushed their winless streak in league play to 7, but at least the effort was good.  Peter Vermes made promises to sacrifice quality for effort where necessary but the only lineup changes were swapping backup defenders for other backup defenders.

While we can perhaps agree that in general the players were trying harder than the last match, they still have multiple weaknesses that cause them to ship goals in a very frustrating manner, something that seems counterintuitive given the ideology of the coach and the consideration that effort and mentality were significant problems.

Thankfully, we did get a bit of a palate cleanser last night in KC with Sporting putting in a pretty comprehensive beat down of FC Tulsa in the US Open Cup round of 16.  There were significant performances from players we do not regularly see, and Vermes did not hesitate to ensure that regular starters came in and pulled a shift at the end of the game when he certainly could have rested them with a view to the trip to Portland on Saturday.

Elsewhere in the soccer universe, MLSPA salaries are official and man did they become a topic of discussion, NWSL loves stoppage time, SKC gets linked to a Venezuelan midfielder you’ve never heard of, and both the Men’s and Women’s national teams post rosters for their last friendlies prior to a major tournament.

Sporting Kansas City went down to Austin this weekend and lost their 4th straight game and pushed their winless streak in league play to 7, but at least the effort was good.  Peter Vermes made promises to sacrifice quality for effort where necessary but the only lineup changes were swapping backup defenders for other backup defenders.

While we can perhaps agree that in general the players were trying harder than the last match, they still have multiple weaknesses that cause them to ship goals in a very frustrating manner, something that seems counterintuitive given the ideology of the coach and the consideration that effort and mentality were significant problems.

Thankfully, we did get a bit of a palate cleanser last night in KC with Sporting putting in a pretty comprehensive beat down of FC Tulsa in the US Open Cup round of 16.  There were significant performances from players we do not regularly see, and Vermes did not hesitate to ensure that regular starters came in and pulled a shift at the end of the game when he certainly could have rested them with a view to the trip to Portland on Saturday.

Elsewhere in the soccer universe, MLSPA salaries are official and man did they become a topic of discussion, NWSL loves stoppage time, SKC gets linked to a Venezuelan midfielder you’ve never heard of, and both the Men’s and Women’s national teams post rosters for their last friendlies prior to a major tournament.

Things seemed to finally have reached a breaking point after Sporting KC lost again at home to Houston making it zero league wins since March, 2 total wins out of 12 games, and a point total under 12 from 12 games for the 3rd season in a row.  Peter Vermes did not hold back in his post game press conference calling the goals they conceded “atrocious” and “amateur at best”, while questioning the effort and mentality of some of the players.  He then doubled down in a fairly frank radio interview with Soren Petro and provided additional detail surrounding what he feels to be unacceptable playing behavior by several members of the squad.

Daniel Salloi seemed to echo his feelings after the match with similarly stern commentary regarding players not having the appropriate mentality on the field.

On the opposite side of the table, the Kansas City Current continued their unbeaten start through a whirlwind 8 days that saw cancelled flights, charter planes grounded for turbulence, and an increased defensive solidity that had Vlatko Andonovski effusive about how much he is enjoying coaching this team and still himself not knowing what their ceiling truly is.

In other news this week, Jake Davis got a new contract, MLS finally got a bit more transparent with teams’ roster makeup and designations, and Jesse Marsch became the new Canadian Men’s National Team.

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The Sporting KC Comms department made sure to let us know how well SKC had performed on the road this before the game up in Minnesota, conveniently leaving out the fact they had only played 3 road games all season.  That backfired a bit as the boys in blue took a 2-1 defeat at Allianz Field with yet another attempt to make the 4-2-3-1 happen. 

It doesn't seem like it is going anywhere anytime soon so we take a deeper dive into the setup, how it is traditionally used, how SKC seem to be trying to use it to their advantage, the issues they are having implementing it effectively, and what the long game might be.

We were dealt another full iteration of the Willy Agada experience, complete with dangerous runs and the highest xG performance on the team, which was also combined with a poor shot on said high xG chance, a wonderful off-side goal and naive turnovers on the ball.

Vermes’ post game comments are drawing the ire of some supporters again, both for his old man yells at cloud moment holding up a tablet screenshot of goal that looks offside without taking into account parallax effect, but was actually likely onside when you do, but additionally for taking a fairly measured approach to discussing the team’s results to date.  This has also led to some areas of the internet to ask whether Vermes is too comfortable given his contract situation and whether he has the requisite drive for results the fans expect.  

Finally, we have to talk about the Current some more, as they are the toast of NWSL early in the season, and we will also try to ascertain whether SKC’s fates are likely to change this weekend in Salt Lake.

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