Coach pleased with FC Kansas City’s first preseason practice

Cone drills and speed tests signaled the start of FC Kansas City’s preseason on Monday afternoon at the Overland Park Soccer Complex.

The Blues, who still are missing a handful of players to college or national team duties, spent their first practice completing conditioning drills as they prepare to defend their National Women’s Soccer League title.

“It feels like everyone wants to be back and wants to be on the field as soon as possible,” coach Vlatko Andonovski said. “They are already a step ahead of where we were last year coming into the preseason, so that is a great sign.”

The Blues will have a quick turnaround before they start exhibition play Sunday against the University of Nebraska. It will be the first of four free and open-to-the-public practice games between March 15 and April 4. The Blues also will face Kansas, Iowa State and Missouri before officially opening the NWSL season against Sky Blue FC on April 12 at Sporting Park.

“The last few years we have been able to build a team with personality, style and integrity and hopefully we can keep building on that,” Andonovski said.

The Blues also announced their 28-player roster on Monday, which includes 12 returnees. There are four acquisitions, five college draft picks and seven nonroster invitees.

They were able to retain three national team players — Becky Sauerbrunn, Lauren Holiday and Amy Rodriguez — and add Heather O’Reilly through a trade with the Boston Breakers. They also acquired Becca Moros from Portland, Yael Averbuch from Washington and Kate Deines from Seattle.

Technical director Huw Williams “did an incredible job in the offseason adding on the pieces we were missing,” Andonovski said. “We had to make some difficult decisions, but everything we did was to make this team better and stronger.”

This story was originally published March 9, 2015 at 7:01 PM with the headline "Coach pleased with FC Kansas City’s first preseason practice."