FC Kansas City looking to avenge earlier loss to Washington Spirit

In a brutal stretch like FC Kansas City faces now with nine games in 30 days, the Blues can ill-afford to lose players to injuries.

However, when Kansas City lines up against the Washington Spirit at 6 tonight at UMKC’s Durwood Stadium, some familiar faces will be missing.

Melissa Henderson, who left the last game because of a right ankle sprain, is expected to rejoin the lineup, but Erika Tymrak is questionable because of lower back pain. Morgan Marlborough (right ankle sprain) and Liz Bogus (right hamstring strain) are likely to miss the game.

“The schedule doesn’t help, and what makes it worse is that we are not even over that hill because that is our fifth game and have four more to go in the next 14 days,” coach Vlatko Andonovski said. “We knew that getting into the season so we just have to be smart, manage it well and hopefully get some positive results by the end of this cycle of nine games.”

So far, FC Kansas City is 2-2 in this stretch with victories against the Chicago Red Stars and Houston Dash, and losses to Portland Thorns FC and the Western New York Flash.

This will be the first rematch of the season for FC Kansas City, which lost 3-1 to the Spirit on April 19.

In that game, Diana Matheson scored two of the Spirit’s three first-half goals, and Christine Nairn added a free kick just before the break. Amy Rodriguez scored the only goal for the Blues.

This story was originally published May 10, 2014 at 7:56 PM with the headline "FC Kansas City looking to avenge earlier loss to Washington Spirit."