Sporting KC kicks off Sunday. Here are 10 things to expect from the MLS club in 2022
Baseball is on hold, but soccer sure isn’t.
Sporting Kansas City kicks off Sunday afternoon in the land of Coca-Cola, peaches and the Migos, taking on Atlanta United in front of 75,000 fans at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. The game begins at 2 p.m. Central Time on FS1.
Expectations for Sporting KC are high, as usual. But with forward Alan Pulido’s season-ending surgery and seven new additions to the roster, things are going to look a little different for Peter Vermes’ squad this season.
Here are 10 things to watch as another season arrives this weekend.
1. Sporting KC will return to the playoffs (of course)
It’s an expectation, right? With 14 teams now in the Western Conference, 50% will make the postseason. If Sporting doesn’t finish in the top half of the conference, it would be more than surprising — it would be a major disappointment. Given the returning talent in Kansas City, and this core’s successful history together, a trip to the playoffs should be expected.
2. Khiry Shelton will lead SKC in striker minutes
No surprise here, either: Shelton led the team in minutes at striker in 2018 and 2021. In 2020, he ended the season (and postseason) as a starter as Sporting finished first in the West. Sporting KC is 18-8-6 since 2018 when Shelton starts at striker, with 63 goals for and 38 against. That’s an accumulated 60 points earned with a +25 goal differential. Unless those sorts of results start to fade, it likely won’t matter how many times he puts the ball in the back of the net.
3. The MLS U-22 initiative kids will impress
Sporting KC signed three players under Major League Soccer’s U-22 initiative, a roster mechanism enabling teams to sign promising young talent to relatively lucrative deals at a reduced hit to the salary cap.
Robert Voloder, Logan Ndenbe and Marinos Tzionis were all brought in under the U-22 initiative. Ndenbe is the most likely to feature right away, as he’s been in camp the longest. He and Daniel Salloi have combined nicely down the left side during the preseason, even producing a goal against Phoenix Rising.
Voloder and Tzionis will take some time to get integrated because of their delayed arrival due to the immigration process.
4. Some veteran MLS depth will help, too
Uri Rosell looks like a locked-in starter as a defensive midfielder, which is a plus as Josè Mauri enters his first full season with the club. Kortne Ford will provide important depth, and potentially some competition, at the center-back spot. Ben Sweat is a veteran left-back, and Ndenbe (as noted above) could be a key contributor.
5. Sporting KC will rotate (and substitute) more
The previous two points fuel this one. Come summertime, Sporting KC’s schedule gets condensed. The Leagues Cup will factor into an already busy MLS schedule and Sporting hopes to make a deep run in the U.S. Open Cup. To be able to compete on all fronts in pursuit of a trophy, they’ll need to utilize their depth.
Sporting KC made 83 substitutions last season, the lowest total in the league and 26 fewer than the next-closest team. In addition, Sporting played the most complete matches in MLS: 291. Injuries, transfers out and suspensions created a trickle-down effect in terms of roster availability, a problem that only compounded during the most crucial stretch of the regular season.
Sporting used the offseason to give itself more options off the bench — options that Vermes must trust when the schedule gets busier.
6. Salloi and Russell will score double-digit goals again
The dynamic duo is back again in 2022, with captain Johnny Russell and Salloi running the flanks. The two combined for 32 goals and 15 assists in 2021, one of the most prolific seasons either player’s had. While it might be hard to replicate that production, Sporting still creates a a lot of high-quality chances for the wingers. Both should once again bang home double-digit goals.
7. A homegrown player will break out
There are a few candidates for this prediction in 2022. Twenty-year-old midfielder Cam Duke is certainly one of them. Coaches and teammates have raved about the leap he’s made, not only in his game on the field, but in terms of his focus off of it. Vermes recently listed Duke, Jake Davis and Kayden Pierre as young players who could take big steps in their professional development this year.
8. This team will win a few 1-0 games
Last season, Sporting KC won all 17 regular-season matches in which they scored more than two goals (17-0-0). A squeaky-clean record, right? OK, but on the flip-side, Sporting was winless when scoring just one goal. It’s a rare feat, to be honest.
In the COVID-shortened 2020 season, Sporting notched three 1-0 wins. In 2018 and again in 2019, that number was four. Teams this good don’t often go winless in 1-0 games. But it happened.
And if history tells us anything, that’s unlikely to happen again.
9. Sporting will get 9+ goals from the No. 9 spot
While Shelton will likely be the starter as long as he’s healthy, Nikola Vujnovic is a talented player who could complement Shelton in much the same way that Diego Rubio did 2018. That pair combined for 10 goals that season. Nine goals from the striker position seems feasible in 2022.
10. Kinda could match his jersey # in goals or assists
Even with games missed because of injury, Pulido scored eight goals for Sporting last season. That production will need to be made up somehow.
Bottom line, Sporting needs a third threat alongside Salloi and Russell to keep opposing defenses on their toes. And that role could go to Gadi Kinda.
He’s shown flashes of ability to play the final ball. When healthy, Kinda has game-changing skills, and Vermes says he’s ahead of schedule in his return from offseason knee surgery. He’ll miss the first couple of matches this season, but a healthy Kinda is a threat to match or surpass his new jersey number (10) in goals or assists.
This story was originally published February 24, 2022 at 12:58 PM with the headline "Sporting KC kicks off Sunday. Here are 10 things to expect from the MLS club in 2022."