Looking to earn their first points of the season, winless Sporting Kansas City host a confident Minnesota United team on Saturday night.
Kansas City (0-3-0, 0 points) finds itself as only one of three clubs without a point through three contests this season, but have been competitive in each loss. Sporting KC has dropped each match by a single goal, including Saturday’s 2-1 defeat at D.C. United.
Coming off a forgettable 2024 campaign, veteran Kansas City coach Peter Vermes knows his group has to start stringing wins together.
“The key is we have got to take our next game and be ready for that one,” Vermes said. “We’ll deal with the ones thereafter, but we have got to really be ready and prepared for the next one. It’s going to be a tough opponent, but we have got to take advantage of points at home.”
Kansas City’s Erik Thommy’s goal in the 53rd minute of Saturday’s loss gave the club its only lead of the season, before two D.C. goals in a span of eight minutes sealed Sporting’s third straight setback.
Minnesota United (2-1-0, 6 points) isn’t a stranger to tightly contested games either, as it followed a 1-0 season-opening road loss to Los Angeles FC with a pair of 1-0 victories over visiting CF Montreal and at the San Jose Earthquakes.
Despite possessing the ball for just 33.2 percent of the game and being outshot by San Jose 15-10, Minnesota found a way to pull out a win, even if it wasn’t the prettiest at times.
“I think we suffered more than we needed to,” Minnesota head coach Eric Ramsay said. “I just said to the players that there, it’s almost like we enjoy the suffering, we enjoy defending the box, because I think we could have made the game far easier for ourselves.”
Kelvin Yeboah has both Minnesota goals this season, while Tani Oluwaseyi has a pair of assists. Goalkeeper Dayne St. Clair is one of just four goalies in the league to allow one or no goals through three games this season.
-Field Level Media
