Sporting Kansas City and host Atlanta United look to rid the bitter tastes from their mouths from the end of the 2021 season when they open the MLS campaign against one another Sunday.
Sporting KC had spent much of the season battling for the top spot in the Western Conference before losing their last three regular-season games to fall to third place in the Western Conference with a 17-10-7 record. They then fell to Real Salt Lake in the MLS playoffs.
Atlanta posted a 13-9-12 record to finish fifth in the Eastern Conference in 2021 and fell to eventual-champion New York City FC 2-0 in the opening round of the MLS playoffs. Atlanta was near the bottom third in MLS in scoring (45 goals in 34 games), and they couldn’t dent the net against NYCFC.
Sporting KC hopes to rediscover the offensive prowess that enabled them to lead the West in scoring (58 goals). Leading scorer Johnny Russell did not score his first goal of the season until July 4, but ended 2021 with a flourish. In his last 19 regular-season games, he amassed 15 goals and four assists.
Daniel Salloi had 16 goals to lead Sporting Kansas City, who will be without designated player Alan Pulido because of a season-ending knee injury.
“The commitment for the guys in the preseason was tremendous,” Sporting Kansas City manager Peter Vermes said. “That’s always a good indication that you have a well-focused and concentrated group for the upcoming season. But there’s nothing like an MLS game, so we’ll have to adjust to the ups and downs of the season.”
Atlanta United are headlined by striker Josef Martinez, who had a team-leading 12 goals last season. The former MLS MVP has 89 goals and 12 assists in 108 MLS matches (99 starts).
Marcelino Moreno added nine goals and five assists last season.
Atlanta added nine players in the offseason, including former Sporting KC striker Dom Dwyer, but no move was bigger than the record-setting acquisition of designated player Thiago Almada for a $16-million transfer fee. Almada’s availability for Sunday remains questionable due to the processing of his visa.
“He’s a player we’ve been tracking for a long time and he’s shown that he’s one of the best young players in South America over the past few seasons,” Atlanta vice president and technical director Carlos Bocanegra said. “We feel that his abilities fit well with the kind of attacking soccer that we want to play.”
Sporting awaits the arrival of Nikola Vujnovic after signing him on loan less than two weeks ago. Vujnovic was one of seven players Kansas City signed ahead of the 2022 campaign.
–Field Level Media
