Minnesota United faced off against Sporting Kansas City on four occasions last year, finishing with a record of 1-1-2. The Loons face SKC for the first since those meetings Sunday and, according to Minnesota head coach Adrian Heath, United has a myriad of reasons for reflection when it comes to facing their midwest counterparts.
Sporting has been a model of consistency in recent times in Major League soccer and the franchise comes to TCF Bank Stadium this weekend sitting firmly atop of the Western Conference. SKC possesses the league’s longest-tenured coach in Peter Vermes — just last week the club extended his contract through 2023.
Vermes is also pegged by many to one day take the reigns of the United States Men’s National Team, a team he featured for 66 times.
USMNT regulars Graham Zusi and Matt Besler have been with the club for nearly a decade and their omnipresence symbolizes the club’s stability over that time frame.
“They’re a great role model for this football club. Everything they do is first class,” Heath said. “It doesn’t surprise me that people like Zusi and Besler — they’ve been there 10 years. They don’t want to move. They’re well paid. They’ve got a really good coach. Got great facilities. All the stuff we are trying to build here. So hopefully I’ll be here as long as Peter. That’d be nice.”
Heath said he’s spent a lot of time with Vermes during Heath’s time coaching Orlando City in the lower division, wherein Sporting would loan players to Heath’s squad.
“Seems like every time I pick up the paper up he’s signed another extension, so he’s doing something well,” Heath said.
To Heath’s credit, he has held is own against Vermes in their recent meetings. United were dealing with the added weight of being an expansion franchise last season and still were able to earn points in each home fixture versus Sporting.
“We had two really good games against them at home last year,” Heath said. “But we are going to need a similar performance to what we had the first time we played them when we won the game 2-0. We were terrific on the day and the game plan worked to a ’T’. But we are going to have to be exactly the same because as they were this time last year, they’re top of the league again. So it tells you everything about Sporting.”
The two away matches weren’t as pleasing from a United perspective as the Loons lost both — one an MLS fixture, the other a U.S. Open Cup game — by a combined score of 7-0.
It’s clear that Heath not only wants to make Minnesota a viable franchise on the field, but eventually orchestrate a well-oiled institution for years to come, something he sees when he looks at the team formerly known as the Wizards.
“From my point of view it’s always a test for us because, for me, they’re the standard bearer of a club like ours,” Heath said. “They’re not LA, they’re not New York — people go there because they want work in that project that they’ve got.”
Speaking of his own club, Heath echoed sentiments we had on the Minnesota Soccer Podcast this week that though the result was a travesty, the team exuded many positives in their flowing play.
“I was incredibly pleased with the response of the players, bearing in mind some of the decisions that went against us, I thought there was a lot of positives in that performance,” Heath said.
You could even argue that Heath once again alluded to the struggles of his captain Francisco Calvo when he said: “We’ve got to cut out the individual mistakes that keep costing us.”
It appears Ibson may have picked up a minor thigh injury and should be considered questionable heading into Sunday. Heath said he’s still unsure of where Abu Danladi is at regarding his ankle injury, but said he may make the bench.
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