Match Preview - Sporting Kansas City
Game Info
Kickoff: 6:09pm CT
Watch: Apple TV
Location: Children’s Mercy Park - Kansas City, KS
All-Time H2H Record
Austin FC has a 6W-1D-3L record against Sporting Kansas City.
One of the few Western Conference foes that the Verde and Black have a pleasant all-time record against, the last time we saw Sporting KC was on opening night back in February at Q2 Stadium. That match ended up as a 1-0 Austin FC victory behind Osman Bukari’s 76th minute goal, after he started on the left wing, an experiment that I’m glad is over.
With six victories in ten tries against SKC, there are plenty of good memories to pull from for ATX fans. My personal favorite is re-living the 4-3 home victory back in 2022, a game where Austin FC trailed by two goals twice before the furious comeback effort to secure all three points, highlighted by Danny Hoesen’s impressive volley for the third goal.
Sporting KC Recent Form
Things have not gone well for Sporting Kansas City since we last saw them on opening night. That loss at Q2 Stadium was the first in a six-game winless stretch to open the season, which resulted in the dismissal of longtime head coach and sporting director Peter Vermes, who had been in those positions with the club since 2009.
Vermes was an extremely impactful figure in MLS history. He was the first person to win an MLS Cup as a player and coach with the same club and brought four total trophies to the Sporting KC cabinet, the 2013 MLS Cup and three US Open Cup titles (2012, 2015, 2017). Vermes was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 2013 and was named MLS Sporting Executive of the year in 2019.
SKC is now led by interim coach Kerry Zavagnin, another former USMNT and MLS veteran who was with Vermes for the duration of his tenure. The team did win three of the first five matches following the coaching change, but they’ve taken a serious downturn after the intial “new coach bump.”
Currently sitting in 13th place out of the 15 teams in the Western Conference, Sporting KC is essentially playing for their season on Sunday night. They’re down to a three percent chance to make the wild card game, which essentially boils down to SKC winning five of their final six league matches, a very unlikely proposition.
Desipte the dismal nature of the club’s standing in the table, the team itself has certainly not quit. Trailing the visiting Colorado Rapids 2-1 late on in last Saturday’s match, SKC was able to rally late, scoring three goals in the final 17 minutes of regulation to win 4-2. The win over Colorado broke a six-game winless streak that saw Sporting outscored 17-6 from July 12th to August 24th.
Last week’s victory isn’t the only ray of sunshine for this team. Offseason acquisition Dejan Joveljić is third in the golden boot race, bagging 16 of Sporting’s 43 goals this season. That looks like one of the better inbound transfers of 2025 and with Joveljić under contract through 2027, the club has a foundational DP to build their roster around. The Serbian striker bagged a brace in last week’s comeback victory, including the game winning goal in the 81st minute.
While Joveljic has been in elite form, the other “big name” options for this club have been unreliable through the summer months. Both DP midfielder Manu Garcia and TAM attacker Erik Thommy have been dealing with injury and while the latter was available off the bench against Colorado and ended up an unused substitute, neither guy should be expected to make a serious impact on Sunday night’s match. On top of those injuries, long time Sporting KC winger Daniel Salloi has yet to reach double digit goal contributions, something he did with relative ease from 2021-2023.
With Garcia sidelined, SKC has been getting some good minutes from 23-year-old Mexican midfielder Santiago Munoz, who is on loan from Santos Laguna. His fellow midfielder Zorhan Bassong is out on international duty with Canada this weekend, putting even more responsibility on the shoulders of Munoz, who has been described by Sporting fans as “a jack of all trades.”
Of course, Sporting KC also made some changes in the summer transfer window, with the most notable being a change at the back. The club bought out 31-year-old center back Dany Rosero and brought in 24-year-old Mexican canter back Alan Montes, the younger brother of long time Rayados and Mexican national team center back Cesar Montes, on loan from Nexaca. With Jansen Miller in poor form and homegrown Ian James on international duty with the USYNT, Montes could slot in next to U22 Initiative center back Robert Voloder for his first SKC apperance after being an unused substitiute against the Rapids.
No matter how Sporting KC lines up at the back, one thing is for certain. They haven’t solved all of their problems on that end simply by bringing in Montes. SKC has conceded the most goals in MLS this season with 57. But their underlying numbers are drastically worse than reality, with Sporting amassing 10.6 more xG conceded than the next worst team. They have also conceded the most penalties to opponents this year with nine and are unsurprsingly dead last in clean sheets with three in 28 matches.
Despite the short handed nature of the Verde and Black’s roster this weekend, Sporting KC profiles as a team that any club with serious playoff ambitions should take points from.
Austin FC Recent Form
The “short handed nature of the Verde and Black’s roster this weekend” is exactly where we need to begin when talking about everyone’s favorite team. Not only is ATX likely going to be without the ailing Ilie Sanchez and Besard Sabovic on Sunday, but they will be missing three consistent starters (Uzuni, Svatok and Pereira) and three other players (Cascante, Farkarlun and Burton) to international duty. And of course, Brandon Vazquez is still in the early stages of his ACL recovery.
I gave my best shot at a predicted starting XI on Episode 253 from Wednesday and have seen a handful of other sickos trying their hand at guessing how Coach Estévez will line things up on Sunday evening. I think only one thing is certain and it’s that Austin FC is too shorthanded for any lineup iteration to be something we “love” when it’s released. There are simply too many key pieces missing.
But that doesn’t mean that I’m out on Austin’s chances to take points home from the road this weekend, not by a long shot. I do think we will see a defensively oriented game plan, something that has been relatively succcessful for Austin FC, even going back to certain periods of the Josh Wolff era. But more specifically to the 2025, Estévez coached version of the team, mucking up games on the road and stealing a goal and hopefully three points is something the team did multiple times to bouy their standing in the table back in the spring.
Remember back to the 1-0 wins against LAFC and St. Louis City SC, both first half goals followed 50-plus minutes of defending. Now put the most pourous defense in MLS out there with Sporting KC and I don’t see a reason why the available options for ATX can’t replicate a similar outcome on Sunday.
We did get some hints from Estévez at Friday’s media availability about which second team players will get the call to fill in the gaps for the first team this Sunday. The two confirmed are the two we thought were most likely to be with the first team on Wednesday’s preview episode, Ervin Torres and Antonio Gomez. Coach did leave open the chance that another player or two would meet the team in Kansas City after Austin FC II finishes their Friday afternoon match against Minnesota United 2, so maybe we see a Jorge Alastuey or another consistent second team starter show up on the bench Sunday.
An Austin FC win this weekend would put the team on the brink of clinching a postseason berth with a 98% chance at finishing top nine in the Western Conference. It would also greatly increase the chances of ATX finishing above the wild card line, jumping from the current 68% to 84% with three points on Sunday.
Injury Report
ATX:
Besard Sabovic (Out - Knee)
Myrto Uzuni (Out - International Duty)
Oleksandr Svatok (Out - International Duty)
Dani Pereira (Out - International Duty)
Julio Cascante (Out - International Duty)
Brandon Vazquez (Out - Knee)
Micah Burton (Out - International Duty)
Jimmy Farkarlun (Out - International Duty)
SKC:
Manu Garcia (Out - Quad)
Zorhan Bassong (Out - International Duty)
Ian James (Out - International Duty)
Sporting KC Players to Watch
Dejan Joveljić - After his four years as a U22 Initiative player for the LA Galaxy culminated with an MLS Cup title last season, Joveljić was traded to Sporting KC in the offseason as the defending champs shed salary they could no longer afford. It’s one of the few wins this club has in 2025, as Joveljić has proven that his career high 21 goal contributions in 28 appearances in 2024 was not a fluke, racking up 18 contributions through 26 appearances this season. He’s one of the best goalscorers in MLS and the biggest threat to Austin’s chances of a road clean sheet this weekend.
John Pulskamp - It’s a tough job and Pulskamp is a young keeper at just 23-years-old (just one year older than Damian Las), but he’s been straight up bad across his 56 career starts for Sporting KC, averaging north of two goals allowed per game over the last two seasons. I’ve been ready to see this kid in the opposing net as much as possible since he allowed this howler to Alex Ring back in 2022. We should hope for as many on target shot attempts as possible from ATX in this one, because Pulskamp is a liability.
Austin FC Keys to the Game
Stick To The Plan - With the lengthy list of absences for the Verde and Black on Sunday, I expect Nico Estévez to roll out a conservative game plan in this game. For once, I’m perfectly okay with that outcome, even against an inferior team. Austin shouldn’t need the average number of chances to put one behind Pulskamp and this Sporting KC back line. If the plan is to sit back and try to hit them on the counter, I’m all for it. It doesn’t matter if the goal comes in the first minute or the ninetieth, they all count the same. Don’t give up anything easy at the back, the chances will come, capitalize when they do and stick to the plan!
Predictions
ZG - 1-0 Austin FC
E - 1-0 Austin FC
