Sporting Kansas City’s Historic Game Against Montreal

Sporting Kansas City is getting ready for the CONCACAF Champions League semifinals against Monterrey this Thursday. When looking last night’s game, we can say that they reached the desired level of play before one of the most important games in the club’s history.

SKC humiliated Montreal Impact with 7-1, showing all the qualities this team possesses and sending a strong message to the Mexican club that they don’t want to be considered as the underdogs in that matchup, despite what most of the experts think.

There were several historic moments in this contest like Sporting’s efficiency and the fact that young Gianluca Busio became the youngest ever player to score at Children’s Mercy Park, and he is already one of the youngest in the history of the MLS.

Manager Peter Vermes was more than pleased after this performance

“From the opening whistle until the very end,” Vermes began, “the commitment of the group with the ball and without the ball, the desire to get into the box if we were getting ready to serve it, the desire to win the ball back when we lost it, – it was fantastic.”

And really everything on the field worked perfectly for the home team, who opened the event early on. Johnny Russell scored in the 10th minute, first of his two goals today. After that, there was a period of SKC’s dominance but without any goals until two minutes before the halftime.

And then a quick one-two punch of the hosts knocked out the Impact.

Krisztian Nemeth and Felipe Gutierrez netted one goal each, and the catastrophe of the guests was on the way.

Nemeth added two more goals until the end of the encounter, and became the first Hungarian to score a hat-trick in the MLS.

“It is easy to play with Gerso, Johnny, with this kind of teammates it is easy to score goals. That was always my dream to play in the team like this.” Nemeth said.

Sporting’s rampage didn’t slow down in the second 45 minutes, and they continued to harras Montreal’s goalkeeper Evan Bush and the rest of the visiting team, who will remember this game for a long time.

Five minutes into the second part Russell added his second goal, Nemeth also his second in 68th, and during the last 12 minutes, SKC netter three more times.

Gianluca Busio put his name on the scoresheet 10 minutes after Nemeth, and also in the history books of SKC’s stadium.

Peter Vermes praised the 16-year old youngster, saying that he already had a chance to score against Philadelphia in the previous match at home, and added that the teenager has various qualities.

“He’s got great qualities and good instincts. He read that situation well. For him to be as composed as he is at 16 years old, it says a lot about that kid.”

The scorer himself was overwhelmed with joy.

“It’s a great feeling… doing it in front of your home fans. It’s a really big thing for me,” Busio told after the game.

Until the end, Nemeth completed his excellent game, while Saphir Taider scored the only goal for Montreal.

Sporting became one of five teams in the MLS history which scored 7 or more goals. Also, this was the 12th match which ended with one team winning by a six-goal margin. But that is something SKC already did before. In, fact, Kansas City Wizards were the first ones to do that in 1999 against NY MetroStars, 6-0.

There is no time for celebrating, as SKC has to go to Mexico very soon. They are the only remaining team from the MLS to compete in the CONCACAF CL, after other three suffered eliminations in the quarterfinals of this competition.

Other three teams are from Mexico, whose clubs are dominating in this competition. What is crucial for Vermes’ boys is that they don’t allow for Monterrey to create a serious advantage at Estadio BBVA Bancomer.

If they manage to do this, chances for the next round will be much higher. Children’s Mercy Park is the stronghold of Sporting who has a 15-1 goal difference, and four straight wins in the MLS when playing here.