Vermes and Collin News

Some news tonight involving Sporting KC's head coach Peter Vermes and central defender Aurelien Collin.

First KC's head coach.  Today MLS announced the coach of the year award winner.  Vermes finished second in the voting, but in a very distant second to winner Frank Yallop of the San Jose Earthquakes.  Yallop finished with 74.14% of the club vote, 63.83% of the media vote, and 58.06% of the player vote.  Compared to Vermes who finished with 10.34% of club vote, 10.61% of media vote, and 6.45% of player vote.  Not incredibly surprising for that, Yallop took San Jose from not making the playoffs last year to the Supporters' Shield winner this year.  While Vermes had a strong season, it couldn't really compete with Yallop's.


As for Sporting's French center back, it's good news.  Collin announced the following on Twitter today:

I have finally received at home my green card thank u very much for the hard work ofVersfeld & Hugo immigration services. Hello USA lol
— Aurelien COLLIN (@ampC2) November 27, 2012

More good news for KC as they have another open international spot with Collin having gotten his green card.  Combine this with the release of Neven Markovic, and Sporting now have only 3 internationals on their roster, Korede Aiyegbusi, Peterson Joseph, and Oriol Rosell.  Leaving Sporting with 5 open international spots (the spot that Sporting traded to San Jose for Bobby Convey was only for one year).  With KC looking for a goal scorer have a number of international spots open isn't a bad thing.

Six Candidates for Year End Awards for Sporting

MLS announced the finalists for their year end awards today, and Sporting KC is well represented among the finalists, as 5 players and head coach Peter Vermes are up for awards. 

Graham Zusi is a finalist for MVP this year, along with Chris Wondolowski of San Jose and Thierry Henry of New York.  Unfortunately for Zusi I don't think this will be much of a contest, Wondolowski should win the award going away for the season he had.  Zusi is a completely deserving finalist for his 5 goals and 15 assists in league play this year.  Henry is really only on the list because of name recognition of people that vote but don't really pay attention to the league.  The MVP award will be announced on November 29th.

Jimmy Nielsen is a finalist for goalkeeper of the year.  Sporting's captain finished one shutout short of tying the league record set by Tony Meola in 2000 of 16.  Nielsen is up against Seattle goalkeeper Michael Gspurning and Chivas USA's Dan Kennedy.  Gspurning missed a good portion of the season due to injury which hurts his case for the award.  And while Kennedy had an amazing season, it wasn't enough to keep Chivas from looking extremely poor this year.  Nielsen finished with a .79 goals against average, behind Gspurning's, but Nielsen has played 10 more games than the Seattle net minder.  Really this should be Nielsen's award.  Goalkeeper of the year is announced on November 28th.

Peter Vermes is a finalist for coach of the year.  Leading Sporting KC to a team record in wins (18) and points (63) in a season and to the team finishing on top of the East for the second straight year.  Vermes is up against Frank Yallop who led the Supporter Shield winning San Jose side that finished 3 points ahead of KC in the standings, and Ben Olsen who has helped to resurrect DC United finishing second in the East and into the playoffs for the first time in 5 years.  The winner is announced on November 27th.

Kei Kamara is a finalist for Humanitarian of the year.  Kamara has done a ton of work in the past year to help his home country, Sierra Leone.  He's helped with getting schools built and has set up the HearShapedHands Foundation.  Kamara is up against Michael Lahoud of the Union who has also done work to help Sierra Leone, and Chris Seitz, who recently missed a good number of games after giving bone marrow.  The winner will be announced on the 20th.

The final award that KC has players up for may be the most interesting.  KC has two finalists up for the defender of the year award.  Matt Besler and Aurelien Collin are both finalists along with Victor Bernardez of San Jose.  Besler and Collin helped to anchor the league's best defense this year.  Besler started 30 of the 31 games he played while Collin started 28 of the 29 he played in.  The one worry I have about this award is that voters may split their vote between Besler and Collin, leading to Bernardez winning the award instead.  While Collin had a decent season, this award really should go to Besler who has had a fantastic season, really establishing himself as one of the league's better defenders and pushed himself onto the national team radar.  The winner will be announced on the 20th.

As a whole I think KC has a very good shot at winning 3 of the 5 awards, the two exceptions being MVP which I think will go to Wondolowski and coach, which I think Yallop will win this year.  The other 3 I think KC can and should win, the one worry again is the defender of the year vote being split between the two.

Vermes Finishes 3rd in Coach of the Year

Today, MLS announced the Coach of the Year. Unfortunately, Sporting KC coach, Peter Vermes did not win the coach of the year. The award this year went to the coach of the Supporters' Shield winning, LA Galaxy, Bruce Arena. Vermes finished 3rd in the voting behind Arena and Sigi Schmid. A strong season for Vermes taking KC from their 1-6-3 start to the Eastern Conference regular season championship and the conference finals, a job not many coaches in the league could have done.

Sapong, Vermes Finalists for MLS Awards

Today MLS named their finalists for all of their awards and two members of the Sporting KC team have been nominated for year end awards. The least surprising of the two, CJ Sapong has been named a finalist for the Rookie of the Year award. Sapong has to be considered the front runner and probably odds on favorite to win the award. Sapong is up against Perry Kitchen from DC and Michael Farfan from Philadelphia. Sapong finished the regular season with 5 goals, good for a tie for 4th on the team, and 5 assists, good for second. A great season for a player who many thought was a stretch to take at the 10 spot in the draft. In comparison, Kitchen finished the season with 1 goal, but did lead all rookies in minutes played this year with 2,726. Farfan for Philadelphia finished with 2 goals and 3 assists in 1,460 minutes. The Rookie of the Year award will be handed out tomorrow November 8th.

Peter Vermes is also up for a year end award, being named a finalist for the coach of the year. Vermes turned KC around from their 10 road trip where they went 1-6-3 and bottom of the East to top of the conference, going 12-3-9 after the home opener of LIVESTRONG Sporting Park. Vermes is up against LA Galaxy coach, and Supporters' Shield winner, Bruce Arena. Also up for the award is Sigi Schmid, coach of the Seattle Sounders who finished second behind Arena's Galaxy. The coach of the year award will be handed out a week from today on November 14th.