NWSL Announce Player Allocation for 2014

The NWSL today announced the player allocation for the 2014 season. As of right now, FC Kansas City is allocated seven players from the US, Canadian, and Mexican federations. Two of those players are new from last year, Amy Rodriguez, who the club traded Kristie Mewis to Seattle for, and Cecilia Santiago, a goalkeeper for Mexico. The other five are all returning players, Nicole Barnhart, Lauren Holiday, and Becky Sauerbrunn from the US and Desiree Scott and Lauren Sesselmann from Canda.

The questions on Scott's move, and Sesselmann's rumored move to Notts County are still hanging in the air, but the two as of now are expected to be in camp with FCKC. That will be something to keep an eye on in the days moving forward, especially with the expansion draft for the Houston Dash coming up soon.

Speaking of the expansion draft, it could have big implications for the Blues. Today, the Dash were allocated their first three players, one from each of the participating federations. Word is that the team's other two allocated American players will come through the expansion draft. With KC being one of two clubs (Seattle the other) with four Americans currently allocated to the club, it's easy to deduce that KC and Seattle will be the two clubs losing an allocated American.

For FCKC, with Barnhart Holiday, Rodriguez, and Sauerbrunn it's hard to decide who they'd lose. With Holiday being the league's reigning MVP, I can't see the club letting her leave. Rodriguez was just acquired from Seattle in the offseason and is another that I don't see KC being pushed to give up. That leaves Barnhart and Sauerbrunn. Currently with the addition of Santiago, KC now has three goalkeepers on their roster with Barnhart and Bianca Henninger. I can't see KC carrying three keepers this year, so one of those three will be departing. Now whether that's Barnhart or Henninger is another question.

It's going to be a big loss for FCKC either way. Whatever happens, the Blues could end up with a big hole up the middle of the field somewhere. Or it could be multiple holes if Scott does not return to the club.

Here's the rest of the allocated players.

Boston Breakers
Meghan Klingenberg (USA)
Kristie Mewis (USA)
Heather O'Reilly (USA)
Chelsea Stewart (CAN)
Kaylyn Kyle (CAN)
Dinora Garza (MEX)

Chicago Red Stars
Shannon Boxx (USA)
Amy LePeilbet (USA)
Christen Press (USA)
Adriana Leon (CAN)
Erin McLeod  (CAN)
Rachel Quon (CAN)

Houston Dash
Whitney Engen (USA)
Melissa Tancredi (CAN)
Teresa Noyola (MEX)

Portland Thorns FC
Rachel Buehler (USA)
Tobin Heath (USA)
Alex Morgan (USA)
Christine Sinclair (CAN)
Karina LeBlanc (CAN)
Jackie Acevedo (MEX)

Seattle Reign FC
Stephanie Cox (USA)
Sydney Leroux (USA)
Megan Rapinoe (USA)
Hope Solo (USA)
Carmelina Moscato (CAN)
Arianna Romero (MEX)

Sky Blue FC
Jill Loyden (USA)
Kelley O'Hara (USA)
Christie Rampone (USA)
Jonelle Filigno (CAN)
Sophie Schmidt (CAN)
Monica Ocampo (MEX)

Washington Spirit
Yael Averbuch (USA)
Ashlyn Harris (USA)
Ali Krieger (USA)
Robyn Gayle (CAN)
Diana Matheson (CAN)
Renae Cuellar (MEX)

Western New York Flash
Carli Lloyd (USA)
Abby Wambach (USA)
Selenia Iacchelli (CAN)
Veronica Perez (MEX)

FCKC Losing Scott to England

It looks like FC Kansas City will be losing a big part of their midfield ahead of the 2014 season. The Equalizer is reporting that Canadian international, Desiree Scott is leaving KC and the US to head to England. The report says that Scott is joining the Notts County Ladies of the FAWSL, the top league in England.

While there's been no word from FCKC regarding Scott's departure, The Equalizer has quotes from Notts County's manager about Scott.

Scott and Jen Buczkowski had been extremely solid in the center of midfield for KC, which had given the Blues attacking midfielders, including Lauren Holiday more of a free roll to get forward more. With Scott leaving that's a hole that KC is going to need to fill.  It also hurts the Blues in the fact that Scott was one of KC's two allocated Canadian players, along with Lauren Sesselmann, so the team will have to fill another roster spot that last year had been a Fed allocation.

Catching Up on FC Kansas City

Apologies for the lack of posts regarding FC Kansas City not just in the last week, but the season as a whole. Life has been catching up with me a bit and I had to cut down a little bit in some of my coverage, unfortunately it was the Blues that had to get chopped a bit.

Year End Awards

While FC Kansas City's season ended last weekend against Portland in the NWSL semifinals, FCKC did clean up when it came to the end of season awards.  FCKC swept all the individual awards and put seven players on the first and second team Best XI.

In goalkeeper of the year, Nicole Barnhart won the award, finishing the season with 10 shutouts, the most in the league and finished 3rd in goals against average with .95.

Erika Tymrak won the league's rookie of the year award. After starting the season as a substitute off the bench, Tymrak established herself as key to the Blues attack as the season went on. She finished the season with six goals and four assists.

Another award FC Kansas City won was defender of the year, which was award to Becky Sauerbrunn. Sauerbrunn helped to anchor the defense in front of goalkeeper for the year, Barnhart.

Coach of the year in the NWSL went to the Blues coach, Vlatko Andonovski. In his first season coaching at this level, Andonovski led FC Kansas City to an 11-6-5 record, tied for the most points in the league, and second in the table.

In the award that probably surprised people the least, Lauren Holiday was named the NWSL MVP. Holiday also won the league's Golden Boot, scoring 12 goals while also adding 8 assists. Basically Holiday contributed in 59% of the Blues goals this year, and also missed four games with US call ups and getting married.

Barnhart, Sauerbrunn, and Holiday were all named to the Best XI first team, along with defender Leigh Ann Robinson. On the second team Tymrak was joined by Lauren Sesselmann, and Desiree Scott.

National Team Call Ups

Also recently announced was the call ups for the US women's team game against Mexico on September 3rd. FC Kansas City led the way in players on the roster with six.  KC's three allocated players, Barnhart, Holiday, and Sauerbrunn were all named to the roster, along with Kristie Mewis, who has become a regular on the national team.

Two new Blues players will get the chance to earn their first caps against Mexico.  Robinson and Tymrak were called up for the first time.  Both had stellar seasons for Kansas City, Robinson established herself as one of the better outside backs in the league, while Tymrak won rookie of the year.

Offseason Loans

Speaking of Tymrak, rumors started to make the rounds yesterday on Twitter of Tymrak going out on loan to German club Bayern Munich during the NWSL offseason. Thad was able to confirm this rumor.  He also mentioned that Blues' back up goalkeeper, Bianca Henninger will be joining Tymrak at the German club. There's also mention of more loans coming up.

FC Kansas City Allocated First Players

FC Kansas City has some players.  Today the NWSL released the locations where the 55 national team pool players would be allocated.  And while they didn't have the "best" allocation at least from initially eye-balling the list (that award goes to Portland which lands both Alex Morgan and Christine Sinclair), the Blues picked up a decent core of players. 

FCKC got the US number two goalkeeper, Nicole Barnhart.  The 31 year old Barnhart has been a regular with the US national team, usually as a back up to starter, Hope Solo. But Barnhart does have 46 national team caps, and should give KC a good strong start in the back.  In Lauren Cheney they got a midfielder who should be able to do a decent job of pulling the strings in the midfield for the Blues and has already appeared 82 times, scoring 18 goals for the US team.  The final US player allocated to KC was defender Becky Sauerbrunn.  This move made sense in the fact that Sauerbrunn is from St. Louis so this is a short trip from home for her.  Sauerbrunn has 37 caps currently for the US national team.

From Canada, KC picked up midfielder Desiree Scott.  Scott was on the Canadian team that took the bronze medal in London and has appeared for Canada 53 times.  The other Canadian on the roster is defender Lauren Sesselmann.  The 29 year old is actually from Wisconsin but has appeared 26 times for the Canadian team.

KC's two Mexican players are also US citizens.  Renae Nicole Cuellar is a forward who actually just finished her senior year at Oklahoma and has participated in the FIFA U20 World Cup with Mexico.  She was an alternate for the 2011 World Cup.  Marylin Diaz is a 21 year old defender who played for Mexico in the Women's World Cup.

On first glance, KC has the beginnings of a good defense with Barnhart, Sauerbrunn, and Sesselmann to anchor the defense.  With Cheney in the midfield, KC will have some attack from the midfield, while Scott, "The Destroyer" will probably cover more of the defensive duties.  Cuellar though is the only forward on the roster now.  So expect that to be a place for Vlatko Andonovski to look to improve immediately either through free agency or the draft next week (or both).  Definitely a good start and "back bone" for the team.