KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Kansas Metropolis Present ushered within the grand opening of CPKC Stadium, the primary stadium constructed particularly for a Nationwide Girls’s Soccer League (NWSL) crew, in model on Saturday, defeating the Portland Thorns 5-4 in a match that tied a league file for many whole objectives.
“I believe this sport was sensible, to have each groups rating, as a result of I do not assume one individual that was right here on this stadium isn’t going to wish to be again for the following sport,” Lo’eau LaBonta, the Present’s captain, mentioned. “They’ll inform extra folks. Everyone’s going to wish to come now as a result of that was a present.”
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The match marked the beginning of a brand new period for people, together with the return of former U.S. girls’s nationwide crew head coach Vlatko Andonovski to the NWSL and his adopted dwelling, in addition to the crew and the league.
CPKC Stadium price over $120 million and was largely privately funded. The Kansas Metropolis Present’s homeowners additionally constructed an $18 million coaching middle that opened in 2022 and shall be expanded additional within the close to future. A sellout crowd of 11,500 followers to open the stadium on Saturday punctuated the crew’s unprecedented spending on amenities for a girls’s soccer crew.
“It is a lot greater than I anticipated,” NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman advised ESPN at halftime. “We have been saying should you construct it they’ll come, internally, after which coming right here and really seeing what it means to really spend money on brick and mortar bodily infrastructure, it is a game-changer.
“They’ve modified the footprint of this metropolis without end, and I believe it should have a fair larger impression than anybody can think about.”
Kansas Metropolis midfielder Vanessa DiBernardo opened the scoring 22 minutes into the match, igniting the group and drawing fist pumps from Present co-owners Angie and Chris Lengthy, and leaping celebrations from Brittany Mahomes and Kansas Metropolis Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, additionally co-owners of the Present.
The Present latched onto the momentum within the constructing to attain two extra instances within the following 12 minutes. Kansas Metropolis constructed a 5-1 lead by the 68th minute, when 16-year-old Alex Pfeiffer grew to become the youngest purpose scorer in NWSL regular-season historical past.
What regarded like an insurance coverage purpose from Pfeiffer ended up being the sport winner because the Thorns stormed again to make the sport attention-grabbing behind braces from forwards Sophia Smith and Janine Beckie.
Andonovski made his title within the NWSL for his groups’ sound defensive constructions. He mentioned he was “terrified” to concede 4 objectives on Saturday, however he was comfortable together with his crew’s means to grind out an unsightly sport and decide up three factors on a historic day.
“If we will describe this crew, it needs to be like we’re describing Kansas Metropolis,” Andonovski mentioned. “It needs to be hardworking, resilient, with aptitude, grit, actually in folks’s faces. We confirmed it immediately. We weren’t good in moments there. We did not win as a result of we had been so good or so significantly better than Portland; we received as a result of we had been Kansas Metropolis.”
The stadium is uniquely Kansas Metropolis, too, from its location on the southern financial institution of the Missouri River, to the crew’s distinctive teal shade that runs all through the ability in the whole lot from the seating to the toilet hand cleaning soap.
Saturday was a very long time coming for gamers and coaches who had been round for the NWSL’s frugal early years. DiBernardo is a 10-year veteran of the league who began her skilled profession enjoying at a 3,000-seat school soccer stadium within the Chicago suburbs.
“[From] the place we began with this league and the place we at the moment are it simply reveals the expansion and the way a lot the gamers have put in and actually pushed the usual and the way a lot we have needed to actually battle for ourselves,” DiBernardo mentioned. “And it is simply the beginning. Now we have grown in our voice and [we’re] simply pushing the restrict, and I believe immediately was only a particular first expertise and it is a day that we can’t neglect.”
Andonovski was the primary coach of the town’s unique NWSL crew, FC Kansas Metropolis, which launched within the league’s inaugural season in 2013 and folded in late 2017. That crew performed in a highschool soccer stadium outdoors of the town.
He returned to the league and Kansas Metropolis after final yr’s World Cup disappointment as head coach of america as a result of he was offered on the imaginative and prescient of the Longs to make the Present the perfect crew on the earth.
“That is one thing that may change the world of ladies’s soccer,” Andonovski mentioned. “That is the start of change.”