Sporting Kansas City’s Hungarian connection, which has fused transfers and filled vacant coaching positions over the years, began over dinner at a dining room in Győri, Hungary 26 years ago.
Peter Vermes, a new signee of Győri ETO FC, took a seat at a table stretched from one end of the room to the other. He had already learned the hard way that rookies weren’t allowed to sit on one end of the table with veterans, so he sat down on the opposite end near his new coaches.
However, he had yet to catch wind of another important club rule: No water before soup.
“Right after his arrival, Peter ordered four or five bottles of water for him and started to drink,” said Istvan Urbanyi, a teammate of Vermes’ at Győri ETO FC and now the Sporting KC U18 head coach. “Everybody was like, ‘Oh my goodness, if the coach sees that.’
“And the coach said in Hungarian, ‘Peter! Hey! What are you doing? Are you crazy?’”
Oblivious to his coach’s ban on water before soup, Vermes responded:
“Víz a legjobb” or “Water is the best.”
Urbanyi has a few dozen more stories akin to Vermes’ humor, stemming from the 1989 season in Hungary and, now, two and half decades of friendship.
The two remained in touch after Vermes moved on to FC Volendam in North Holland in 1990 and the U.S. in 1995 ahead of the inaugural MLS season. Urbanyi, who spent his first 17 seasons as a player in his home country, followed suit in 1997 with the San Jose Clash as the first Hungarian in MLS.
After another stint in Hungary, coupled with dozens of phone calls, texts and email exchanges, Urbanyi was eyeing Kansas City as a potential home. His three daughters were already in the states, so attempting to link up with his longtime friend and former teammate seemed like the logical next step once stateside.
“It was so easy to have a good relationship, to become friends with him (Vermes), because he was not only a great soccer player, but also a great person,” Urbanyi said. “A funny one, too. He’s half Hungarian but I can tell you that he’s Hungarian — the way he smiles and sees things.”
Vermes offered Urbanyi a job at Sporting KC in 2014 as an academy coach. The club’s culture, winning mentality and trust in Vermes peaked Urbanyi’s interest for some time. Now, he was a part of it.
“Whenever you’re building a staff, you’re looking for a couple things: High-quality, high-performing people and people you maybe already have a relationship with, because you know what to expect with them,” Vermes said.
“We had played together many years ago and stayed in touch in many different ways. Now that he’s (Urbanyi) here, he can help in many different parts of our club, because I have so much trust in him and also in the quality that he brings. It’s a tremendous asset for not only myself, but also the club.”
In the last few years, Sporting KC has scouted Hungary heavily. Vermes and Urbanyi have played a huge part in that, helping bring in talent such as Krisztian Nemeth, who has six goals in 10 games played and was named MLS Player of the Month for May, and Daniel Salloi, who is fresh off a 20-goal season for the Sporting KC U18’s.
Vermes believes there’s a dynamic in he and Urbanyi that helps relate with Hungarian players interested in a move to MLS and Sporting KC.
“It’s one thing that my background is Hungarian and I played there and now I’m here. It’s a different thing when you talk about a guy who grew up in Hungary and is now here and can tell the story to those players,” Vermes said. “It helps with recruiting and making a lot of those players over there feel very comfortable when they decide to come here, knowing that they have not only myself but more importantly him, because it’s probably a little more closer to home when they talk to someone like him.”
One thing is for certain: The water-before-soup incident 26 years ago helped form an immediate bond. The one-time roommates turned colleagues at Sporting KC continue to grow their relationship while also nurturing an ever-growing soccer culture here in Kansas City.
“The friendship is one thing. The way of thinking about soccer is the other,” Urbanyi said. “We are pretty much on the same side of the story when it comes to that. That’s what makes us soccer friends, not just friends.
“I just have a huge respect for Peter, because what’s he’s doing here is unbelievable and extraordinary. I’m not talking about winning MLS Cup. I’m talking about building this organization and the way things are going here.”
