Sporting Kansas City announced two player signings on Thursday as Hungarian international forward Krisztian Nemeth and Chilean international goalkeeper Luis Marin joined the club from abroad. Following the announcements, Manager Peter Vermes expressed confidence that both players will contribute valuably in 2015 and discussed the possibility of more acquisitions this offseason.
On Nemeth and Marin playing significant roles in 2015...
Both guys have qualities to be able to (play right away). If you look at both guys’ resumes, they’ve played at a very high level. Both guys have quality in their game, and like with any player that comes into our team, it’s going to be more around the adaptation and how fast that happens. But I think both guys are very good professionals and are extremely excited about the challenge of playing here with the club.
On the possibility of Marin being Sporting KC's starting goalkeeper in 2015...
Am I comfortable if he had to be our No. 1 [goalkeeper]? For sure. He has all those qualities in the world.
On Sporting KC's player turnover this offseason...
Whenever we don’t win, we’re always disappointed. But obviously there are a lot of circumstances that happened last season that were really unique and sort of an aberration. Sustaining as many injuries as we did and missing players on international duty and having multiple competitions—this has been well documented. It has a lot to do with salary cap; it has a lot to do with the CBA (collective bargaining agreement). There are a lot of things that are happening. There’s a lot of speculation, and I want to make sure that we’re prepared and ready to take advantage of it, as opposed to being caught off guard. That’s a really important aspect for us. It’s hard to look ahead and make decisions when you really don’t know what the salary cap’s going to look like or what some of the rule changes are going to be. I think it’s better to be in a position where you can adapt and adjust to those things when they do become concrete. So it’s been a year of turnover. The other part is we want to evolve and get better, and that’s one of the reasons for those decisions.
On Nemeth's strengths as a player...
I actually saw Krisztian when he was 19 years old. He was already purchased by Liverpool at that point. Since then, he’s played in a couple different countries and, more importantly, in a system that we play and that’s a 4-3-3 in Holland. I know where he’s been very well. He has qualities to be able to play all three positions up top, and as much as he has a nose for the goal, he also is very good at finding opportunities for other players as well. I think he’s just going to give us another dimension up front, and I like the fact that he has played in Europe. That will help us on the front line because there are a lot of qualities in our team the way we play that are European. The fact that he was spending time in Holland before coming to us will help him adapt to our team pretty quickly.
On bringing more new players to Sporting KC...
We feel that we have some pretty good opportunities in this upcoming (MLS SuperDraft) with our draft picks. That will help us to round out a little bit more of the roster. I do think there are a few other players still to be had, but we’re not in any rush to make all of those happen. We want to be in a position to understand a little more the way things are going with the CBA and the different players that will be available come our primary window, which is this winter window. I think we’ll be patient and calculated on some of those other moves, but I would say there’s no doubt we have another keeper to bring in. We’re actually in a place where we want to bring in a few more players on all three lines, just to develop some players for the future, too.
On Nemeth and Marin's desire to play for Sporting KC...
What’s great is that we’ve been pretty good at finding guys who are really interested in coming to the United States. The great thing is that him and Luis [Marin] want to be here. They want to be playing for Sporting Kansas City. It’s not as if we had to convince them. They want to be here, so that part is always a huge step in the right direction whenever you’re bringing that type of player to your team. And it’s not just financial. They have a serious interest in playing in this league and living in this country. That part is always exciting for me because it’s important to the overall success of the individual player.
On Nemeth's brief stays with several clubs in Europe...
Sometimes that can be a concern with players. You have to understand, he’s a young guy who was at Liverpool. There are a lot of players in those situations who get loaned out because they’re not going to make the first team. It’s more of an investment for that club than anything else. So sometimes those experience that he had can be a positive for us because now he finally gets to a place where he wants to settle down. He’s been through all those other experiences—sometimes positive and negative—which really make that player feel fortunate to be in a situation such as the one we are going to provide him when he gets here. He treasures the opportunity that much more, and he won’t want to let it slide. We’ve been in that situation a couple times now with some players. [Aurelien] Collin’s a perfect example of that when he was here. He had been to five different countries before he came here, let alone five different teams. Then he came here and he was here for four years. We’ve been through players like that before, and I think this kid has a real motivation and he’s at a great age to come into our team.
