Sporting Kansas City mourns the passing and celebrates the life and legacy of the club’s original head coach Ron Newman, who died today at age 84 in Tampa, Florida.
KC Star: "His passion for the game was like no other"
Newman was hired as the first head coach in MLS history on Oct. 11, 1995 and brought in Sporting Legends Preki, Chris Klein, Mo Johnston and Tony Meola alongside the likes of Digital Takawira, Mark Chung, Sean Bowers, Matt McKeon, Diego Gutierrez, Brandon Prideaux and many other club contributors while guiding Kansas City during the team’s first 100 regular season games from the inaugural season in 1996 until his retirement in 1999.
Known for his attacking style of play during Major League Soccer’s shootout era, he led Kansas City to two playoff appearances and a first-place finish in the Western Conference with a club-record 21 wins in 1997 when he was a finalist for MLS Coach of the Year.
Born Jan. 19, 1934 in England, Newman arrived in Kansas City with more than four decades of professional soccer experience. He began his career as an accomplished player in his native country before coming to the United States in 1967 to continue his career in the National Professional Soccer League as MVP of the Atlanta Chiefs.
In 1969, Lamar Hunt promoted Newman as player/coach of the Dallas Tornado in the North American Soccer League and he led the side to the 1971 NASL title en route to capturing 13 championships as a manager with four different teams.
Over a 30-year coaching career throughout the United States, Newman amassed more than 700 career coaching wins across the North American Soccer League (Dallas Tornado, Fort Lauderdale Strikers, San Diego Sockers), the American Soccer League (Los Angeles Skyhawks, Miami Americans), the Major Indoor Soccer League (San Diego Sockers), the Continental Indoor Soccer League (Arizona Sandsharks) and Major League Soccer (Kansas City Wizards).
He was the only coach in NASL history to win three Coach of the Year awards and was inducted to the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 1992.
