KANSAS CITY – A windy and stormy night in Kansas City in a game that ended up lasting over four hours. A rematch from Sunday night’s MLS game between FC Dallas and Sporting Kansas City created an exciting and very long game between the two sides.
From the get-go, this game had a completely different vibe from Sunday. It was obvious each team was not as fresh as normal. The game was very long ball heavy. It stayed even for quite a while.
The first thirty minutes could have been more exciting soccer. Sporting KC had decent build-ups but was unsuccessful in the final third. Dallas had two perfect looks but Tim Libold and Tim Melia came up big to deny the shots from Dallas. Davis had a goal-line clearance and Melia had a big save off to his right. Dallas continued to counter-attack but the first half ended 0-0 after each team recorded around five shots.
In the 51st minute, the game was paused due to lightning in the area. This delay lasted until 11:10 PM and the game kicked back off! Sporting KC started by controlling the game in the rain and although there weren’t many fans at this point, Children’s Mercy Park was LOUD!
A penalty kick was awarded to Kansas City following a challenge right on the edge of the penalty area. However, Tim Ford was called to the monitor to review the play. The VAR determined the foul occurred outside the box so it left SKC with a dangerous free kick which did not lead to anything unfortunately.
In the 77th minute, nearly four hours after this game kicked off, Willy Agada finds the back of the net to break the stalemate! After a perfect ball over the back line from Russell, Jake Davis took a touch off his chest and played a cutback ball to find Agada to open the floodgates for SKC!
The game quickly seemed to shift momentum in favor of Dallas. For 30 minutes Dallas could barely keep the ball, right after the goal they seemed to wake up and possess the ball very well. SKC defended with integrity. However, in the 87th minute, the Dallas attack found a wide-open Petar Musa in the middle of the SKC defense. Musa was then one on one with Melia and leveled the match!
The game stayed tied 1-1 after regulation and went into Extra Time. This meant thirty more minutes of soccer to be played amongst the teams! This is now the second game in a row between the two teams in the Open Cup to go to extra time! In 2022, SKC won 4-2.
It took until the 111th minute for another goal. A corner as whipped in by Johnny Russell and found the head of Dany Rosero who put the ball past Maarten Paes and into the goal!! The stadium erupted in joy. Dany celebrated this goal by taking his shirt off and the whole team proceeded to tackle him in the corner!
Peter Vermes said in the post game press conference “We always take this game very seriously.” and that was shown 100% the whole night. The intensity was some of the best SKC has put out on the field he also said “Playing a team back to back and playing how we did was [awesome].” “From the opening whistle [of extra time] we were ready to go.”
This long game ended up finishing 2-1 in favor of SKC. The game officially ended at 12:36 AM on July 11th. The match took 4 hours and 36 minutes to play. This was the latest finish ever at Children’s Mercy Park for SKC. Sporting Kansas City moves on to the Semifinal of the US Open Cup! They will now face the Indy Eleven from the USL Championship in the next round.
