The Vermes Experiment Begins this weekend

By: Herschel | August 14th, 2009

On Sunday the Wizards will take on the Fire at the CAB. It will mark Peter Vermes’ first game as a coach after taking over the position when Curt Onalfo was fired. From watching some of the practices and reading the reports from their friendly against a PDL team last week, it seems that unless Mr. Vermes brought a real attitude change to the players, we might be looking at difficult times ahead because it seems KC will have a similar lineup in this game than the ones Onalfo used before.

I can understand in part the idea that Vermes wants to live and die by the players he has brought to the team in the last 3 years with the hope that somewhere he can show OnGoal and the Kansas City faithful that he can actually scout for players (and that not all players but Lopez are busts) but I also believe that if this approach blows up in his face and he doesn’t make the playoffs and have some success there, he will be gone, and deservedly so.

I could be wrong (and hope to be) but unless Hungarian import and Vermes “discovery” Zoltan can renew a stagnant office and the return of Jimmy Conrad can plug the gap in the defense that allowed 6 goals, we might be seeing more of the same from KC when an offensively strong Chicago visits this weekend. It looks like Vermes will play Harrington in midfield (where he has seemed lost), Hirsig will be trying to control Blanco and hoping not to play him on for a score like he did Donovan and Blanco in consecutive games, and the KC offense will try and lead the team to its first win in more than one month. All with very similar personnel, meaning that either Vermes can work magic, or the players weeks back really just quit on Onalfo.

Whatever happens I just hope (sadly) that we can at least pull off a point but I doubt it. I expect Chicago to come in hard and fast and with a midfield that will give us fits and with an offense that, contrary to ours, can score goals in bunches.

With the Western Conference seemingly breaking the trend this year and taking 5 playoff spots, losing these points at home might be (and pardon the cliché) the first nail in the Wizards’ playoff coffin.

My prediction: CHI 3 – KC 1

What do you think?

Who wins this Sunday?(trends)