FC Kansas City Allocated First Players

FC Kansas City has some players.  Today the NWSL released the locations where the 55 national team pool players would be allocated.  And while they didn't have the "best" allocation at least from initially eye-balling the list (that award goes to Portland which lands both Alex Morgan and Christine Sinclair), the Blues picked up a decent core of players. 

FCKC got the US number two goalkeeper, Nicole Barnhart.  The 31 year old Barnhart has been a regular with the US national team, usually as a back up to starter, Hope Solo. But Barnhart does have 46 national team caps, and should give KC a good strong start in the back.  In Lauren Cheney they got a midfielder who should be able to do a decent job of pulling the strings in the midfield for the Blues and has already appeared 82 times, scoring 18 goals for the US team.  The final US player allocated to KC was defender Becky Sauerbrunn.  This move made sense in the fact that Sauerbrunn is from St. Louis so this is a short trip from home for her.  Sauerbrunn has 37 caps currently for the US national team.

From Canada, KC picked up midfielder Desiree Scott.  Scott was on the Canadian team that took the bronze medal in London and has appeared for Canada 53 times.  The other Canadian on the roster is defender Lauren Sesselmann.  The 29 year old is actually from Wisconsin but has appeared 26 times for the Canadian team.

KC's two Mexican players are also US citizens.  Renae Nicole Cuellar is a forward who actually just finished her senior year at Oklahoma and has participated in the FIFA U20 World Cup with Mexico.  She was an alternate for the 2011 World Cup.  Marylin Diaz is a 21 year old defender who played for Mexico in the Women's World Cup.

On first glance, KC has the beginnings of a good defense with Barnhart, Sauerbrunn, and Sesselmann to anchor the defense.  With Cheney in the midfield, KC will have some attack from the midfield, while Scott, "The Destroyer" will probably cover more of the defensive duties.  Cuellar though is the only forward on the roster now.  So expect that to be a place for Vlatko Andonovski to look to improve immediately either through free agency or the draft next week (or both).  Definitely a good start and "back bone" for the team.