Are NWSL teams fearing the KC Current? They’re certainly playing them differently now

After Lo LaBonta’s penalty kick in the 67th minute of the KC Current’s home victory over the Seattle Reign, a familiar chant rang out at CPKC Stadium.

“We want another one, just like the other one. We ... want ... six,” a listed sellout crowd of 11,500 chanted.

To be fair, the Blue Crew, the Kansas City Current’s most fervent supporters group, leads that chant after every goal. It’s just somewhat jarring to hear fans asking for the sixth goal of a match.

And it hasn’t happened just once this year. Three times that chant has rung out at CPKC Stadium in 2024, signaling a flood of goals scored by the Current.

The players have yet to give the fans six, but it doesn’t really matter. The club boasts the most goals for an NWSL team through 12 games, with 31 on the season. That’s five more than the next-best team, the Washington Spirit.

Teams don’t like conceding goals in numbers, and the Current’s transition attack has been so deadly that teams are starting to play them differently.

“More and more, we see how the line of confrontation drops, and how the blocks are getting lower and lower, and then closer and closer to their own goal,” said Current head coach Vlatko Andonovski.

The first time a team went with an especially low block against the Current was the road match against the Houston Dynamo. The club saw low blocks in three subsequent matches from opponents before Racing Louisville decided to take away the middle third and play a mid-block. They surrendered three goals.

The “low” and “mid” blocks describe where a team sets its line of confrontation. A mid-block means the opponent’s defenders are usually stationed somewhere at least 35 yards from their goal. A low block pushes a team’s defensive structure deeper into its own defensive third.

A mid-block can be used to compress the spaces for the Current in the middle of the field and force the players to go over the top. Temwa Chawinga has mostly burst through that strategy with her ability to get behind the defense and the Current’s willingness to consistently put her into space.

A low block means the Current’s attacking players can’t play over the top. There are more bodies to play through in a tight space in front of the net, while the opposing defenders can play with their back to goal, for the most part.

The spaces behind the defense are few and far between but still exploitable. And in a low block, more of a team’s players are stationed farther from the goal on the other end.

The Current obviously haven’t lost against teams employing a low block, still holding an unbeaten record. But the club has yet to score more than one goal in those games.

As teams continue to try different things to knock the Current off the top of the league standings, Andonovski says he welcomes the challenges. He views the regular season as preparation for whatever may come in the playoffs.

“We’re facing low block, mid-block, high press, everything possible,” Andonovski said. “Ultimately, when the playoffs come, we’ve got to be ready for anything that comes our way.”

Sure enough, some teams have tried to throw surprises at the Current, such as odd formations they haven’t used to throw them off their game. While Andonovski wants his players to have the tools to solve whatever gets thrown at them, he wants them to find the solutions themselves.

“I feel like it’s my responsibility to give them a solution, to give them options,” Andonovski said. “Then, we allow them to use their creativity to implement those changes.”

Up next for the Current is a Friday night game against the Chicago Red Stars at 7 p.m. at CPKC Stadium.

Camille Ashton takes position in San Diego

Just weeks after resigning from the Kansas City Current, Camille Ashton has taken a job with another NWSL team.

The San Diego Wave announced Ashton as the club’s sporting director and general manager on Wednesday. At the KC Current, Andonovski holds the sporting director role in addition to being the manager.

Daniel Sperry covers soccer for The Star. He can be reached at sperry.danielkc@gmail.com.