Sporting Kansas City has parted ways with manager Peter Vermes, the club announced on Monday morning.
Vermes, who took over SKC in 2009, is the longest-tenured coach in MLS and has been in charge seven years longer than the next person on that list (Brian Schmetzer, Seattle Sounders). He coached 609 matches for Kansas City across all competitions, a figure that totals more than half of the games in the club’s 30-year existence. No figure in MLS history has coached more games for one MLS club.
“It would be hard to list all of the people I want to thank after 20 seasons in managerial positions at Sporting Kansas City,” Vermes said in a statement. “I am thankful to everyone, especially ownership for giving me the opportunity of being a steward of this club for the past two decades. I wish the club nothing but the best in the future.”
While with Sporting Kansas City, Vermes helped lead the club to the 2013 MLS Cup and U.S. Open Cup titles. In addition to serving as manager, Vermes was one of the only coaches in MLS to simultaneously head up his team’s front office. But after three-straight seasons of missing out on an automatic playoff berth in the Western Conference and after collecting just one point from their first six regular season games this year, Vermes’ time in charge in Kansas City came to an end.
Assistant coach Kerry Zavagnin will now become SKC’s interim head coach.
