Former U.S. women’s coach Vlatko Andonovski is the new coach of the Kansas City Current of the National Women’s Soccer League, a person with knowledge of the move told The Associated Press on Friday.
The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the hiring has not been announced. The Washington Post was first to report the move.
Andonovski resigned as coach of the national team in mid-August, two weeks after the Americans were knocked out of the Women’s World Cup earlier than ever before.
The four-time champions struggled through the World Cup. The team barely made it into the knockout stage and played a scoreless tie against Sweden in the round of 16, losing in a penalty shootout. The U.S. scored just four goals over the course of the tournament.
The United States had never finished worse than third in the Women’s World Cup.
The 47-year-old Andonovski was named the U.S. coach in October 2019, taking over for Jill Ellis, who led the team to back-to-back World Cup titles. He finished with a 51-5-9 record but was 3-2-5 in major tournaments.
For the Current, Andonovski replaces Matt Potter, who was fired in April. Caroline Sjoblom served as interim coach for the remainder of the season.
The Current finished 11th out of 12 teams at 8-12-2 and failed to make the playoffs. Kansas City lost in the NWSL title match a year earlier.
Andonovski returns to the NWSL and Kansas City, where he had previous coaching success. He led the now-defunct FC Kansas City from the league’s inception in 2013 until the club folded in 2017, winning two league titles. He was coach of Seattle’s OL Reign when he was hired to coach the U.S.
Andonovski, a native of Macedonia, played for several teams in Europe before moving to the U.S. to play indoor soccer.
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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
