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In a gut punch that dropped during Sporting Kansas City’s game against the San Jose Earthquakes, Taylor Twellman reported that Krisztian Nemeth has signed with the New England Revolution.
.@NERevolution getting Nemeth while $350k+ allocation goes to @ColumbusCrewSC (waiting on league approval) #MLS
— Taylor Twellman (@TaylorTwellman) August 10, 2017
For New England to move up a single spot in the MLS Allocation Order they had to give up “$350,000+” in allocation money. That is inline with the amounts we were predicting would be a minimum for SKC who would have needed to jump far more spots.
This will no doubt leave a sour taste in the mouth of Sporting KC fans who were hoping for the return of Nemeth after Dom Dwyer was traded away in a record breaking deal earlier in the transfer window.
Instead it appears Sporting KC will have stood pat with what they have for their upcoming US Open Cup Final and potential MLS Cup run.
Nemeth will join one of the most high powered offenses in the league with the Revs. He may find himself disappointed though because in the past he’s said he enjoyed playing in “a beautiful stadium” that “was sold out every week.”
Krisztian Nemeth:"I would like to go back to #MLS.In Kansas we had a beautiful stadium & it was sold out every week." #SKC (DigiSportHun)
— Tamás Kun #Jenkifoci (@jenkifoci) February 10, 2017
While the Revs don’t have attendance problems, they play in a stadium that is meant for a NFL team and is artificially restricted to 20,000 seats when the stadium holds over 60,000.
Maybe he’ll get traded to SKC eventually. Sporting have dealt with the Revs in the past when they acquired Benny Feilhaber for allocation money and a first and second round SuperDraft pick.
So even though you are probably disappointed, Sporting KC are going to play for a trophy in the Open Cup next month!
Update (August 10th): The Nemeth signing was made official on August 10th and the deal was for $200,000 in General Allocation Money (GAM) in 2018 and $200,000 in Targeted Allocation Money (TAM) in 2018 plus an international roster spot until the end of 2018. The Columbus Crew actually used their allocation spot to get Nemeth and then traded him to the Revs. The Revs are now first in the allocation order, though that appears to be useless as the window has closed.
Update (August 11th): The Kansas City Star reports that Sporting KC’s offer to Columbus for the rights to sign Nemeth, “did not approach the $400,000 offer from New England.”