Sporting Kansas City defender Jalil Anibaba was a guest on The Sporting KC Show last night, joining hosts Nate Bukaty, Andy Gruenebaum and Carter Augustine at Jazz, A Louisiana Kitchen to discuss the team's draw against the Portland Timbers last weekend and to preview Saturday's match at New York City FC. Listen to the full podcast embedded below and available each week on 810whb.com.
Anibaba -- acquired in the offseason from the Seattle Sounders -- was one of three players to make their Sporting KC debuts in the scoreless draw along with Servando Carrasco and Soni Mustivar.
On the defensive end, he contributed to the club's first shutout of the season by winning seven of his nine duels (including all four aerials) with three clearances, two interceptions, two recoveries and one tackle won. Offensively, he led all players with three shots while also logging 66 touches, 29 successful passes and two dribbles completed.
His performance earned the praise of Sporting KC Manager Peter Vermes and fellow defender Ike Opara.
“He was excellent, he really was,” Vermes said. “He was great in his individual duels. He made some very good decisions of when the time was to just whack it out and not try to play. At the same time, I thought he was pretty dangerous on a couple of set pieces. He almost had a diving header in the first half and he had that one that just squeaked past the post late in the second half. He had a very good game for us.”
“Jalil did a very good job. He's a fighter as well, and he's always going to give it his all,” Opara said. “He established himself early and was confident. He just shut down those attacks on his side of the field.”
