Sporting Kansas City-Impact Preview

By KATE HEDLIN

(AP) -- Sporting Kansas City is one of the top teams in the Eastern Conference, but its offense has gone cold.

After suffering back-to-back shutouts, Sporting will try to avoid a third straight loss Wednesday night when it visits the Montreal Impact, who are having similar scoring issues.

Sporting KC is within four points of the East lead but has gone winless in its past three league matches, losing the last two. Sporting has gone 255 minutes since its last goal in an MLS game.

Most recently, a 1-0 defeat to Chicago on Friday was particularly frustrating as it outshot the Fire 27-10.

"We were knocking on the door the whole time, and we were all thinking that one was going to go in," forward Soony Saad said. "But this happens sometimes in soccer. You can get as many shots as you can, but if they have a good goalie and get lucky a couple times, you don't get the breaks."

Before its last two defeats, Sporting (9-5-2) had failed to score in only two games all season. Between the two most recent shutouts, it recorded a 3-0 win over Dayton in the U.S. Open Cup.

Kansas City, 0-3-2 in its last five road games, suffered a 2-0 home loss to Montreal on May 5 in the teams' first meeting.

The Impact (5-10-3) also are on a scoring drought, having gone 202 minutes without a goal, and they're coming off consecutive 3-0 defeats.

They had one shot on goal in last Saturday's loss at D.C. in their fourth game in 10 days.

"Our guys have a lot of miles on their legs. We played lot of games recently," coach Jesse Marsch told the Impact's official website. "With the heat tonight, we just had nothing left in the tank. ... We've got to figure out how to refuel as we have another big game coming up Wednesday."

The Impact made a change in goal before the match, starting Evan Bush in place of Donovan Ricketts. It was Bush's first appearance in an MLS game - a combination of Marsch of wanting to rest Ricketts during a busy stretch and provide a lesson after a 3-0 loss at Philadelphia earlier in the week.

Ricketts could be back in net Wednesday. He has allowed the second-most goals in the league with 28, including seven in his last three games. However, Ricketts had four saves in the shutout of Sporting earlier this year.

Like KC, Montreal is trying to avoid matching its longest losing streak of the season, set in March. The Impact are 4-2-2 at home.

Updated July 3, 2012