'I'm really thriving': Freya Coombe on life, footy with the Kansas City Current

It was October. The Kansas City Current had just lifted the NWSL x LigaMX Femenil Summer Cup.

Confetti rained overhead; I was standing on a soccer pitch in San Antonio, Texas.

A few yards away from me, KC assistant coach Freya Coombe was cheering on players and staff. Taking photos for people, posing for photos herself. Pumping fists, applauding, taking it all in.

I've met Coombe several times in person, talked to her in press conferences, but I decided not to bother her. Not then. Who am I to get in the way of a good celebration? She should enjoy herself. After all, this is what it's all about.

Thankfully, a few days later, I was able to catch up with Coombe. This time via video call. There was no active celebration to spoil. No confetti. No shining trophies in the room.

Coombe chatted from her office at the training ground in Kansas City, with a tactics board behind her, and the soft hubbub of players and staff in the distant background.

First and foremost, I wanted to check-in with the person before the coach. Perhaps unsurprisingly the two things were connected. A simple "how are you?" prompted a deeper thought.

"I'm so good, thanks for asking. I feel like I'm really thriving in the environment," Coombe told Squad Depth emphatically.

"For me personally, I'm learning so much not only from Vlatko [Andonovski] but also with the other coaches and performance staff, and the people that we interact with every day. That's been so good for me in terms of my own development, but also just the environment of how friendly and supportive everyone is.

"It's not just the case of being challenged and learning, but it's the support that comes with it. That's the biggest thing. You want to be in a challenging environment all the time, but if you feel you don't have support, it's really hard to constantly be challenged. Whereas I think here, we can challenge each other, but support each other, so that we can help find answers together as a team."

Coombe arrived in Kansas City on a freezing day in January 2024 (don't worry, since then she's upgraded the coats available in her wardrobe).

Coombe was coming off a whirlwind 2023, where she was sacked as head coach of Angel City FC midway through the season. The move came after a poor run of form consisting of five consecutive leagues matches without a win, and one win from her previous 10.

Two years with the 2022 NWSL expansion club had been preceded by two years at NJ/NY Gotham FC. A near half-decade relentless run of being a NWSL head coach. It was a breathless ride.

"My growth was very quick, through my time with Sky Blue, then obviously they changed to Gotham, and then with Angel City. The things and the topics I had to navigate was stuff that probably doesn't happen in most clubs for 10 years, and then I had it all within two and a half years to four years."

In New Jersey, Coombe had enjoyed more on-pitch success. She helped raise the club's profile, standards, and end an eight-year playoff drought. Albeit she departed before the end of the season for the ACFC job, and couldn't guide the team in the playoffs.

After leaving Los Angeles in June 2023, Coombe says she needed a break from the NWSL but also wanted to stay in the game. Something to stay sharp, and stay close to the world of football.

A call from FOX to invite her to be an analyst for their 2023 World Cup coverage was the perfect solution. Off to Sydney, Australia, she went.

"The timeout was really important. But I still felt like I was involved in game [working with FOX]. I was involved in a good level of the game. I stayed current with the players and I knew what was going on. So that part was great," she said.

Rejuvenated after short stint in broadcasting and some consultancy work, deep down Coombe knew she had more to give.

At the end of 2023, she saw that Vlatko Andonovski had been given the job as the new head coach of the Current, following a parting of ways with the U.S. women's national team after a disappointing World Cup performance.

Immediately Coombe called her agent and said that she would be interested in working with Andonovski, and learning by his side.

Coombe explained that she never was concerned about titles or being an assistant again. She calls her new role "very different" to when she was last a head coach.

"He [Andonovski] had been on a journey too, where he's learned so much. Just to be a part of this staff, where you not only have him with all his knowledge, but then you have such highly qualified people around him with Milan [Ivanovic] and with myself, with other players, other coaches and performance staff that have been in the league for a number of years.

"They are at the very top level. For me, it was this is a great environment to come into and learn. And I'm so glad I did it, because I feel like we are really thriving."

Of course, Coombe is not the only former head coach to recently join a staffing group in the NWSL. There is a trend of highly qualified coaches eager to learn and step into an auxiliary role again.

Carm Moscato, who won LigaMX Femenil with UANL Tigres, has been assisting Bev Yanez in Louisville. While Scott Parkinson, formerly head coach of Gotham after Coombe departed, is now the number two in Seattle.

Coombe was also quick to shout out the long-time assistants that she views as being primed to soon become head coaches. People like Victoria Boardman, in North Carolina, and Sarah Lowdon, in Portland.

"There's a number of coaches that are head coach caliber that are in assistant jobs, and I think that that's only contributing to the development of players, the improvement to environments within the league, and the way that the league has grown as a whole," said Coombe.

In perhaps the best-coached NWSL season we've ever seen, Coombe and the Current have been brimming with success in the Midwest.

In 2024, the Current have been one of the most entertaining teams in the NWSL. Scoring a league record 57 goals from another record 18 different goalscorers.

KC finished in a very commendable fourth place in the regular season (just five points off first). They captured the only other trophy they could, the Summer Cup trophy, and will head now into the NWSL playoffs hosting a quarterfinal match against the NC Courage.

"They're a fantastic group of players," Coombe said of the Current squad. "Credit to them, because when they've needed to go out and perform, they've been able to do it over and over and over again. No matter what conditions that they are faced with, whether they've been facing adversity, they just roll their sleeves up and they get on with it."

This year, KC made even more history by opening the first-ever purpose built soccer stadium for a NWSL team, the 11,500 capacity CPKC stadium. After a regular season where they sold out every single match, and lost just once, the anticipation of a first-ever playoff match at CPKC is growing.

"Playing at home for us is incredible, and the it's just little touches that are so important. Like having your branding that's not temporary. So, you come to the stadium and it's our colours. And, you come in and you walk through and it's like our motto on the wall. There isn't an auxiliary locker room that we're renting from a men's stadium," said Coombe.

"Those are the touches that are really important, because it truly feels like home, and then you fill it with our fans who are just such passionate football fans, and are so passionate about the game and are so representative of the community that it's it really means everything."

Special fans and a raucous support is nothing new to Coombe, who, coming from Angel City, was used to seeing sold out crowds, pageantry and tifos.

But she says there is something different about the support in Kansas City. It goes beyond the walls of CPKC Stadium. In a sports-mad city with a population of 510,000, the uniqueness of the Current is how the club has been embraced by the entire town.

Coombe tells a story of walking her dog in a park near to where she lives and getting asked about if the team was ready for playoffs. She says it is a very common thing when you are wearing anything with the club's logo on to be stopped to have a chat about the season.

There are too many anecdotes of fan interaction in the Kansas City streets to pick out just one or two. It permeates everywhere.

"You go for coffee, and the coffee shop has got our flag in the corner. You can stop at a bar and buy a KC Current beer. Things like that that make all the difference," said Coombe with a smile.

In the NWSL playoffs, each team will only be allowed to field 11 players. But with roughly 510,000 backing their players in every corner of the 816, it's going to be very hard indeed to knockout the Current.

"You feel like you have the whole city behind you. That small teal stadium is ours and is home. And I think that there's no better home advantage in the league than that."

The KC Current plays the NC Courage at 12:00 p.m. Eastern Time U.S. on Saturday 9th November, you can watch in the U.S. on CBS