Rodney Wallace, left back candidate. How close is U.S. citizenship?

Been following Rodney Wallace with the Portland Timbers and he seems to be having a very strong start so far. He's getting assists, goals (2 in the last two games) and his injury problems definitely seem to be behind him. He would seem to be a top candidate to try and fill the perpetual black hole we have at left back. Problem is, he's not a U.S. citizen yet.

So, other than discussing his qualities here, I wanted to see if anyone has any recent updates on how close he might be to getting sworn in.

I know he has his green card, but I haven't been able to find out exactly when he obtained it, which would be helpful in giving us an idea on how much longer he has to wait (if I'm not mistaken, you need to have it for 5 years before applying for citizenship).

I have also found these quotes from articles that came out 2 years ago:

From Steven Goff:

By birth, he is eligible to represent Costa Rica. He is in the United States on a green card and not a citizen, which means he can't officially play for any U.S. national teams. The naturalization process will take a few more years, he said, and he has just begun to weigh his international playing options.

From Ives Galarcep:

Although Wallace has been in the United States for a dozen years, he did not start the process to attain citizenship until a few years ago. Wallace has his green card, but is still a few years away from becoming a U.S. citizen.

Again, both of those articles are nearly two years old now. And considering that he's been living here for 14 years now one would assume that he has to be close to swearing the oath. But I still haven't been able to find anything more specific than this.

Any info, comments or feedback?

Yes, going from GC to citizenship takes 5 years. He could be up to 3 years away still. And it sucked for him to have his second year largely taken away by injury.

Is it 5 years? I thought it was four years when you get your GC. Isn't also if you marry a US citizen and you have a GC already, you can just file for citizen after? Either way, I hope he doesn't rush things with his decision, because the guy has loads of potential.

He's only 22 so he still has time to develop as well.

At 22 there's limited growth area. Of course there's some room for improvement but its limited. He's pretty much the player he will be.

Yes and no.

In terms of his professionalism - how he practices and prepares himself for the game, rarely have I seen a player change much after about 20 years old. That plays a huge part in the player they become. Also, in terms of soccer fundamentals, a player is not going to drastically improve much after 18-20 years old. If their first touch stinks now, it is not going to get much better.

In terms of whether he can become a better left back? Absolutely there can be a dramatic change, and there often is. It usually takes a few years for a player to really get comfortable there, and Wallace really has only one year of experience. If you talk to the coaching staff or even Timbers fans, they will tell you Wallace has already improved from just the start of this season. Against Colorado, he was one of the worst players on the field. He has improved significantly since. I expect he will get better as the season goes on.

Having said all that, from where I sat in Jeld-Wen field yesterday, Wallace was the second best left back prospect on the field. Brek Shea was more impressive overall.

Has he not already picked his home country of Costa Rica? I think that he and Miller will be batteling to fill the LB slot for Costa Rica.

I know WE are short at left back, but I don't see him fillin the slot, ATT.

I agree completely, I think Shea could be a great LB and had a great second half yesterday. I am naturally biased towards Wallace if anything.

While searching around, I came across this in a thread on Wallace in the DCU forum. The post comes from long-time BS poster Cweedchop:

This post was made roughly two years ago, just like the couple of articles that I linked above, and it doesn't give any more specifics than those ones do.

But if the statement from Ives is correct -- that Wallace had started the citizenship process "a few years ago" -- and it was made in 2009, then you would have to think that Wallace is very close to being sworn in at this point. Perhaps even as soon as next year.

I pretty much agree. In terms of attribute set, I would draw Wallace up something like this:
* athleticism: really fast/physically strong/very strong work rate
* can shoot OK
* reasonably confident on the dribble when has some space
* mediocre first touch (definitely couldn't be a central player)
* decent passing skills on the ground and solid awareness of where to put the ball
* not much of a crosser

things can be 'shored up' to where you're not operating at as big of a deficit as you started with, but generally a deficit will always be there.

In terms of the tactical awareness of being an LB, I think a guy can improve, especially one in Rodney's spot of being new to the position. Even at DC United, he was shuffled around a bit and not told, "look, you're a left back, embrace that because it's your best shot to advance your career."

Shea has a bigger positional dilemma than Wallace does. Wallace's task is simpler in that it looks like he will never excel in MLS at any position other than LB. Shea, his coach is still tempted (any coach would be) to play him in midfield, as even though he likely has no NT future there, he's probably an above-average MLS player right now. I've been thinking lately that Shea's a particularly tough case because it seems like the interests of "Break Shea, NT hopeful" and "Brek Shea, MLS player" are at odds.

I remember Wallace playing as a DM with DC and my opinion is that he was very, very good. Obviously, that's not a need position for the Nats, but I disagree that he can't play centrally.

But I've liked this guy as our 2014 LB for a while now, and it's good to see he has recovered from his injury. I was one of the few DC fans that really didn't like the McCarty for Wallace trade.

Not with the way he's played at left back. He was eye-opening on Sunday.

The way I looked at that was making the best of a bad situation. His athletic abilities and tackling make him a decent thought as a d-mid, but I don't think his ball-holding and distribution in tight space allow for him to ever take his game to the next level at that spot.

I think the point of the McCarty for Wallace trade was mostly not a discredit to Wallace but just a statement that in MLS central midfield players matter more than wide backs do.

I could be behind the times, I didn't see that game, I just remark that after it seemed like his best shot at an NT career was as a CB, the experiment was quickly discarded when he turned out to be (predictably) raw there. I had read (which could be inaccurate) that he was shifted to wide mid for the last ten minutes of the Portland game, when Dallas made its comeback.

Wow, I hope Jozy is not reading this.

Wallace has put in some pretty good crosses this year.

You could be correct on Shea, but if Dallas continues to use him as a left back, that may change. Jeremy Hall is not slow or lack for quickness, yet Shea continuously got separation from him. Because Shea is 6'4" tall and a bit gangly, we may be predisposed to think he cannot be quick enough to be a left back at a higher level. We may be wrong.

If I were a DC fan, I would have hated the trade. In terms of scarcity, central midfielder is a far more abundant resource than left back. DC United traded a scarce resource for one far easier to find, and took a bigger hit against their salary cap to do so.

Basically, Portland happily traded away a relatively abundant resource for the most difficult position to field in soccer. And they took a smaller hit against the salary cap to do so. Then, they went and got a similar, if not better, player (time will tell if this is true, but based on what I have seen I think it is) on the open market.

In short, I think DC got fleeced.

Shea didn't play LB in the second half of that game when he made his biggest impact.

Context is key. When Shea moved forward, two things changed. One, Portland had a three goal lead and was sitting back on the counter. Two, Hall - a pretty good defender from the midfield - was subbed out for Zizzo.

This freed up Shea to go after Portland's right back, Steve Purdy. A nice match up to make an influence in one game, but not (to me anyway) an indication Shea should be an international left midfielder. Shea was impressive the entire game, but it was the second half miss-match that led to his goal.

I don't think he should be an international midfielder either, but I don't think he's an international anything right now. And certainly for FCD's purposes, he shouldn't be a LB.

If Schellas didn't have an eye to the USMNT, and God knows why he does, he'd keep Shea in the wide midfield, where FCD needs him and where he's more dangerous, and keep Jair Benitez at LB. The loss of Dax stings more than I think Schellas realized, and the midfield needs more bite. Instead, Shea is being moved around like musical chairs at the back, the place where there's most depth. Schellas needs to do what's right for Dallas, and that's advancing Shea's position.

I don't like Shea's temperament, and I think he can play recklessly and out of control at times, but he has a lot of potential. That's all it is, though. He's the Matt Jones of MLS.

Wallace makes the MLS Team of the Week:

http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/article/mlssoccercom-team-week-week-5

I was at the game and he played a very good game at left back. He played a great 10 minutes at LM. As I said somewhere else, I thought he was the second best player on the pitch behind Alhassan.

I don't really know, or care, where he would be most effective for FCD, but I think he could develop into an international quality LB for the US if he gets consistent club minutes there.

The whole problem with the Shea debate is FCD doesn't need him at left back. They have Benitez, Loyd, Hernandez, etc. for that position. And they went to MLS Cup with the John/Ihemelu CB combo, so they don't really need him there either. Everybody is trying to fix something here that wasn't broken.

They need him at LM.

Anyway, as far as Wallace goes, I'll be interested once he gets his citizenship. For the USMNT, if he can play LB......then we'll look at him.

Understood. The best thing for the USMNT would be for Shea to go to Europe, where a team could concentrate on developing him at whatever his best position might be, rather than needing him to be one of their best players right now, at whatever position the team needs.

Just like Freddie, Eddie, Jozy. Get that magic Euro-thing working! It (almost) never fails.

The magic euro fairy dust is obviously infallible, that goes without saying.

However, you know that was not the point of my post.