All I heard was that PM said he was happy with "the character of the back four." He then made no secret of the fact we need another CB to put alongside O'Dea, and that they were actively looking for someone. As for Nigel Reed's old-keepers-are-the-best argument, the Galaxy are in the MLS cup for the second year in the row, and they've had the awful (and 31, which isn't terribly old) Josh Saunders in net for both cup appearances. Meanwhile, Houston's Tally Hall is like Frei: both are around the same age and among the best shot-stoppers in MLS. So no, Nigel, we don't need to improve the keeprs, not with a defence, midfield, and attack to fix.
Nigel reed is just generally clueless. Trying to make find issues where the are none, and finding solutions to non-problems. I can't think of specific things that he's writen/said, because I generally forget/block out the mindless shit that he says/writes, but this seems pretty much in line with his usual mind-numbing nonsense.
I have no idea if Nigel knows what he is talking about. His job is to do interviews on the radio. Its Mariners and Cochrane's job to win games. I wasn't feeling that Nigel was necessarily correct, but Mariner's responses very, very underwhelming. Almost flippant.
That's pretty normal from him. Not sure what flippant means, but if it means that he sounded almost appalled that the question was being asked, than that's pretty much how he usually acts. I remember once after a game where we completely sucked and were dominated by the other team, he acted totally shocked when a reporter suggested that the team didn't play as well as it should have. He said something like "I thought we played some fantastic football!"
Yeah, we've gotten used to those. Any reporter or fan who tells him something he doesn't agree with seems to get yelled at.
I watched the Soccer Show yesterday. I don't know if Mariner was especially arrogant. As others have said, Nigel went on for about 5 minutes about goalkeeping and then mentioned that Hartman was available and if Mariner was interested. Mariner simply said "We're not." I don't think Mariner needed to expand on that, although when he saw Nigel's bemused look, he said "for all the reasons we've just been talking about"..namely, he implied, how they were just talking about the difficulties of getting all the right pieces of the puzzle in this league , implying that with the salary cap, and resources, spending more on yet another goalie was not an option when there were other necessary pieces. I tend to agree. Kosic/Frei are good enough. They're not the best out there, but not necessarily an immediate priority to fix.
I think theyre actually one of the top GK tandems in MLS. Kocic wants more money and is probably on his way out, which will hopefully allow us to upgrade other areas of the team. I was worried about Freddy Hall being the #2 keeper, but tbh watching MLS Cup, I don't think he's all that much worse than Saunders
Looks like the trend of young players doing off-season training in Europe continues (Frei went to Liverpool last year) with Silva going to Germany for a couple weeks to train with FSV Frankfurt http://www.torontofc.ca/news/2012/12/germany-stint-silva?
I like it, never really sold of Maund from what I seen and remember in the draft many of the experts were very surprised that we went for him. Braun seem to lost his way last year after a couple good season at Chivas USA, believe he offers more than Wiedeman and Amarikwa
I feel sorry for you guys. People in Montreal were happy that the front office traded him mid-season so Marsch would stop playing him.
Braun's seemed really promising when he was traded from Chivas. Not sure how much his struggles have to do with being in Montreal (Zarek Valentin went from Chivas to Mtl too, what happened to him?) so hopefully we can get his career back on track. Not starter material (at least not yet) but at the very least he'll be better than Maund. That part I'm sure of.
Problem is we're starting to have an overload of strikers, while only having two good ones. Amirikwa, Johnson, Weideman and now Braun are mediocre backups. Weideman and Johnson can apparently play in midfield as well, but to me they look like subpar strikers playing out of position in midfield, not that they're so versatile that they can play there. Next player we need to ditch is Weideman.
Just checking the list of the re-entry draft. 17 former or current TFC players available, 18 if you count Will Hesmer. Considering there are 63 names on the list, it tells you something, no?
Avila, Weideman, Harden, Hall and Cann are on the list from the current Toronto FC squad. http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/artic...de-guzman-segares-among-re-entry-process-list
Deducting the 5 current players.....that leaves 12......12 who found a home (at least one home) on a MLS team not called TFC.....so, what does that tell us? (my guess is......nothing)
Still time for Avila, Hall, and Wedeman to be taken off the list if they get a new contract, but not likely. I'm amazed that nobody in MLS wants to trade for Avila though....
he's out of contract. I'm not sure that we can trade an out of contract player. Plus this way they can get him for free if they don't mind his current salary (which IMO is a quite reasonable one)
according to wikipedia: Players who are at least 25 years old, have a minimum of four years of MLS experience, were out of contract, and whose club did not offer them a contract at their previous salary (available at 2012 salary) Avila falls under this category (if he's out of contract, I've now also heard that he's in an option year, but that doesn't make sense) which means that if he gets picked, the team that picks him would have to pay him what he earned this year
Thanks....so, essentially, it prevents claiming a player's rights from his current club and then chopping his wages......if he is gonna earn less (in MLS) it would be with TFC. Kinda makes sense.
Yeah, it does make sense. Avila will probably still be picked in the re-entry draft by someone though, since 125k isn't that much of a reach if he can be used in the right way. It's best for him if he plays for a manager wh actually wants him there. Edit: Also, it turns out TFC passed in the first round. Maicon Santos was the only player chosen and he goes to Chicago. Should be able to score some nice goals for them before the usual pouting and lack of effort sets in
Jesse Marsch was in Toronto the other day, and has apparently been offered the head coaching job. http://www.canadiansoccernews.com/content.php?4003&postid=432784 Edit: too bad. Hopefully he's lying here