To be fair, when he was younger Yura could carry quite well at speed and was big enough to be difficult to knock off the ball. Unfortunately, unless Yura had an undisclosed injury that cause him to turn 30lbs of muscle to dad-bod insulation, there is every reason to believe that those days are well behind him. He is now shaped like an aging, fairly immobile 9. Unfortunately his mind thinks he is a mobile offset forward. Last year's experiment simply proved that Yura was unwilling or unable to adjust to the realities of his body / age / conditioning. (He actually reminded me of Bomma at the beginning of seasons before Kreis took over. Andy always showed up in shape - the shape was pear.)
Yeah, no Yura defense here, it's just sounding like we're really struggling to find someone to take him on loan even at half-wages. And yes, he's not a speed burner anymore, in the past he was much quicker and tended to drift out wide, not a traditional #9 with back to goal, hold-up play. I get it, he'll either be fit or he won't be in the 18. And yes, it's messy grouping AM and DM together, my mistake, Mulholland falls more to the DM/holding especially as of last year. It looks like Jorquera is more ACM than DM from what I can see on Transfermrkt, even dabbled in a false 9 here and there. Without Rusnak or Jorquera, to me we'd really struggle creating in the middle and we'd resort to a lot of crosses, hopefully Ortuno is as good with his head as he seems. I'm not sure I get your 4-4-2 without Rusnak/Jorquera, one of Savarino or Plata on the bench with Ortuno and with Lennon and Jordan wide-midfielders behind them and Beckerman/Luke holding behind that? I'd rather have Plata drift back than having one of Jordan or Lennon in there from a possession and movement perspective. I don't think we'd ever see that lineup barring a lot of injuries, thus the reason they're bringing in Jorquera and hopefully we have an academy ACM that can pick up some minutes. Net net, this year is make or break for Allen, will be interesting to see if he takes the next step following huge layoffs.
I guess this is how I see the starting 11 assuming that the Jorquera and Henley rumors are true. -------------Ortuno---------- Plata-------------------Savarino --------------Rusnak------------ ---Beckerman--Jorquera---- Alvarez--Glad--Silva--Henley -------------Rimando------------ Here would be my full second string -------------Silva---------- Lennon-------------------Allen --------------Bofo------------ ---Sunny--Mullholand---- Phillips--?--Horst--Herrera -------------Sparrow------------ Do we have only 3 CB on the roster? Can Herrera play CB? We have Wingert and Peay listed on the website but I'm not sure where they fit in. As for Yura, he wasn't willing the play the 9 role in the 4-3-3. I'm not sure he is physically capable of play as a winger but I'd give it a try at some point. Maybe he works himself into the role, but I'm not counting on it. Obviously I see Bofo as more of a attacking mid than a winger but I'm not sure about it. Anyone not included I either haven't seen enough or do rate enough to be in the top 22.
Peay is a CB. I'd be (only mildly) surprised if Wingert is back. However, I think there's a reasonable chance RSL tries to find another journeyman CB. I hear this consistently, but not sure I fully get it. While Bofo certainly has skills that could translate as an attacking mid in this league, I think he's made more of a mark on the left wing. He also can play as an underneath forward. Saying he can play attacking midfielder is fine, but saying he's out of position on the wing is just a fallacy to me. (not purely directed at your post, JLaw, just been hearing recently that Bofo has been played out of position which I disagree with)
Who is Alvarez? Guessing you meant Acosta Peay is the 4th CB on the team, currently. Like KIR said, that is a spot I would expect RSL to look for another journeyman type player unless I'm underrating Peay's abilities. As for the best spot for Bofo: I'm not really sure what it is, either. We didn't get a ton of minutes from him last season so it's hard to really say what he grew into last year. He reminds me of Gil in a very specific way: that being he is hyped as a lot more of an attacking/creative player than he actually is. In Petke's setup he probably makes the most sense on a wing or at the 8.
If we are talking AM depth, I thought Savarino pulled it off well enough. He is much better on the right wing, but he has the ability to back up Rusnak as long as he has a couple of wingers that he can link up with well. Meaning a guy like Lennon on the right side would probably hurt a bit. Also, Silva's natural position is an AM, and that was his role before we pushed him to CF this past season. He can link well, though he isn't so much of a creator. He is more of a guy who keeps the ball moving and takes his shots when they come.
Why do I keep seeing suggestions about trying Yura on the wing? He didn't have the speed in the middle, why would that suddenly make him good on the outside, where he'd have even more ground to cover? I'm sure opponents would love to see this happen, they'd have one side of the field they could largely ignore, and freely counter down.
He could stand out there wide and be more or less out of the way, thus freeing up the rest of the attack rather than getting in the way of other players?
Superdraft is next week and I've seen little to no coverage on it. I'm guessing that's a sign of the talent available through it, still. With that said, some clubs in this league have a knack for finding talent in these things. We're not one of them. We have the 10th, 33rd, 51st, 56th, and 79th overall picks. I'd be a fan of packaging them all up for some cash or a journeyman CB with a low cap hit to flush out that part of the roster. Am I wrong in thinking this is a better idea than looking to see what talent is out there to be had with the 10th pick?
Henley deal is official based on this video package the kid can time a sliding tackle @JasonMa, aren't you a Blackburn fan? What are we getting here
Two of the three (Tony and Henley) are injury prone so I would assume not. I think it's a calculated move that all three can't be hurt at the same time... right? It's also in a lot of reports on Henley that he can play either RB or LB, so I'm guessing he is being used to close out the shopping on outside backs for the club
I'm cool with that, I think the TAM addition is giving us more roster flexibility which improves that quality of league play by raising the quality of roster depth. We probably couldn't have afforded this guy without TAM. Now, we await the Jorquera announcement. I haven't seen any other rumors.
Hopefully he'll be solid, though hamstrings are a real bitch. I pulled my hamstring a long time ago, and no matter how much time I give it, the injury always comes back.
Also, Tony is out for the season. So at least this year we need a starter quality RB in case Herrera isn't ready for that leap. Also, if you check out the video on the team website, they show a clip of some of the team welcoming him, and Beckerman walks by. So for anyone worried about his resigning... he is at least currently still around. I am surprised to see guys like Rusnak around Salt Lake in the off season and not back at home though. https://www.rsl.com/post/2018/01/09/adams-riot-arrival?autoplay=true
I'd actually be curious to see how much he's costing us. He has s decent resume, but hasn't been on a team since May. I wouldn't be surprised if he was actually below the TAM threshold.
It's possible there will be some talent at the 10th pick. We could still use depth at CB or GK, so maybe we look for someone at one of those positions. In the last few years, there's usually 1-2 players picked around then who turn out well. We may as well just let Mark Briggs make all the other picks, since they're just Monarchs players.
I love how they reveal the new signing with the secondaries because Adidas doesn't give RSL their new primaries until the week before the new season
Can someone explain the calculus on the timing of new kits. Are major markets done earlier? Is this a case of "you don't sell that many shirts compared to LA, so you don't need the same advanced time frame pre-season"? Or am I just small-market paranoid?