The loan thing to another MLS club doesn't work for a player like Carleton. First of all, because he is in the 18 most weeks. Why would Atlanta loan out a player that's in their 18? A player loaned out to another MLS club can't be recalled. If Atlanta had an injury crisis or they sell a player this summer window, then they couldn't recall Carleton. So even though he's not playing, he's their depth. Its the same reason FCD can't loan out Pomykal..........even to their USL team. He's in their 18. If he's not there, then who is it? A player not as good as Pomykal. When the season started we all knew Carleton wasn't going to be a full-time starter. We already knew that. What we wanted to see was Andrew as a routine sub off the bench with sporadic starts. I had predicted 500 minutes, which isn't actually a lot. But we're not going to get close to that unless Atlanta has an injury crisis.
There are examples where the delay doesn't seem to have an impact, and others where development seems to have completely stalled. The downside of that idea is clearly seen with the current situation of Blaine Ferri. Would it have been better for Blaine to have been at the FCD academy these past two seasons, or doing whatever the hell it is he's doing right now? Sporadically suiting up for a DFW Development Academy team not as good as FCD's? And what has he been doing since Solar's DA season ended? I have no idea. He still has another 3-4 months until his 18th birthday, by the way. The poster child for that was Junior Flores. I don't think there's any doubt that the lengthy gap inbetween the end of his time at Bradenton and the start of his tenure at Dortmund......................had an effect on his develoment and future pro opportunities. I think its easy IN HINDSIGHT to look back and say Carleton shouldn't have signed that deal. At the time I don't recall folks being vehemently opposed to it. Mostly because it was really his only option. Other than not signing a deal and playing at the same club for two years. But as part of the academy and not part of the first team.
I think Ferri is playing this right but time will tell. Rumor is he was offered a deal by FCD to come in and be HG but they wanted him to sign until he was 19 or 20 without an option to get out of the deal. He smartly turned them down. I know he was at the U19 camp scoring goals and I have heard he has been in Europe of this spring on trial with a number of teams. I anticipate he will land in Europe and then we will see what happens. FCD HG is a dead end for most kids so he made the smart choice to turn that down.
Hard to tell anything with Flores. He is always hurt. It is a credit to Dortmund he is still on the books there. These MLS 3+2 contracts really are a pain and make all these decisions for our U18 players very difficult. What we can say is that the ones that did sit out and wait till 18 seem to be in a much better place at 18 than Carleton (Sands is another one). ATL2 is brand new. NYFC has no USL team. FCD has no USL team. Whether in hindsight or not, signing a HG contract with an MLS team without a USL team seems to be a mistake. Luckily for Andrew, ATL did start a USL team. Watching NYRB and RSL (or listening to Jacori Hayes and others), it does seem that 1,000 USL minutes is the best way to get prepared for MLS. If AC can get 1,000 minutes this year (and he seems on his way), along with U20 time, he should be ready to ATL next March.
Is Carleton a big enough prospect to get so much "ink" around here? Maybe. I know some think he is. But I think he gets written about more because he seems to be at the center of so much of the professional development isues in US soccer. You can almost discuss any aspect of when kids are turning pro, how MLS helps and hinders that, how MLS is allowed to do that by USSF, how European teams are capitalizing on MLS's short sigtedness and USSF's strange TC&S stance, and how our YNTs deal with call ups in a rapidly professionalized player pool just by discussing Andrew Carleton. Throw in he plays for a revolutionary MLS team that is only just getting its youth development path together, and it is a recipe for thousands of posts. In other words, you could already write a biography on Andrew Carleton and, in it, discuss almost every problem, triumph, and nuance of professional soccer development in the US and with it the world.
Should any player have "so much ink" around here? Some wanted all the Carleton discussion to go into one thread because it was taking over the MLS thread. But if we are going to start saying that the best players deserve the most ink, I would say that Carleton belongs in that group of players. I think it would be hard to conduct a case that he doesn't. He's been as productive as it gets in limited minutes with Atlanta, and he's been maybe as dominant of a YNT player as we've seen in recent times.
Exactly, he was taking over other threads because his situation exposes so many of the issues, especially in MLS. Basically, and Atlanta's use of Carleton shows this so well, MLS sees HG players as roster filler and cheap depth that allows them to spend TAM on the starting 11. European teams see all youth players as potential sales. And of those thousands of European teams, all but 2 have to develop and sell to stay in the game. Maybe NYRB is the only team in MLS that is looking to develop and sell their youth players. But no MLS team has to develop and sell players to stay in the league.
It seems Martino doesn't trust him for some reason. I feel he's going to have to get more minutes soon though. Recent games Vasquez and Williams were subs and didn't provide all that much. Amiron needs some rest as well, probably had one of his worst games Sun. He is getting playing though with Atl Utd 2 so it's not like he's completely wasting away.
What is the ceiling for Carleton? Does that kind of player usually break through at his age? Maybe because they kind of look alike, or Carleton's Paraguay U17 game reminded me of this players best games, or all of it: I would think the ceiling is Kevin De Bruyne. At 17, KDB was just getting into the first team at Genk. He didn't start regulary, if at all, until the fall of 2009, when he was 18; he got a 1,700'. When he is 19, he gets 5G and 16A, in 2,400'. He is at Genk until he is 21; where he transfers to Chelsea. He doesn't really play for Chelsea but goes on loan to Werder Bremen. He is then sold to Wolfsburg at 23. In 2015, he is named Player of the Year in the Bundesliga and sold to Man City at around 24. Now Genk played at the top of the Jupiler league and was in the Champions League several years. Not saying ATL2 (or even ATL) is close to Genk (or not close) or that Carleton is on the same path. Just that if KDB is the kind of player AC can become, it isn't probably happening at 18. That KDB became the player now around 24. We can look at other examples. But I wonder if we will find most of your younger break throughs are speedy, beat you on the dribble, wingers. That your CAMs will take longer to develop.
The difference is if Carleton is in Atlanta next year, I'll be very surprised if he gets over 1000 minutes. He'll never play over Barco, Almiron, Martinez, or Villalba. Suddenly next year's season is over, and Andrew is 3 months away from being 20.
The rumor mill from a atl blog said barco is suspended a couple weeks. So hopefully he gets a good couple games in for that hopping window....
Carleton starts? And against Durkin? I haven't been this hype for a soccer game in... well, I can't even remember. Games on Twitter.
Well now it is on him. If Barco is truly out for 2 weeks, a good performance today (on Univision, no less) would mean a near guaranteed start next week. And a good game next week would leave him firmly in contention to get real minutes going forward. I hope he realizes the gravity of his situation. This could be the difference between becoming an immediate rotational player, or conversely toiling on the USL team, nearly exclusively, until 2019.
Ok I'll stop posting rumors now since they are sort of pointless, but the team says he is not suspended: The good folks @929TheGame saying that Barco resting is a “coaches decision” not an injuryCan confirm from the team that he is *not* suspended despite rumors— Dirty South Soccer (@DirtySouthSoc) July 21, 2018
You can tell he doesn't fully trust Carleton yet. On the play where he backheeled it to Carleton, he did it after taking a few too many touches trying to get a shot off. He's just a little more selfish with Carleton around.
Carleton needs to be more selfish and make more plays, if he comes back out for the second half. He played in that half not to make errors. A lot of plays to keep possession, working very hard defensively. He's playing more like a left sided #8 than a real winger. When Atlanta's in possession, he's checking back to midfield to give an outlet, and occupy a defender farther forward to give more space to the other attackers. The other Atlanta attackers are playing selfish and no defense. They are just looking to go for goal or very risky passes to each other. He had a couple of nice plays. He started the Atlanta goal by recovering the ball, going past a guy and passing it forward and he nearly assisted on a Martinez goal that Martinez headed just wide. Also had a shot, although it was right at the keeper. Almiron didn't put enough momentum on the ball for Carleton to strike it in stride because Almiron held the ball too long.
Tata Martini was very explicit in his sideline instructions that he wanted the players pushing forward. Carleton seemed a little rattled with the style. Need to chalk this up as a learning experience.
Very conservative. That's not his game. Every time he touches the ball he is turning around. Rooney almost punished him for that. If I want conservative I want big fast conservative.Not a disaster like Almiron, but he doesn't have unlimited chances to prove himself either.