Is it me or are we playing with all youth from top to bottom? Other than Erazo, Noboa, and Enner I think the rest are all kids 22 or younger... right? Its like a U23 team right now. I'm loving it! Awesome to watch the next generation together.
Damn... these kids... are impressive... the pressure... and the danger they bring is refreshing. The attitude is completely different than what I've seen Ecuador bring in the past. They have a 'can do' attitude which I love seeing in sports teams. Vizuete is doing a fantastic job with these kids.
It was a strange game, El Salvador played it's game until Plata scored the first goal, then the keeper laid an egg lol and for those 10 minutes ES was just lost, we took advantage of that, then the second half our subs were just light years better than theirs.
I know, not as strong as Canada, besides, being fair, El Salvador gave Colombia a good challenge during some moments. besides Colombia is playing with 80-90% of their starting squad, today we were missing key players such as Antonio Valencia, Jeff Montero, Felipe Caicedo, Michael Arroyo, Joao Rojas, Renato Ibarra. it's a good victory considering what we had in the pitch.
tough to compare one game vs the other. We are in a 'rebuilding process' of sorts so if you compare our starting lineup vs ES we did not line up several key players (Ospina, Zuniga, Teo, Sanchez, Aguilar, Yepes and Cuadrado). I won't knock Ecuador. They looked very good and it's the confidence that the team needs. It's a good test to play teams that will bunker. Enner Valencia continues to improve. And the #7 (Plata?), guy is very fast and 'atrevido'. But that ES goalkeeper played horribly. Even the BeinSports announcers were literally ranking on the guy. Worst GK I've ever seen for any Senior team. This upcoming Copa America is going to be sick.
Hey guys, I haven't been posting but I've been reading all the comments and pretty much agree with what everyone is saying. Many of the conclusions are obvious as far as who played well and who didn't. It's clear to me and hopefully to everyone that Vizuete needs to be given the chance to lead the team on a permanent basis. Last time he had to clean up a big mess left by Suarez and he almost pulled off a miracle to qualify us. Now he can start the process of rebuilding on his own terms, and so far the team is playing very well, even without a few of our key players. After 4 years of boring, negative, timid Rueda football, it is amazing how quickly Vizuete has changed the team into playing more dynamically, with more possession and creating more danger. The new players are coming in with confidence and scoring goals - in 4 matches the new guys Cazares, Sornoza, Penilla and Plata have scored. The defense is looking solid for the most part, even though we are still experimenting with center backs. One of the problems with Rueda is just that he simply didn't seem to know our players. It took him at least a year to figure out which players played in which positions. One time I remember he called up Joao Plata, like 3 years ago when Plata hadn't done anything yet in MLS, I swear it was a mistake and he meant to call Joao Rojas. The bigger problem was that Rueda didn't understand our players' characteristics including their mentality. He couldn't motivate them properly, and so many times we looked scared on the field, and waited until the opponent scored to start attacking. Vizuete is doing everything right so far, even though he had to deal with the controversy around the World Cup money. He handled that extremely well, the media is now focused on other things, and now we have successfully tried out backups in several positions. We have gotten good results, destroyed the teams we should be destroying, gave Brazil a better match than Colombia or Argentina, and played very well to tie against an emotionally charged US team. Vizuete gets my thumbs up.
I like Vizuete and the work he did within these 4 games. I also believe if he would manage to coach this NT, he would take us to the WC. I don't doubt that one bit. My little bit of doubt comes later on in the process which would take place in a WC. Is Vizuete ready to take this NT to a Quarterfinal game? That's the real long-run question I have kept in my head. I don't doubt he could make us play beautifully and effectively. Way better than Rueda for sure, but will the end result at the end of the 4 year cycle be what we want it to be? That's where I think experience and coaches that have won something "important" at the international level would help us take that leap. That's the main reason I wanted to see Bauza. Not because he would qualify us to a WC, but because of what he could possibly do in a WC. Bauza knows how to play and win tournaments intelligently where the margin of error is slim to none. That and the fact that he knows the ecuadorian player very well and he was able to get across to them in some way that no coach in history was able to do. Mentally he took Liga somewhere else and he did the same for San Lorenzo who had never won anything internationally. And that's why he always got my vote. I think Vizuete should be a candidate. A strong one at that. Before Gustavo Quinteros or even Pablo Repetto. That's for sure. But I have a list of strong candidates that I hope make the list. Of course Bauza isn't an option any loner which blows big time. I heard not too long ago that Aguinaga said he had talked to Jorge Fossati about possibly becoming a duo to coach Ecuador and supposedly Fossati liked that idea. IMO that should be the #1 option b/c it's the most interesting. Fossati is ALWAYS either in a Copa Libertadores or Copa Sudamericana coaching a team that makes the quarter-finals, semi-finals, or manages to get to the final. He coached Liga and won a campeonato in 2003 and later came back and won the Copa Sudamericana and Recopa. He later coached Internacional in Brazil and took them all the way to the final (which they won) and got fired once the team had made the final which always surprised me (although I never looked into the reason). So that's 3 international tournaments. He's won a champions league out in Asia which also deserves it's merits even if some may think otherwise and he won the Paraguay league with Cerro Porteno in 2012. You add all this experience to Aguinaga's leadership and knowledge of the ecuadorian player and you make a very great combination. Aguinaga's experience with Liga de Loja being the most sucessful stands out A LOT to me. That's a team with 0 "star players". Not even Johnny Uchuari is NT material, yet Aguinaga took them to the Round of 16 and fought at the top of the table in the campeonato. This is my #1 option. Now aside from this, I think it's important to look for other options even if they are coaches that aren't so familiar with Ecuadorian futbol, but that have a good history of adapting well to the countries in which they move to. My #2 candidate is Antonio "El Turco" Mohamed, currently coaching America de Mexico who I believe is an excellent coach. This guy won a Copa Sudamericana in 2010 with Independiente after a nearly 20 or 25 year drought of not winning an international title. This was Independiente's first Copa Sudamericana ever btw. And guess who he eliminated from the tournament in semi-finals? Liga de Quito- who at that time was an unstoppable force in south america and was always competing to win cups. This same guy went to Tijuana (a team that had just risen from the Liga de Ascenso In Mexico) not too long after and won them a championship title which if im not mistaken was their first ever. And he had them playing beautiful, fast pace, effective futbol (Fidel Martinez being a part of this squad). He later took Tijuana to the Copa Libertadores of 2013 which was their first participation EVER at international level and led them to a Quarterfinal game which he lost against the team that later became the champs-Atletico Mineiro. Tijuana could have easily eliminated Atletico Mineiro in that game due to how they were playing but a failed penalty kick by Duvier Riasco and a couple other post hits and misses ended up kicking them in the ass. Either way these are 3 big accomplishments. Right now, America is #1 in the table in mexico and they are playing VERY well and are candidates to win the league this season. I think this guy has proven he can do what's never been done.....and he proved it with Independiente and Tijuana. I'd give him a serious consideration. And my final two candiates (in no particular order) are: Ricardo Gareca (ex Velez Sarsfield coach) and Marcelo Gallardo (current coach of River Plate in Argentina). Ricardo Gareca hasn't won anything internationally, but he did coach Universitario in Peru and made them champs a few years back. In Argentina he was very sucessful winning 2 or 3 titles (if im not mistaken) with Velez Sarsfield which was regularly in Quarterfinals and Semifinals of Copa Libertadores and Copa Sudamericana during the time he was coaching them. Great coach who knows how to work with very young players as he always did in Velez. Practices fast pace and dynamic futbol that we'd all love to see. The only thing that's missing in his curriculum is an international title which I think he could've achieved with Velez. Great coach. If Zubeldia had not came to Liga, this guy would've been my #1 option b/c of the fact that he works very well with the youth (kinda like Vizuete). And finally Marcelo Gallardo. Some people may agree or disagree here strongly with me because this is a coach with what some may consider very little experience. But i'll explain....As a coach, Gallardo has only been around since 2011 where he coach Nacional of Uruguay winning the championship within his FIRST season ever coaching a team. This is a good accomplishment, but there's other things that draw my interest towards him. He recently started coaching River Plate this season and he has River fighting up top in the #1 and they remain undefeated in over ten games if im not mistaken. He works really well with the youth and has River plate playing even better than last season IMO....and they won the title last season. So that right there to me speaks highly. He has young kids that are 18 and 19 years old like Giovanni Simeone and Driussi kicking Libertad's ass in Paraguay in Copa Sudamericana yesterday and in the league he also very young players playing excellent ball like Kraneviter (21 years old) and Lucas Boye (18 years old). And I'm talking about the argentine league which is no piece of cake, yet this guy has these young guys playing with no fear. If you ask me, come December, Gallardo will have won the Argentina league with River and the Copa Sudamericana where I see them as firm candidates to win the entire tournament. On top of that this guy won cups/titles in many, if not most, of the teams in which he played in and was someone who always knew how to display leadership. Por ahora no puedo decir que el es una realidad, pero en Diciembre la cosa puede cambiar. I'd have my eyes on him if I were the FEF.
Great post and great info on upcoming NT coach candidates. Can't wait to the FEF elections and who is going to be the official NT coach. I can definitely say that it is going to be crazy couple of months coming up, starting with Dep. Quito pretty much disappearing forever. This is not going to sit well with the team owners at all. Anything can happen now and it's going to be entertaining.
Are Chiriboga and Villacis really not getting us any matches for Novemeber's FIFA date? I know the Argentina game got cancelled but come on, even if we can't stop the campeonato, fortunately we could afford to exclude our local players and come up with a descent line up, --------------------------------------------------------Dominguez---------------------------------------------------- --JC Paredez------------------------Becerra----------------------------Erazo-----------------------------Ayovi- --------------------------------Noboa-------------------------------------------Gruezo------------------------------- Ibarra---------------------------------------------Arroyo------------------------------------------------Montero ---------------------------------------------------Enner-------------------------------------------------------------- I know playing Beccera is a HUMONGOUS risk but Vizuete played a similar roll dice with Canga. Morante (no team) Andres Mendoza Christian Ramirez Oswaldo Minda Antonio Valencia Joao Platta Jaime Ayovi Segundo Castillo Fidel Martinez Joffre Guerron Joao Rojas Felipe Caicedo. all these players can come off the bench, players such as Dominguez, Lanza can goal keep since they are not starting in their clubs anytime. overall this would give Vizuete a chance how hi 4-2-3-1- works with his more experienced squad.