BShreddder. Your insight is appreciated. Do you think us soccer/tab will provide insight from this camp or just wait until next camp?
England's loss to Norway at the UEFA U19s means they won't be at the FIFA finals two years after winning the tournament. (Neither will Germany or Spain, or several other "name" teams.) Full time in Finland, where our opponents added another late goal to seal a 3-0 win over the #YoungLions. Congratulations to Norway on qualifying for next year’s #U20WC.— England (@England) July 26, 2018
This was England's squad: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_UEFA_European_Under-19_Championship_squads#England Clearly not close to their top group of '99s and later, which would include Ryan Sessegnon, Jadon Sancho, Mason Mount, Phil Foden, Marcus McGuane, Angel Gomes, Callum Hudson-Odoi, Rhian Brewster. I suppose Sessegnon is already with England U21s and has such an outstanding resume for his age, so maybe he wouldn't want to drop down to the U19s, but the others would have been very reasonable callups for this level. I'm guessing a combination of some of those clubs not releasing players -- and also England being very confident, thinking that given all their recent youth success, they could call up some players from deeper in the pool to get them experience and qualify anyway.
The England coach's quotes about player availability have absolutely NO relevance in this forum, but you can read them here anyway. http://www.thefa.com/news/2018/jul/26/england-u19s-norway-paul-simpson-260718?utm_source=Direct
I'm not completely convinced that none of the three CF's will be available for qualifying. We don't even know whats happening with Soto. Supposedly he's going to sign somewhere soon, but he hasn't yet, and do we know he'll be playing with the first team wherever he signs? Werder Bremen just brought in another striker, and the latest report has Sargent starting with the U-23 team. Weah probably has the best chance to not be available, but we don't know for sure that he won't. If he stays at PSG this season and PSG does not have many injuries/suspensions, he likely won't make the 18 most weeks. If he goes out on loan, he almost certainly won't be available.
So remember when we thought CB was gonna be a weakness for the team this cycle? Those were good times! Now we have Chris Richards starting for Bayern Munich on national TV and Mark McKenzie becoming a regular for a rapidly improving Philadelphia Union side. And, assuming those two can play for the 20s in qualifying, CB suddenly seems like a strength.
I still think the depth is questionable. Richards and McKenzie is a good starting pair. Maloney as the first back up is probably also pretty good. The problem is what comes after that. There's no guarantee any of those three will be released.
Harrumph.............................I was pretty confident of Richards being available for qualifying. Now I'm not so sure. I'm not convinced he's going to be in the Bayern first team when the season starts. However, Bayern doesn't seem to be treating this as a "training stint." They seem to be really treating Richards like a real part of the program. So I don't know.
I've been on vacation - I still am but am only now wading back into the news after taking a week off. But when you go on Maloney's instagram, he thanks his American aunt from Orlando who came to the Raleigh camp to watch him play. She replied The "until November" part is interesting.
I don't think UB would have loaned him for the camp if they weren't serious about loaning him for qualifying. He's still on the fringes of their setup. Qualifying and the subsequent WC could make a huge difference in his game and in his potential price in the future. I'd say he's more of a lock on this roster than either McKenzie or Richards at this point.
I think thats the plan for now. But Maloney is part of their first team. If they have an injury or two at CB, are they going to honor their request and play short-handed on first team CB's just to help Ramos out? I don't think so.
The file is too big to upload, but Manny Perez’s Instagram story was a picture of him in the Atlanta united locker room with the captain “Last Day of Training ”
As of this moment, he's still on NCSU's roster for the fall. https://gopack.com/roster.aspx?path=msoc FWIW, other observers have noted some guys' names dropping off at other schools.
I’m not very well versed on MLS roster rules but could Perez even sign with Atlanta? He didn’t play in their academy and would have had to go through the draft, or so I thought. Unless he’s on his way to Europe, I think he’s pretty much locked in at NCSU for the season.
MLS teams have back-doored the draft by signing players to USL contracts, but no one has ever tried it with a high-profile NCAA player like Perez.
I would assume that means it's his last day training with ATL before he goes back to Raleigh. As I understand the rules, any underclassmen an MLS team signs to a USL 2 deal can't sign an MLS deal till he's spent a year in USL. So, the Timbers, for instance, could now sign Lamar Batista to a senior deal because he signed last year. So if Perez were to sign with ATL2 now, he couldn't play with the MLS side till this time next year. (And that's assuming MLS even allowed it. This policy has never been tested by such a highly-regarded prospect.) If Perez were inclined to sign with ATL2, the time do have done it would've been in March. Whereas, if he goes into the draft this winter, he can play right away at the start of 2019. That said, barring a trade, it's very unlikely Perez will be on the board when ATL picks. United figure to be picking between 20-24 in the first round and Perez could easily go first overall. Of course, Atlanta also has plenty of trade chips so I can see them offering Cincinnati or San Jose something nice to move up and take Perez if they really liked what they saw whilst he trained with them. Having said all that, there have been rumors about foreign interest for awhile, so MLS might not even be part of the equation.