I was gonna make a joke that _____ had a job all lined up, but I can't remember the name of the guy who played for the Crew and then ended up at Lowe's.
Wasn't Duhaney the guy someone saw stocking shelves at Sam's Club or something on Hamilton Rd. at 2 am? And I've been wracking my brain trying to remember the name of the Crew player who had a side job picking up dog shit at a kennel in Gahanna.
Wasn’t that Matt Naopolean? Or maybe that red haired defender that looked like a discount Alexi Lalas. 2005 ish
New on FC Cincy: Club acquiring via loan Nicholas Gioacchini from Como (Italy, Serie B in 2023-34; nine appearances). 10 goals for St. Louis in MLS in 2023. Also played for Orlando City and knows MLS well.No buy option. Could stay longer but, for now, flexibility all involved.— Pat Brennan (@PBrennanENQ) August 15, 2024
AFAIK, Matt never had any non-soccer jobs during his playing days. When he got cut from the Crew, he ended up in Portland for a few years, then moved back to Columbus where he ended up in a fairly nice career. Discount Alexi Lalas. Ha!
Rzepa may have sucked but he didn't cost an $8million transfer fee and $8.5 million a year in salary.
Not even for league minimum, let alone more than double what Cucho is being paid. The F*re took a serious bath on the guy. Disaster is not too harsh a term for it. Fortunately for him, there's always someone out.there who's sure they can get something out of a guy like him. They can't.
He’ll go to Saudi Arabia or something like that. Immediate edit: Shaqiri has gone back to Basel?! He is certainly taking a paycut to go back to Switzerland. I lightly follow Basel (southern German/Northern Swiss heritage) and they’ve been a train wreck for a few years now. An interesting move by both sides here.
And in an undoubtedly unconnected announcement F*re sporting director Georg Heitz says he is leaving the club to return to Switzerland “due to personal reasons.” It's funny how often losing your boss $30 million leads to needing to spend more time with your family.
There's a ton of detail in this article from Tom Bogert about Cincinnati's attempted moves to acquire McKennie/Sargent/Berterame during the summer transfer window: https://www.givemesport.com/fc-cincinnati-weston-mckennie-josh-sargent-german-berterame/ Weston McKennie FCC had been pursuing him for months Club officials visited Italy to recruit him McKennie visited Cincy and toured club facilities FCC couldn't get a deal over the line but are open to trying again in the winter Juve boss Thiago Motta has said for weeks that McKennie is not in the club's plans this season, but news has come out today that his situation has changed and is back in the plans for this season Josh Sargent FCC submitted a bid of $20m to Norwich Norwich were demanding north of $25m FCC and Sargent had agreed to personal terms FCC want to try again in the winter but will have to negotiate with StL for his rights EPL clubs are also interested in Sargent and have made bids for him during this transfer window, if he gets off to a hot start he could be off to the Prem before the window closes German Berterame FCC triggered the $15m release price with Monterrey and agreed to personal terms with Berterame FCC was in the process of scheduling a player unveiling, writing up a press release, etc., when Berterame backed out of the deal citing family reasons Berterame was close to making a move to Portland in the previous transfer window but backed out at the last second as well opting to remain in Mexico Ultimately, FCC ended up with Gioacchini who was decent with StL in the first half of last season but ultimately lost his starting spot in the second half of the season. He subsequently made a move to Como in the second division of Italy who were promoted to Serie A for this season. Gioacchini is coming over on a short term loan until the winter with no option to buy, indicating that FCC will try again for a big move in a few months. FCC are clearly being ambitious and showing their willingness to spend. They were prepared to set a league transfer record this past window and seem to be poised to attempt the same this winter.
The easy thing to do here would be to sit and laugh at their whiffs and sweaty desperation to try and keep pace with the most massive club in the world. But I think it’s also right to applaud the ambition. This is type of thing the league needs. They are not satisfied at all with being the second best club in Ohio, and getting embarrassed in the playoffs at home by their rivals. Good for them. I have to assume this will only motivate Columbus more in turn to keep pushing forward.
I'm not laughing at them at all. The ambition is impressive. With that said, you could definitely question whether they should have taken a more reasonable approach in the first place. Getting Sargent or McKennie was always going to be a stretch. Berterame already stood Portland up a few months ago, so assuming you could push that across the finish line was likely ill-advised. They swung big and ended up with Gioacchini who, in my opinion, is a very average MLS player. Also, an MLS team paying $20m for Sargent is insane. I could see a PL team dropping that for him, but that's nothing for a lot of those teams.
Reminds me of my favorite aphorism -- "A rising tide lifts all boats, but will still drown those f#cks in Austin".
The arms race in MLS is real. Ever since the Crew fired a shot across the bow last summer, the rest of the league has been jostling to outdo each other in copying our blueprint. They've seen a potential dynasty brewing and they all want to be the team to derail it.
I think the next two transfer windows will be very interesting, especially if we somehow manage to win MLS Cup again, or at the very least advance to the final. Teams will have had enough time to become comfortable with new roster rules and will certain teams will definitely be trying to maximize their potential spending.