One of the areas that I believe the MLS can have an immediate impact on the game is to hire more coaches from overseas. Right now, we have a great deal of raw talent and to raise the level of our players is to find and hire coaches from Europe or elsewhere. Right now, we are still looking at college and coaches who played in the U.S. Why not try and recruit some overseas coaches?
Ah yes.. this old canard. OK.. name me a foreign coach that 1. Is available; 2. Is affordable; 3. Understands and accepts the restrictions that come with working in MLS; 4. Is intimately familiar with the US college and youth national team player pool (after all, in MLS, youth must be served); 5. doesn't mind playing second fiddle to the US National Team. If you can name one, I'll be shocked. Somehow, I don't think Del Bosque is dissapointed when the caller ID shows a name that's not Don Garber. The fact is, there are no foreign coaches that can make it work. Rather there are no big-name foreign coaches -- which is what you mean. After all, you don't want Chris Coleman. Sachin
I think he means coaches like: -Carlos Quieroz -Bora -Carlos Alberto Perreira -Octavio Zambrano ...and the instant success they would have cultivating the talent in this league. When it comes to MLS, I'll take Schmid, Bradley, Arena or Sarachan any day.
As much as the level of play has been raised, foreign coaches can raise it higher. We are behind the world club game and one of the reason is that we are too enamoured with American coaches. Since there is no cap on how much coaches are paid, you could find some assistant coaches out there who would view the MLS as a means to the bigger clubs. Ask yourself this, why hasn't Bruce Arena been offered a job in one of the European leagues? Because they have a bigger pool of coaches to draw from than we do. As for the coaches not knowing enough about the american college system, well a good/great coach can spot talent for what they need.
ALL of the historical evidence to date suggests exactly the opposite of what you contend. Can you prove that foreign coaches can raise the level of play? How will they do so, given the limitations of MLS? What happenes the first time they lose three in a row because their best players are away with the national team? C'mon, answer these questions. If you can't provide a CONCRETE example, then admit that you're talking out of your ass. Like I said, the record of foreign coaches (i.e. coaches that have not spent years and years coaching and playing in the US) is beyond horrible. All the evidence proves I'm right and you're wrong. Sachin
Not so much with MLS, but I am leaning toward wanting more foreign influence in the youth coaching ranks. The impression I gained from watching the u-17s this year was that we have a whole new crew of kick and run types joining MLS in a few years (with some obvious exceptions), that will no doubt run 100 mph for 90 minutes, but as individuals and as a team can't possess the ball for more than a few seconds. It seems at all levels our basic skills are lacking, contributing to poor possession play, and athleticism and tireless running are still receiving the lion's share of the emphasis, even to the detriment of essential soccer skills. Perhaps a new infusion of coaching philosophy is needed, even if it must come from abroad?
mls should hire foreign coaches but NOT NEWBIE COACHES! It angers me to see a league like mls hire foreign coaches with little experience! (new england, dc) MLS SHOULDN'T BE DEVELOPING COACHES! MLS should get foreign coaches with experience. Look at what japan did. They brought euro/south american coaches to help develop the young players. Do you think they brought coaches that had little coaching experience?? (like Hudson for example) that would be an insult to the league and a lack of seriousness. just look south of the border (mexico) to see the impact of foreign coaches. Not only do they help improve the quality of the league, but they help the native born coaches improve as well (by learning different tactics and forms of play) mexico has benhakker (former real madrid coach), passarela (argentina coach), pumpido (libertadores cup winner), westerhof (ajax youth system coach) combined with mexico's own Vucetish (has won mfl titles), Meza (has won mfl titles), Trejo (libertadores finalist) etc
Actually, you made a good point about the up and coming vs. going after the established and I will agree with your points.
      Frank Yallop (although he was previously an assistant coach at Tampa Bay and DC, he was hired two days prior to the 2001 SuperDraft for his first head coaching job... San Jose).      
MLS absolutely needs some coaches from other countries. Yallop and Nicol have come into the league with backgrounds spent primarily outside of the US. It is good to bring different ideas and coaching styles to the US. This isn't like the first years of MLS when some foreign coaches (Parreira, Queiroz, Bora) struggled with MLS' restrictive rules. Now the league is more structured and foreign coaches would be able to adjust to the league's salary restrictions. The league needs to be less insular and look for coaches with diverse backgrounds.
First you gotta ask yourself why exactly are foreign coaches better than American coaches or are they really? That takes some analysis. Let's look at some criteria here. 1. Leadership. I don't think foreign coaches are better. American coaches are very strong in this area. 2. Communication. American coaches are better. 3. Personnel Management. American coaches are way better. Foreign coaches doesn't understand the importance of draft and doesn't have experience with player barter system like we have here while American grew up with it. 4. People skill/motivation No reason to believe why foreign coaches would be better. 5. Tactical knowledge. Ahhhh... This is one area which foreign coaches might be better. However, if a coach installs a complicated system beyond player's ability to execute, you have a disaster. A good example would be Steve Sampson's super fluid 361. Whatever tactics a foreign coach can draw up might or might not be feasible since he has no knowledge of the players. So it's even. 6. Technical ability. Foreign coaches better no doubt. However, first team in the pro is generally not a place which you teach someone technique. I think it would be good for MLS to have reserves or youth academies and hire foreign coaches to manage those.
Frank Yallop played in MLS, so I'm not sure that he fits the same profile as most foreign coaches. Yallop knows the ins and outs of MLS as well as any American coach. In many respects, hiring foreign coaches is just like signing foreign players. It's very likely that most of the big-name foreign coaches that were hired in the early years were mercenaries looking for a big paycheck. All of them were obviously dismal failures. I'm all for foreign coaches, if they're willing to put in the effort to learn the system, and more importantly, if they want to win.
BRILLIANT!!!! If I were as smart as you, I'd begin polishing my acceptance speech for when you when the Nobel Prize for Soccer Genius. It's as good as yours.
But all those leagues have one essential thing in common: NONE OF THEM ARE MLS! I don't understand how you can be so thick. Did your mother beat you when you were a child? What makes you think that a coach that's successful in Germany would be successful in MLS? The coach of Real Madrid couldn't win when he was at the Metroscum. If he wins the Champions League, he's still nothing more than yet another foreign coach who couldn't hack it in MLS. You couldn't have chosen worse examples to prove your point. ALL of Yallop's coaching experience is in MLS. Hell, he even played in MLS. Nicol -- along with Hudson, Rongen, Timo whathisface, etc. -- all spent YEARS coaching here before MLS came calling. It's possible that you're correct and foreign coaches would be able to make a go of it, but somehow, I still don't think so. Sachin
Don't worry, Ajax65. Genius always meets with resistance. With persistent effort, your baseless theory can no doubt be proven superior to the facts constantly thrown in your face.
I sincerely believe the biggest revelation for Chivas US will be when they find out their team is repeatedly unsuccessful despite having a "knowledgeable" Mexican coach.
Foreign coaches are about the last place that MLS needs to spend money. If they're cheap, fine. However, I don't buy the personnel management or personal connection thing as necessarily a plus for American coaches--look at how American coach Tim Hankinson @*#^%ed up the Rapids chances in the playoffs with his "management", or how Andrulis couldn't do a damn thing with a hugely talented team in Columbus. Could Mike Jeffries "connect" better with his team because he's American than Steve Nicol does with his? Where the real work needs to be done is in setting up reserve teams and local academies--and I agree that emulating Ajax or other successful European clubs wouldn't be a bad start, but we don't need to pay foreigners big bucks to do this or to consult. We could probably get all the free advice we'd need on that score from Jurgen "Roof" Klinsmann and others who've settled over here. And whether they're foreign or not, we DEFINITELY need better scouting. I know the individual teams do it, but someone somewhere needs to make sure that we put a stop to the Juskowiaks, the Darryl Powells, that awful new hack defender the Crew got, and others before they ever start.
Yeah, that's what we really need... a league full of Walter Zengas and Thomas Rongens. Instead of "Hire More Foreign Coaches", how about we change that to "Hire More Good Coaches"?