Can someone please enlighten me as to why MLS isn't in the market for deals like Eyal Berkovic? Berkovic went from Manchester City to Portsmouth on a free transfer last month and the contract was reported to be a two-and-a-half year deal for 500,000 pounds. How perfect would this 31-year-old playmaker be for DC United? If MLS paid $1-million dollars for 39-year-old Lothar Mattheaus, why can't it find $1-million dollars for a 31-year-old Berkovic? Is there a philosophical problem with finding deals like this, or is there nobody keeping track of the free-transfer-international-stars-approximately 30-years-old market?
I think partly because of the Lothar disaster MLS has stopped paying big-bucks (by MLS standards) for aging players. The focus now is on young up-and-comers. Or to put it differently, they're looking for the next Ruiz, not the next retiree.
United needs a playmaker because: 1) Etcheverry is gone. 2) Bobby Convey will be gone soon. 3) Earnie Stewart never really showed up. Berkovic would have fit perfectly with what I suspect will be a new Euro-style play, now with Nowak in charge.
-- If 31 is considered aging, I guess it's time to put Eddie Pope out to pasture, since he's 30 now. 31 or 32 is still a great age for an international playmaker to come to MLS. Look at the great stuff Nowak did in Chicago, and he came here at 33 (or was it 32?).
Being of Israeli descent and also b/c I follow European soccer (espeically teams with Yanks Abroad on them), I know quite well who Eyal Berkovic is. I would bet, however, that MLS would not pay $1M or so for a player that most "average" US soccer fans had never heard of. Everyone knew who Mattheaus was, same with other "famous" Euro's like Donadoni and Zenga, to name a few. But part of the reason MLS would ever pay big money for a European player has to be for the name. Berkovic may be very talented, but he is not a draw.
Three reasons: a) Berkovic's history is one that there's a fair amount of risk attached to it. b) The cost effectiveness of the strategy is in question. Would Berkovic in any way bring in enough money to justify the expense. c) Most importantly, I think MLS is still considered very much to be football siberia for European players. It's where you go to cash checks when Europe's had enough of you. I think a club like Portsmouth is tons more attractive to a player like Berkovic because a good run of form can get him back in the shop window for good clubs. IOW, Berkovic probably wasn't interested.
Gilles Grimandi. That cheese-eating-surrender-monkey came to MLS on a free I believe, and was out the door quicker than a white flag up a French flagpole. Thx, Jay!
All those things, plus the all important fact always ignored in these discussions: Did he have any interest in coming to MLS?