Really good from Luca here. The ball painfully rolls across the face of goal. pic.twitter.com/s0AlnT5cN4— Daniel (@DanielSmith1022) May 21, 2022
Luca's out: 61. Wissel Heracles Almelo➡ Sem Scheperman & Samuel Armenteros⬅ Luca de la Torre & Anas Ouahim#herexc | 1-1 (1-4)— Heracles Almelo (@HeraclesAlmelo) May 21, 2022 Down 5-1 on aggregate with 10 minutes left to play. ETA: Now 6-1.
That's the last time he'll be seen in a Heracles shirt. Pity it had to end this way, but he was attracting attention already. With relegation, his price has just gone down a notch
WTF! Where the heck have I been that I didn’t realize that Heracles was even close to the relegation zone, let alone in the relegation playoffs and now relegated. Wow. Nosedive. Yikes. LDLT has clearly played his last match with the club. It sounds like his form over the last month has been pretty poor but assume it’s been a team thing. It’s going to be interesting to see where he lands. Is he PSV, Feyenoord or Ajax quality? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe he’s more the AZ, Twente, or Vitesse type.
He has skill but not everyone is going to be rushing for a 24 year old central midfielder with 1 goal & 1 assist over 2800 minutes for a relegated team. If he goes to a big club, he’s gotta be careful. It might just be to provide depth. He has positive metrics that show he’s better than his goals & assists indicate. But it’s still a risk. Teams who sign him are going to want more than he’s shown
Luca becomes our #10 Yank Abroad relegated this season, after Green, Tillman, Sargent, Tyler Boyd, Gallegos, Bello, Busio, Tessmann, and Miazga. Hoppe still on the line, but he has a decent shot to survive. Since they have a different schedule, our four guys likely to be relegated in Sweden (Gyau, Gal, Lasso and Corona) won't count until the end of the year, but we're likely to get about 12-13 relegated YsA making this a record-breaking season in that regard (usually we get 6-7, but it must be noted this season we've had more active Yanks than ever --still, if we get 12 guys who played league games relegated, that's a bit over a third of all our guys active in first division European leagues). Active player = one who has played in at least a league game for the main team.
No, for the relegation list I count all the active players from any divisions --if I happen to know, it's likely several duals slip through, specially guys in places like Israel, Poland and Finland.
Yes, with the loss to Huesca he became the #11 Yank Abroad relegated this season. After they beat Valladolid I thought they'd be safe, but looks like they lost the last two and Malaga managed to beat Moore's team. Shame.
Jann George and Erzgebirge Aue were relegated out of the 2.Bundesliga. Charlie Kelman and Gillingham were relegated out of League One. And yes, it's your list, your rules. But I would advise against including Patrick Leal at Venezia. He only played one minute in a game AFTER Venezia clinched relegation. The reason why he played is that nothing was on the line.
Luca de la Torre vs Morocco (6/1/22)all involvements pic.twitter.com/dXS9Fps9Ix— Justin Moran (@kickswish) June 2, 2022
I never included Leal. Jann George is a dual who's unlikely to ever play for the USA. Kelman does count and he was the #12.
Exactly, he's 29 now and completely out of the picture. Kelman is 20 and was part of the U20 setup before the pandemic. He's still in the picture for the USA.
Not to derail this fascinating conversation, but has anyone heard anything about Luca de la Torre’s future club?
He's not a priority transfer. Teams want to see if their plan A's (maybe Bs too) come to fruition first. So his news will likely come later. I would expect him to end up at one of the 2nd tier of clubs in Holland, i.e. Utrecht or Twente. Otherwise it could be one of the relegation battlers in Spain or Italy to one of the promotional contenders in their 2nd divisions. He said he was averse to England due to the physicality. Those expecting some big move for him are going to be disappointed when he went down w/ a team in a non top 5 league & down the stretch was partially at fault. Also, when, on the nat'l team, he's a depth piece/specialist and not overly young.
Don't want to be triggered by people who have different opinions on players you're fanboying. I get it.
Hard to argue with this. That end of season was beyond brutal. Really hurt IMO. Then add the limited offensive production and it is what it is at this point. Just changed the whole vibe sadly.
I think it's the way it always was. The honeymoon effect focused on the positives in his game, & over-exaggerated them, while ignoring the glaring flaws he has - lightweight, poor vision, poor shooter, often doesn't play w/in team concept, etc. A lot of teams can use the 1st touch, dribbling ability, & aggression on both ends. But they aren't at a very high level, unless they use it situationally, which can be tricky. And can he harness his strengths while learning to compensate for his weaknesses..in his 7th yr as a pro? I mean some people were suggesting he was better than Musah and Adams, and he could be a creative force w/ his production, which was just wild.
The US boards don’t count. Fools and buffoons. We always tend to project for our players. I have followed him enough to know his limitations, but his strong play during the meat of the season had given me hope he could take a solid step up. That was upper Dutch, lower Spain/Italy. This will probably derail that. I think a move to Utrecht would be great TBH. It’s interesting that on the US boards fans always are cautious of MLS player limitation internationally to a fault. Even good performances against decent teams are downplayed because it is not a top team, so how do we know that player can handle it. Well, there is little doubt that LDLT is the European version of that. He can look good in situations and certain spots, but he ain’t ever hanging with the big boys. Guess what? Nothing wrong with that, and I am still a Luca fan, but he isn’t some sought after player at this point. It’s gonna take time.