This new team that ray has made looks good. They had a great back line. We have Rimando in goal then we got Nelson, Petke, Reyes, and now Galin. "wow" In the Mid we got Etcheverry, Kovalenko, Olsen or Convey, Stewart (who can play some mid). Then up front we got Stoitchkov (if he can handel ninety min) or two young gunners to choose from Quaranta or Eskandarian. "WHAT A TEAM" Don't forget that we still got some young talent on the bench. Quintanilla, Alegria, Curtis ( the i will score in the last 20 min of the game if you put me in coach). So it looks likes Rays boys might be able to play some nice FUTBOL!
Only problem, I just dont see Stoichkov starting too much... At least I dont want him too. Ray said that the players who try the hardest and play the best that week get all the positions.... I think stoich is mainly a player who is there to get the players who will be new and playing the most (alecko and co.) some expierience playing with one of the best players of our past. Hristo brings style, fluid motion into practice.. just what we need....
My sense with Stoitchkov is that he's at DC United mainly to get experience coaching and that the only time he'll really play is during the last 15 minutes of a match and, even then, only occasionally if we absolutely need a goal. He'll be the super-sub par excellence.
i'm pretty excited This team is really starting to look pretty exciting, at least on paper. in a 3-5-2 this team could be awesome. I think we are going to see a totally different style of play than we are used to. with Rimando in goal, Petke, Reyes, and Ivanov in back, I think we should be pretty solid. We'll have good height, and Reyes is lightning fast. In the mid I can see Nelsen as D-Mid, with Convey, Dema, and Olsen running the core of the mid field, and having Etch play A-Mid setting up our forwards. Earnie Stewart should have great presence and will certainly draw a lot of attention from opposing Defenders. With Tino beside him, I can see Earnie setting Tino up for 18 yard shots all day. I'm pretty excited. Ray has certainly built a Euro looking squad. Think about it. If those were starters, we really only have like 4 pure 'white bread' americans. And those guys can play. #1 Stunna
Welcome aboard Supermanuno! Actually last year our best defense started 4 guys, Nelsen, Pope, Reyes and Prideaux. We lost the two center backs there as Nelsen has moved into midfield and Pope was traded. Nelsen was our organizer and Popew as the best pure defender we had. While I like the addition of Petke and potentially Ivanov, I wouldn't say that we have even as good of a defense as we had last year. While I think Nelsen can be successful at Dmid, I don't expect him to do as good a job defensively as Richie Williams did last year. Losing someone of Pope's quality can only hurt. Trusting a new non-English speaker to be your organizer is risky, not necessarily bad, but potentially bad. Going from a 4 man back line with a full time destroyer Dmid to a 3 man back line with one Dmid and one part-time Dmid (Dema will be out of position attacking quite a lot) should weaken our defense. Hopefully the twin Dmids can deflect most of the attacks away from the back line. The only big improvement our defense made was in getting more depth (with Prideaux and Stokes presumably on the bench) and losing Pope who is out of the lineup with Nats commitments and injuries very often. So all in all, I wouldn't expect our defense to be quite as good as last season. -Tron
The New DCU I for one am rather excited about the team. We're going to have a good mix of youth and experience, speed up and down the flanks, and (hopefully) good creative, flow through the middle. I think that the D will need time to work together but hopefully by mid season we will have a solid core. The most important part is for Ray to get everyone on the same page and functioning as a unit...this is his chance to show how good he is at building a cohesive team, one thing that was obviously missing last year for a variety of reasons.