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MLS Notes: FCD’s Hernandez sent on loan, Impact’s Italians hurt and more

Hernandez, Moises- FC Dallas

Moises Hernandez will take the road less traveled when it comes to MLS Homegrown Players. 

Hernandez, an FC Dallas Homegrown Player and U.S. Under-20 defender, was loaned to Guatemalan club Comunicaciones for the 2012-13 season according to the club's official website. The move gives Hernandez a chance to earn playing time for one of Central America's top clubs, and a place that currently employs former Chivas USA defender Michael Umana in addition to a host of Guatemalan national team players. Former FC Dallas striker Jeff Cunningham spent the clausura season with Comunicaciones, a team that was in the group stage of the CONCACAF Champions League in 2011-12 but did not qualify for this summer's competition.

Hernandez has yet to play in an MLS match for FC Dallas since signing with the club from the FC Dallas academy in July, 2010. He has played all 90 minutes in every one of Dallas' six reserve matches this season, but Dallas' reserves are not scheduled to play again until September.

Here are a couple of more notes from MLS:

FERRARI OUT 4-TO-6 WEEKS, CORRADI TO GET MRI

The Montreal Impact's Italian veterans both could be set for spells on the sideline.

Centerback Matteo Ferrari has been ruled out for the next 4-to-6 weeks with a quadriceps injury that he suffered in the club's 4-1 victory over the Seattle Sounders on Saturday.

Shavar Thomas and Nelson Rivas figure to be the tandem at centerback while Ferrari recovers. 

Forward Bernardo Corradi, meanwhile, is set for an MRI on Wednesday to determine the severity of a left knee injury. Rookie forward Andrew Wenger started in place of Corradi against the Sounders, scoring in his second consecutive match, while Corradi came on as a late substitute. Wenger figures to be given the lion's share of minutes should Corradi be out for an extended period of time.

RAPIDS SIGN O'NEILL TO HOMEGROWN DEAL

The Colorado Rapids signed academy midfielder Shane O'Neill to a Homegrown Player deal on Tuesday, making him the second such signing in team history. Davy Armstrong (2010) is the other.

O'Neill, a Boulder, Colo., native with dual, Irish-American citizenship, had signed to play at the University of Virginia this fall but is instead passing on the collegiate game to get integrated with the Rapids. He scored 10 goals for the Rapids' U-18 side in 2011 and was also named the state's 2011 Gatorade Player of the Year.

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What do you think of Hernandez' loan to Comunicaciones? Think the Impact will be able to get results without Ferrari and/or Corradi? Happy to see another Homegrown Player signing in the league?

Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. You’re right about not having the resources to develop. At least not enough games via reserve league and USOC. Arena is advocating affiliate teams with the lower division, similar to what happens in other countries. (Germany comes to mind)

    As far as leaving them in college goes, if the players are loaned out where they play, then that’s much better than the NCAA limited training/playing restrictions. And you’d assume these teams would be paying enough that it’s not in their best interest to let them ride pine. If they don’t play on loan then college is better. I like the affiliate system myself. If the league will invest in it.

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  2. Um…His dad is from Guatemala – way to be “that guy” with this little remark. Oh and by the way, many Central American clubs are just as good as MLS clubs if not better…or don’t you watch CCL?

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  3. Loaning may be standard practice elsewhere but all due respect our loanees are not being squeezed out by Wayne Rooney. And I think you’re eager to defend loaning to the point where you miss my argument, essentially, what’s the point to MLS teams signing homegrowns away from college they can barely use, then loaning them off to the minors or some foreign league fingers crossed about them even playing there?

    For that matter, I don’t often get the idea that we’re sending players down to season because of roster crowding — what English teams often do — I think we just can’t get reserves enough games to develop. I mean, compare the length of a MLS reserve season to Arsenal’s reserves:

    http://www.arsenal.com/fixtures/reserves-fixtures?season=2011-2012&x=18&y=17

    I’m not giving up on players at all, and I am a huge advocate of playing time as what improves young players, I know the immediate starting role I got at a modest soccer school catapulted me past benchriding club colleagues who went to name schools.

    I just don’t see a few reserve games plus however many USOC contests you get as being an effective means to develop players. Which is why I think we’re shipping out players not so much because we have to work around numbers but want to bring them along for next season, as that we simply lack sufficient resources to do the job right.

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  4. i wish every team would loan out their young kids that dont have a shot at the first team. playing games is the only way to get better. nyrb should have loaned out kassel and hot to lower division. if they work out, good. if they dont, you cut them anyways. but not before getting them games. i just hate when mls teams loan players out for a weekend or a month. just send them out the entire year.

    id be for fc dallas sending richard sanchez to a 2nd division team in mexico.

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  5. Is Hernandez Guatemalan-American? I’m wondering if this is the kid that was getting booed in Mateo Flores during Olympic qualifying.

    Either way, Cremas vs Rojos is one of the best Futbol rivalries futbol has to offer on this side of the world. He will definitely learn to be much more tactical in C.A.

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  6. However, I do completely agree with your point that these kids should only be selected as Homegrown players if they have already proven they can play at that level.

    I do think that many teams are just signing as many as they can to get around the draft and allocation process. In my opinion, that is not fair to the players who may have developed much more in college. However, for the Agudelo, Luis Gil, even Freddy Adu types, rewarding teams for truly developing players makes sense with the “Homegrown” rule.

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  7. Imperative Voice: Maybe I am missing your point, but loaning out young players to lesser teams or leagues to get first team action is very standard practice everywhere in the world. I am a huge Arsenal fan and most of our young players are loaned out until they are ready for full time first-team duty.

    That does not mean that you don’t have the resources to develop them. (Although MLS does not have a lot of resources to develop reserves due to poorly negotiated TV contracts, but that is way off topic).

    But of course it is a better option to loan a young player out to get him experience. At the ripe old age of 19 you want an MLS team to just give up on a player and get rid of him because he hasn’t worked out yet? Why not loan him out?

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  8. If you’re going to quote Arena from the Wapo piece you might as well mention that his basic theory was homegrowns were better off in college. Even granting Hamid and Agudelo the question would be the overall success rate and whether Arena is right.

    When you have a homegrown player system to retain your “developments” and a reserve league ostensibly to “hone their skills,” why am I shipping them out? They often have to pull up academicians to make numbers. The reality is I’m shipping the guy back out on loan because I lack resources to develop players, can’t get them first team time, don’t have a reserve game for two months, and might even be wasting their time, because, particularly with a team like Houston, most likely I am using veterans with an occasional draft pick, will fill gaps with veteran acquisitions, and will probably play you either USOC or when hell freezes.

    I’m not sure we can afford it but rather than sending players to loans I think we’d be better off with minor league team affiliations or something like Barca B, playing full schedules in meaningful and consistent contests in a separate league. You can keep 25 or so senior players and they’d be picked knowing there’s no reserves and that they are rolling the dice on a senior opening. If you want PT go play in the minors.

    Last thought, if everyone was Agudelo I’d think the “dibs” concept for homegrowns made sense, but the vast majority don’t seem well trained for the senior set so I’m not sure continuing their “education” in the same system is smart. They might be better off in the draft getting snapped up by the most eager team for their services rather than a home team looking for numbers and perhaps as concerned with aesthetics as anything else….”look, hometown kid.” When the reality is the kid who plays is the draft pick from Louisville U.

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  9. Actually, I would go in the opposite direction. Homegrown players that don’t produce I’m assuming are signed to multi-year deals. (Probably 4, which I think is somewhat standard for young players in the league. Although it may be less or even more.)

    If that’s the case, and you know the player will not play with your first team, then why not loan them out? If you can recoup some of the money for them, they get more games than they would in the reserve league (which is ridiculously low 10 matches), and they get to compete for a decent side where they may develop then why not??

    It’s a win-win. Either the player is released at the end of his contract and you’ve lessened your cost to the club, or the player gets some experience and develops nicely wherein you still retain his rights.

    Why yes, I think I’ll have my cake and eat it too. Especially since the alternative (the reserve league) is “falling into a black hole” of development as Arena calls it.

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  10. I didn’t see the new Montreal stadium in action, but I hope they installed rocking chairs alongside the bench for the broken-down Serie A retirement home contingent to relax and take in a fixture comfortably.

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  11. Yeah, wow, if you haven’t made a first team appearance in two years since signing the dotted line, something’s got to give. I find it interesting he’s merely loaned when he’s never appeared and probably ought to be outright released if this is how much they care, “go play in Guatemala.”

    I read an interesting Wapo piece the other day about the modest “success” of the homegrown player program/ reserve teams in MLS. It definitely feels “off” to me when a “homegrown” player is then “loaned out.”
    And, not playing another reserve game for two months? Just underlines how half-serious the reserves are.

    In fact, my pet theory on HPD 3, TFC reserves 0 is the accused are out on the town because there is no reserve game and a modest chance at best they’ll even play with the senior team.

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