Good afternoon everybody. Since I know many of you are gearing up for the Memorial Day weekend I decided to have a Q&A session today. The answers will be posted on Monday, Memorial Day, for those of you looking for something to read while you’re enjoying your day off (or at work wishing you had the day off).
You know the routine. Please send your soccer-related questions my way and I will give you my answers. If you’re new to SBI I really suggest that you go through previous Q&A sessions to see if your potential question was already asked.
Topics that are off limits include: John O’Brien, promotion/relegation in MLS, roster questions for the U.S. Olympic team as well as 2010, 2014 or 2018 World Cup teams, Red Bulls practice facility, where will any Fulham’s Ameicans wind up next season and why the New York market should/shouldn’t get a second MLS franchise.
Fire away and be warned, I will be looking to close this at around the 50 question mark.
Tiebreaker goes to the loyal reader???
Ives,
Should the Red Bulls get a central attacking midfielder to have a realistic chance to win the MLS Cup this year or do you think the team can win the Cup without a CAM? If the former, who realistically should they go after?
NO MORE QUESTIONS!!
Ives,
Great work as always on the blog.
Last year you reported on Red Bull losing a massive amount of money (I believe the figure was around $14 million), and losing all corporate sponsors.
So far this year, watching the games on MSG constantly being brought to us by the Red Bulls and not corporate sponsors reminded me of this situation. Thus, is there anything new happening on this front? If not, do you see Red Bull lasting as the owners?
Is there any European interest for Ricardo Clark?
I’m a fan of the mlslive.tv function MLS provides through mlsnet.com as another way to let fans watch the games (though I wish more of the games were shown through it).
My question is about the feed/window – can or will MLS do anything to improve and increase its quality and size, which right now are sub-par?
1) What position on the field is most lacking in terms of quality in MLS: the wide players, attacking mids, etc.?
2) Could the Red Bulls, or any other MLS team, loan out an academy player without them being under contract, like Exantus or Kassel?
Why do you think Adu and Bradley were not called up for the Toulon tournament (as well as other European based players). Maybe they want to give Bradley a rest, but this seems to be a bad decision to leave Adu out. He has not seen any first team action in months. I understand that they want to see the marginal players, but there should also be some attempt to win.