Good morning folks. I’m at Red Bulls practice today, checking out the new players set to join the squad. I’ll do a running commentary from here for a while.
Enjoy:
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11:51am– Plenty of different formation looks today, with 3-4-1-2 and 4-2-3-1 among them. We also saw the 4-3-3, which looks painfully like a 4-5-1 if you don’t have the players to play it well (which is the case when you have Echeverry as one of the wing forwards).
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11:50am– Some good stuff from Rojas and Pietravallo. Van Den Bergh looked sharp today and Dane Richards looked pretty dangerous.
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11:41am-Nice little shoving match bewteen Magee and Pietravallo, good to see some fire from these guys.
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11:38am– We now have the 4-3-3 with Rojas-Angel-Echeverry. Unfortunately for them, Echeverry just can’t run and you can see Angel and Rojas getting a little annoyed by this.
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11:36am– The break is over and we have some new lineups.
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11:34am– And no Fire fans, he’s not Paulo Wanchope.
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11:31am– There is an unidentified Costa Rican player here as well. He’s about to start playing.
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11:29am– Oscar Echeverry looks really bad. He always looks like he’s laboring and nursing an injury. His knees must be killing him. I just can’t see him staying on the roster.
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11:28am– David Roth looked good taking on Hunter Freeman.
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11:25am– Juan Carlos Osorio is gushing over Gabriel Cichero’s passing out of the back.
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11:23am– George Welcome is drawing some fouls. He’s a handful, but I don’t know how quick he is.
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11:21am– Now we’re seeing a four-man back-line of: Jimenez-Cichero-Boyens-Freeman
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11:19am- Juan Pietravallo looks very good, gets into the attack well.
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11:14am– The sides have switched to 4-3-3. Her are the lineups
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11:13am– Few things funnier than hearing Jon Conway speak Spanish. It’s better than you’d think.
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11:11am– I haven’t been to many practices in the past few weeks but I have to say this is the best practice I’ve seen this year. The extra talent surely helps. Rojas looks legit and Cichero looks very good.
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11:09am– Yes, that’s Honduran Under-23 striker George Welcome at training. He’s a big kid. I’ll be sure to ask what they plan to do about New England’s discovery claim on him.
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11:05am– Here is another lineup:
——–Echeverry——-GEORGE WELCOME——
———————-Magee————————-
Van Den Bergh———————–Ubiparipovic
————-Pietravallo—-Mendes————
Goldthwaite———-Boyens—————Parke
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11am- Here are the lineups:
————Angel——-Wolyniec————-
——————–Rojas————————
Borman——————————-Richards
————–Stammler—Roth—————-
Jiminez———-Cichero————Sassano
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10:59– Ubiparipovic with a header goal.
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10:58– Gabriel Cichero is here.
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10:56– The team is playing 11 v. 11 with emphasis on the 3-4-1-2 formation.
Nice digging Ives, I love hearing this stuff. Hmm, I wonder if both practice sides were playing for a scoreless draw (just had to throw something negative in 🙂
Jimenez’s deal looks done while Cichero is hammering out details. I don’t think the team will announce these until the paperwork comes in.
As for the Costa Rican, it definitely wasn’t Ronald Gomez or any World Cup player. I would have known that. I don’t think the player was anyone of consequence. I’ll find out more later today.
hopefully its foward Ronald “the Bala(bullet)” Gomez that guy was awesome at the WC 06 and imo best player from CR at the moment.
thanks Ives that was great its nice to see some practice reports.
btw who is the Costa Rican player???
Jiminez, Cichero
are these 2 signed to the team already? I haven’t seen anything official about their signing/loan, just wandering
Ives,
Any word on when or if Reyna will be back this year?
At one point Magee was a forward. Not great, but useful sometimes. He’s not working as a midfielder.
Does anyone ever go back up front or is all movement one-way (F => MF => D) ?
Jonny,
Marco Etcheverry is from Bolivia and retired a while back; Oscar Echeverry is from Colombia and should have already retired.
When did we get Marco Echeverry? I thought he retired last year?
Who do you think will be dropped from the roster? Echeverry?
Thanks Ives… any word on the visas?
Etcheverry is terrible. So is Magee. I wish Magee had gotten knocked out in that shoving match.
Tim…it depends on their visa issues.
Second Freddy’s question: Who’s the Tico? Is he a forward?
How did Welcome look?
Who is eligble to play on Saturday (Jiminez, Cichero, Pietravallo, Rojas)?
I refuse to get excited about this. I read far too many live practice reports like this during training camp. Magee and Echeverry looked great back then, remember? This team is woeful and until it shows results on the field, I won’t believe anything like this (no offense to you, Ives, I really love the reporting)…just the cynic in me, I suppose.
I wonder who the Tico player could be? Hopefully, it ain’t an aging veteran (see Fonseca links with San Jose Earthquakes). Ticos got some good young talent and would bode well for the big Tico population in Jersey.
Ticket sales for LA are at 42,000. As for Jimenez, he looked pretty steady, though didn’ stand out as much as Cichero did. I liked him as the left back in a three.
CT and Smorebs – I heard that tix sales were 50k+ as of this morning.
Ives – The running commentary from RBNY practice is greatly appreciated and enjoyed. Keep it coming! I noticed that you haven’t said anything about Jiminez, how does he look so far?
Sal actually the guy that should be making that call is Agoos. I forget, why didn’t Welcome sign with New England earlier? If he didn’t sign with New England in March, why do they still get to have a discovery claim on him?
Nice to see some fresh faces in the lineup but we still don’t have a forward
You guys make awesome babysitters. Taking care of Marmol for Chicago and now Welcome for NE.
So when are you going to sit down with Osorio and explain to him the discovery rule, Ives? ‘Cause it doesn’t look like someone’s done that yet…
Signings or no signgings, I think this is a useful thing to do once in a while Ives. It’s great to get some insight into how guys are looking in practice and whether it’s more of what we’re seeing in games (Echeverry), or something different (Roth…who just never plays).
So Cichero’s official?
And great coverage! Keep it coming!
Do they all have their visas? Will they come through for the Galaxy game?
I think the last announced ticket sales numbers were above 41,000
Sounds promising.
Do we know what the ticket sales numbers are for this weekend’s game?
it would be nice to see this line up on Saturday, assuming they gel:
——-JPA——Woly——–
———–Rojas————
DVB—————–Richards
—-Pietravallo-Stammler—-
Jiminez—-Cichero——Park
———–Conway———–
Or
—–Rojas—JPA—Richards—–
-DVB——-Stammler—–Freeman-
Jiminez–Chichero–Park—Mendes
————–Conway————
So, is Cichero official, now? And, if so, how many more players need to be cut?
Any word on who might get released? I see no mention of Leitch or Thornton are they possibilities?
Can someone please print the Discovery Rules, in Spansih, in really big letters for JCO. I think he might be having ahard time grasping how this works.
Ona plus side he’s definitely the best coach in the league at trialing other teams players.
Good to see you back on the NYRB beat. I’ve missed your coverage of the Pink Cows in the past few weeks. I’m not a NY fan, but I’ve always considered it to be your staple, or more my staple, and there has been a huge gap in NYRB coverage since it dropped off your radar a bit.
“How does Rojas look?”
Duh, with his eyes.
Thanks ives!
How does Rojas look?
Thanks for the commentary Ives, keep it coming!
thanx. keep it coming!