By AVI CREDITOR
With BMO Field selected as the 2010 MLS Cup host, Toronto F.C. has a bit more motivation at reaching the promised land.
The only problem is, the team doesn't quite have the horses to get there.
Preki enters his first season as Toronto coach with a lot of work to do. The roster has some shining stars (Dwayne De Rosario, Julian de Guzman, Stefan Frei), but many key components went elsewhere in the offseason, and there are far too many holes to consider the team a serious contender.
The continued sellout crowds at picturesque BMO Field will give the team that extra boost at home, but there's plenty more that needs to be done to ensure a home game on Nov. 21.
Here is a look at the 2010 Toronto F.C.:
2010 TORONTO F.C.
Players to Watch: Dwayne De Rosario, Julian de Guzman, Stefan Frei, Sam Cronin,
Key Arrivals: Jacob Peterson, Ty Harden, Zac Herold, Nick LaBrocca
Key Departures: Ali Gerba, Adrian Serioux, Amado Guevara, Carl Robinson, Danny Dichio, Marvell Wynne
Projected Lineup (New starters in bold)
————-O'Brian White———-Chad Barrett—————–
Dwayne DeRosario———————————Nick LaBrocca
—————Julian DeGuzman—–Sam Cronin——————
Jim Brennan——Nick Garcia—–Ty Harden—–Nana Attakora
——————————Stefan Frei—————————
Biggest Question: Who's scoring the goals?
The team has a strong midfield presence between De Rosario and de Guzman, but they don't have many options to feed to. The central defense is a liability, and even though Frei is an all-star in the making in goal, Preki is going to need more goals from his attack if Toronto will be able to compete.
Preki knows a thing or two about attacking the goal, but he'll either have to magically transfer the skills from his prime to his thin group up front or have Mo Johnston bring in some new talent to augment the player pool.
X-Factor: Any healthy striker
Chad Barrett and Jacob Peterson could help the team's offensive woes, but both are on the mend. As noted above, there aren't many goalscorers on this roster with Gerba's pending departure and Dichio's retirement (still with the team, but in a coaching/administrative role).
Keep an eye on O'Brian White, who netted a couple of goals last season. He was a prolific scorer at the University of Connecticut until suffering an ACL injury at the end of his college career in 2008. Now two years removed from the injury, he has a better chance at recapturing his form.
Outlook: Not good. At least not presently. A roster move here or there would turn things around, but the team didn't help itself for the coming season in the draft (Zac Herold is a project that could blossom down the road), and Preki has his work cut out for him in his first year as boss north of the border. As things currently stand, Toronto won't be close to playing in the MLS Cup that it will be hosting.
Preki hasnt got alot to work with at this moment courtesy of Mo. As for these new players we have gotten, most of them were highly regarded adn continue to be but were not in use at their old teams. We certainly have higher quality players in Cronin, DeGuzman and DeRo, its just a matter of finding players to compliment them which unfortunately may take another season. I just expect and hope that Preki will give us enough this season. Its beena long 3 seasons and to be frank we should be in the playoffs by now but its obvious we’ve been mismanaged adn we are making moves in the direction to rectify it. Our next best step would be to rid of Mo.
yep MoJo is definitely the problem. Whats nice is that this years team is increasingly looking like Prekis team unfortunately we are still paying for Mo’s sins. I do hope and believe he will be gone after this year tho.
Conor wanted to go home and was injured.
Cunningham was a waste of time and put no effort in, he couldnt even finish a ball that was 2 yards from the net against Montreal, he had a sour attitude and showed on the field.
Marshall was old and getting older and was paired with an inexperienced CB, hes done well under Sigi’s system but in no way would have excelled any further than he had here.
Outsider’s take:
WTF?
Well, these guys are clearly a few players away from replicating the thug ball that Preki’s Chivas teams played. Meanwhile, does anyone have any idea what the heck is going on with this roster? I don’t even think Mo and Preki know at this point.
I think Preki is counting on “addition by subtraction” but at this point it just looks like “subtraction.”
And what’s with the love of Rapids players? Gotta be kidding, right?
So I come back to WTF?
I think the heart of TFC’s problems are MoJo. You hate to blame it all on one man. But….
–he’s the guy who treated the coach/asst role such that when Bob Gansler arrived, he thought he’d be a true assisstant, not the coach (with MoJo as “manager”). What does it say about the head coach that he can’t clarify expectations enough with someone who’s worked with before that there would be such a big mis-match?
–as GM, he’s engaged in non-stop player acquisition. This isn’t the NFL where you just slot players in. Teamwork and fit and cohesion matter hugely in soccer, maybe more so than other sport. Any trade you make (unless it’s addition through substraction) comes at a cost to team cohesion. But MoJo trades and moves players like that’s the real game.
–there has been no real cohesive, coherent model for building the team. Were they trying for a speed/counter team? Defense first? Possession? Kick-ball–direct soccer? First, they over-paid for Canadians. Then they went for a lot of former english league players (Robinson, Dichio, etc.) some of whom worked out, others of whom didn’t but almost all were expensive.
–hired a bunch of coaches that show an allegiance to the UK leagues but not a lot of expertise in MLS (until Preki).
Alex,
De Guzman is a DP I believe.
Shocked, with all their fans and a nice stadium, the team hasn’t gotten around to making the trades in the areas they most need. Always seems to be the same thing with TFC, where are the goals coming from? Who’ll be the leading CB? Love the fans and plan on heading up there one day but the team really needs a striker to set the crowds in a frenzy…
Oh, i should also add.. because we spent all that money in one year and didn’t think long term, we ended up being cap tied this year.
So while TFC had a large payroll last year, it’s going to be small this one.
I know every team technically spends the same amount under the cap. But allocation dollars provide a temporary boost. TFC had A LOT of allocation dollars between trades and the Edu transfer. All of it was wasted.
Rory, that allocation money actually came in handy.
TFC (for a team without a DP) had a higher payroll than anyone else in the league, by a huge margin. Casey never wanted to play here (the other two i conceed were mis-managed).
The issue is, what we spent that allocation money on was crap. But if we had actually been prudent with our signings it would have been a huge win. Mo Johnston is just a terrible GM overall.
Casey Conor
Jeff Cunningham
Tyrone Marshall
All sent away from TFC for the likes of Riley O’Neill, a third round pick (wasted on Mike Grella who refused to sign) and some allocation money.
I wonder why TFC has never made the playoffs?
I’m not sure I agree with a lot of the article’s analysis:
1. “Defense is a strong suit”? Really? I agree that Preki teams usually do a pretty good job of defending. But I think that a center back pairing of Harden and Garcia is one of the weaker ones in MLS. I don’t believe defense is a strong suit with this team.
2. “Frei is an all-star in the making”? Well, he’s a fine young GK and absolutely an improvement over Sutton. He’s got probably the longest punts and kicks in MLS. That said, I wouldn’t put him in the upper half of GK’s in MLS based on last year’s play. Don’t get me wrong–he’s a fine young GK. But there were probably 7 GKs in MLS that had better, stronger seasons than Frei last year.
3. “Barrett…could help the team’s woes”? I think most TFC fans would attribute a chunk of their goal-scoring woes to Barrett. I’ve never felt he was the answer (or to put it this way, if Barrett is the answer than you don’t want to know what the question is).
I love watching this team play, would be even funner to see them host a playoff match or two. I really thought they would strengthen the roster more over the past 3 months or so.
Depressingly accurate.
Its sad that TFC can’t get their sh1t together. I really want to get up to Toronto for a game. Those fans deserve a playoff-worthy team. If they suck again this year, shouldn’t they get rid of Mo? Seems obvious to me.