By TRAVIS CLARK
Three Americans playing in Mexico will have to impress a new coach in the coming weeks, with Pachuca manager Guillermo Rivarola quitting his post in the wake of a 4-1 loss to Cruz Azul.
Pachuca had struggled during their past two games, losing heavily to Cruz Azul the past weekend after getting beat 3-0 at the hands of Santos Laguna. Prior to that, they had managed four points in their first two games of the season, though the club does sit just a point behind Club America, in third place of Group 2 in the Apertura. Rivarola departs after just over a year in charge of Pachuca, guiding them to a CONCACAF Champions League trophy this spring.
His departure means Herculez Gomez, Jose Torres and Marco Vidal will look to impress and earn playing time under a new manager.
Here are a few other stories for today:
GIL MAKES LOAN MOVE
U.S. youth international Luis Gil, acquired this season by Real Salt Lake, was loaned to USSF D-2 side A.C. St. Louis on Friday in an effort to get the talented 16-year-old more playing time. He made just one appearance for Salt Lake this year, coming in as a substitute against D.C. United during a U.S. Open Cup play-in match back on June 2. He debuted for St. Louis over the weekend as his new side lost 1-0 to the Portland Timbers.
NO LIVERPOOL APPEAL ON COLE RED CARD
Joe Cole's disastrous Liverpool debut lasted just under 45 minutes, and the midfielder won't start another Premier League match again for the next three games. Liverpool decided to not file an appeal for Cole's red card, awarded when he was adjudged to have made a reckless challenge on Arsenal central defender Laurent Koscielny close to halftime. Cole will miss games against Manchester City, West Brom and Birmingham, though is likely to feature in Liverpool's Europa League match this Thursday.
ENGLAND WANT BRITISH SUCCESSOR FOR CAPELLO
Even though their current manager has two years left on his current deal, the English FA have already indicated that they want Fabio Capello's successor to be British. No successor is being lined up at the moment, but Capello has come under scrutiny in the press for his recent handling of David Beckham's international future. The Italian is under contract through Euro 2012.
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What do you think about Pachuca's coach quitting? Surprised to see Gil move? Think Liverpool should appeal Cole's red card?
Share your thoughts below.
Well, they only need one.
Besides for that nationalistic segment of England fans I think having a manager from Wales, Scotland or Ireland would be like hiring Rafa Marquez to manage the USMNT.
I got it from the SBI headline above, “England Want a British Successor”, but you are right. The original story is actually about hiring an English coach.
This makes a big problem for the FA since almost all the coaches of top teams in the EPL are Scots, Italians, French, Irish, etc.(Redknapp and Hodgson being the obvious exceptions) and there is no English coach of a top team overseas (unless they want McLaren back).
Where did you hear that? The Telegraph article I read made it very clear that the new manager was to be English:
“Going native: The top homegrown candidates
Stuart Pearce
Has the benefit of already being part of Capello’s backroom team and is well liked by the FA. Patchy club record, though.
Roy Hodgson
Would have leapt at the chance had the FA jettisoned Capello in the summer. Ensconced at Liverpool now, but is on record as saying he would not turn down the job.
Harry Redknapp
Like Hodgson, age is not in his favour, but this 63-year-old’s man-management skills are outstanding and he is fiercely patriotic.
Nigel Clough
Still a managerial fledgling, but there would be a poetic justice in Clough Jnr winning the post that always evaded his father. ”
He’s not 18 so it doesn’t matter. He can’t go anywhere abroad until he is 18. Even then Arsenal would have to loan him to Spain for 2 years before he would be eligible to play for them.
That’s a fair point but on the other side, last year Tottenham chose not to compete in their reserve league and instead Redknapp chose to loan out many of his surplus players.
Apparently, he felt that playing in the reserves was not competititive enough as opposed to a loan situation where presumably, you’d find a club for your player where he could compete for PT. Adu’s situation, where he mostly sat, is not the norm. Remember, even though it’s not as costly as buying someone, the club with the loan is paying at least part of the salary and they are agreeing to take you on because you’ve been identified as someone who can fill a need.
Loans to USL D2 aren’t perfect but it’s much better than what was available before. I don’t think it was an option years ago when players like Adu were at RSL, which is too bad.
“there” aren’t enough. So much for my English.
Notice that the ENGLISH Football Association wants a BRITISH national team manager. Apparently, their aren’t enough qualified English managers, so they feel the need to keep the door open to Scots, Welsh and Irish. How the mighty have fallen.
Bet he wishes he went to Arsenal now!
i highly doubt its his choice on where he gets loaned..
Wasnt he drafted by Kansas City?
Ummm, wasn’t there a big fuss over Gil going to RSL because he wanted, or required to be out west, lose to his family? As far as I know, St. louis is a far cry from the west coast, even more so than salt lake
This all makes me think how terribly Adu was handled. I feel bad for him…
I gravitate to something like this situation. Especially since USSF set the financial bar for USSF D-2 very, very high. Of course I’m not sure how it would work legally or anything.
While we don’t do relegation and promotion, I would like to see each MLS club be tied to an team in the USSF, like baseball does. That way, players can continue to grow within the organization, and it would be easier to follow these players throughout their careers. It would be a good place for players in rehab
You probably can’t loan out your entire reserves, and I think basically all of your reserve players need games to increase the benefit out of carrying the reserves. So there’d be that.
Also you can never really be sure what the other coaches are doing with your players. Even if you do your due diligence, there is absolutely no substitute for setting the training yourself.
I would guess they didn’t want to loan him out instantly because they wanted to see where he was at and know what he should be working on. Also, teams prob. want to instill the team’s philosophy in the player before they let a different organization mold him. 6 months with RSL probably allowed all this and now they feel confident he can go somewhere else and improve.
But I think a very good move, a struggling team who will be happy to have a player who can grab some media headlines with his addition. He played 15+mins this weekend so it is good he is getting instant playing time.
Glad to see Gil loaned out. The USSF D-2 is a good challenge for him, not too easy, not too hard. The key for the USSF and MLS is to get these talented young Americans more experience so they are ready at a younger age. Instead of our nats emerging at 24-28 years old, they need to be emerging at 18-22 years old. This is the perfect scenario and won’t always occur. But it is a good goal to help our national team reach the next step.
Perhaps you could minimize the travel costs by limiting reserve team play to within the conferences (East teams only play other East teams, West plays West). With Houston and Dallas presumably moving eastward next year, their trips wouldn’t be as bad as if they were in the West.
Bradley will take the Pachuca job and bring Landon Donovan with him… Maybe even Bornstein, Findley and Beasly will tag along…
MLS needs to start loaning players more often. This is something they don’t do enough IMO. Without a reserve league the rookies need playing time.
The reserve league is pretty costly to run IIRC. Think about an away trip to a place like San Jose. Instead of only bringing players for a first team game you also have to bring enough for the reserve game the next day. The cost adds up. No wonder if folded. I know they want to bring it back but the biggest obstacle IMO is the travel.
After watching the highlights from Pachuca’s 4-1 loss to Cruz Azul, I could only think: “Pachuca’s defense s*cks”. I remember their play from a few years back when they beat Houston to go to the CONCACAF Champions Cup final. They used to play great attacking soccer with good-enough defense and great goalkeeping. Now everything appears to have declined, but especially the defense. I’m not sure if this is the coach’s fault or not, but something had to be done.
This Guy – I think mlshole’s comment was about the Pachuca manager walking away…not the English Manager possition.
what does a MLS reserve league have as an advantage to loans to USL D2?
Other than the fact that youth players need to earn a position (see Altidore in Spain)and they would be potentially playing more men as opposed to boys (see Adu at DCU), I don’t see any problems here.
We need to MLS reserve league NOW.
McInerney has 12 appearances in 19 MLS games so far this season and he played the USOC game, IIRC. Granted, he’s only averaging 21 minutes per appearance (12 games, 1 start, 252 mins) but Jack Mac is one of Nowak’s favorite options off the bench even with 3 new additions in midfield during the window.
Slightly different situation than Gil. I wouldnt have loaned him to AC STL, but I definitely would have been looking for loan options.
The British papers started those rumors not US supporters. You need to read up a bit more.
And to clarify, I don’t mean Ives starts rumors like that, I mean others on the internet do.
Quick! There’s a coaching opening on a foriegn team with an American (or three) on it… start the “___________ is going to Hire Bob BRADLEY” rumors!
Agree, he’s very talented but still only 16. Jac Mac is in a simular situation but appears to a bit closer to get minutes with the big club
any idea why it took so long to loan gil out? wouldn’t he have been better off playing the whole season at level2 …