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Red Bulls sign forward Mike Grella following successful trial

Mike Grella

By MICHAEL PENG

Mike Grella is coming home.

The New York Red Bulls announced Tuesday that the club has inked the Glen Cove, New York native to an MLS contract, pending a physical. Grella, 28, joined the Red Bulls as a trialist during the preseason after scoring two goals in seven appearances with NASL’s Carolina RailHawks last year.

Red Bulls’ head coach Jesse Marsch said Grella has “earned this contract” with his performance during camp, according to the team’s release.

“His form has been great, but his attitude and work ethic have been even better,” Marsch said.

“He embodies attributes we’re looking for in terms of character and effort,” Red Bulls Sporting Director Ali Curtis said. “We feel that he will add value to our roster and be a positive presence for our club on the field and in the locker room.”

Grella, a former First-Team All-American with Duke University in 2008, was originally selected by Toronto FC with the 34th overall pick in the 2009 MLS Draft but spurned the league initially to play overseas.

The forward found a home in England, where he joined Leeds United and tallied five goals in 40 appearances from 2008 to 2011.

After leaving the club in 2011, Grella split the next two seasons with League One’s Brentford, Bury and Scunthorpe United, before joining Danish side Viborg, where he made just two appearances.

Grella will provide a welcome addition to the attack of the Red Bulls, which needed another option to complement 2014 Golden Boot-winner Bradley Wright-Phillips following the retirement of Thierry Henry.

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What do you think of the signing by the Red Bulls? What are your expectations for Grella with his new club?

Share your thoughts below.

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Comments

  1. Sigh. More pickups from the scrap heap. Entering the season with one DP – BWP – who is barely DP quality. RBNY spent this offseason shopping at the bargain basement sales after Henry, Olave and Cahill left. Even the biggest optimists must be wavering at this point. The sooner RB sells this team the better.

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  2. Good news, really good new. I’ve been waiting for this since the start of his trials. Even as a DC UNITED fan ‘m happy that this move went thru. He had so much potential during his days at DUKE. Its about time players realize its better to come home, get exposure and play in MLS than ride pine for some league 1 or league 2 team in some foreign country where they are more concern with developing their own homegrown players. 6 years later and he’s in MLS…..awesome
    .
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JeCe2qa46sc (1:33 leeds interview with leeds teammates Jermaine Beckford and Neil Kilkenny)

    Good luck and congrats. Hope you regain then form and confidence you had, and excel

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  3. Ok signing. Nothing more.

    40 appearances at Leeds in four seasons is nothing to write home about.

    Nor is scoring two goals in NASL in seven appearances.

    Still refusing to spend money on this club until Curtis is gone and Petke is back. And, Red Bull is out.

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    • Man… New Yorkers are some seriously demanding customers 🙂

      It’s not that I disagree…. everything I have seen from the ownership/management of this club over the past few months has suggested they have thrown in the towel on trophies and have lately focused on a bare bones strategy rooted in (1) offloading high-profile stars ,(2) stripping away any thing or person with large or lengthy contract,(3)systematically identifying, undermining, and removing all coaches and employees who might publicly or privately harbor thoughts that could constitute a vision, and (4) putting anybody except the true decision-makers behind a microphone to spray metaphorical Febreze on the whole dumpster fire.

      9 times out of 10 when you see moves like this its all about prepping the organization for sale. Obviously, this is a good thing (though I don’t think you’ll see Petke back soon…. somebody’s gonna snap him up)

      But until the sale happens, the best you can hope for is a B-plus team (perhaps a playoff contender in NYRB’s case) that specializes in value, which can eventually become depth for the new ownership group to pick through as it implements the long-term strategy and buys the big-name players it needs to flesh out a “champion”.

      For NYRB in particular, this is so absolutely critical. More than anything, I think the organization could benefit from learning “how the other half lives” so that they can finally fix their long-term limitations.

      Watching NYRB underachieve over many years now has made it painfully obvious to me that their ownership and prior management teams have effectively no idea how to construct, grow or manage a depth chart. The top of chart (where they have spent 95% of their attention) has consisted of blue-chip internationals who do not seem to have experienced deputies or understudies in spite of their age and importance to the attacking scheme. Everything is just a merry-go-round of unproductive speculation. Dax McCarty has been a solid fixture, but he has had a rotating cast around him in midfield that has failed to evolove into a convincing unit in spite of endless configurations and personnel, limiting the team (and perhaps Dax’s own) development. Too many youngsters who proved worthless both as contributors and sell-on investments.. So much fascination with (supposed) upside, when mere competence and experience would have been sufficient amongst the role players that provide the platform for the team’s key stars

      And yet the most frustrating/confusing thing is that when they have actually dabbled in “traditional” recruiting on rare occasion of players with experience and proven (if modest) track records, and the results have often been good. Did anybody have to change their drawers when the team signed BWP a few years back?

      It’ll probably be a lost season in NYRB. But right now they are best-served loading up on known quantities on short-term deals than speculating on prospects, where they have failed uniformly over many years. The depth problem that has plagued this team forever has got to be solved before they can really challenge consistently– and this is one of the few problems they can actually begin addressing right now.

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      • Cravin, I assume based on your name you live in London, or maybe further East. If you’re in the States, that’s a LOT to write before 6 AM.

      • It’s worse than you think. I’m on the West coast of the US, and am not even a NYRB fan. Soccer insomnia at its glorious worst

  4. So we have BWP and Grella, maybe Peguy. Is Peguy a forward, no not really. Hmm great depth at forward. And limited wing players. Lets hope hope hope maybe we have someone coming in the summer big.

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  5. Still one of my favorite comments when grella went to Leeds and did his first interview. The comment that followed on this site was great.

    Reply

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