Ricardo Pepi’s impressive loan spell in the Dutch Eredivisie may be coming to an end, but his time is the Netherlands could reportedly continue into next season and beyond.
PSV has continued its chase to acquire Pepi on a potential transfer to Eindhoven this summer, Dutch outlet ED reported Thursday. PSV is set to advance talks with Pepi’s parent club FC Augsburg and could speed up the process if the Eredivisie side clinches a UEFA Champions League qualification spot this weekend, according to the report.
Pepi, 20, led FC Groningen with 13 goals scored in all competitions for the relegated side. 12 of his goals came in league play as FC Groningen fought off relegation until just last weekend.
A former FC Dallas academy product, Pepi scored 16 goals in 59 MLS appearances with FC Dallas before moving to Augsburg in January 2022. Pepi made four appearances for Augsburg last summer before earning a loan move to Groningen for continued playing time and development.
Pepi’s contract with FC Augsburg is set to run until June 2026. A move to PSV would unite Pepi with former USMNT sporting director Earnie Stewart, who joined the club’s front office earlier this year.
Pepi was not part of the USMNT’s 2022 World Cup squad last fall but did feature for Anthony Hudson’s squad during Concacaf Nations League action last March.
PSV sits second in the table with final matches against Heerenveen and AZ Alkmaar. A win or draw against Heerenveen would clinch Ruud Van Nistelrooy’s squad a spot in next season’s Champions League qualifying round.
With regards to Bradley, He was not Arena’s assistant on the USMNT, though he was for 2 years at DC United and I think for a year at Virginia before he went “home” to Princeton. Arena and Bradley did remain close, however, and Bradley did have some involvement with Arena’s 2006 WC squad, but I don’t think in any official capacity.
In LAFC’s first couple years, it was clear that Bradley (and Thorington) chose the best players they could sign and tried to find a system that fit the strengths of those players. In contrast at the same time Marsch at Red Bull NY sought to implement a system that was based on a high press, winning the ball back quickly to attack. Marsch shed players he did not think fit into that system, even some of the team’s stars and captains and relied upon fit younger players (and BWP). Interestingly both Bradley and Marsch won Supporters’ Shields, though not MLS Cup with the very different approaches.
I think in the end Bradley started to believe more in the way LAFC played than he did in the importance of finding and keeping the best players; that is when LAFC’s fortunes stumbled for a couple years.. I haven’t paid enough attention to Toronto to have an opinion on whether Bradley is doing okl with a weak squad or badly with good players by trying to fit players into a predetermined system to which they are not good fits.
Nistelrooy was a goal machine. He once led the EPL in goals with 0 goals from outside the 18. He had a great reading of the play and anticipation.
Viera, Marsch, Henry, Dolo appear to be the names out there now. Personally I’d still bet the field at this point.
leeds should have dispelled any idea he’s a genius at the elite level — such that he should get it — but the real clown car aspect to this — if he was our chosen guy — is our job was empty december 2022, then marsch was out of work february 2023, and yet having obviously focused on him early on — hence crocker — he maybe gets hired end of may or early june and doesn’t coach all summer. first runs the team september 2023.
personally i think any hiring bureaucracy that lands on berhalter and marsch instead of someone elite isn’t worth its paychecks, and it’s incompetence to take months or even a year to replace a coach.
Rumors bubbling out that Jesse deal is basically done. Of course we heard this with Southampton and Leicester so maybe this is just his team’s strategy. If you listened to Crocker’s interviews after his hiring he seemed to be listing qualities and qualifications that didn’t fit Marsch at all. I’m with this doesn’t seem like a good idea.
His predecessor and successors haven’t done any better. You can’t turn straw into gold.
I agree on this one. We’re going to do a long, exhaustive, protracted search…and then hire Jesse freaking Marsch? You mean, the guy we could have had back in February in about ten minutes with a deal written on a dinner napkin?
If so…great job, Matt. You’ll fit right in with US Soccer and the fine standards of professionalism we’ve come to love and expect from them. It would also definitely begin to explain why Southampton wasn’t just relegated, they were curb-stomped right out of the Prem and have been basically a dead team walking for months now.
If this is what we end up doing with the most important cycle the USMNT has ever had….Sweet Baby Jesus.
Q: that’s part of what upsets me is this is an unusual generation being handed pedestrian coaches. maybe the idea is to build up american coaching in tandem but i don’t see us hiring the actual best domestic coaches and the assistants being apprenticed were awful under GB. i mean what worked historically was someone like bradley, with a MLS title, was the understudy. that’s actually building up the job. 5 time NCAA champion and 4 time MLS champion running USA, with a MLS champ on his bench as the second in command. GB was mediocre and hudson hasn’t won anywhere.
personally i see the mistake as letting the tail wag the dog. pick a dogmatic coach for tactics. hope the tactics work. instead of hire a flexible proven winner where it’s not as big a guess if the tactics translate.
i think going down this moneyball rabbithole has been destructive meanwhile the A’s are about one step from being moved to vegas. yeah, that should be the paradigm…..nickle and dime the team and play analytics games……funny thing is the A’s won before that stats driven business started — and not after……..
Bradley wasn’t Arena’s assistant with the NT he was managing in MLS. You could say Sampson won a title at Santa Clara before assisting Bora, but that experiment went up in flames in 1998. With the birth of MLS, quality managers just aren’t going to sit around on the bench when they can be head coaches in MLS. Luchi, Varas, Wolff all examples from Berhalter’s staff. Vermes isn’t going to give up technical director and manager spot to hold someone’s clipboard. The US soccer landscape has changed. Curtin mentioned it as a theoretical possibility but we’ll see if he gives up his job in Philly to be a #2. We saw how well Kries’s MLS championship benefitted the U23s.
I like Viera out of that bunch. And the qualities Crocker pointed out fits Viera. But both Viera and Marsch would like to stay in the club realm. I wonder if Felipe Scolari would be interested?
He’s 74, so he’d be 77 by the next WC. I understand the CV but not sure you put someone that far along with a still young roster.
They start Luuc DeJong at Cf he’ll be 33 in August but had a good season. They also have some promising looking young attackers. If he’ll get minutes it’s a good spot, if DeJong is going to play 75 mins per game it doesn’t make much sense
Not worried. Pepi will get plenty of playing time. Also remember that two striker formations are coming back again.
Not in the Netherlands and not at PSV.
RVN was a one man strike force. SAF got him for that reason. He was tired of Man U. being overrun in midfield.
Regardless, that’s not to say Pepi couldn’t learn a ton from Ruud whatever formation they use.
As an assistant, Ruud used to coach the strikers at PSV but with this promotion, it remains to be seen how much time Ruud will have for Pepi. I would think he’d want to hire someone else to do his old job.
Definitely a good spot for him. Hope it happens. No better striker teacher than Van Nistelrooy.
I think it would be a good move since PSV is often in the Champions League and has made the knockout rounds in the CL in the past.