Soooo like, we just skipped cleanout day this year?
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Soooo like, we just skipped cleanout day this year?
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One thing I'm very curious about - is the way Canada played in the World Cup qualifying Herdman's preferred approach, or is because of the players we had available? Canada played with a lot of speed and fluidity. But we obviously had some very quick wingers in Tajon Buchanan and Davies (who got moved around a bit, but used generally as a winger). I'd love to see that be implemented with TFC, it was very fun to watch. I'm so sick of the slow, plodding build-up we have used for years. But obviously we have zero speed to do it at this point.
Journos have not been told about a cleanout day - Molinaro mentionned that this week.
My question is this - is there social media evidence of anybody still around training?
If so - those would be clues to who is sticking around but not 100% evidence
I am not comfortable with social media stalking but if you follow already, nobody is going to complain about a report.
Seems the immediate decisions will not be very unexpected. The 20 guys under contract are going nowhere unless someone is, in time, traded, or a buyout happens (which also probably won’t be anytime soon).
The rest should be not difficult to predict, with a few exceptions. Does Romero stay given Gavran’s good play? Is Gutierrez resigned at lower money (if Bob was still here it would be no, but Herdman knows him and started him in the last match higher up where he’s better). Will Mabika stay given his salary doesn’t count against the cap? Relatively minor stuff like that, it seems?
I figure they kaiboshed cleanout day and the interviews with it as nothing positive for them would come out of it.
We've already heard Bradley & Osorio subtly take shots at the Italians and management after the last match and most likely there would just be more of that. No "sales" value in it. I expect the only further communications from the team to be from Herdman or possibly Hernandez when things like the draft and things come along.
I agree. It’s really management that need to be speaking here and leading from the front.
Glen Grunwald once took the mic at centre court at the last home game for end of a crappy raptors season. Told people he’d do better and the crowd mercilessly booed him. But I’ll tell you what, he won a lot of respect from me for that (and others too).
What a contrast between that action and this group who hire Dunfield as their fall guy and otherwise do the absolute minimum in terms of speaking publicly.
Subtle bit by Osorio in his post-game presser after that last game.
"Trust me, the people moving on, we will do everything can to make sure this club moves forward"
Some personnel moves were already known before that game.
I suspect a coalescing of movements will take place then be announced as a sweep.
Another tidbit from the post game presser by Herdman - they like the 5 man back line idea.
So look for
3-4-3
3-5-2
3-4-2-1
3-4-1-2
as our formations next season.
https://www.torontofc.ca/news/toront...DXSPZEZl0h2_kg
End of season roster moves
It's going to be very hard to achieve proper traditional width and speed to the touchline with our current DPs, if he's confident he's going that road maybe he's confident in moving at least one of them. I'm just looking for a glimmer of hope, really!
This is by far the worst team in the league, and it cannot cut even a single one of its top 10-12 players? Show me another club in world football history like that.
The hopelessness of our situation is effing unreal, when you see it in black and white like that.
The league has to create some rules to help us out here. This is genuinely dire. Franchise threatening. Except for a couple of hundred diehards, nobody is going to be there to watch this again.
Last edited by ensco; 11-02-2023 at 06:11 PM.
"There are some people who might have better technique than me, and some may be fitter than me, but the main thing is tactics. With most players, tactics are missing. You can divide tactics into insight, trust, and daring." - Johan Cruyff
Have they used their buy-out for this year? If they haven't and don't and let it lapse, that's a fireable offence for the whole front office.
Maybe a hot take here, but if we use our buyout, it needs to be Ayo Akinola who is bought out. San Jose isn't keeping him. No one else is trading for him to clog up a u-22 spot and we can't have him clogging up ours.
FWIW, not only to your eyes.
To be fair, if I recall correctly he wasn't a planned signing per se. At the time we had used up his short term loans so essentially got forced into bringing him on full time. He was given a long runway and never took off.
Not sure that any take in relation to this team can be taken as hot. You name a player and odds are he deserves to go.
Well have a top 10 attendance in mls next year regardless.
But also we've shifted 3.5-4 mill of salary from the start of 2023 season (hedges, laryea, Vazquez, Bradley etc). That's before a buyout or any trades or sales happen.
Buyout diomande you've freed up close to 4.5 mill in cap space already which is huge in mls.
We definitely need to do what we can to shift one or both the Italians, petretta, rosted and maybe try to recoup some assets by trading johnson.
I'd imagine some liberalization of the economic rules is coming too which would be a huge help to us.
The most important thing is doing everything to shift the Italians imo. Or at very least bernardeschi.
We're not gonna go anywhere without a dp striker and a 3rd dp in the team and I bet a lot of our players would look a lot better with genuine difference makers around them (I'm thinking kerr, Franklin, coello, blessing, etc).
If we let manning bring in another high paid flop to try to sell tix, however, we're finished for a long time.
I remember that, he also earned respect from me.
You’re right, it’s management that needs to speak here. Manning especially and also Hernandez. We’ve just had a very long press conference with Herdman - I doubt he could add anything after one match in charge. Rubio was hired 3 weeks ago. It would have had to be something other than the usual thing.
Indeed, nothing surprising there. I’m guessing Thompson will be back with us. Petretta will probably play on the left of a back three… I thought he looked okay there and Herdman will probably like his ability to get forward from there. It’ll be interesting to see who they bring in for the other two places.
Thinking about Herdman’s Canada, we have nothing at all like Davies, Buchanan, or Layrea. Not to mention a striker worth his salt.
I think with Canada Herdman was very much in the mindset of “what do I have?” and “what’s the best way to make it work?” He may not try the same things here.
But team speed definitely needs to be addressed. It’s been an issue for years now. The league has only gotten more athletic and faster while we are seemingly stuck in the past and with an overall roster that has very little pace.
We need to be credible on a counter attack up front and have enough athleticism through the midfield to keep up. Not sure how they solve the problem up too short of offloading one of the Italians.