Monday Morning Gaffer: Wrap Up Scrimmage
November 13th, 2008 . 1:46 pm . By: Buzz Carrick
Well this is it for the 2008 season. Certainly a season of dissapointment to say the least. I wonder when someone at HSG/FCD will figure out that crap franchises change coaches all the time and good franchises stick with a guy the growing pains. I guess with Schellas having what appears to be ultimate power and a long term deal they may figure out by accident that sticking with one guy is a good thing. FC Dallas White 2, FC Dallas Green 1Normally I would get right to the Good/Bad thing, but since there are no game reports out there I’ll give you some stuff you need to know first. The scrimamge is played inside the PHP stadium with a full crew of officials. Ferruzzi warms up both teams together but no one coaches each side during play. Ferruzzi and goalkeeper coach Drew Keeshan sit on the bench while Schellas and Ellinger sit up in the stands. Shortly after the game starts Dan Hunt comes and joins Hyndman and a few mintues after that Micheal Hitchcock shows up and sits with them as well. Oscar Pareja watches from high up in the stands above the large TV int he corner. He’s eventaully joined by some other staffers and some players like Dello-Russo and Marcelo Saragosa. Both teams, of course, play a 4-4-2. White: Cunningham Rocha Second half: Oduro in for Cunningham, Lambo in for Burse. Green: Ouma Oduro ‘30: Dax McCarty out, Hernandez to attacking mid, Woodberry on at right mid. Second half: Watson up top in Oduro’s spot, Hernandez drops to holding mid. Garza at left mid and Baladez at attacking mid. Ricchetti takes Pitchkolan’s spot at center back next to Torres. A bunch of guest players today. Kevin Ouma is a Kenyan-born attacking forward who has played for Mathare United (=in Kenya and Al-Ryan in Qatar. Daniel Torres is a central defender and Carlos Johnson is a right back, both are from Costa Rica and just finished the season for Bryne FK in the Norwegian second division. Torres has also spent some time in MLS with Columbus (01-03) and Salt Lake (06-07). Josh Hernandez is the FCD Juniors kid who’s going to the U20s with Lambo and Wallace. Andrew Scaglione is a former FCD Youth player who is now at Richland. London Woodberry is a FCD Juniors player who scored a ton of goals in high school last year. I’ve seen him play outside back for the Juniors before, but today he plays right midfield. He’s a ‘91 and still in high school. In the second half we see a few more guests… Bradley Baladez is another FCD Juniors player. Today he plays central mid wearing #21, like Woodberry he’s also a ‘91 and in high school. Fernando Garza is a former FCD Youth player who plays at Richland. Some notes…- A reporter asked Hyndman about the Glenn Davis rumor (which I have also heard) of a 7 year deal at near $400k. Hyndman called that ludicrious and said Davis needs to seek psychiatric help. - SH’s is heading to River on Nov 29th and then on to CAP. He will return December 9th. - Brek Shea may be joining the contigent of players that will go to CAP, based on recovery. Today he did some ball work on the side line. - Adrian Serioux came out to watch the game after doing some rehab work. - Drew Moor and Keeny Cooper left to join the US yesterday. - Dax McCarty may hed to Europe on a training stint like Pitchkolan is going to do. Both locations TBD. - Jeff Rowland continues to rehab on the a side of the field today. Goals1-0 to White at 15′ Guarda steals from McCarty and carries from midfild all the way to 25 yards out without being closed down. He shoots and scores from there. 2-0 to White at 42′ Another turover in midfield sparks a white counter. Guarda on the right of midfield is led behind the defense with a nice pass from Avila (I think). Guarda runs with the ball to just outside the right wide edge of the box and plays a simple ball across to Cunningham who has outrun all defenders for a easy goal from 10 yards out. 2-1 Green goal at 21′ Garza chases down a lead pass on the right wing and crosses. Wileman one time clears the cross but it falls to Ouma who plays a one touch pass back across box to Woodberry. London hits a cracker of a shot back across the net for a goal. El Bueno (The Good)- Andre Rocha as a second stricker is fascinating. I’ve talked this off season alraedy about finding a place to play him in the Scellas system and this looks like an attempt to find a spot. Rocha was deployed like Schelleto for the Crew, behind Cunningham and freed up to create and influence. Schellas has called Rocha “the most talented and skilled player on our team.” This move might unharness that. Mixed results in this game, but there were a few great, oh-so-close moments. Rocha also got pulled out of place a few times. But the downsides today are easily fixable and I love the potential here. - Man of the Match: Bruno Guarda. Yes, seriosuly. Let’s be honest, the competion in this game is not as good as a real MLS game. Chase Wileman is not Ricardo Clark. But credit for Guarda as he had the best game today, playing both ways as usual. He also frequently swapped and intercahnged with Avila, that’s a tough thing for defenders to keep track of. Second goal came during one of these swaps. - Speaking of Avila, he was interesting out wide in midfield. Not a pure get to end and cross kind of guy, but dangerous penetrating and cutting inside. Makes defenders sit back… great interchange and flow with Guarda. - Torres helped himself, as he was calm & composed. He went up against Dom and Cunningham and did fairly well. But is he the height and speed SH has talked about? Cunningham did outrun him on goal 2, but Cunningham out runs most people. And who would SH give up to add Torres? If there are some holes come spring he might be on the list. Probably not the answer. Can I trade him for Davino? No? Damn. - For me the real exciting revelation today was Bradley Baladez the FCD Juniors player who just turned 17 in August and is 6′1″. Oh my. He plays in the middle and has great defesive instincts, frequently stipping balls. Plays with his head up and can pass well and dribble and possess the ball. Most importantly there was just something about him. He influenced play and wanted to take control. I really want to see more of this kid. - Woodberry has some real upside. He’s very raw at this point, but has range and some pace over distance. The goal he scored was quite nice. - Kevin Ouma is kind of interesting too. He’s not starter quality at this point, as Cunningham and Cooper are still on the roster, and his fitness is really lagging. But he’s very big and strong, plus with some pace. He reminded me of Tony Nhleko but faster, to make a refence for long time FCD fans. To be honest he would need a spring to get fit to really make a call on keeping him. I’d like for SH to keep him around so he can get fit and we can find out if he’s worth adding, cause I can’t tell now. El Camino Central (Middle of the Road)- Carlos Johsnon is intriguging, but FCD has a right back and I don’t see enough to think right mid would work. Being young he has much more upside than Torres I just don’t think there is much use in bringing him here now. Unless Serioux has to be sacrificed this winter to get something else Schellas wants. - Wallace had a game of two halves, the second half being much better. Gee, there’s a suprise, Walalce being in consistent. If this kid would buckle down and work like a professional he could be amazing. There’s so much upside here as I see the raw tools of a Marvell Wynne with more soccer skill. Will he ever figure it out? - What I love about Victor Sikora: his professioanlism, work rate, toughness, and detemination. This guy’s a leader. What I don’t love: age and price. At his age is he worth the risk with the recent knee injury? Goff reported him on $163,000, I would imagine his option is the same or maybe higher. But given that when Ronnie O’Brien palyed here he was on $150,000 are we seeing enough? I’m just not sure. No Tan Bueno (It’s Not Good)- Dax McCarty got kicked and left the game at the 30 minute mark. Schellas said he’s the fittest player on the team, but when you’re in the dog house and have all winter to get healthy, playing through this one might have been just what the doctor ordered. - There’s not a lot bad in this game, except to say that some of the bottom of the roster kids didn’t elevate themselves over the Juniors or kids from Richland. In a game some of these guys should have dominated and excelled in, we didn’t see a whole lot from Wileman, Daniels, and Wadsworth. And that’s not good. 33 Comments Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI Leave a comment |
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but in reference to woodberry and baladez, what’s a ‘91?
‘91… as in “born in 1991″
‘91 is the year they were born in and their age group when playing select soccer.
I’m glad Guarda is making progress
let’s hope this continues and come
season he’s a threat
Ummm you don’t have to be born in ‘91 to be a ‘91
My son was born in Sept ‘96 yet he is a ‘97
It goes from Aug 1 ‘90 to July 31 ‘91 to be a 91…..
Woodberry is a scoring machine. In High school he played Forward and scored 38 goals last year. For FCD Juniors he is mostly playing as right sided defender. He is in his Senior year at McKinney High School.
Not as Familiar with Baladez but the U-18 or 91’s are having a decent season in the US Soccer ACademy League. The U-16’s are even better. If you want to see them play they are playing Saturday at PHP field 8 at 2 and 4pm.
From what it sounds like Avila is similar to Artie in that he goes out wide then takes defenders on and makes his way into the box. Personally I love that kind of player and if Artie wasen’t so lazy I would of loved to keep him. Sikora is also a player I feel we should keep for his leadership ability, besides Pablo and a little from Coop and Drew there are no leaders and with such a young team we need someone like Victor. Just my 2 cents.
I actually attended the game and felt the last comment about Wadsworth and Daniels was very wrong. Daniels wasn’t great but wasn’t disappointing, and was part of that backline which didn’t allow many chances against them, except for at the end when they were down a man. Wadsworth passed the ball well, got up and down the line, played a great long ball almost the whole field to Sikora, hit a few crosses, defensively he needs a little work but from what I know of the kid he is not a right back nor is he expected to play there on this team. not to mention he was combining well with avila, guarda and Rocha. I am interested to know how you were assesing these players. Wileman will always have a place on this team as I remember SH saying earlier in the year that he was one of his guys and that he loves the kid.
I’m evaluating them based on their being 2 kids form Richmond and 3 FCD juniors players in this game. It’s not that they were bad, it’s that they needed to dominate this level of game.
True, there was but then what does that say about all the other players?? Oduro? Watson? Wagner? Pitchkolan? They didnt dominate by any means and one could argue that they are established but with there being 5 amatuer players they should dominate with a breeze….and I am sorry but you are asking a center back, right back and defensive midfielder to dominate a game?? 2 of the 3 were on the winning team from the beginning and if the chances were finished from the beginning for the winning team there wouldnt of been a contest. In addition to that one could argue that Wadsworth did dominate the right side as much as he could, and Daniels didnt get beat once and actually saved the team more then one time. I appreciate the site Buzz and i know this is coming off a little bias but I am interested to hear more from you….Personally I thought Rocha was Man of the match Please shut me up
they were not the only thee who were not dominate, but these three were at the bottom of the roster and need to prove something. SH has said this game was the last chance to evaluate some people. The three I mentioned needed to have great games. Pitchkolan is getting a raise and is in no danger. Watson has been int he 18 and even played before Dom. The three I mentioned are in serious danger from the 9 picks FCD has in the coming draft. Look at the roster dance and you will see what I mean.
Thanks for the article, Buzz. It’s great to get deep insight into this scrimmage instead of just the FCD Blog’s, the-game-happened-and-here-are-the-lineups coverage.
I agree with texansoccer 100%. Please stop drinking the Watson Kool-Aid and stop hating on the same guys.
Thanks for the article Buzz! Good stuff here.
FCD09, I am not hating on anyone. I was an advocate of all three of these players being signed as they all have potential.
But let’s be clear, Hyndman is looking to make big changes here, .500 is not good enough he says. FCD has NINE draft picks this year. Who do you think is going to be fighting with those pics for a job?
This was the LAST chance to make an impression on Schellas before the various drafts/trades/signings take place. Hoe much playing time did those three players get this year? How much chance are they going to get in the spring?
And if you like include Oduro, Watson, Wallace, Dello-Russo, and anyone else to that list.
Ya well I guess that makes sense now that I think about it. I attended the scrimmage and I just felt that you were unfairly harsh on those three when there were more established players who were non existent. But I get your point that the three had to make an impression.
particularly given the post I just made on the blog section about the possible end of the reserve league and a loss of four roster spots.
But as you stated before Buzz SH does not want to get any younger!!! I would not be surprised if those draft picks are gone….especially cause college soccer is lacking this year…more and more players are leaving because the money is there but I think those draft picks will be traded for later years to acquire first round picks…I think that teams like New England who just recently released their entire reserve team will want more draft picks and revamping also, I wouldnt be surprised if Seattle will take a few….I think the first round draft picks will stay but why keep later picks when this teams average age is around 24?? maybe even younger…..wileman is established as SH says about Guarda he knows what they can do he doesn’t need them to show….I will put my life savings on the fact that Wileman will always be here especially with the vast improvements in all facets of the game….You can’t teach touch and knowledge of the game…Wileman is straight class I have watched majority of the reserve games he has been the rock in the middle in all of those games that he has been in the middle….I was actually in Colorado and got a chance to catch the game they were defeated 3-0, Wileman was the best player for FCD…I know its your opinion and we love the site but I mean he isnt in danger neither is Watson—–ELLLINGER come on
You make a fare point about the youth thing, and I would agree some picks will probably get moved.
And you’re right about Wileman being class. I like that kid, he’s a hard worker.
But I still think Wileman is in danger and for that matter Watson probably is as well.
I appreciate the commentary between you two but I think the players being discussed is the least of Fc Dallas’ worries. I believe this team is in a bunch of trouble. Buzz, I was wondering if you could kind of give a timeline of the next events that are happening in MLS. i.e expansion,combine,draft, trade deadlines, window openings, ANYTHING or what FCD is planning? Love the site, keep it up Buzz!
On this team I would say there are very few players that are NOT in danger of losing their job. That is not saying most of the team WILL lose their jobs, but MOST are going to be challenged and if they do not step up to the challenge they will be the ones looking for a place to play.
You can count on your fingers the number of players that will absolutely be welcomed back next season without a major challenge.
Buzz –
any idea whether Daniel Torres brought to RSL by Ellinger?
Losing the reserve league?
Is there any replacement or comparable situation coming down the pike?
Toffee, I believe so. I’ll ask next time I see Ellinger.
Scotty, good idea. I’ll put something together.
Doug, something comparable? No. Unless FCD starts their some-day-it-will-happen PDL team.
You make a big deal of the nine FCD picks in the upcoming draft, but you need to remember that Ellinger will have a say in the players selected. Therefore, it is no sure thing that any of those players will be good enough to displace the lowliest fodder on the current roster. Also, I suspect that at least some of those picks will be dealt. SH likes hard-working, but mediocre veterans. And MLS is chock full of those. He should have no trouble trading for a few of them. Though I wouldn’t mind if he acquired Ugo. I wonder what he would cost?
I know they’ve asked about Ugo.
and yes some picks will be moved and some vets will come in. I wouldn’t be shocked to see close to 40 players in camp next spring when training opens.
I would not be surprised if the reserve league went on hiatus for a couple seasons to save $$$. Just like NASCAR cutting out testing.
However I also think MLS could save money by not signing busts like Davino. They need to pay the quality players well (Cooper) instead.
And the last thing FCD needs is another Klecko. Never was in shape.
Buzz I think you know where I’m headed with the Torres question. I know he’s not signed, but this is starting to get funny.
I’m with you.
If there are European training stints to be had, why on earth would you risk any type of injury playing in a bulls*** scrimmage
No Cooper?
He is with the US Nats.