SoccerWise - Soccerwise: MLS Edition Houston DP Signing, FCD Coach Firing, USMNT-Brazil And More

Episode Date: June 13, 2024

00:00 Soccer Wise Launches Live Show06:24 Houston Dynamo Sign Ezekiel Ponce as DP12:50 Tom Trying To Be Coached By Tab Ramos17:30 Atlanta Coaching Shuffle And Their Summer Plans27:42 Nico Esteves Let Go What Is Next For Dallas42:00 Colorado Rapids Transfer News48:03 Julian Carranza Transfer Battle To Feyenoord1:00:00 USMNT-Brazil Reaciont1:05:05 CANMNT-France Reaction Soccerwise Live 2pm ET Every Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday on Youtube/Twitch/Twitter

welcome everybody into soccer wise our first ever live episode if we're even out there and if we're on and if we're even live thank you everyone for joining us david goss and tommy scoops with you here we're going to come with you live every single week twice a week to talk MLS USMNT as we get into Copa America we'll talk a little Olympics in this one we'll talk some negative stuff for US soccer as well with Obed Vargas moving on and so much more um we're excited Tom we did our intro last night with Jordan she will be on with me to talk Nwsl as we get into next week which will be our first full week and i'm excited to be on right now talking with you having zero idea if anyone can hear us yeah i mean as as i'm trying to tweet this live um i

don't think that anybody can hear us because i don't see any links i don't see any tweets as i'm trying to put that out but yeah david goss it's just great to hear your voice and talk soccer with you it It is exciting. I did realize as I got into the day, like, oh, whoa, I'm doing this again. I haven't done some deep MLS talk in a little while on a show. I've still been talking about it with all my friends and everyone else, and I'm excited to dig into this one. It is classic. You already have breaking news that we can start the show with as we go through.

But one of the reasons that we're doing this live is because I've always wanted to do a live interaction with fans. So be in the comments section on YouTube and Twitch. We'll work on other streaming platforms as well. Tweet at us throughout the day, throughout the weeks to ask us any questions. And then we have set up Patreon so that people can be in there. And we're going to do some Patreon-only mailbag shows. And we're going to do some private shows as well for Patreon supporters. We're going to get the Millers out so that we could really break it down

and talk the game. My family is not watching right now, but my in-laws are Orioles fans. And I didn't know this about you, or is it just the nice hat? No. Can I just wear a nice hat for a baseball stadium that I love this is like I it's like makes me want to stop wearing this hat because because people ask you the last time I wore this hat um this this kind of thing happened um yeah it's funny you were joking about I'm getting a phone call right now on potential

breaking news and I don't really know what to do like can you monologue for eight ten seconds i could monologue as long as you would like for me to reminder to mute yourself at some point over the course of that otherwise we're getting tom um overhearing him chat so we are very excited about this we're very excited about this show we went into a little bit on our intro episode which you can go back and listen to i am currently working on making sure we are on every podcast platform. So feel free to keep tweeting those at me. Because when you ask, are you going to be on this? I can go make sure we are.

I've been in a battle with some entities on digital media to make sure that we are everywhere, that you can find your podcast and that you want to find your podcast. So I'm working on that. And any feedback, I appreciate. Any feedback, we appreciate. This show is want to find your podcast. So I'm working on that. And any feedback, I appreciate. Any feedback, we appreciate. This show is supposed to be for everyone. So the type of shows you want to hear, how often you want to hear them, the style of

shows, the topics you want us to talk about, anything like that, we are happy to listen to you. So feel free to DM me, tweet at me, tweet at the SoccerWise account, which we are now building out. Thank you, by the way, to one of my good friends for helping create the graphic, which looks super cool. And we're going to continue to grow on that and put together merchandise and all of those things as we go along, because this is our opportunity to build our own platform, to

talk about the sport and talk about the game, to platform Tom at him doing what he does at his best. Jordan as well, who breaks down the game better than anyone. We've got a ton to do on this show before Tom comes back in. He's got breaking news on Houston Dynamo. We've got FC Dallas coaching stuff to talk about, Atlanta coaching stuff to talk about as well, some moves in Colorado, Columbus.

So a ton to talk about. We'll get some weekend preview in there as we go along. And then, of course, we'll react to the U.S.-Brazil game. We'll talk a little Olympics and we'll get you ready for Copa America. It is shocking to me after this week that you watch U.S.-Brazil and France-Canada and they're basically the same soccer game, which is bizarre, but also like kind of makes sense because it's Jesse and it's U.S. soccer and it's kind of all the same. Tom, do you have any updates for us?

You feel good? No, I feel good. I just wanted to throw my phone into the ocean is what I wanted to do. But, yeah, nothing that I can say right now from that phone call. But, like I said, we can get into the Houston Dynamo news if you want to just kick off the show. Yeah, let's do it. So, Houston Dynamo. That was like the warm-up.

That was like watching me and you do rondos, watching me be like oh my boots aren't tied we need to go back so yeah everybody got a real good listener so just to throw out there my seasons my men's league i skipped this week because it was my birthday and i went and saw gary clark jr um which you don't know i don't want to do anything other than kick people in a men's league game on my birthday i'm shocked to hear that i didn't know the season would have started already and my co-ed has not begun but after this week thursdays are going to be rec league reviews because i know you went to your game last night straight from our recording and i assume it went well yeah i your

boy had i think four assists and a seven nil win nice nice and nice way to start the season and didn't get selfish even up four or five didn't start looking for glory and goals no i'm i'm a i'm a chance creator i'm not i'm not a dribbler these days particularly so so yeah that's uh i i believe in the finer things in life like i don't need the goal like i i get enough satisfaction from the assist it's just you know you need to be on a higher plane you know i just Love that. All right. Hit me with the news. Oh, wait.

I can do this. No, I can't do this. Yes, I can. Go. Dude, that is phenomenal. Lower thirds. It's just top quality. So, yeah, sources told me that the Houston Dynamo are finalizing a club record deal to sign designated player center forward Ezekiel Ponce from AEK

Athens. I don't know what the exact figures are. My assumption is that means within the region of like 5 million. Their previous club record was like 4.7, which is Sebas Ferreira. And the Houston Dynamo have been looking for this big attacking boost for the last couple months. And from what they told me, or from what I was told, told sorry just from around reporting on this asking around of what he's done in greece and europe he's well traveled he's played in a ton of different leagues in europe and again he's been excellent under matias almeida at ak athens he his data and what they want in ben olsen's game model kind of jumped off the page and when they were uh kind of combing their list from identifying players to a long list to short list to finalists like ponce he was kind of always there like all

right this is our guy like there's probably bigger names and there's maybe like more expensive deals that they could have pursued but it was like we think that this is our top target we think this is how this is who fits the best so that deal is about to be done things are being finalized just you know final signatures and everything else and then it should be announced okay love this stoked about this um i think you start as a reaction as like okay houston spent some money and signed a player that's like the initial part of like okay this is positive um it seems like he's what, 29, I believe? 27, sorry.

Coming from Ike, scored a ton of goals there. It feels like the idea is to take advantage of what's going on, which is that they are competitive right now, that Ache Ache is into towards the end of his prime. Like this is the team to build rather than signing. I think Aliyu's been really good this year, and that's a different type of signing. But rather than doubling down and going super young and being like,

oh, we'll sell this player in three or four years. So I think if you're a Houston fan, you have to be excited there, which is they are trying to win games today. They are trying to be better than they were yesterday. And this is the clear avenue to get better for a team that has a solid back line, has fullbacks that do the exact job they want are obviously loaded in central midfield the clear upgrade was at this position and rather than waiting or even waiting for the sebas deal to be done it seems like

they're being proactive in getting this done first yeah so they can move eric sviachenko he's just technically a dp right now that's just accounting purposes that's just to save allocation money just every team should be doing that by the way i had like as recently as a couple years ago not all teams were doing it which was a surprise to me where they would only have like two db spots filled and then be buying somebody else down with tam but anyway so they had the flexibility they are still working to offload say bass ferreira that is something that's active i don't know if anything's close or not right and i'm assuming i know that all parties would prefer it be a permanent deal at this point he went on loan to vasco tagama last year and the eye and like they well and truly believed when he came back this winter that he was going to be the starting center forward yeah he's got one more

chance like he looked a lot different this preseason than he did under the first one under ben olsen where he very quickly fell out of favor because he wasn't doing what Ben Olsen wanted from their number nine. Houston had so much success without him in 2023, and now 2024. It really was – everybody was optimistic, and that wasn't them being cheap. It wasn't them failing to get rid of him. It was kind of all parties, and unfortunately he's dealt with injuries, and there is no more let's see what happens, let's see what happens. They were intent, but they wanted to not only have this deal done as quickly as possible

to make sure that the player Ponce will be able to debut when the window opens on July 18th there's still whatever four games I believe left for most teams so I don't know exactly what Houston has and but the visa will be done he'll be able to be in training for several weeks before he can debut. So the idea is that day one he's able to play 90 minutes, if available for selection for 90 minutes. I think huge credit goes to Ben Olsen's staff and the players that are there and that when Ache Ache didn't start the year and then Sebas goes down, what, week one? Or actually it was in CONCACAF, so before they even started MLS.

You kind of thought it was going to be like season's over and they've hung around enough i think to convince ownership in the front office to make this move like they are seven they're three points out of a home playoff game that is because they stuck to their fundamentals and they played the way that they do they control games they control games in possession not to score but to defend because they can't really score but it's kept them competitive and it's kept them in this season and so you look at a move like this and you say if it goes poorly they should still be a better team like it's an option at the center forward position that they just haven't genuinely had over the course of this entire season that's a great way to put it like it's additive right now um it is

completely necessary i want to say like i've been impressed by what they were able to do particularly earlier in the season when they were without hector herrera but like as you said like there's just not enough attacking firepower can you own this going down before the season was unfortunate i'm told that they are still in the market for u22 initiative attacker they were hoping to get a deal done on that front in april before the primary transfer window closed but it's kind of difficult to do deals around them like cincinnati they had to fight tooth and nail to get kevin kelsey from on loan from shocktar and shocktar weren't playing him he played like 300 minutes all season and even then they were like oh we can't lose him he's an important squad player so that just shows the difficulty of trying

to get a deal done in april when other teams can't replace players and they're at the end of their season like all right screw it we'll just do it in the summer so it wasn't for a lack of trying but they they were well well understood that they need multiple big big signings in the attack i will say i didn't know what direction this search was going to go if i had to have guessed i would have assumed it was a younger kind of rising player um you brought this point up kind of off the jump for this for this deal like i would be very excited as a houston dynamo fan there is still the possibility that they could resell him down the road and like we saw yorgo shagamaki's what's going on with atlanta but this isn't like uh we're buying an exciting young player we're gonna let him develop and then we're gonna sell him like it can be, but this is obviously we want to win right now. We want a player in his prime.

And they need it. I think you also look at, like, we've talked about this with some other teams. He probably makes Aliyu's life better. Aliyu then becomes more sellable down the road as he performs better and he's more comfortable on this team. There's a ton of options like that. For anyone out there messaging us, I'm working on YouTube while we're talking uh people on twitch want to know if tab really told tom to learn how to pass oh my god if you need me to to filibuster for like i don't know 35 minutes i could tell that story

so he coached you very briefly look um i played for tabs academy and jsa at the time it's since been sold a little new jersey soccer this was um right before he took over as United States U-20s coach. I'm the same age as his son, same birth year. His son was miles better than me. His son was at TSD for the second year in a row. Was he? How'd he do? I played against him in men's league last year, and I was like,

what in the hell are you doing on this field, man? I think he was on Jimmy Conrad's team. I did not cover him. Last year he was on a team with two guys, the Caligiuri brothers, who are like big brother MTV reality TV star legends that played college soccer at Rutgers who are super Jersey. Hold on. It was like, wow.

Why don't I know this? That's incredible. That is such a hole in my game. Yeah. Yeah, that's incredible. Yeah, so I'm his son's age and there was like a special not a special tournament but it wasn't like it wasn't like oh we're going down to south america for some like club thing it was it was more about like we played some

friendlies in argentina and it was a mixed group me and his son were the only two 95s birth year not like the young we were the two youngest players on the team and i already told you his son is miles better than me the older players were also better than me and also older so i that was uh that was a clear like oh i'm not gonna be professional like there's no chance at 15 years old but like it was such a fun experience and we played we played some second division academy on on a muddy dirt field it was was cool. Won that one. Playing good. Feeling good. We go play River Plate.

We were playing there either 95 or 96 teams. So they were either younger than everybody but me and Alex Ramos. Or the same age as me and Alex and then younger than everybody else. So we had the older team. We had a couple 18-year-olds, but mostly they were 16, 17-year-olds. My man, we did not come close to touching them. I couldn't imagine what the possession numbers were. I probably played half of the first half. I was a disaster.

And, again, this is, like, there wasn't technically anything on the line. Like, right, it was more about the development, the experience, everything else. Like, we weren't playing for a trophy or anything. Get into halftime, and I'm like, wow, that was tough. And I could kind of see Tab, like, he's starting to really get into it on the sideline. And I was like, all right, well, this is the first time he's coached me.

I wasn't very good, but neither was anybody else, so I think that I'll probably just stand in the back here and escape a little bit. And he did not leave a single soul untouched in that end. Team Tuck. And at one point he came to me he's like tom can you complete complete an effing pass and like i like stood there and nodded i was like you're right i've been awful like i like i would be screaming at me too and it was like it wasn't

like anything militant like i don't want anybody to get this idea that that tab is like a crazy angry guy he was a lovely man he was so so nice had so much time for everybody and was really good as a coach. But in that moment when we're getting killed by River Plate at halftime, it's like, hey, can you complete a pass? I'm like, yeah, if that's fair. Did he remember in today that he ever coached you on top of not remembering saying it? I don't know if he really remembered the first time I told him,

but the first time I interviewed him when he was the U20s head coach, he definitely remembered the trip. I don't know if he really remembered the first time I told him, but the first time I interviewed him when he was the U20s head coach, he definitely remembered the trip. I don't know if he remembers me, but again, he's an impossibly nice person to me, at least. So I don't want this to come off as anything other than me making fun of myself. Don't take away anything negative about Tab, because I think it's

too funny. It's amazing. Also, cred to you for going and playing River Plate plate didn't know that was a thing that you did in your life it's pretty cool i played against river plates dude this is so unbelievably uninteresting to most people but i will just end it on this to say i've played against river plate and i have also played against the chinese olympic age group whatever don't get that scarf when zhao kane the light blue one yeah down my my d3 university in new jersey was the first school to open a university i believe in china we were either first or second and harvard was either first or second sold out first whichever

one it is point of pride um okay i'm not going to figure out youtube while we're doing this so i apologize if you're watching on twitch thank you i will keep going through those comments it will be posted as a podcast everywhere you get your podcast as soon as i can get this done this is only the first episode we are going to be doing four shows a week uh a weekend review that i'm going to get out as fast as i can either on sundays or mondays and then me and tom are going to be on every Tuesday at this time. Then as a podcast, Tuesday and Thursday. And then Jordan on Wednesday.

So I apologize for everyone who's super excited, who wants to be here right now, who isn't, who's listening in the future and anyone on Twitch. Keep shooting us with all your comments and we'll dig through them. So Houston making a DP signing. They also are going on the road to play against Atlanta on Saturday and Atlanta put out one of the weirdest news releases of this season, which is that they have hired Carl Robinson as an assistant coach to an interim coach while they still don't have a permanent head coaching solution.

Carl Robinson, obviously a longtime MLS player after being a Welsh international. New York Red Bulls, TFC, and then coached the Vancouver Whitecaps for a while. Came back as Wayne Rooney's assistant most recently with DC United and then followed him to England. I cannot put my finger on this. And like, who is hiring an assistant coach without a head coach? It sort of goes back into as positive as some things have been under guard since he took over and the team's been better overall over the last year and a half. It's still super chaotic.

And it feels like since Tata left, everything Atlanta does is in the wrong direction. Yeah, I think you're i i like i don't understand i don't know again like you said who hires an assistant coach and why you hire an assistant coach like does this mean that rob valentino has the inside track i think that would be a little bit presumptuous in in this right now but i don't know what the end game is here yeah for atlanta or for call robbins right like, unless he thinks that he could come in and either, hey, I have a guaranteed contract through whatever, or, hey, I have a chance to be the top assistant to whoever takes the job, whether it's Rob Valentino or somebody else.

It's just really weird to me. Like, I don't really see the boost. I don't see the value, and I don't see, like, i don't see like long term maybe yeah you told me that's fine right like i don't want this to sound so crazily negative towards carl robinson just catching strays here for taking a job but i don't i don't understand i really don't know also to be clear you don't have to throw strays but i'll just mention like coming out of vancouver there's not a lot of positivity about carl robinson um especially for the way he handled i think a lot of transfers and the players he chose to bring in

and the way he chose to go about it which won't be his responsibility here yeah but it's again it's just very odd and you look at a atlanta group that you know frank de boer doesn't go well or sorry heinze doesn't go well you get stuck Heinze doesn't go well. You get stuck in a DeBoer situation as well. Both of those are weirdly timed in terms of when they happen in the season. Garth comes in. Pineda's already there. So you're not going to fire a manager that you haven't worked with yet. Even though he had worked with him in the past.

So now you're in an awkward spot. Then you get into Pineda gets let go. The assumption now is like what I think we're going to talk about with dallas you're going to wait for the year so that you have the next coach in place for the next season but you don't rush it so why are you in now at this point employing anyone permanently as part of the staff unless it's just for the end of the year and this is a way to sort of help rob valentino keep i you know keep the the train on the tracks yeah like that's that's the most plausible scenario in which okay you it makes more sense but look i would be really surprised

if that's what's happening with if atlanta aren't planning on hiring a full-time head coach until the offseason and even so in the low low case scenario if that's the plan i don't know why it would be the plan um unless like again y jacob mackie's is leaving but this is this this was supposed to be a win now roster this was a team that a lot of people had in the top four in the eastern conference myself included and we're just straight up wrong this team is too talented to punt on a year nashville part of the reason why they parted ways with gary smith when they did mike jacobs was like we believe that this this is a team that can do something this year we believe in the, like, I love that that was the mentality

or that was how that they spun it forward because, one, in MLS, you always have a chance. Yeah, for sure. And, two, they have Hany Mukhtar, Walker Zimmerman. Like, you can fix some stuff around the edges. You can bring in a new coach on the fly. Like, you don't have to punt on the season. Hell, even Toronto FC last year, they punted on the season.

And guess what? They lost 16 of their last 17 games before, or 17 of 18, including Canadian Championship. It's unreal. And that was part of it was that we're just going to have an interim for a while. It's like, why? So what's the point? So I think, one, you would argue as well,

this Atlanta roster is pretty set up in that if you can bring the right coach in who can, one, motivate, turn the culture around, but two, that if you can bring the right coach in who can one motivate turn the culture around but to continue to put pieces in the right place it should be pretty cohesive and like you've got options in central midfield you've got options on the wing the big question mark is the center forward do you does this now take you in a spot where you say maybe they don't replace Yakumakis no no no they're gonna they're gonna absolutely do that and and with urgency like if they don't it's just because they couldn't get deals done or targets whatever happened like that they're absolutely gonna try to replace him the problem

is is that he won't play the next four like he'll be gone he's played his last game for atlanta united unless he fails the medical that just is what it is um and they have four or five games until the transfer opens they as part of the negotiation was cruz azul when cruz azul put the 10 million bid forward and they were going to accept it they were like hey do you think he could stay until july 18th i don't blame them for asking yeah cruz azul not having any of it uh yakumakis i think was having even less of it even if cruz azul said yes i don't think yakumakis would have showed up so it would have been like straight into leaks cup well it would have been straight into Leagues Cup.

Well, it would have been July 10th when the transfer window opens. But I'm saying that means I think Cruz Azul starts Leagues Cup like five days later. Yeah, whatever the case is, they wanted to keep him until the transfer window opened because they were trying to bridge to when they could replace him immediately. It's not something that they're not considering. Yeah. It's going to be interesting because i

think garth has a history of in seattle signing talented players and talented players that like anyone could work with but you would think you would want a coach's input on what style of center forward they want especially because we assume tiago amada will be gone as well and so for the most part the team is going to be built around whatever this number nine signing is until they then bring the replacement there. You have some updates with Almada? Yeah, so there's been rumors that Botafogo are – one rumor said that the deal was closed. That is just not true from what I understand. But what is true is that Botafogo desperately want to sign him.

Their owner even said as much in March. They tried to make a last-ditch lower bid, and Atlanta obviously said no. And then the owner was like, oh, I understand that they can't replace him. He pretty much said in March, we're going to go strong for him in the summer. And I believe it's genuine. I also believe he knows it's positive press for his team to be linked with Thiago Amada. And at least, hey, look, we're trying to sign a World Cup winner. All this, hey, everybody thinks he's going to go to Europe, but maybe he'll come here for a year and then go to Europe.

So it's advantageous for Botafogo for this to be out there. And again, the interest is real. What they want to have happen is real. There have been at least some talks in terms of Botafogo calling and trying. I don't know if it's been an official bid, an official bid rejected. I don't know what Thiago Almada wants. I wouldn't assume that it's Botafogo. It's a lateral move.

Botafogo, maybe they're a bigger – it's not the jumping-off point that we all think for him. So I'm not sure what would happen here. But that is a team that really wants him. Their record signing was €16 million, whatever it was, two years ago. Otherwise, every other player is 6 million or less. Really? It's not really a club that's in this stratosphere.

They're not Palmeiras. They're not Corinthians. They're not one of the huge ones. And even the big ones in Brazil are not normally spending at the number that we thought atlanta was going to get for tiago amada when we talked about setting a transfer record breaking miguel elmi ron's number like we're not talking about clubs that hit at the 30 million mark and above so that's where it's confusing where you assume it this is with a percentage to sell yeah there there is a report in brazil i think it said in the range of 20 million and i

was like if it's 20 million the sell-on's gotta be like 35 like i don't know what yeah what um what because then that would take the valuation to closer to like 30 million so i i mean it's unlikely is is the best i put it and that's some sourcing and some discussions but that's more so just general deduction right like yeah this isn't something it makes a ton of sense and and hey we'll see we'll see if that's wrong so a lot to talk about for atlanta a lot to think about for them uh again they face the houston dynamo this weekend i think it's one of the best games of the weekend it's two teams that are probably going to open up and play a little bit atlanta's been ridiculous at home because they don't control games and they're not consistent all of that

was part of pineda leaving and if you remember last time um they were actually somewhat consistent in their interim run in between when pineda took over and i think a lot of that was simplifying the game and making things straightforward uh they'll have no Saba because of Euros. So that's something to watch out for with them. But again, I think when you talk about simplifying the game, you talk about a team that maybe is a little bit more straightforward, a little bit more direct. And Yakumakis would have fit perfectly into that.

He is not a part of it. But there's still a ton of talent on this roster. And I think when you go into a game where Dex doesn't have to chase Messi, he can help with a lot of that and his experience and what he's done. And you can try and hopefully solidify at that center back position. Because every time they switch from 5-4, everyone is chasing ghosts on that back line. And you at some point need someone to be able to defend 1v1 if you're going to be able to take steps forward.

So it'll be an interesting one this weekend because Houston are going to move through that zone 14. They're going to move the ball a ton. You're going to have the fullback sort of come into the attack. Is Brooks Lennon chasing there? Is Caleb Wiley chasing there? If not, what's the overload situations and who's helping in those spots? There's a lot of question marks that Houston asks

that I don't think Atlanta is super comfortable with, but also could show like, oh, this is going to be the shift without Pineda if they are able to have a positive performance this weekend. So that game's on Saturday night. Every game on Saturday except one. But let's talk FC Dallas before we get there. FC Dallas letting Nico Estevez go this week because no one likes having coaches in Major League Soccer, clearly, and that's the future that we're in for. So they let Nico Estevez go this week because no one likes having coaches in major league soccer, clearly. And that's the future that we're in for.

So they let Nico Estevez go. Peter Luxen, I was told to pronounce it is the interim in Dallas. And Dan Hunt said that he is currently trying out for the full-time job. So it feels like. What else are you going to say? What else are you going to say? Right? Like, I mean, you could say this is a longtime soldier of the club and a club legend, and we think that he can help guide us through this tough moment without saying this is his game.

Toronto said this about Terry Dunfield. This is what you say. I think it's possible, but I don't place a lot of – But my reading of this is they're not going to rush the coach in over the course of this summer. Like I would be shocked if the coach starts before the reading of this is they're not going to rush the coach in over the course of this summer. Like, I would be shocked if the coach starts before the end of this year, whether they hire that coach or not. Interesting. I don't know because I don't want to get ahead of myself to candidates first, but I don't know.

I'll save that for when we get there. Thoughts on it happening? My only thought is, the only surprise is that it took this long. And there's just been so much disappointment around this team. it happening my only thought is i'm the only surprise is that it took this long and there's just been so much disappointment around this team and some of it is some of it is internal at myself because i fell for it i fell for dallas i fell for oh look at the pieces that they put together this makes so much sense in theory this makes so much sense when i look at it on my depth charts on google

docs yeah oh man and now they're putting in a 10 million dollar center forward on top of it dude they're gonna rip there's gonna be great nico's talking about how they're gonna play front foot and dominate with possession all this and then it's just slow sideway passing and then they're not getting results because they're second to last in mls and expected goals they're not creating chances everybody's underperforming to a man. It's like the opposite of Wilfred Nancy, where everybody overperforms. And then they start, they even start ceding possession because they have to be pragmatic because Nico Estevez knew his job was on the line.

Again, I'm surprised that this didn't happen in March. So I'm an even bigger mark in that I re-watched the Minnesota game and was like, they were pretty good this weekend against a terrible Minnesota team where they actually did create some dangerous chances. Everything you said is right. Obviously the Paxton Pomichael injury was huge. They don't have... It gets hurt every year.

That is... E.R. Mendy, same thing. If you're painting your tactical hopes... That's a larger FC Dallas conversation, right? That's true. Nico Estes can't do anything if those are the two players that he's in. Who do you think signed E.R. Mendy? Oh, 100%. But not on Paxton. Paxton's sure. You can't do anything. If those are the two players signed ER Mendy. Oh, a hundred percent, but not on Paxton. Paxton's there. Fair enough.

But like Paxton's potential is better than whatever else they're going to sign. You're right about that. Fair, fair, fair. They cannot pass through midfield. They don't control the game. Jesus has to drop super deep to get the ball when he's healthy. And he was hurt for a while as well.

I was a little interested to see Paul Areola's post. He was like super complimentary and connected to Nico Estevez. And he's the guy where it's like, well, you've played second forward, center forward, wingback, winger. It felt like it was actually toughest for him in this whole period. So it was interesting to see him say like, we never gave up. You've turned me into a better person and a better player. Like, obviously you're not going to go out of your way to say something negative he went out of his way

though on this post yeah really complimentary it's one of those moments where it's just you walk away from these things and we have a view from the outside i think you get into this with the national team of like everyone asks about what greg does well and every player wants to play for him so those are always differences inside and out. And yet, they still played scared. And that's the part that you come back to with Dallas. They played on their heels. They played scared.

They played in the middle third. They played in the defensive third. There was very little possession in the final third. And when that possession comes, it is not with overwhelming numbers because they're so worried about giving things up on the backside. The center backs. I think that was the one personnel spot where it felt like a problem coming into the year and is still a problem. They would have to,

I think no matter what you do at coach, you have to upgrade at that position and have someone who can play both ways. Because if you want your wingbacks involved in the game, you need someone that can help you defend in transition moments and hold up play until everyone else comes back. And all of that's not even talking about central midfield, where that is their biggest weakness. That's their biggest hole. And you just you don't see anyone who can connect the game for those front three. And so it felt like if Jesus dropped a little deeper with Peter Moussa coming, that does the job.

He's still too far. He's either too far from Musa because he has to come so deep to get the ball or he's too far from the back line to pick it up. And so you look at a team that can't play through a lot of these. You don't want to go into candidates? You want me to start naming right now? No, no, no. I was saying I didn't want to hijack the conversation.

I wanted to look back before we look forward. If you had to guess before you said a name, you think it's someone with mls experience or not well the name that i'm thinking it's it's okay not technically yeah eric quill is a name that i think is i wouldn't i know is going to be in the mix eric quill former north texas sc is that technically mls experience it's mls next pro or mls league one um but anyway when they hired nico estevez i was told eric quill was a finalist somebody i talked to went as far as to say he was a runner-up i don't know if that's a thousand percent true but i know that he's somebody that the club still really

really rates he's currently at new mexico united usl championship he's got that team top of the western conference i have actually talked to people around usl about eric quill about that team it's a lot of positives. It's a lot of compliments. So I think that he's going to be heavily involved. I don't know. It'd be way too early to call anybody a favorite, but I know that he's going to be in the mix.

Okay. I think that's an interesting one. I think one of the things you heard from, whether it was Zenota or Hunt in the conversations was like they've disconnected the academy. And so Eric Quill is a guy who's worked in their development structure. He's been around there. He then worked in Columbus, who started to do this really well. And if you're going to take an opportunity on a young up and coming coach, why not a guy who won a lower division championship for you?

So I think that name makes a ton of sense. Those are the names I'm thinking of as well, of like you get into the Danny Cruises and Palmo de Casa of the world to have won at a lower division championship for you so i think that name makes a ton of sense those are the names i'm thinking of as well of like you get into the danny cruz's and palmo de casa the world who have won at a lower division ben pyramid as well i think is going to be in conversations like this i'd be interested if there's someone off the oscar pareja tree that they think they can go and get connected to um he has older assistants normally in what he's done and then obviously luchi's not an option or going to be an option but part of their issue in the academy is like the talent's not the same and i have said it was a golden generation and that's fine you're not going to produce a weston mckinney and then chris richards and then a brian reynolds every year but like in watching the youth

levels that the teams are not as competitive the players are not as good and i think part of that is austin's come onto the scene houston's re-established themselves yes el paso's done a good job san antonio's done a great job so like they are losing battles for players in texas while they thought that they were in a range where they were going to expand out and rather than lose battles in in Texas, they thought they were going to dominate in Oklahoma and Alabama and the edge of Florida, and that's where Chris Richards' players and guys like that come from. They need to fix a lot of that,

and so the manager doesn't need to do that, but it needs to be connected enough that people that are in these scenarios start to be curious about the club. When Oscar Perao came into a room for ricardo pepe's family like they wanted to go play for it and lucci comes into that meeting as well the family's connected they're inspired by that and they know who oscar prea is both for his work in mls and his columbia background like they know who that person is so you need someone who sort of hits a few of those things if you're dallas and can then re-establish what's going on because I think for

Zenota it's like you look at this team and the big signings have not hit and he replaced their biggest young player sales with Alan Velasco and Petar Musa and Velasco has been okay when healthy and not really healthy and Musa has not performed yet so for him now, the pressure has to be there, that he has to get a manager who can make his players work. Yeah, that's fair. I mean, it's just the most annoying pushback out of all of it. I agree with a lot of what you said, but just a little hair to split is Peter Moussa.

I wouldn't say that he hasn't impressed. I'd say that he's been pretty good, maybe not 10 million good, but also, again, this team second to last or dead last in MLS in expected goals in Jens Granat. I'm not sure what else he's supposed to do. He's still got some goals. So for me, I would be leaning more positive on that than negative. Comment on Twitch that they can have Preja back,

which I think is what we're getting from Orlando fans. Lord Billiam, appreciate the pronunciation guide. That's how I had heard it as well. But now he made a recording that they sent to us. Directly to David Goss. No, I think I, well, I don't know who's got it. His son, by the way, is one of actually the good players in the academy right now. So you can get the multi-generational addition going for.

Austin has Josh Wolfe and Owen Wolfe. And then Dallas could have this. And we'll see how quickly the fans would turn on them. Yeah. A center mid going in there. I mentioned Velasco. There is a. I'm just going to start the like, is this a real thing?

Or are you going to ignore me? Questions. Apparently Boca Juniors put in an offer for Alan Velasco. He's out. I'm just going to start the, like, is this a real thing or are you going to ignore me questions. Apparently Boca Juniors put in an offer for Alan Velasco. He's out most likely for the full season with an ACL tear. What? Bro, he did it in, like, July or August. I thought it was, like, the last week of the season. No.

Okay. He'll be back this summer. This summer is what, like, so. Off an ACL tear. Boca wouldn't be making a bid for a player that wouldn't be available for six months right like but anyway boker jr they're making a bid for a player who just stores acl so either way there's not that's very good doctors um yeah boker jr's made uh interested in in alan velasco i think that they're trying to sense an opportunity to buy low because they offered $3 million for 50% of effectively a $6 million valuation.

FC Dallas paid $7 million for him. I will tell you $3 million plus a 50% sale on is nowhere near close what FC Dallas would even consider. And I don't know what the number would have to be for them to truly consider. I know that you have a different feeling on this. For me, I wouldn't sell low on Velasco. I'd want to see him be part of this team. Again, I still think that whether it's a 3-4-2-1 or a 4-2-3-1,

a system that includes Peter Moussa, Jesus Ferreira, and Alan Velasco makes a ton of sense to me. So, again, maybe I'm just going to fall for it again. But that's the Dallas and what makes sense in theory. It does, man. And, like, I think those three players complement each other. And, like, I don't think – I think if you wanted to go get $3 million, $3.5 million for 50% of his rights in January, you could go do that.

Right. So I don't – there's – it would have to be a bigger offer. I would say that you don't have to jump on that move now because it's not going away yeah i see the sign of like this he was fine when he's played he has not been elite in major league soccer his life should be the easiest it's ever been and coming 22 under 22 number one bro i love I love when players get signed and it like ends up in their release article or whatever. And you're like, oh, you know, that's like a fake thing that we just did. Like, that's not real.

That's not a real definition. It is real, man. Yeah, it is real. So for me, it's like, if I think it's questionable how well he plays boca has a history of selling they're gonna sell it's a big platform for him maybe he sneaks his way back in argentina playing at boca quicker than he does for dallas and then we get 50 of the sell-on you could talk me into it but i think you're right in that if he's gonna come back and be a part of this group to some extent look what see what he looks like with musa like see what he looks like with more talent around him i don't know that there's enough you can't play through

him so he's not your 10 he's not game dominant and he can be a threat and he can be dangerous oh look i did a thumbs up he can be a threat in moments that is hold on the fun of the show is going to be that we don't need to do normal procedures. Like, to be professional, I should have just let you go. But I need to stop right there. That was the perfect encapsulation of the difference between Tom Bogart and David Goss. You just went, oh, that was pretty nice. Anytime this happened to me with a little thumbs up, I've stopped and been like, what in the fuck?

I've no idea. Just yelling at my computer. And you're like, oh, that's pretty cool, man. It's the beauty of live. You get to see the true personalities. You get to see me sweating, which is going to be a huge element of the show as we go through the summer. Especially because I'm trying to figure out the tech on the back end, which I am terrible at, as we go through this all, which is why this is a soft launch. What makes it soft?

The fact that I didn't figure this stuff out in advance. I don't know how to do it. Nothing else about it. We will be here live and going through over the course of the days. We are also going to go as long as we can talk, which clearly is way longer than it should be. So get ready for the other people to complain about that. Let's move to Colorado here. By the way, Dallas hosting St. Louis this weekend.

So that's the last one to throw in there for Dallas. A chance to see them rebound. Reminder, Luke Son, that's who I'm going with for now. Played in Major League Soccer, played for Dallas, has been an assistant for about four or five years, was a part of the academy before that. I've heard really good things about him from people that have played with him, like immediately when this was named,

from people that had played at Dallas alongside him or played under him as an assistant over the last few years of excitement so let's see like is it just a new coaching jump or are there some ideas and things that they can put into place to sort of shift things as it goes along because I would say for Dallas the roster they put out there this weekend is one of the best they've put out there because they haven't been fully healthy. Let's talk Colorado here. Hoffa Navarro news from you. They face off against Austin at 930 on Saturday night. Those are like the two, I think, teams on the exact opposite ends of the data spectrum where Austin's the luckiest team.

Colorado is pretty far from it, but yet has still put together decent results. Yeah. Colorado is pretty far from it but yet has still put together decent results yeah and some of that you could point to personnel like Zach Sheffield has not been very good particularly with the underlying numbers the news that we're coming to Colorado Rapids are progressing on their deal to sign

Hoffa Navarro on a permanent deal they had hopes probably 8 weeks ago when they began really making these talks that they think that they could make it a TAM deal. And then Hoffa Navarro went out and scored, what, seven out of eight games or whatever it was. And it's not like he was playing himself back into Palmeiras,

but it was like, oh, all of these teams in Brazil are going to start putting interest in offers. And so Colorado and Palmeiras are progressing Navarro wants to stay Colorado wants him to stay Palmeiras is open to it all of that being said because of the other interest and offers it's going to have to be a designated player rather than a Tam do as they kind of hoped but if he's scoring like this he's totally worth a DP spot I stress that nothing is agreed nothing is done but everybody I've talked to on all sides of this feel uh pretty confident something's going to get them there's zero reason to lose a player who's scoring goals to

bring in a new player to hope they can score goals especially if you're colorado nothing you spend is a guarantee so like to have done the loan deal which was let's take a risk and see what happens and for it to work you have to double back down into that you cannot take the risk of doing it again because that would be the next move. They're not going to spend $10 million on their center forward. They were going to try and find a deal where they could get a loan and find a piece or a player that's available out there. Honestly, when we started talking Houston,

I was like, is Sebas Ferreira going to an MOS team on loan if they can't get him out? Because that's kind of the move that a Colorado would make there are a few other teams in the conversation that could or would make a move like that a Montreal like it's not outside the realm of possibility so this I think is a lot more positive like the guy you chose he's fit into the the game model pretty well he's he's worked pretty hard you've got Cole Bassett making a ton of runs behind him georgie's starting to get comfortable and they understand the space that navarro's leaving or when they can link up with him so it's been good for for colorado you wouldn't want to change any

of that if you don't have to uh they're going to lose their linchpin defensive midfielder games i that when you put the tweet out and you said he has played 15 minutes the whole season, because I was one with depth chart preseason, it's like, oh, yeah, right here. Boom. There's that team. New starter, yeah. That was the idea. And there's a few teams that have made these moves of, like,

the loan for the depth chart center mid that could work and very rarely does, I guess, unless you'reati and then everything works out for you uh in those positions so that's another move that they're going to make as well we have a a question on austin i think in the uh in the mailbag any austin news that you'd like to go these are the questions i usually get guys yeah like this is what my mentions are filled with um now we get to do your mentions live no i don't have anything necessarily new again they just made a club record signing to usman bakari um he'll be i haven't asked about the visa situation because it's they still have five weeks till the window opens the idea there

is that that's going to be resolved at some point soon he's obviously taking a little time off because he just had a full season but the idea is that he's going to be in training for three full weeks before he's available to play. And thus, if Josh Wolf wants to start him, he will start him and he will be fit to start and go 90 or whatever it is. So there's that. And I'm filibustering on that because it's club record

signing. I don't know if the next one's coming immediately. I know that they're going to be busy this summer. I know that I was one of the people very critical of them over the winter because I thought that they needed to do more. It's worked out fine. Again, they're vastly overperforming their expected goals and expected goal difference, but whatever.

Games not played in a spreadsheet, mate. There's a new right back coming in, as you said, Dessler at right back. That was done kind of in the winter, which I first reported, and then I was on an austin podcast and they were like yeah and you've talked about desler coming in and i was like who is that and what are you talking about guys like you broke the news in january i was like oh did i okay um i completely forgot this is your version of tab being like did i really say that um so anyway look i i do expect them to be more aggressive again this

summer like they can i believe they can sign another dp yeah and but like where like dp9 is part that make the most sense but like i really like how diego rubio fits with with serena drews yeah do you use it in the midfield again you don't use it on center back i don't know that the dp signing makes sense for them right at this point of like i think you try and reinforce more of the roster you try and improve that center back you try and get a little deeper in central midfielder find the right pieces i still think danny perera is not long for that life just because he's their only asset was that a threat no i just not long for life for that dann life. Danny Pereira, should Danny Pereira check his shoulder? The Austin FC, like, one, he should always be checking his shoulder. He should always be checking.

That's what we talk about in the training session. Both on the streets and in training. Never on the streets. I would protect him with my life. What a great super draft pick. Any super draft pick is safe in my book. But I think that's a position they make, too. Bukhari should help in that if he

hits anywhere like some of the wingers we've seen come in i think you think about the la galaxy for sure the both the signings they made you should be able to play on the front foot even more dangerous you should be able to let the back line adjust in moments and rest defense should get a little bit higher up the field you make life easier for other attackers it's not rocket science and what he can bring to this team if he hits the ground running and if he doesn't he might still be better than Rigoni and so then you've got a lot of positivity

going there Colorado Austin that's 930 on Saturday let's do Philly here Julian Carranza is it official how close are we what are we talking so terms are agreed between Carranza and Feyenoord for the winter. What I was told is essentially a deal is there.

I don't know if they've technically signed the pre-contract or not, but Carranza will be playing for Feyenoord in the winter. And right now, Feyenoord and Philadelphia Union are negotiating over Feyenoord trying to sign him now. Yeah. They don't want to pay much of a fee because they're going to get him for free in six months if they wait, but they also have Champions League, and it makes sense for kind of all parties for a deal to get done here.

Nothing is done. Nothing's agreed, rather, between the clubs. I think this makes too much sense to not happen immediately, and Ernst Tanner is a reasonable guy. Feyenoord's CEO is Dennis Teclosa. He's also a reasonable guy. Also previously LA Galaxy GM. There's a relationship between those two guys.

I can't really imagine a scenario in which they can't hammer out just an agreement that makes sense. And we'll see when that would be. If honestly, I don't know this. My fun theory is that if I'm Ernst Tanner, I'm taking as long as I can to answer these texts and calls, knowing that I'm going to agree a deal, but I'm stretching it as far to July 18th as I can

because they need results and they can't replace him. And he is pretty irreplaceable in this group right now, particularly coming from the bench, people from the bench. So if I'm Philly, I'm saying, oh, sorry, dude. I opened your text. I forgot about it. Like, I'm going to call you later. Oh, DMGoss style texting.

Starting every text with my bad. My bad. I just totally lost my phone all the time. My phone is always lost. And that's not me joking. Like, straight up, I never know where my phone is. I wish, dude. Just like, I feel like locked to my phone.

So, like, when I hear stuff like that, I'm just, it's like it's like a person looking at the Squidward looking out the window. Like, oh, that must be nice. So, Teclosa obviously is a guy you'd think should be farming in MLS. Like, should be finding moves like this consistently. Because of his background and what he's done. When he was in MLS, he was doing this with League MX and the Ducks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If I'm Ernst, Ist I say okay who's gonna

come on loan then like we'd love to send him early you obviously have more talent than you need don't send them to Vitesse or Utrecht don't send them to Belgium like send them here let's start to create a connection between these two clubs but I'd be shocked if Carranza was the last MLS signing going to Feyenoord that was done in a way like this, where it was like, oh, that's a really smart deal. That's a really good deal. Because that's what DiCloso did in his time here. I agree. And another thing that he's done, they partnered with, I believe it's Orange County SC.

Because he watched the Galaxy fail to take full use of that area. And he got to Feinord and he set that up um paulo rudasso was in the la galaxy academy us youth international he's a fine word now like has a has i believe an italian passport so it was available yeah that was they said usu 17 world cup fine or helped with that yeah that was the deal reading his name you could guess that there's a possibility out there that you could get but uh i will say that that was fast track thanks to uh uh fire to it um to make it easier for him to come early but like so those are the things like you said if they make like if they find fits like look talking about julian carranza he turned down verter bremen he turned down olympiacos um

if switch town they either had a deal agreed with philly or like it was it was a series bid and like they were going to be able to find common ground caronza's just like i don't i don't have any interest in going there um and so don't even bother agreeing a deal so caronza's been like looking at this long term like hey i know in six months i could just pick wherever i'm gonna go yeah and at first i was like man like vertebrate that's a pretty good thing that's where you want to go if switch town like that would have aged really well they're in the premier league right now um so i was like i was a little bit surprised and then when i was hearing about the the fine word talks i was like dude that makes a ton of sense like i like this landing spot better than the others for him and so credit to him for having the long-term play in his ages

whatever whoever advised him whether it was him or not like i'm always glad to see players kind of take control of the future it's unfortunate for philly because they agreed those deals in the winter right like they tried that was the last chance that they were going to have to get decent money again not the top top value but in a business sense and then being able to replace him like they tried yeah but it just he said said no, right? Like, so it's tough on Philly, but I'm always going to be kind of pro player on stuff like this. For Philly, the only like saving grace with this is they gave nothing up,

right? They got him for free, basically from Miami. This isn't a situation where they paid $10 million and then you got the production from it. So no matter what, he was worth bringing him into your team oh yeah it's not like you made the mistake where if you'd acted a year earlier you could have flipped that money and brought that next player in you got him for free basically you're gonna lose him for free that's unfortunate or whatever small number it'll be um for the fine thing not a huge fine art supporter don't watch a ton but i can say in. Not locked in, but his game is very similar to Santi Jimenez,

who has scored a ton of goals there. They are of a similar age. I think he's actually more physical than Jimenez. He should fit pretty well in the Dutch League. He can cover a ton of ground, or he can move in space really well, and that's what you need to do in the Dutch League because everyone marks you 1v1 everywhere across the field. Philly hosting Miami this weekend.

Do you want to talk Rafael Varane? Is this a real? No. Is this a real rumor Miami this weekend. Do you want to talk Raphael Varane? Is this a real? No. Is this a real rumor? No, I don't want to talk about Raphael Varane. I'm happy to move on from that one. Let's do a little Columbus, and then we'll get into some national team. Aiden Morris, you've been the one breaking this news and covering it.

Columbus will play on Friday night at NYCFC here in the five boroughs. I will not go, probably probably although i've thought about it and considered it i don't think i will but aiden more i'm glad we cleared that up good yeah i just didn't want there to be rumors and reports coming out of tommy scoops about whether or not i'd be there as my aiden morris send-off game uh in that moment uh what what's the deal with morris how done is this uh everything's agreed the only thing that could debunk in this is if something bad happens before he stops playing for columbus um deals agreed around four million plus a sell-on percentage to middlesbrough what i was told

is that it was him pushing for i want to play for columbus one or one like one or two more times like it wasn't like col, Columbus were obviously extraordinarily glad, but they weren't going to blow up the deal over something like that. It was Aiden Morris saying, I want to play for Columbus. And I love that. This is a local boy. Came through the academy. Schoolboy, by the way.

Came through the academy, boy. Grew up with this club as a professional. Won two MLS Cups. He's a fan favorite. They love him. He loves them and i you know look sometimes i know i can be overly romantic about this game or kind of want to be because of that's better to believe in than just you know the cold reality sometimes and being in the business like you understand that sometimes it's it is that cold reality and then a lot of questions can be answered about who paid more money right

so i i'm always going to gravitate to a story like this where, yeah, this is a win for everybody. This is Aiden Morris. He developed with this team. He won two MLS cups. He has nothing more to do here. If he wanted to sign a five-year contract lucrative deal,

that would have been great too. Right. But he's always wanted to go to Europe. Columbus aren't standing in his way. Columbus get a good deal deal they get a sell-on they have plenty of this deal has been in the works for a while they've known that they need to replace him in the summer or probably going to need to replace him in the summer um so i i just can't say enough positive things about this deal for all parties like obviously it's going to be near impossible like a lot of these deals to dollar for dollar value for value replace aiden moore's on

your salary cap but they're still getting a good deal they're gonna have room they're gonna have money to spend they have a dp spot open if they want to uh this would open a this will open a u22 initiative slot so they can't like the brand of azquez one was tougher for cincy because that was a that was a dp guy on on like a low tan deal right yeah so it's everything's great and this is just the evolution of the game and the evolution of the league. This is what you want with your, um, Academy players,

right? You want them to win with you and then go for these big fees to help you reinvest both in the next generation, right? You can use those resources to build the Academy out, blah, blah, blah.

Um, as well as bringing in players, his like partnership with Darlington Agby and the way that's grown and what that's been I think to what you were saying like that's the essence of what everyone's looking to do to have uh DP all-star level player in Nagby who understands what it means to win in this league help sort of raise Aiden Morris but then also I think Aiden Morris helped buoy Darlington Nagby to like be inspired again to make them good to make Nagby re-sign and fall in love with the project again. And obviously Nancy is a big part of that.

Weird times for Columbus. I think we'll dig into it more next week and as we go along because we'll sort of see how this window goes. But Tim Bezbachenko gone. Isatol takes over. They let Corey Ray go, who was in charge of the two team in the academy and a lot of this process building that pipeline into the first team as well as helping fill in those roster spots behind and now aiden morris got so it's a lot of change for a club where if everything stayed the same they are one of the best teams in mls change can be good but sometimes when you're in the positive moments you don't really want it and so it'll be interesting to

see how columbus reacts to this because probably the nature of their market is they were always going to have to move quickly. Like you're not going to be a force every single year unless you spend numbers that are disproportional to what your market is, which they've gotten close to, but not completely outside on that one. So that'll be interesting. Friday night's going to be good. NYCFC have been phenomenal

all the pieces are hitting i think they are somewhat as close to columbus as you can get in terms of the danger at every position the ball skill at every position the ability to want to be in possession to take risks um and the friday night games have been pretty wild uh over the course of the season for nycfc just every game's been back and forth. So that's your MLS rundown for now. We could go for four hours. We're not going to. But reminder, this is new. So feel free to shoot us messages.

What do you want to hear? How do you want us to structure things? What do you want to sort of tune into when and where? And we're going to keep building this and keep changing it. So this is for all of us. It only works if everyone's involved. So we want your feedback please spread the word anyone you know who has ever watched the soccer ball roll whether on tv or in person that you think could be interested let them know that

soccer wise is happening we're talking all things soccer wise and we're going to try and do it smarter less us do more jordan on the intelligence side but that's why yes jordan jordan jordan is here for intellect um and one thing to add to david spiel right here dm everybody dm david guys if you know how to work a computer on youtube to give a little instructions on that because the test worked and the live one did it and that is the worst case scenario for what happened to me but shout out to everyone on twitch who's in there also shout, shout out to David on Twitch, who's a Borough fan watching this, who's looking forward to see Morris learn from Michael Carrick,

which is actually a pretty good lesson for him to take. Let's do U.S. real quick, because we'll have plenty of time to talk about them going into Copa America. The bounce back performance against Brazil, 1-1. I said it in the open of this show. It was almost the Canada-France game of like you've outplayed them. Then it feels like you're going to lose it.

Obviously, there were goals in the U.S.-Brazil game, but it was very similar. What were your takeaways sort of of the U.S. performance? Does this make you feel better? Did you not care before? Where are you sitting right now? So I kind of go, I'm pretty in the middle on this. One, first and foremost, horrific performance against Colombia. Really strong performance against Brazil.

Those two things are true. I really like about that. I wish that the emphasis on how they played and what they wanted to do against Brazil was the same against Colombia. That's my biggest gripe, I think, this regime with greg berhalter and this team they built the game model to dominate concaf and that's cool that's great for me i care more about these games against brazil where like look we're they're not going to win more than than they lose they're not going to pick up points more than lose probably not that's just where we are in

the hierarchy of global soccer i was so happy to see the way that they played. This team, you have to earn the right to play. And by that, it's you win your duels. You do all the dirty work. You track runners. You kick people. It's like playing like Uruguay or Argentina below their superstars, right? What I love about some of those countries are they just got a bunch of dogs

and they got a bunch of warriors. And that's what I want the United States to be. That's the 2010 team that's you know the 2008 to whatever 14 those teams that we really really love i'm very encouraged to see that's what it was against brazil i do not have confidence that this will be the preferred style of play in a more macro sense i well and truly believe the best version of this team, what hits all of the players, most of the players' strengths, is hitting in transition. I think that Pulisic in space is terrifying for defenders.

Gio Reyna, he's not the prototypical transition winger, more like Pulisic is, but all of his best highlights with the national team were that run against Mexico, right? That's him in space. Weston McKinney, kills in space. Obviously, Tyler Adams. All these things. Tim Ream is getting old.

Might not be the worst thing to be defending a Luzibar. Matt Turner, for when he's not broken by England, phenomenal shot stopper. He's not a playmaking goalkeeper. And I know this is a crazy take. If you can't defend as a center back, and if you can't stop shots at a high level as a goalkeeper, I don't care what your passing range is. I do not. That should be secondary.

And modern soccer, we've been putting that first too much. Yeah, when you're Pep Guardiola and Barcelona, you can. And you should. If you're in that second or third tier of international teams i don't care if you can ping a pass as a goalkeeper what i care about is shot slapping same thing with center back so i i was so happy to see that against brazil but i don't think that that's what they're going to be this tournament like i think that this was more the exception than the rule i hope to be proven wrong but i feel like i've said this before in some of their best performances against bigger teams it's been more like this and then again like i know the merits

of the tactics of of how defensively solid they are because of the way that they structure the game because of the way that they pass the ball and play a little bit slower sometimes to control the game and dominate the game i understand that we can be phantom panama fine we can beat mexico in the nation's league fine that's great. I want to compete against Brazil. So I agree with most of what you're saying. I think I disagree sort of with the way the team's built. And, like, actually the frustration is they're bad against Honduras. They hang in games like this when they don't have to create the game.

And against Honduras, they look befuddled when they knock it around. But I think the point of, like – Because they go into that game thinking hey this is like brazil playing bolivia and we're just gonna dance around it but like for sure i think part of it like it's the tactics and the mentality that comes into it sorry go on no and i think the the idea of like where the line of confrontation is what zones you want to play in consistently what you want to do i think all of that is fair complaints i thought one of the things in this game that like and this is part of why i think this team is really tough when

everything falls on the coach is like weston mckinney was good and weston mckinney's not always this good and when he's this good you play through him and now all of a sudden you've got a center mid where every time you play into his feet it's back out in the right speed at the right pace to for pulisic to run onto and Weah to run onto and Pepe to line to link up with and then against Columbia you can't find him and so I think part of the issue with this team I've said it five million times it is one of the youngest national teams I've ever seen it has very few veterans to fall on and so the consistency of performances is low across the board and you don't know that Joe Scali is going to play the same way in a week

that he did in this game because he's not done that in his life. And so I think there's some givens. I think Weah is a consistent one. I thought Moussa was really good in this game. I thought it was an example that he should be this, he should play this position if Tyler can't play, at least in the group stage, because that's the other thing, is you're talking Bolivia Panama and Uruguay Uruguay not going to dominate the ball and Bolivia and Panama are some of the weaker teams you're going to see in

this competition so I think it gives you the right to say Moussa and Reina are starting center mids because this is the games that we're going to be in and they fit this maybe even with the performance against Brazil you come out of it and say against an argentina i don't know like let's get some more cover in there alongside him or instead of him whatever you want to say but i think coming out of this you probably set your starting 11 you probably feel pretty good about a lot of what you're doing and that's a positive going forward but the like style and performance i totally agree with you it is the first time that i've been up off my couch yelling at the TV in a while

for a USA game of like, I thought they had the 1-0 lead. I thought they had the 2-1 lead on the chance that went across for Pulisic. And I'm like, as that ball came in towards the box and the moves going from right to left and you see Pulisic's run, I'm screaming like, it's a goal, it's a goal. It felt a lot like the u.s teams as you said that we've watched over the last 25 years where they're punching above their weight and they're making you proud a lot like the england game at the world cup um and so all of that was really fun all that was really exciting it was obviously necessary it resuscitates i think a lot of the

confidence and as i said a million again the same for for Canada. Like for Canada to play the way they did against France for 95 minutes and play through France a ton, play with confidence. I thought they got a lot out of Alphonso Davies, which is a huge question mark for them. I still don't know how Jonathan David gets performances for the national team. He struggles so much in this group but kone is a stud the roma rumors i believe like he's that good right now and i think if you're any coaching staff you look at and say like and if we can tweak these things and work with him

he can keep doing these things at a high level he started central midfield against france and was fine and he has not done this a lot in his life um and a lot of the other pieces looked really good i think jesse talked about like cornelius and bombito center backs a hole for them they both fit his game model especially bombito like he is one of the fastest center backs in mls he has played in central midfield so he's comfortable in space um a lot of it's really positive for canada sorry i was just, one thing to add on Moise is that, like Kone, or maybe unlike Kone,

in that the belief from scouts I talk to and people in the know around MLS, they don't Colorado doesn't want, wouldn't want to transfer Moise Mambito to like a stepping stone club to a white front or whatever, right? They believe he develops here for 18 more months and he's going to the Premier League. that's kind of view and and on the way

of cone is that like you said he hasn't done this for that long but it makes sense why bigger teams would be coming in for him that's how moise bombito is being viewed too and i thought it was important to put that into the conversation um for colorado that only works if he plays for this team, right? Like Colorado can do as much as they can do, and obviously the Austin Trustee thing happened, so maybe there's a little bit more to it. He's better than Austin Trustee is what everybody has told me.

Yeah, which I believe, by the way. And that's not a slight on Trustee. He's a premier league player. For sure. But if he does it at Copa America, and he does it again in whatever tournament, if you look at Canada's schedule this week, playing Netherlands, playing France, they're going to continue to put games like this on the board. And then you talk about a World Cup that they're hosting,

that's where Colorado gets that value for Bambito. And it feels like every possibility that he could be there. I have zero, zero idea what is going to happen in argentina against canada in a copa america debut game at mercedes-benz in front of 65 000 fans i've texted a few canadian friends where because i was setting my calendar so that day by the way spain plays it. Denmark plays England in Euros that morning. And I think Serbia plays Slovenia. And then it finishes the day with the Copa America opener of Argentina against Canada.

So for one of your Canada family, this is the moment you've been waiting for. Even more than the World Cup. Like, you've arrived. You belong. You're on the stage. You're going to be the side story. Everything's going to be messy, messy, messy. And then you're kind of like, oh, and Canada's playing on the other side.

But, like, this is the stage you wanted. You could convince me they win 1-0, and I wouldn't be shocked. You could convince me they lose 5-1, and I wouldn't be shocked. Anything in between, I'd also believe as well. Like, it is going to be an absurd moment and an absurd game. Olympics coming up. U23 has lost to Japan, playing in Kansas City as sort of a warm-up game. I watched a bit of it.

There is a clear lack of creativity in the team. Diggle Luna is the obvious conversation with there. Ben Hakromoski as well gets involved. He's a little bit of a different player. He would fit tactically. It's sort of like a 4-3-2-1. He would fit perfectly behind Duncan McGuire. I thought Gomez worked hard and was effective,

but isn't creative and isn't dangerous. And so Luna could fill into that spot. There's Brian Gutierrez could fill into that spot as well. In general, though, you're going to go play France in France. So like, you're not really going to have the game like you did against Japan and Kansas City. And reminded that Olympics are really small tournaments. Like you're in, you get two games to prove yourself. Otherwise, you're probably not getting out of the group. against Japan and Kansas City. And reminded that Olympics are really small tournaments.

Like you're in, you get two games to prove yourself. Otherwise, you're probably not getting out of the group. You're into the knockouts and it's done. That's what we've seen on the women's side over and over. It's like, it's a really tight competition. So it'll be interesting to see. Obed Vargas probably won't be a part of that group as it sounds like he has officially registered his one-time switch to Mexico.

Yes, confirmed by FIFA. So he's no longer available to the U.S. I think there are a lot of people who are surprised by this, me being one of them. What do you make, like, did you have any big reaction, or is this just a young player who wants to play for Mexico choosing to play for Mexico? Yeah, and if I'm him, I probably would have myself if i had the options interesting like look at the central video group the united states adams mckinney musa uh johnny ada moore is coming through um what tanner tessman john lucabuzio all the time i didn't

even write any of this down that's like seven or eight names off your head that it's like you got to go past um mexico again i'm not I'm not an expert on the Mexican national team, but I do know their pool is a little bit thinner, particularly on the younger side, particularly with them. I've heard Alvarez got called into a camp a month ago, three weeks ago. Like that's, yeah. Yeah, I mean, if I'm Obed, if just raw numbers, raw spots, like I was even thinking that a little bit about Aiden Morris, to be honest with you.

He has a Canadian passport, and Canada tried pretty hard to convince him. And he thought about it, and then he went to the Gold Cup of the United States last summer. But I was like, man, if I'm him, I see a real pathway to being, I'm starting every game for this team, or at least I'm on the... I mean, Sam Piat's been in that convo. You're in that convo. You're in that convo ahead of him now. Right.

In the next five years. Without most of the world's got. Yeah, and again, I think we just talked about how highly we both rate Aiden Morris 15 minutes ago. So, again, this isn't a knockout OB at Vargas. It's just like, Jesus, man. Like, that midfield group for the national team is young, it's deep, and it's going to be really hard to break into. Yeah, it is – it's a tough one. I think – i think i mean if you're vargas you're looking at players at

your own club like jose tencio and saying i don't know if i'm 100 above all these players in that national team convo and then you go as you mentioned the full pool um it's exciting i also could see a situation where it's your dream to play for mexico and so the doors open and you do that i don't come away from this like sliding u.s soccer and that like no he's been in every camp he's been in every conversation he's been really injured with odd injuries for a young player so he hasn't been in every game because you're not going to risk a guy with a back injury at 17 and 18 in some of these moments uh this feels like a decision he made and good luck to him. I love seeing the Mexican national team just be loaded with MLS Academy

players and just going that route. I'm sure the LA Galaxy love it too, because they realize you could just sell to Chivas now. You don't have to actually develop a transfer market with anyone else. You could just develop players and sell them to Chivas. Let's close out with national team transfer stuff. I know you were on Galazozo, I think, this morning talking some Brendan Aronson stuff,

Weston McKinney rumors still out there. Are there any of them you are very excited about or feel very strongly about? Yeah, I mean, I could just hit the Weston one in that I haven't heard anything new since the last couple of days. Like, yes, I really want him, and the deal is progressing. But part of the issue with the deal is that

there's three players involved and money. So it's a lot of personal terms being discussed. But Douglas Luiz to Juventus, Weston McKinney, and another player that I'm blanking on to Aston Villa, plus some money. But McKinney, close to the Premier League. There was some contract talks with Juventus that did not really get too close. And so off he is to Aston Villa. As for the Aronsons first with brendan he's staying at leeds united it's he he could have left he still has an active clause in his contract that

if the club at any point during this deal that they're not in the premier league another team in the summer if they just pay his full salary they can have him on a free loan i didn't see that that shirt i was very low down i bought it the day he scored against chelsea and you know leeds was mr was team usa yeah and so there were interests there was teams that that were triggering that clause and trying to convince him like in germany in particular but brendan like i did an interview with him as well he his direct quote to me was i I had unfinished business at Leeds. This is somebody that usually runs two challenges.

Like for whatever criticisms that you have of this player, his mentality isn't one of them. Some Leeds fans that are still bitter that they got relegated as if it was his fault are like, well, why did he leave last year? At this time last year, when Union Berlin triggered the clause and were saying you need to decide to come, these were the two options. Union Berlin, they were the surprise story of the year before in the Bundesliga.

Champions League soccer, signing Leonardo Bonucci, all this, hey, you're going to start. These were all the things. And again, Champions League is a very big part of it. Leeds, complete disarray. The fans are ready to revolt. No sporting director. Ownership is a muddy situation.

No head coach. No plan. Nothing. Why would he stay if he had that offer on the table? Because the people are like, well, what do you mean he wants to stay at Leeds? It's like, yeah, I think you, even Mr. Leeds fan, not you, Goff, the royal you. Hey, I'm wearing the shirt. That's true random leads fan in in lancashire

um they would have left too if they had to have if they if they had their career in mind like it's just a disingenuous argument for me um and i'm excited to see what happens and again maybe it doesn't work again maybe this truly is it's not good enough but daniel farke sees a very central role for for brendan aronson in this team next year as part of their quest promotion brendan again he knows that there are going to be fans that are still upset with him or don't like him or going to be critical he knows what he's walking back into and he's going to just try to win them over and see how the season goes so i'm super excited to see how that one plays out but but we'll see and he needs

to play like he needs to play consistently um a ton of minutes he needs a team on his shoulders and i think that's where this fits really nice for him uh so i'm excited as well i think it's the right move uh i think it'll be really interesting uh for weston i said it when we did the national team thing when he's good he's great when he's not good he still changes the game like he does things that are different but when he's clean and he's efficient like he is in that world-class conversation he's in juventus for a reason he could be in another champions league team now with assen villa for a reason but it has to be consistent um and maybe this is the right move that sort of brings that out of him where a team is buying on him because leads they didn't right

it was like okay we'll take a flyer on this. Juve sort of has felt that way as well at times of like taking a flyer and what they get from him is great, but they're not invested in a way that feels like we have to make this work. And maybe Aston Villa is that move that makes a ton of sense. So we had like 97 things on the rundown. We only did half. We still went nine hours.

I still have to go figure out YouTube and put this up as a podcast. So the show will be out there for anyone if you're watching on Twitch because you'd be the only one. Tell everyone. If you are listening on a podcast or you heard from someone listening on a podcast and we are not on the platform that you want to listen to us

on, I am working on it but feel free to still message me or message us so that we can make sure that we're there uh the patreon is up and live so we're gonna have a ton of stuff there we have the different tiers that you can join uh and all of it is to keep people involved so we want you to help craft some of the shows we want to do some private stuff where we can hang out and talk soccer with you all as well. And otherwise I'll be back Monday morning, very early with our first mailbag weekend review show.

And then me and Tom will be back with you on Tuesday at 2 PM. Eastern time live Jordan on Wednesday. And then again on Thursday with Tom, as we talk soccer, all things soccer wise, Tom, any last words? You feel good.

I feel good. This was a, this was uh this is a fun bumpy ride and that's what makes it fun i think part part of the allure of this show is watching us curse at things and and figure things out and see you blurry right now and again like you said see you sweat and see me with an orioles hat on all this stupid stuff so uh again if anybody's i know the people that are still listening right now you guys are legends um it means the world. This is what we believe in a serious note.

What we believe is that there's appetite for a show that cares deeply about American soccer, and we hope to deliver to you. And again, if you're here right now, that means that we're betting on you, and you're believing in us, and I can't tell you how much we love that. It's nothing without the people listening. So again, we appreciate it and hope you keep tuning in. Hope that we have won you over and you're going to keep seeing you. I love that you did the outro for us.

I can just play the song and we can be done. That's all for us here on SoccerWise to close the weekend. We'll be back, as I said, on Monday morning with your weekend review, weekend reaction, and, of course, we will go all week to cover MLS, end of yourself, US National Team, men's, women's, Canadian, and everything else in between. Bye everyone!