Yallop (and others) speaks after Lux friendly

[Daniel]

Question answers that I can post before Quebec Soccer comes out this month (which is why my answers might seem incomplete):

- General impressions: nothing too enthusiastic, "a win's a win", "we improved in the 2nd half", etc.

- Fernandes: FY mentionned how he's been getting noticeable results "just recently" and how he'd scout him once back in Canada (presumably on video ).

- Nsaliwa: was in camp 8 months ago and it seems that when Canada calls "it doesn't always fit with his club schedule". Yallop did not look particularly enthused, and I don't expect that Nsaliwa will get many more chances (probably a few more, though).

- Mentionned the Austria game, which we all thought was a scoop .

- We should see something ressembling an A team this year, I'll let you guess when.

- Hutch: Hume laughed when I asked Hutch "about playing central defense" and said "good question". Hutch said he'd rather be playing mid. I asked about the quiet transfer rumour front and he said "we'll see", but it seems like he's hoping for something to happen

- Bernier: asked about a transfer, he seemed a little flat (although he's often like that) and didn't look convinced about his chances of moving this winter.

All the players thanked us for coming as they made their way to the bus from the main entrance (which was a cool thing about the small Lux stadium). Yallop had a word with the other Canadian fans before getting on the bus, which was nice.

[Kurosawa1555362267]

quote:Originally posted by Daniel

- We should see something ressembling an A team this year, I'll let you guess when.

In 2005, our A team??? Surely not on a soccer field, are they planning a X-Mas party???

[Cheeta]

I'm going to take it (given what sounded like a wee dig from Hume) that Hutch isn't too keen on playing center half and pretty much everybody knows it. Doing what you got to go but realy just playing good soilder.

Now that is interesting.

1st team in 2005? Is there another international date this year? Or is 2006 what you ment?

Curious to see what Frankie considers our 1st team and how long it would take for him to settle on one. You can't go on forever looking at this group or that. Have to put the foot down some time, say this is what it is and leave it to those outside the group to play their way into it with club performances. Build some familiarity and start demanding results and tune as required.

Patiently awaiting more.

[youllneverwalkalone]

[youllneverwalkalone]

[youllneverwalkalone]

[youllneverwalkalone]

[Joe Keeper]

lol thats awsome

[Ivan]

So Fernandes has yet to be scouted?

[shaku_bert]

quote:Originally posted by Ivan

So Fernandes has yet to be scouted?

That surprises me too. Or maybe I shouldn't be surprised.

[loyola]

When a college coach ask you for game tapes when he recruits you, he wants to see at least 4-5 games. I think it might be the same for a MNT coach, he wants to see the whole picture.

So no worries here, DF has omly been starting since september, it's not like FY should of fly to Greece when the guy had only start 3 games. Now he can scout him properly.

Of course inviting him to the Lux game would have been a good option too but Begovic was a logical choice since he was an hour away from Lux.

[Canuck Oranje]

There is a significant difference between NCAA programs and the MNT.

First, prospective scholarship candidates are many, especially at nationally ranked schools. Some schools get hundreds of inquiries from virtual no name high school players. How many new players of MNT calibre would surface each year? 10 - 20? And how many are in the MNT pool? 40? That seems like a manageable number to see in person, especially when many are concentrated in Europe and most of the rest in North America.

Second, an NCAA coach is scouting for players that he expects to have access to on a continuous basis for four years. He/She also expects to spend a lot of time developing this talent. He/She does not expect newly recruited talent to be central to the team for a year or so at least. Nationally ranked players will be actively recruited and scouted. On the other hand, a National team coach needs to form a team in a short space of time. It would seem to me that the Coach would need to know more than whether a player looks good on tape.

Third, high school players with scholarship potential are are surrounded by people who are interested in helping them obtain a scholarship and therefore willing to help by taping games/practices etc. Who would someone like a Fernandes or Nsaliwa go to to tape them? Their Club Coach? How many times per year do you have to send tapes?

I suspect that most Coaches (and their Assistants) of National teams ranked higher than 50 in the FIFA ranking actually spend a lot of time watching their players from the stands.

quote:Originally posted by loyola

When a college coach ask you for game tapes when he recruits you, he wants to see at least 4-5 games. I think it might be the same for a MNT coach, he wants to see the whole picture.

So no worries here, DF has omly been starting since september, it's not like FY should of fly to Greece when the guy had only start 3 games. Now he can scout him properly.

Of course inviting him to the Lux game would have been a good option too but Begovic was a logical choice since he was an hour away from Lux.

[loyola]

I think that in a case of a prospect like DF, the best option is to scout him on game tape and ask your contacts and if he deserve a more serious look, then you travel and try to watch him play at least twice or invite him to a MNT camp.

Imagine if our coaches would travel everytime they hear about a new prospect.....our budget won't last long.

[Canuck Oranje]

I think the fact that he is starting in a credible league would suggest that it might be worth the trip already.

The fact that we ignore players seeing regular first team action and then continue to call players that have fallen to the reserves of their club is disturbing to me. I don't know what the reasons are but it would be nice to have some explanation of that.

quote:Originally posted by loyola

I think that in a case of a prospect like DF, the best option is to scout him on game tape and ask your contacts and if he deserve a more serious look, then you travel and try to watch him play at least twice or invite him to a MNT camp.

Imagine if our coaches would travel everytime they hear about a new prospect.....our budget won't last long.

[loyola]

A player yes, a GK no, there's too much chance you'll sit there and watch him do nothing or get scored on an impossible shot and it will be impossible to evaluate him. How many time do we see GK being non-factor in a game? Almost all the time, I would say 80% of the time.

Watch him on tape and then call him for a camp where you'll see him train and maybe in a game situation with your players (communication).

I don't think it's fair to say that FY is ignoring DF when he just said that he's scouting him and that he's starting position in Greece is a recent news for us.

[Guest Jeffery S.]

quote:Originally posted by loyola

I think that in a case of a prospect like DF, the best option is to scout him on game tape and ask your contacts and if he deserve a more serious look, then you travel and try to watch him play at least twice or invite him to a MNT camp.

Imagine if our coaches would travel everytime they hear about a new prospect.....our budget won't last long.

Let's not forget that it was Frank Yallop himself who complained about the fact that Holger had not seen his Canadians play when they were in North America, Holger could have gone to Washington or NYC to see them, and at that time he could have even gotten in a few others out there (like the Canucks once at Charleston).

Then it seems that Frank's scouting is based on going on holiday to England and while there, while buddying, see a few games. That is plain comfort-based scouting, and plain provincialism, of which he once complained quite rightly.

If they are not up on Fernandes they are not doing their job, he has been playing UEFA since August after all. And starting for Paok in the league since mid September.

[Manuel]

That's just Yallops way around the question. He will probably invite Fernandes to a camp sometime in January, when he knows Fernandes can't make it, and use that as an excuse to not invite him again. I agree with Jeffrey, there is no excuse as to why they haven't scouted him yet. Here is how you can do it from your home, Mr. Yallop. Call your cable subscriber and order the two Greek channels available in Canada (Odyssey I & II). For $19.50 a month, you will be able to watch Fernandes play from the comfort of your living room, and I'm sure you could even expense the cost of the channel. It's not that hard.

[Daniel]

We should get a Brazilian coach to teach us latin technique.

Guys, he's played 11 games for PAOK. Chill out.

And yes, I *did* mean 2006. I think in terms of soccer seasons .

[Guest Ed]

quote:Originally posted by Daniel

We should get a Brazilian coach to teach us latin technique.

Guys, he's played 11 games for PAOK. Chill out.

And yes, I *did* mean 2006. I think in terms of soccer seasons .

By my reckoning, that's about 11 more games in a good league than most of his apparent rivals.

So it sounds like you're telling us that if Yallop can't see the players on an afternoon's jaunt within England, they don't get scouted. Clarify if I'm wrong.

[Daniel]

If he times it right, he can probably see 2-3 potential CORE players with a flight to England. And they should play. This includes Stalteri, who has rarely figured in Yallop's squad. The team trip also went back through England, apparently.

Like someone said, it's much harder to scout a keeper based on one game watched. Fernandes has recently played enough game to make scouting him feasible on more than a one-off basis. Whereas the others have been around for longer or have played regularly for longer.

I also don't know how much better the Greek league is compared to Norway...

[youllneverwalkalone]

Why does Yallop have to "scout" him at all??? Scouting suggests the possibility that he's not really what we need right now. Does Yallop think we have such an embarrassment of riches at this position that he can ignore the 1st team keeper of a major European club? I'm not sure Canada could defeat PAOK -even with Murdoch, BA, and Face on the bench. WTF are we scheduling kick arounds with Luxembourg if not to give a young keeper an easy time of working his way onto the squad.

[Cheeta]

I think this raises (at least in part) an old complaint on the ability of our manager to get a real look at players outside of these internationals.

It seems like at times so helter-skelter who qualifies for "a look" and who doesn't. And in fairness to Yallop, and Holger before him, there just has to be an odvious lack of infastructure within the program for scouting these fellows at their club level.

These internationals are just too precious a commodity to Canada to allow them to be (if you'll forgive the choice of words) waisted giving "a look" to players who're odviously no where near 1st team quality.

Say what you want about nothing to play for until WCQ in 2008 and who's going to be what age when, you'll no build a program of high standards and higher expectations by using our too few MNT matchs as auditions for chicks who've no business leaving their club nests yet.

At least to me, it seems unfair to them, unfair to us, and of no good use to the long term program.

[Cheeta]

I think this raises (at least in part) an old complaint on the ability of our manager to get a real look at players outside of these internationals.

It seems like at times so helter-skelter who qualifies for "a look" and who doesn't. And in fairness to Yallop, and Holger before him, there just has to be an odvious lack of infastructure within the program for scouting these fellows at their club level.

These internationals are just too precious a commodity to Canada to allow them to be (if you'll forgive the choice of words) waisted giving "a look" to players who're odviously no where near 1st team quality.

Say what you want about nothing to play for until WCQ in 2008 and who's going to be what age when, you'll no build a program of high standards and higher expectations by using our too few MNT matchs as auditions for chicks who've no business leaving their club nests yet.

At least to me, it seems unfair to them, unfair to us, and of no good use to the long term program.

[loyola]

quote:Originally posted by youllneverwalkalone

Why does Yallop have to "scout" him at all??? Scouting suggests the possibility that he's not really what we need right now. Does Yallop think we have such an embarrassment of riches at this position that he can ignore the 1st team keeper of a major European club? I'm not sure Canada could defeat PAOK -even with Murdoch, BA, and Face on the bench. WTF are we scheduling kick arounds with Luxembourg if not to give a young keeper an easy time of working his way onto the squad.

Are you suggesting that DF is what we need without having seen him play? Have you read the comments(Paok fans) about him making alot of mistakes?

Goalkeeping is not about making the big saves, goalkeeping is about avoiding mistakes. Right now we need an experience GK who'll avoid silly mistakes and we need to start using those friendlies to practice our A team with our #1 keeper in net, while keeping track with the young prospect.

I'm all for giving Fernandes a look in the next year but the reports from the PAOK fans are that he'll be good in the future but that he still looks inexperience. So let him get the much needed experience with his club while inviting him to a game or a camp but stop the Fernandes as our #1 when no one has ever seen him play. FY is talking about watching some of his games on tape, so no worries, the coach is aware of him and we have no evidence that he'll snub him if he's good enough for our MNT.

[Canuck Oranje]

I don't think this was ever about making Fernandes the National team #1. I think the issue is simply why when a Canadian has been given the starting role by his club head coach, he is not considered important enough to the MNT program to even take the time to "have a look". I am not just talking about Fernandes.

While this should be obvious, I don't think a Coach would simply watch the game if he were to travel all the way to Greece (as an example). Yes, Fernandes is a GK. Arrive 2 hours before a European game begins and you will see a good Goalkeeper workout too. I would also think the Coach would speak to the player in person. If you can't at least get that, how can you ever expect anyone to submit a tape to Vancouver. Who pays the courier?

In my opinion, a better example is that of Bircham. First off, I am not saying that Bircham is incredibly talented nor am I a fan of Bircham. But his Coach/Manager thinks that by playing him, he has a better chance of winning. If Bircham's Coach feels that, why does our MNT feel differently when I doubt our MNT would be that much better than QPR if better?

MNT program should be all about developing a winning team; it is not the place for developing players. Club teams do that.

On Cheeta's point, most experienced coaches have extensive networks. That means they have people whose judgement they trust regarding player evaluation. That also means that they do not always have to go and see young players before calling them because someone in his network has and has recommended. Club networks are even stronger and more developed. I don't think our MNT has that at the moment. At least, not in continental Europe.

Finally, I also am beginning to fear that maybe our MNT program is losing credibility amongst our top players and I hope I am wrong. There are just too many top flight players opting out. I am not talking about the young guys. I am talking about our experienced base.