Robert Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 Does Victor Montagliani have the balls to take Canadian soccer to unprecedented heights? Will he ultimately be remembered as the man whose bold leadership transformed the eternally underperforming Canadian Soccer Association into an internationally respected organization, governing teams and players that are consistently capable of competing successfully against their Costa Rican, Cuban, El Salvadorian, Guatemalan, Honduran, Jamaican and Panamanian counterparts? The timing of Victor’s ascent is unenviable, as he has only one month to prepare before Canada’s first semi-final World Cup qualifier. The length of his tenure will depend in large part on how Canada fares during this round of qualifying, which is unfair, as based on what he is inheriting from the previous round of qualifying is anything but desirable. However, that is the nature of this particular beast. If Canada manages to advance to next year’s Hex, then the odds of Victor staying in charge of Canadian soccer for the foreseeable future improve considerably. Any aspiration for a lengthy reign would be entirely dependant on qualification for the World Cup Final in 2018, which would require that drastic steps be taken to improve the infrastructure of Canadian soccer. Failure to attain any of the afore mentioned objectives would render Victor Montagliani to being just another unmemorable name on the long list of unmemorable names who briefly tried to manage Canadian soccer before him. Good luck Victor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vic Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 Sounds a lot more like Hart. Victor Montagliani's markers would be things like infrastructure, business wins and losses, relationships, financial health, national stature and domestic growth of the game. Success of all our programs including women's and youth is the lesser part of his legacy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
killgod Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 Sounds a lot more like Hart. Victor Montagliani's markers would be things like infrastructure, business wins and losses, relationships, financial health, national stature and domestic growth of the game. Success of all our programs including women's and youth is the lesser part of his legacy. I would agree with this. Hart is out at the 90 min whistle in San Pedro Sula if our campaign is over. Victor shouldn't be scrutinized for our summer team performance I don't think. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gator Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 I would agree with this. Hart is out at the 90 min whistle in San Pedro Sula if our campaign is over. Victor shouldn't be scrutinized for our summer team performance I don't think. True but what if the unthinkable happens and we lose our first two matches? In most countries this would be looked at as a disaster and a coaching change would be in order! I think our coaches, not just Hart get away with under achieving teams because the CSA hasn't had the balls to make the change! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peter_mtl Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 I agree that he'll be judged on the business side of things and the growth of the game for not only the CMNT but all programs, male and female. I was wondering if anybody may have ever heard him comment on anything related to hosting the Gold Cup. Has he showed any willingness to get Canada to host it in the near future? I haven't heard anything but I wasn't as plugged in during the campaign as most of you. I think it would really help the football culture in this country and we already have the stadiums to do it. We may even turn a profit, which is badly needed for the CSA. I apologize if this gets off topic but was curious about Montagliani's stance on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpg75 Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 True but what if the unthinkable happens and we lose our first two matches? In most countries this would be looked at as a disaster and a coaching change would be in order! I think our coaches, not just Hart get away with under achieving teams because the CSA hasn't had the balls to make the change! Bingo. Last time around the CSA were speaking with Holger Osieck to take over and decided not to pull the trigger on firing Mitchell after losing in Mexico on MD3 - with only 1 point to speak of. Contrast that with the JFF that fired Rene Simoes after 3 road losses and hired a competent coach like John Barnes who led them to 3 home wins and within goal differential of beating out Mexico for 2nd spot. IMO, if we stumble out of the gate this time the CSA must make a change - and they'll have the entire summer to do something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
madmonte Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 Odds are here end as another suit more concerned with internal politics, and organizational infrastructure. He may have some disadvantages but he comes in with huge advantages too...inheriting 3 MLS teams and 2 NASL teams (if you include Ottawa who are getting a franchise, the deal being done before he was president). If the goal of the average fan is player development to strengthen the CMT, then inheriting these certainly doesn't hurt, although it may take more time than people are willing to give it for the payoff. It's not just about having systems intact on the club level to develop with...it's also about generating interest nationwide in Canadian youth early so that they may choose soccer over other sports that had been more popular. And THAT will take time. But even over the next five years, we should see more Canadians developed in that system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
killgod Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 I don't disagree about making a change should we start off with 2 losses. That's up to Victor I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonovision Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 However, if Stephen keeps his job while failing to qualify for the Hex we can safely conclude that Victor does not have the balls, as the thread title asks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Olympique_de_Marseille Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 I was wondering if anybody may have ever heard him comment on anything related to hosting the Gold Cup. This would be cool in 2017; even if we were only co-host I think this would be great for the game in this country. (2013 is already decided as being the USA again - 2015 we have the Women's World Cup). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Ref Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 I generally agree with all the postings above. The question I would pose is will Victor have the balls to fire Hart and bring someone that can guarantee success. Hart will have to be fired sooner or later unless he pulls out a rabbit out of the hat and get us to Brasil 2014. If Victor is going to hang onto Hart forever, like the CSA did with Mitchell and Pellerud, then nothing really would have changed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Olympique_de_Marseille Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 The question I would pose is will Victor have the balls to fire Hart and bring someone that can guarantee success. Hart will have to be fired sooner or later unless he pulls out a rabbit out of the hat and get us to Brasil 2014. No one can guarantee success. even Guus Hiddink. I don't like the tone of this thread. IMO it is unproductive speculation at this point. If we achieve poor results in our next three games let's revive it. If not, let it die. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grizzly Posted May 28, 2012 Share Posted May 28, 2012 No one can guarantee success. even Guus Hiddink. I don't like the tone of this thread. IMO it is unproductive speculation at this point. If we achieve poor results in our next three games let's revive it. If not, let it die. No but some coaches can guarantee lack of success. And with a top coach while there is no guarantee of qualification they will improve the program in the long run. Hiddink failed to qualify Russia to the last World Cup and their failure was largely his fault because in the final game he employed poor tactics that did not fit the players he had at his disposal. Nevertheless, the Russian program and national team improved immensely during his time there and his successor Advocat has benefitted greatly from the work Hiddink did before him and they qualified impressively for the Euro. If we don't qualify what will our players have learned from Hart in the meantime. How to constantly play 4-5-1 without any variation whatever the circumstances? I think this is a very productive thread because certainly many CSA members read the forum and quite possibly Victor himself. And he has to realize in the eyes of the fans that if he does not fire Hart if we start the first two matches poorly or barring that after a failure to qualify for the Hex then he will just be another in a long line of incompetent CSA presidents who play politics but have no clue about football. Hart himself should know the pressure to win is on now. In most of the world coaching is a results oriented business and the CSA should require a coach to achieve results to retain his job. Enough of the "We like you and you are cheap attitude." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wingback6 Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 No one can guarantee success. even Guus Hiddink. I don't like the tone of this thread. IMO it is unproductive speculation at this point. If we achieve poor results in our next three games let's revive it. If not, let it die. +1 Coaches are accountable, to some degree. But so are players. You can blame coaches, for subs, poor morale, and poor formation. But the players are the ones on the field. The buck stops with them, and if you're going to hold Hart to account you can hold them too, because at least there has been a fairly stable line-up, barring injuries, and for the most part there have been few real issues with you he has called. You can' blame a coach for all failures, responsibility lies with the players too. A better question. DO WE AS FANS have the 'balls' to ditch this defeatist attitude and replace it with a positive one. It takes positive thinking to step on to the pitch and believe you can make a difference, we may be in the stands, but the least we can do is think positively in solidarity with those who play for us on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Olympique_de_Marseille Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 No but some coaches can guarantee lack of success. This is where we disagree I think. I feel the tone of this threat implies that Hart will be a failure; it is only a matter of time. My view is that he hasn't been great so far but he hasn't failed. My view may change after the next three games. I feel this threat goes beyond a possibly helpful and constructive level of pessimism (that we know well) to an unconstructive defeatist level of pessimism. Even the title of this thread "Does Victor Have The Balls?" is toned so as to be goading to Victor: not a title for constructive criticism. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grizzly Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 +1 Coaches are accountable, to some degree. But so are players. You can blame coaches, for subs, poor morale, and poor formation. But the players are the ones on the field. The buck stops with them, and if you're going to hold Hart to account you can hold them too, because at least there has been a fairly stable line-up, barring injuries, and for the most part there have been few real issues with you he has called. You can' blame a coach for all failures, responsibility lies with the players too. A better question. DO WE AS FANS have the 'balls' to ditch this defeatist attitude and replace it with a positive one. It takes positive thinking to step on to the pitch and believe you can make a difference, we may be in the stands, but the least we can do is think positively in solidarity with those who play for us on it. You can hold the players to account to but unlike a club team a national team can not change players unless it is a top soccer nation with a lot of high level players available. We are stuck with the players we have and the only thing we can change is the level of coach. And if we are going to hold the players accountable, then we sure as hell should give them a good competent coach to work with. If players could coach themselves there would be no need for coaches in the world. There may be the occasional coach who is successful through mere inspiration but for the most part coaching is a highly skilled and knowledgeable profession. With the same group of players one coach can achieve far better results than another. Even a good coach may not mesh with every team but you can be sure a poor one will not be good with any team unless that team is just full of superior players or coaches itself in which cases they are successful despite the coach. If you compared coaching to conducting, Hart would be like a student with no professional experience who has just graduated from a mediocre music school. If such a student were to conduct the Berlin Philharmonic they would still sound good because the players would follow him at those few times he did things that made sense and ignore him the rest of the time. But they are still good enough players that it would sound good just like Hart would get better results if we had a team of EPL and La Liga stars. But the inexperienced conductor in front of a third rate orchestra and it will be a disaster even though under a top or even merely good and competent conductor this orchestra could play well. The 3rd rate orchestra needs a good conductor far more than the 1st rate one although most first rate ones also realize they are better with a good conductor than without. We are the football equivalent to a 3rd rate orchestra and we need a good competent conductor not the guy with no experience who just graduated from school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grizzly Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 This is where we disagree I think. I feel the tone of this threat implies that Hart will be a failure; it is only a matter of time. My view is that he hasn't been great so far but he hasn't failed. My view may change after the next three games. I feel this threat goes beyond a possibly helpful and constructive level of pessimism (that we know well) to an unconstructive defeatist level of pessimism. Even the title of this thread "Does Victor Have The Balls?" is toned so as to be goading to Victor: not a title for constructive criticism. Hart was always an under-qualified hire and should have been on a short leash. I think he should have been fired after the Gold Cup performance. I think there was a strong case for firing him after the poor uninspired play against minnow teams in the last round even though we qualified. The results have not been great but he has survived and if he is a good enough coach not to bring failure in the next round he needs to show it in the first two games. I am not saying he is destined to failure, I am saying if he is able to bring this team to success he needs to show it in the first two games. If he can not handle that type of pressure than he has no business being the coach. And a coaching change has to be made between the 2nd and 3rd game if one is going to be made because of the two month break in the schedule. Plus it may be possible to recover after 2 poor games if the other team's results allow it but after 3 poor results it is probably too late. As far as being positive, this is World Cup Qualifying not a team of 12 year olds who need encouragement. What matters is results and both players and the coaching staff need to be absolutely clear about this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpg75 Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 This is where we disagree I think. I feel the tone of this threat implies that Hart will be a failure; it is only a matter of time. My view is that he hasn't been great so far but he hasn't failed. My view may change after the next three games. I feel this threat goes beyond a possibly helpful and constructive level of pessimism (that we know well) to an unconstructive defeatist level of pessimism. Even the title of this thread "Does Victor Have The Balls?" is toned so as to be goading to Victor: not a title for constructive criticism. All coaches eventually fail at the NT level, it is almost inevitable. Stephen Hart will be fired one day, it's just a matter of when. Some of us think it should have happened already, some such as yourself disagree. Postulating whether Victor M. is like former CSA administrators and will sit idly by while our WCQ campaign goes down in flames or whether he will act quickly to try and change course is a valid point to bring up, especially since he fancies himself as a soccer guy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
madmonte Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 Hey Grizz, that was an eye opening comparison. Normally people on forum boards go in with a certain opinion, and no matter what others say, they leave with the same opinion, and all the words in between are just filler, and meaningless banter of people trying desperately to look more intelligent than the person you are arguing with. I had no previous problem with Hart, coming in with little knowledge of him, but your philharmonic comparison made me squint and nod and think hmmm...maybe this is something I should keep an eye on. thanks for that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
closetboostie Posted May 29, 2012 Share Posted May 29, 2012 No but some coaches can guarantee lack of success....................... Nevertheless, the Russian program and national team improved immensely during his time there and his successor Advocat has benefitted greatly from the work Hiddink did before him and they qualified impressively for the Euro. If we don't qualify what will our players have learned from Hart in the meantime. How to constantly play 4-5-1 without any variation whatever the circumstances? I think this is a very productive thread because certainly many CSA members read the forum and quite possibly Victor himself. And he has to realize in the eyes of the fans that if he does not fire Hart if we start the first two matches poorly or barring that after a failure to qualify for the Hex then he will just be another in a long line of incompetent CSA presidents who play politics but have no clue about football. Hart himself should know the pressure to win is on now. In most of the world coaching is a results oriented business and the CSA should require a coach to achieve results to retain his job. Enough of the "We like you and you are cheap attitude." Your orchestra analogy was excellent, and for the most part I agree with what you are saying. However, the timing is all wrong. The fact is, Canada has 3 matches in the next 2 weeks and they are massive. Now is not the time to start the death watch. Definitely the evaluation of our personnel, and that includes coaches, never ends. But the feeling around the team and atmosphere in the stadium, whether that comes from CSA bigwigs, the fans, or the coaches themselves will have a huge impact on how we perform. The risk of our underachievement becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy is huge, in fact we've seen it before. Canada must go into the matches with a killer instinct, expecting to win, to qualify. If the CSA brass has one eye on the guillotine it WILL have a trickle down effect, and not a positive one. As you say, there is a huge break during the summer for self-evaluation. I hope everyone involved in the setup is throwing all resources at these upcoming matches. Deal with the fallout starting June 13. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
intim0dating Posted May 30, 2012 Share Posted May 30, 2012 Just want to chime and in and say Grizzly is a fantastic poster. He has had a lot to say about Hart's regime, and whether you agree or disagree with his claims, you can't fault the power of his arguments. Carry on... =) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert Posted February 12, 2018 Author Share Posted February 12, 2018 Obviously not. Just to make it easier to find. Wow 6 years ago, where does the time go? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 Well, this is a good thread bump. We can celebrate with this graphic right here. Personally I am disgusted Gandhi would steal this quote from Vic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vince193 Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 Since he left the CSA has regressed to their old ways. How many days in counting since the Zambrano firing and we have nothing from the CSA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 9 minutes ago, Vince193 said: Since he left the CSA has regressed to their old ways. How many days in counting since the Zambrano firing and we have nothing from the CSA. They announced a game for March 24th. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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