Kamron Habibullah

[Aird25]

I hope Habibullah turns into a great player. I truly do, but based on what we've seen with Pacific and the Whitecaps that seems unlikely. He hasn't shown enough and there are many players ahead of him. I don't blame the development pathway for this though. He has had more opportunity than most but he just hasn't cut it yet. Fingers crossed that changes. 

[Watchmen]

3 hours ago, El Hombre said:

The problem though is that this determination has been made for a kid that turned 20 three weeks ago based on one loan as an 18 year-old.  I don't get that.

Look at Richie Laryea: the same "argument" could've been made in 2018 when he was cut from Orlando as a 23 year-old.  Maybe he just couldn't make the transition to the pro game?  Luckily Vanney took a flyer on him (this will be the one and only time you will hear me praise Vanney) and without CanPL at the time, he could've very easily been out of the game at 25.  Or stuck in USL purgatory.  Either way, definitely not at the level he is now.

Habibullah now has to rely on the same luck.  Fortunately, there is CanPL but he definitely faces an uphill climb, much more steep than if he had been developed properly by VWFC and given a chance to succeed after spending 7 years with them.  And those who insist on carrying water for the club will point to any failure in that climb to reaffirm the club's decision, no matter how many times we see this over and over again.

Well, then the good news is that the best players in BC shouldn't be picking the Whitecaps anymore.  They have other options now.  Honestly, best of luck to them.  I'd like to see this province putting players back on the national team.

[P-O]

There wouldn't be anything wrong with going to play D3 a season to get your confidence up & then get a CPL move.

Better than sit on a CPL bench.

[Footyeh]

3 hours ago, Aird25 said:

I hope Habibullah turns into a great player. I truly do, but based on what we've seen with Pacific and the Whitecaps that seems unlikely. He hasn't shown enough and there are many players ahead of him. I don't blame the development pathway for this though. He has had more opportunity than most but he just hasn't cut it yet. Fingers crossed that changes. 

Who's ahead of him from the the 2nd team/Academy?  Based on what?  He hasn't shown enough to who?  

Edited November 11, 2023 by Footyeh

[Footyeh]

8 hours ago, El Hombre said:

This is an exceptionally flawed way to evaluate talent.  Anyone who has paid any attention to Canadian soccer over the last year has seen umpteen examples of how individual talent is just a small percentage of what it takes to succeed in a given situation:

Lukas MacNaughton went from being the whipping boy on the worst team in MLS to a regular contributor on one of the best.  Did he learn how to play defence on that flight to Nashville?

Cyle Larin went from being less than a bench warmer in Brugge to the hottest thing in La Liga and then back to a bench player.  Is his talent level that sporadic?

Liam Millar went from being a squad player in the Swiss league to an important contributor in the Championship.

Those are just three off the top of my head, I'm sure there are more.  There are so many things that contribute to a player's success other thn raw talent: coaching, tactics, role within a system, surrounding players, confidence etc, that to draw conclusions about a player's quality based on one loan is so fundamentally wrong.

I know it's of utmost importance to tow the VWFC party line on this, but he and Campagna can't be seen as anything other than a failure on the organization.  To cut ties at such a young age is ludicrous.

The most sensible post. 

I won't go on as you hit the nail on the head.  Performance on Team A DOES NOT EQUAL Performance on Team B.  Two totally different qualities of football, two completely identifies of football being played, two completely different spectrum in quality of players being played with and against.  There's players in CPL who are studs who simply won't look good in most MLS teams.  And vice versa, there's players in the MLS that would go to CPL and look lost.  

If anyone has Wyscout, I recommend watching the matches Habibullah played prior to going away with the U20 National Team and then follow his matches/minutes/positions played once he came back.  He was a 18 year old on Loan.  Pacific was winning, Bustos performing very well in that position.  Why did Pacific try and bring him back if they felt he "couldn't play against men"?  How many guys have been out to UBC to see him in training with Whitecaps 1st Team?  Anyone see how the 1st team players interact with him?  The way he performs alongside them?  

Maybe in the end Habibullah won't make it, maybe he will.  But to make claims that "he's not good", "he hasn't lived up to opportunities", "others have passed him" is comical and baseless.  That's like informing an opinion based on a couple of people on twitter's comments.  Look across the whole country, how many players of his profile have we developed, it's exactly the type of player we should be pushing to see more of.  We all just watched our U17 National Team get dogged by Spain, what kind of profiles did Spain have running the show?

[Aird25]

2 hours ago, Footyeh said:

The most sensible post. 

I won't go on as you hit the nail on the head.  Performance on Team A DOES NOT EQUAL Performance on Team B.  Two totally different qualities of football, two completely identifies of football being played, two completely different spectrum in quality of players being played with and against.  There's players in CPL who are studs who simply won't look good in most MLS teams.  And vice versa, there's players in the MLS that would go to CPL and look lost.  

If anyone has Wyscout, I recommend watching the matches Habibullah played prior to going away with the U20 National Team and then follow his matches/minutes/positions played once he came back.  He was a 18 year old on Loan.  Pacific was winning, Bustos performing very well in that position.  Why did Pacific try and bring him back if they felt he "couldn't play against men"?  How many guys have been out to UBC to see him in training with Whitecaps 1st Team?  Anyone see how the 1st team players interact with him?  The way he performs alongside them?  

Maybe in the end Habibullah won't make it, maybe he will.  But to make claims that "he's not good", "he hasn't lived up to opportunities", "others have passed him" is comical and baseless.  That's like informing an opinion based on a couple of people on twitter's comments.  Look across the whole country, how many players of his profile have we developed, it's exactly the type of player we should be pushing to see more of.  We all just watched our U17 National Team get dogged by Spain, what kind of profiles did Spain have running the show?

Habibullah had every opportunity to perform well at Pacific but he wasn't good enough to grasp it at the time.  We were a side struggling to score. He was young, so maybe that changes, but others who have received no hype have been far better in a similar scenario 

[toontownman]

Can see both VFC and Valour making a play for him.

I haven't seen the hype when I saw him at Pacific or Vancouver. You can tell there is ability there but consistency and decision making isn't consistent. Still has plenty of time to figure that stuff out and build his physical game too.

[SthMelbRed]

I watched young Kamron playing for a touring VWFC academy+ team playing against men on a cold night in South London when he was 15 . The team he was playing against was in the 6th tier of English football. His coach was Nick Dasovic and he was by far the best player on the pitch that night, and he only played about 30 minutes. Theo Bair was playing as a lone striker in that team and ran his absolute bollocks off for 90 minutes.

Then, within a short period, both players moved to the 'Caps senior team, playing for MDS, the most incompetent football manager I've ever had the displeasure of watching at a team I support (and I watched every game of Hodgson at Liverpool for six months).  Kam impressed in very limited minutes with the first team in league play, but then gets no opportunities at all. There were times when the game was won, or, more frequently, lost with plenty of time remaining. These were chances to let Kamron play, make mistakes. learn under little pressure. MDS chose to play one of the old, terrible retreads he signed for no benefit while Kam watched on from the bench.

They sack MDS, much too late for my liking, and then they bring in another clown who sends Kamrom to Siberia, 'cause his brother had the temerity to speak back to Vanni as a teenager.

So, the question is, why could Kamron play against men when he was still a child, and Daso was his gaffer, but not under MDS or Vanni? Why could Theo run and run, closing down every ball, for 90 minutes while his team was under the cosh when Daso was his gaffer, but was deemed too lazy under MDS and Vanni?

I'm a lifelong Whitecaps supporter. I defend them against moronic criticism a lot. But, for this, they have to wear the blame for not being a serious organisation when it comes to player development.

[Watchmen]

1 hour ago, SthMelbRed said:

So, the question is, why could Kamron play against men when he was still a child, and Daso was his gaffer, but not under MDS or Vanni? Why could Theo run and run, closing down every ball, for 90 minutes while his team was under the cosh when Daso was his gaffer, but was deemed too lazy under MDS and Vanni?

Just to keep our levels of blame clear - Bair was loaned out initially on August 6th 2021, MDS was fired on August 27th, and Bair was permanently sold in January 2022.  In other words, Vanni never managed him.  But as well, he's now on his second team in the SPL, after the first team mutually agreed to terminate his contract.  So it's not just the Whitecaps that found him lacking.

[Footyeh]

2 hours ago, SthMelbRed said:

I watched young Kamron playing for a touring VWFC academy+ team playing against men on a cold night in South London when he was 15 . The team he was playing against was in the 6th tier of English football. His coach was Nick Dasovic and he was by far the best player on the pitch that night, and he only played about 30 minutes. Theo Bair was playing as a lone striker in that team and ran his absolute bollocks off for 90 minutes.

Then, within a short period, both players moved to the 'Caps senior team, playing for MDS, the most incompetent football manager I've ever had the displeasure of watching at a team I support (and I watched every game of Hodgson at Liverpool for six months).  Kam impressed in very limited minutes with the first team in league play, but then gets no opportunities at all. There were times when the game was won, or, more frequently, lost with plenty of time remaining. These were chances to let Kamron play, make mistakes. learn under little pressure. MDS chose to play one of the old, terrible retreads he signed for no benefit while Kam watched on from the bench.

They sack MDS, much too late for my liking, and then they bring in another clown who sends Kamrom to Siberia, 'cause his brother had the temerity to speak back to Vanni as a teenager.  

So, the question is, why could Kamron play against men when he was still a child, and Daso was his gaffer, but not under MDS or Vanni? Why could Theo run and run, closing down every ball, for 90 minutes while his team was under the cosh when Daso was his gaffer, but was deemed too lazy under MDS and Vanni?

I'm a lifelong Whitecaps supporter. I defend them against moronic criticism a lot. But, for this, they have to wear the blame for not being a serious organisation when it comes to player development.

This is the question no one in Vancouver can answer.  HOW was he even able to play 3-4 1st team games off the bench and LOOK GOOD at 17 years old but not at 18 or 19.  Not to mention the preseason games where he was scoring/assisting.

We can say things about MDS, I agree Kam should have gotten more minutes, but the guy was fighting for his job and he chose to run with older players.  MDS was very high on Kam and the two had a good relationship.  He was one of the reasons why Kam chose to sign with Whitecaps 1st team.  

No one can say the incident with Vanni and his brother didn't effect Kamron because the season directly after Vanni took the job, he removed Kamron from preseason all together (which is why he went to Pacific when he did).

Edited November 14, 2023 by Footyeh

[BearcatSA]

13 hours ago, Footyeh said:

We can say things about MDS, I agree Kam should have gotten more minutes, but the guy was fighting for his job and he chose to run with older players. 

Unfortuately, it's not a developmental situation where a gaffer has leeway in allowing for growing pains.  Depending on the position, unless you are delivering the goods, you'll get the hook, especially in the back line:  I have argued on here that Cornelius got the hook from starting too easily in favour of  Rose, who seemed to be afforded a whole lot more leeway for his cock ups because of the "coach on the field" narrative that got spun in the local media. (It's funny now when I hear one of those guys, Paul Dolan, talking about how they could use Cornelius ahead of Brown or Laborda on the left of the back three with Blackmon going to his natural right side.  Go figure.).

 

 

Edited November 14, 2023 by BearcatSA

[SpursFlu]

Because of the structure of the MLS, teams will 9 times out of ten look abroad for a Habibullah type player

[Footyeh]

2 hours ago, SpursFlu said:

Because of the structure of the MLS, teams will 9 times out of ten look abroad for a Habibullah type player

Agreed.  RSL got it right with Diego Luna, a direct comparable player.  I bet Vancouver would happily have a Luna on their books.

[SthMelbRed]

5 hours ago, BearcatSA said:

Unfortuately, it's not a developmental situation where a gaffer has leeway in allowing for growing pains.  Depending on the position, unless you are delivering the goods, you'll get the hook, especially in the back line:  I have argued on here that Cornelius got the hook from starting too easily in favour of  Rose, who seemed to be afforded a whole lot more leeway for his cock ups because of the "coach on the field" narrative that got spun in the local media. (It's funny now when I hear one of those guys, Paul Dolan, talking about how they could use Cornelius ahead of Brown or Laborda on the left of the back three with Blackmon going to his natural right side.  Go figure.).

 

 

The situations where I lost my shit with MDS most were when 'fighting for his job' was out of the equation. I remember a game, one of the few that were available to me on Australian TV. I can't remember the generic American opposition, but it was 1-all after an hour, and MDS has only used one of his subs. We concede two goals in the fifteen minutes up to 75. Game over, for all intents and purposes. MDS immediately rolls out a bunch of ordinary, at best, veterans from the bench, using all of his remaining subs. Kam stays sitting and watching. If you don't use those 10-15 minutes on your most-promising prospect, you don't give a fuck about development. There were a number of similar situations throughout that wasted season.

[InglewoodJack]

36 minutes ago, SthMelbRed said:

The situations where I lost my shit with MDS most were when 'fighting for his job' was out of the equation. I remember a game, one of the few that were available to me on Australian TV. I can't remember the generic American opposition, but it was 1-all after an hour, and MDS has only used one of his subs. We concede two goals in the fifteen minutes up to 75. Game over, for all intents and purposes. MDS immediately rolls out a bunch of ordinary, at best, veterans from the bench, using all of his remaining subs. Kam stays sitting and watching. If you don't use those 10-15 minutes on your most-promising prospect, you don't give a fuck about development. There were a number of similar situations throughout that wasted season.

*Biello taking notes*

[Watchmen]

36 minutes ago, SthMelbRed said:

The situations where I lost my shit with MDS most were when 'fighting for his job' was out of the equation. I remember a game, one of the few that were available to me on Australian TV. I can't remember the generic American opposition, but it was 1-all after an hour, and MDS has only used one of his subs. We concede two goals in the fifteen minutes up to 75. Game over, for all intents and purposes. MDS immediately rolls out a bunch of ordinary, at best, veterans from the bench, using all of his remaining subs. Kam stays sitting and watching. If you don't use those 10-15 minutes on your most-promising prospect, you don't give a fuck about development. There were a number of similar situations throughout that wasted season.

I can almost guarantee I know MDS's thought process. "Shit, we're losing. I better get more of the players I blew the Davies money on and pray one of them looks like he's kicked a ball before."

Having said that, I do remember him giving Bair opportunities in the situation you described above. Just not Kam.

[BearcatSA]

1 hour ago, SthMelbRed said:

The situations where I lost my shit with MDS most were when 'fighting for his job' was out of the equation.

Related to your point was that he never got called to account nearly enough for his highly questionable decisions.  He'd give some vague, folksy answers post match that begged for obvious follow up questioning and instead all we got was the flaccidly impotent, "Thank you for your honesty, Marc" response.  That was from the same crowd that bigged up "Coach on the Field" Rose.  

 

 

[Buchta]

He is/was on trial with Pécsi MFC (Hungarian 2nd tier).  He scored in a friendly on January 27th.

https://www.bama.hu/helyi-sport/2024/01/az-egyesult-allamokbol-hozhat-uzbeg-kanadai-jatekost-a-pmfc

[Footyeh]

He was in with a 1st division Hungarian club that sent him there until end of the season.  Last I heard is his signing was being finalized

[InglewoodJack]

6 hours ago, Footyeh said:

He was in with a 1st division Hungarian club that sent him there until end of the season.  Last I heard is his signing was being finalized

Is he signing with the first division club or this second tier one he’s trialing with?

[VinceA]

8 hours ago, Buchta said:

He is/was on trial with Pécsi MFC (Hungarian 2nd tier).  He scored in a friendly on January 27th.

https://www.bama.hu/helyi-sport/2024/01/az-egyesult-allamokbol-hozhat-uzbeg-kanadai-jatekost-a-pmfc

Former club of one Manjrekar James.

[Footyeh]

2 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

Is he signing with the first division club or this second tier one he’s trialing with?

Trying to find out.  Could possibly be a sign & loan.  

[Dominic94]

Signed with SKC2

 

 

[Watchmen]

Interesting. Wonder if no CPL clubs were interested or if he wasn't interested in them. Either way, best of luck to him.

[Footyeh]

https://x.com/tv_jjd/status/1765841484572398033?s=20 

Edited March 7 by Footyeh