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Grady McDonnell (2008)


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20 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

Thanks, was surprised by that. Real Madrid does have lapses in player development, but still, on the Spain national team there is Morata, starting striker, and his sub at striker Joselu, both RM developed. Then Carvajal. Nacho the CB was left off recently only because of long-term injury. 2/11, maybe 3/11, plus one supersub, not great but not bad. 

Though what you are saying makes sense, if anyone thinks there should be more. Sometimes the big teams with good finances can just buy, and the youth can't break in if the quality is that high. Unless they get a lucky break, even Casillas got a break as a teen when the starter Bodo Illgner got injured. TFC has done the big buying more than any other Canadian MLS team. But then, the others, with weaker finances, have not bought in well enough to the other more economic option, bring up the kids.

I think there are two questions for development at MLS clubs

1-what is the playing model or style, and does the reserve or NextPro team play it? Meaning either a younger player can step into the role if needed, or not know what the hell to do. Obviously the standard bearers for this model are teams like Ajax.

2-is the reserve level high enough to make the leap feasible? While there are many cases of players being called from a lower level reserve to a first team, usually the higher the reserve team and its competition, the easier the step up.

Again, most top reserve teams in Netherlands are in second division, which makes their development model one of the most envied, for both factors. 

Our MLS model does not care enough about the first, and the reserves are probably too low a level to fulfill the second.

In fairness to RM, most of the 2010 era teams were RM and barca with only 3 players not in la liga. Now the spanish national team has players all over the place. Barca's contributions have significantly decreased as well with them only really contributing through the new wave of prospects. Obviously that wave is extremely high potential and better than RM spanish youth..... However, I think its just a temporary lull. 

Great points on development. 

1. I think this matters less in MLS than a heavy tactical league like inter. TBH, theres not extreme core identities built into whitecaps or TFC like at barca or ajax. I think if the player is talented enough, they can get up to speed with a few sessions. 

2. This is the big one for me. Theres just to big of a gap between first team and reserves. Im not sure theres a feasible solution though. Logistics aside, maybe joining usl and mlsnp increases the quality of the "reserves" league. But even that seems like a big jump to mls. 

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15 hours ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

 

I think there are two questions for development at MLS clubs

1-what is the playing model or style, and does the reserve or NextPro team play it? Meaning either a younger player can step into the role if needed, or not know what the hell to do. Obviously the standard bearers for this model are teams like Ajax.

It is interesting you bring this up- Laurent Courtois of Crew II was just hired as the CF Montreal head coach, and when they announced the hire, a graph was circulating on twitter showing the similarities in style between MLS clubs and their NP affiliates. Columbus’ teams were I believe the most similar in the league, and given the Nancy connection I assume that was a factor in hiring him, though a few teams play in absolutely incompatible styles with their NP team and that’s probably why some clubs just can’t develop talent between the two teams. I can’t find the chart anymore, but if someone has it, post it, since it was interesting to see which clubs have stylistic overlaps between their development and main teams.

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2 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

It is interesting you bring this up- Laurent Courtois of Crew II was just hired as the CF Montreal head coach, and when they announced the hire, a graph was circulating on twitter showing the similarities in style between MLS clubs and their NP affiliates. Columbus’ teams were I believe the most similar in the league, and given the Nancy connection I assume that was a factor in hiring him, though a few teams play in absolutely incompatible styles with their NP team and that’s probably why some clubs just can’t develop talent between the two teams. I can’t find the chart anymore, but if someone has it, post it, since it was interesting to see which clubs have stylistic overlaps between their development and main teams.

I've heard Vanny Sartini has been instructing the Caps Next Pro coaches in knee slides, facial incontinence and the art of going shirtless after a win.

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  • 2 months later...
5 minutes ago, Dominic94 said:

I can’t find the article but it seems like he’s highly rated by his coach and I don’t think it’s unrealistic to expect to see him and Tahid play big roles this year.

His manager was interviewed in the  Northern Football podcast this week and he seems really high on the player

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Kudos to VFC for going out and signing talented young players in TJ, Cameron & this yr Grady and playing them. The coach seems smitten with Grady, so looks like he will  have  a prominent role to play. This is the best way for the CPL to have a tangible impact. Signing and developing young talent in a pro environment which should result in material transfer fees in the near future. It's a good business strategy.

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9 hours ago, toontownman said:

Hopefully he shines and grows a bigger connection to Canada in the process.  

He would likely have to look and be legit pretty special to crack into the u20 group for July but I guess it's possible. I would expect as the article says he might not be ready to commit. Certainly if the tournament is cap tieing.

I mean if he’s starting he will crack it, but will he commit?

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Obviously making Qatar will have opened the eyes of the football world, knowing Canada is now on that stage.  Playing Holland, France, Argentina, Chile and Peru ( in COPA ) will continue to show we are taking our new found level seriously.  In theory that should continue to open the eyes of younger dual nats looking at Canada.

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24 minutes ago, Ottawafan said:

Obviously making Qatar will have opened the eyes of the football world, knowing Canada is now on that stage.  Playing Holland, France, Argentina, Chile and Peru ( in COPA ) will continue to show we are taking our new found level seriously.  In theory that should continue to open the eyes of younger dual nats looking at Canada.

Well we have to develop these kids, when Vancouver eventually sells Cameron, Tahid and McDonell, and Forge sell Tavernier, more teams will start to scout, sign, develop and sell the 15-20 age group, which is really what they should have been focusing on from the start. 

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1 hour ago, Dominic94 said:

I mean if he’s starting he will crack it, but will he commit?

Not sure about that. I've never seen the kid play (maybe tomorrow?) but he is 3 years younger than most. They didn't even take Tahid, who is a year older,  to the play in round.

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11 minutes ago, Ivan said:

Not sure about that. I've never seen the kid play (maybe tomorrow?) but he is 3 years younger than most. They didn't even take Tahid, who is a year older,  to the play in round.

True, though it was probably the weirdest omission of the group, he was arguably our best player at the U17 World Cup and many from that team made the U20 roster

Edited by phresh
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17 minutes ago, Ivan said:

Not sure about that. I've never seen the kid play (maybe tomorrow?) but he is 3 years younger than most. They didn't even take Tahid, who is a year older,  to the play in round.

I have no inside info, but I'm still convinced there is more to the story about TJ's omission. 

And with the significant depth and CPL experience that Langley has added, I actually think it's going to be very challenging for the youngest 5 or 6 to get minutes of much significance this season. It may come down to a choice between moving up 2 or 3 positions in the table, or sacrificing the odd result in favour of youth development.

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1 hour ago, Dominic94 said:

Well we have to develop these kids, when Vancouver eventually sells Cameron, Tahid and McDonell, and Forge sell Tavernier, more teams will start to scout, sign, develop and sell the 15-20 age group, which is really what they should have been focusing on from the start. 

Vancouver is perhaps taking it to another level, but it's not as if teams haven't been doing this from the start. Nearly half of Pacific's lineup in year 1 was in this age group. Alghamdi was 16 and he's one of the league's best exports to date. Hojabrpour, verhoven, verhoeven, chung, campbell etc. We signed Gazdov at 16

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36 minutes ago, Aird25 said:

Vancouver is perhaps taking it to another level, but it's not as if teams haven't been doing this from the start. Nearly half of Pacific's lineup in year 1 was in this age group. Alghamdi was 16 and he's one of the league's best exports to date. Hojabrpour, verhoven, verhoeven, chung, campbell etc. We signed Gazdov at 16

Gazdov went on loan for 2 years, most of those guys were 18+.

a lot of the leagues young guys were 17 and up.

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1 hour ago, nolando said:

I have no inside info, but I'm still convinced there is more to the story about TJ's omission. 

And with the significant depth and CPL experience that Langley has added, I actually think it's going to be very challenging for the youngest 5 or 6 to get minutes of much significance this season. It may come down to a choice between moving up 2 or 3 positions in the table, or sacrificing the odd result in favour of youth development.

I think Vancouver is going to play these kids, Tahid is highly rated as is McDonell, that can be worth quite a bit of money down the line.

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32 minutes ago, Dominic94 said:

Gazdov went on loan for 2 years, most of those guys were 18+.

a lot of the leagues young guys were 17 and up.

I was responding to you comment about signing and developing the 15-20 year age groups. If you'd said 15-16 I would have responded differently.

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