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Posted by
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December 2, 2016 |
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Email
Aaron Nielsen
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@ENBSports
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The game on Wednesday night was amazing and one could write a whole book on the drama that took place. It showed what MLS and Canadian Soccer is, what it can be, and although not the best example of how the game is played, why MLS or Canadian Soccer matters as much as any league in the world. My only regret Wednesday was not being at the game, however even watching it and being on twitter made me numb. Throughout the day you still had ongoing stories and responses to the Chapecoense disaster, which not only struck me because in my work I have covered the club and all the players, but also the world response to the event. This cemented my love for the game because global awareness of the sport is why I rate soccer above all other sports.
Then you had the Toronto FC and Montreal Impact game itself. In my view, the Impact were at fault for allowing such an open game based on their starting lineup and how they play. The Impact should have slowed down the game and frustrated Toronto, especially after scoring the first goal and taking a 4-2 lead. Although by the time we reached extra time, Toronto FC were looking like a team of destiny having players like Ricketts, Osorio and Cheyrou making a difference coming off the bench. Overall, the whole team had an influence and without repeating myself, despite some noticeable mistakes this might be the best we have seen them since they started in 2007. I do have a lot of Seattle people who I'm connected with on social media who have a different view, so before the final game I will breakdown each team in detail and give my actual prediction for the finals.
With a game of that excitement and magnitude it has overshadowed an earlier announcement in the day between the Canadian Soccer Association and Major League Soccer regarding the status of Canadian players within the MLS. The current rule has Canadian players on American MLS teams count as international players, which has been widely believed to have hindered the number of Canadian players in MLS. I agree with this, although one point not mentioned is once a Canadian player has some long term establishment in the US, that player can acquire an American Work Visa and at that point they no longer counts as an international player. So currently players such as Kofi Opare, Tesho Akindele are not regarded as foreigners, although Orlando's Cyle Larin and Richmond Laryea as well as any new signing such as an Atiba Hutchinson or current free agent Adam Straith, would be an international signing if not signed by a Canadian team and would have to compete for limited roster sports with other non-American players.
Like many MLS rules, the press conference and further write-up from the Canadian Soccer Association as seen here - both give details, yet still are a little vague of how it will actually be implemented. As I work firsthand with regards to the potential movement of players, I can give my opinion on what I read, what was said and how it may affect Canadian players going forward.
The easier part to explain of the agreement is the addition of Canadian Generation Adidas players. Currently Generation Adidas contracts are offered to players that the league thinks are prospects with a high amount of potential for the future. Most players are taken from undergrads at NCAA Division 1 schools with some exceptions, the last one being Vancouver Whitecaps’ Kekuta Manneh. Manneh never attended College before playing in MLS but did play US Academy and PDL soccer before being drafted fourth overall in the 2013 MLS Superdraft. Ironically both Larin and Laryea were also given Generation Adidas contracts despite being Canadian, although they did play in NCAA Division 1 before playing in the MLS.
The truth is, many of the current and past Generation Adidas players are not American. NCAA Colleges realize they can be more successful by recruiting foreign players, as oppose to American players who then turn out to be the top prospects in NCAA Division 1 and the MLS Draft. Some recent drafted GA players include Andre Blake, Omar Holness Damion Lowe and Romario Williams who are Jamaican; Fabian Herbers and Julian Buscher who are German; Schillo Tshuma is from Zimbabwe; Josh Yaro is from Ghana and Jack Harrison who is English. Even in the upcoming draft, some top underclassmen I like include Tim Kubel and Gordon Wild who are German, Abu Danladi who is Ghanaian, and an outsider but also getting decent attention is Albert Ruiz, who is Spanish.
Right now Canadian underclassman of note include Syracuse defender Kamal Miller, although the top two Canadians for the 2017 MLS draft are seniors in UCONN's and Sigma FC player Kwame Awuah and Vermont's Brian Wright. So this opens an opportunity for a player like Ajeej Sarkaria, who as a freshman was one of the top performers in CIS this past year, or players in League One Ontario with Niba MacDonald being first on my personal list. Although in the case of Niba he played most of his soccer in Cameroon before coming to Canada quite recently, so there might be the question if he would even qualify for a Canadian Generation Adidas Contract.
Which relates to the second part of the agreement - the status of Canadians counting as non-internationals in the MLS which in the press release says:
-The player became a member of an MLS club academy, either in the U.S. or Canada, or a Canadian Approved Youth Club in the year prior to the year in which he turns
16 - AND
-The player signs his first professional contract with MLS or an MLS club’s USL affiliate.
Both of these points raise red flags based on discussions surrounding the current Canadian landscape. First, it is in direct conflict with the proposed Canadian Premier League. This is because one would assume if a player is playing first team soccer with a Canadian Premier League he would have signed a professional contract, which if it was his first, he would count as a foreign player if he moved to MLS. Second, it restricts any Canadian players from taking a shot at Europe before returning to an MLS club, because again their first contract would not be with an MLS club.
The biggest blunder regarding the first professional contract stipulation is what exists in the Canadian landscape now. Under these rules Canadian players on Ottawa, who is now a USL club, would count as an international player if they moved to MLS and the same would go for FC Edmonton. What all of this does is basically creates a monopoly of Canadian players for the three MLS clubs because a Canadian restricts himself in terms of contract opportunities if he is identified as an international player in MLS.
In terms of the agreement regarding playing for an MLS Academy or Approved Youth Club, this seems to me as much of a CSA requests than an MLS one. As talked about before, including by myself, the CSA is establishing elite youth clubs including OPDL in Ontario. This is designed to create a better structure within the Canadian Soccer landscape, partly to help in the overall development of players and partly to eliminate rogue teams/leagues from the Canadian Soccer Youth System. It should be said many of these rogue leagues exist because of costs, because to play on an OPDL side currently it is more expensive than playing on a non-OPDL side.
I'm not against MLS, CSA, or the OPDL, and also not involved in youth soccer and it is a subject I'm an outsider to. I know the biggest debate/issues with this involves parents versus pay-for-play clubs and overall value for money over the player’s career. I try to do whatever I can to help with this, although truthfully what I think is not going to be popular and likely controversial.
For the most part I feel academies or elite clubs are not the key ingredient in pro player development. In my career of monitoring players’ careers, I find good soccer players come first from athletic ability, second a passion/drive to succeed and finally technical ability and awareness of the game. I admit some of the last skill comes via academies and elite youth soccer, although there are other factors that can influence this as well. Personally, I never played youth soccer, have never been involved with a youth club and if I had a son or daughter would not be concerned in terms of development of what youth team he or she plays for. The simple truth is, if the perceptions of academies and youth club were true, all the best players would come from these systems, which is simply not the case anywhere in the world.
Even in the case of MLS academies, who now do have a lot of top players at certain age groups, in most cases these players were not developed by said MLS Academies. Most often they were recruited or tried out, or came from other youth clubs in the area or even had no to limited youth experience and have been recruited mostly on raw talent. An example of this is Toronto FC's top Academy team who played in League One Ontario this season. 13 players were playing for another youth club in the city as recent as 2015 or joined TFC Academy in 2014 or 2013 and these players are 16 and 17 years of age.
The other story is players who don't participate in youth soccer at all and instead play high school, college, or just street soccer but are good enough by 21 to be consider a pro. This might happen less with so many youth clubs existing, although if you take a map of the current OPDL, vast areas of the province are not covered by teams and probably even more significant is area where most top Ontario players come from, but don't have local teams such as Brampton and Scarborough.
To be blunt, we know these programs are not about finding the best players but instead providing a service to the middle class and above people in their areas. This has also been the case with the US USSDA program that has been in place since 2007 which I promote the best I can. However, almost every pro team tells me a high percentage of these players are just not good enough leaving parents dumbfounded since pro opportunities was one of the reason these players were playing in these Elite Academies.
Recently, after US lost surprisingly to Costa Rica and I sent out the above tweet. To a lesser extent this is also true with Canada. Money has never been the answer to soccer development. What makes soccer great around the world is its grassroots, what made the Chapecoense story even sadder is they were a small club from a very small city who were beating all odds to make it to the final of international club tournament. The story was never about money. Even with Toronto FC and Montreal Impact, it is far more about the grassroots of the supporters than the club or players themselves and how a large collective of people care about something so deeply. A group where if Toronto FC no longer existed tomorrow there would still be a deep soccer culture in the city.
Like many things, MLS and unfortunately CSA, this new deal isn't about what the original argument was about making it equal for Canadians as exists for American in MLS but instead was about structure, power and in the end how the money is controlled. From experience, the results of these bureaucratic initiatives is they end up failing or a better analogy clogging up the system. Let us hope the collateral damage isn't a struggle between MLS and Canadian Premier League like we have seen recently with MLS and NASL, and most importantly let’s hope the players who deserve to play professional soccer get an opportunity to do so.
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Aaron Neilsen is a co-founder of Prospect XI (Prospect Eleven), a scouting network and online magazine dedicated to tracking/highlighting young players that refer to as "prospects" as well as their development pathways both within North America and worldwide. Follow PXI via www.prospectxi.com or on twitter @ProspectXI.
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