November 11, 2009
MY TWO CENTS
The balance of foreign talent on MLS teams (or another reason why Red Bulls failed)

Chris Brandon is a soccer fan who lives in New Paltz, N.Y.

By Chris Brandon
Special to BigAppleSoccer.com

With the regular season over, most MLS teams are turning to the task of tweaking their rosters for 2010.

Two teams, however, will be building their rosters from scratch: the Philadelphia Union and the Red Bulls. A closer look at why the Red Bulls have been forced to rebuild provides insight into what others, especially upcoming expansion teams, need to do and to avoid in order to put together a successful team.

There are many reasons why the Red Bulls had one of the worst seasons in league history, but one of the most glaring was in the area of player acquisition. As sporting director, Jeff Agoos was responsible for assembling a mess of parts that simply did not work well together. His (and ex-coach Juan Carlos Osorio’s) most blatant error was a penchant for choosing foreign players who did not adjust well to the American game.

Although each MLS team is allowed eight international players on its 24-man roster, the Red Bulls traded for an additional two international spots. However, the influx of foreign talent did not serve them well. Including these 10 internationals, the team had an astounding total of 16 foreign-born players. The result was far from a dazzling international team like Manchester United or the Cosmos. Instead, it produced a disjointed team that communicated poorly and showed no unified style or identity.

The cause for this disarray was partly because too many of the players grew up playing a different style of the game that did not translate well to the physicality and athleticism of American soccer. Case in point: Carlos Johnson and Juan Pietravallo (and Gabriel Cichero in the previous year) accumulated a staggering number of cards in their unsuccessful attempts to adapt.

It is important to emphasize that the lack of cohesion in the Red Bulls was not due to cultural differences so much as incongruent styles of play. Clearly, what MLS teams need to avoid is the Red Bulls’ strategy of recruiting a gaggle of foreign misfits.

A report released by the league states that foreigners accounted for a third of the players in MLS in 2009. Of this total, 25 percent were from Africa, 23 percent from South America, 23 percent from the Caribbean/Central America, 18 percent from Europe, seven percent from Canada, and four percent from the Pacific Rim. This breaks down into an average MLS team consisting of two players from Africa, two from South America, two from the Caribbean and/or Central America, one from Europe, and one extra from either Canada, Europe, or the Pacific Rim (or any of the above).

This breakdown reveals a possible recipe for success at this point in the league’s development. Significantly, several winning teams have similar international player ratios on their rosters. Seattle fits this formula precisely with an extra player coming from the Caribbean, but so do Columbus with an emphasis on South America, and Chicago with the accent on Central America.

Perhaps Philadelphia, Vancouver, and Portland would be well advised to follow Seattle’s example when acquiring foreign players and to ignore New York’s low budget imitation of Real Madrid.

While the diversity of foreign talent gives MLS a unique brand of soccer, which is quintessentially American in its multicultural nature, it needs to be acknowledged that the two-thirds core of U.S.-born soccer players is what drives and thrives in MLS teams. While most sides hope to acquire key international stars (especially at the playmaker position), they should not disregard the qualities that American players bring to the pitch, as Agoos has done to the detriment of the Red Bulls.

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