Interview with a vampire*

By: Robert | June 20th, 2007

Okay I’ll be honest with you I’m not actually interviewing a vampire, I just thought that was a cool title. Actually I finally caught up with soccer expert Brian Kopinski, in case you forgot he’s a former London resident (but still an Arsenal fan) now living here in the States. I orginally wanted to interview him after the Real Salt Lake game but the timing (and a TiVo) just didnt work out. So I asked him to watch the Toronto game and discuss what he saw with me (could there have been a worse game???) So not only did he only get a one-game look at FC Dallas (its hard to make any solid judgements about a team after only 1 game) but the look he got was probably the worse game the Hoops (Dallas edition) have played in years. Anyways, I asked him to watch another game some other time, hopefully so he wouldn’t have such a one-sided view of our team. He said “yes” so we’ll do this again at a later date as well, but here’s his ideas on the Toronto game, MLS and Arsenal (I threw him a bone because he’s a Gunner…gotta be nice to your guests.)

1. I know this game more than any other this season highlighted our defensive deficiencies, but is there anything positive you can see from FC Dallas after this game?

You were missing your two top forwards in this game; although Ruiz played the second half and earned a yellow card nice and quickly into his insertion (an action that might lead one to conclude that he was in his usual form), it could be argued that he was still suffering from a Gold Cup hangover and playing with his national team.

One positive sign in this game was coming out in the second half with a few good shots on goal, which showed they have a bit of fortitude in them. I get the feeling that they are well-coached; to be honest, I don’t think they have talent as good as some other MLS teams, so some credit for where they are now has to go down to their coaching.

2. What do you think is the cause of our defensive shortcomings?

I’d like to get a better idea of who their regular defenders are (based on the spanish-language broadcast, I couldn’t have been sure), but this could go down as just one of those games where the home team plays their ass off. Those fans in Toronto are a bit wild and it would only be a matter of time until that team found their stride. FC Dallas has a solid road record so far, so it could have been a case of this just not being their day.

3. What do you think was the cause of our dearth of quality goal-scoring chances?

I would rather see how you play with Ruiz and Cooper together up top (in the upcoming absence of Cooper, Thompson can fill in). Taking out a couple of big guys, target forwards or not, can really disrupt a team’s offense. Alvarez, who I have always thought was solid, is the type of player who loves to get to the byline and send in crosses, which are best cleaned up by guys like Cooper and Ruiz. Oduro seems have some skill (this is the first time I have seen him), but it might be a while before they figure out how best to play with him (although I hear a three-forward lineup has been used on occasion as well).

4. Juan Toja has become FC Dallas’ best player this season, what are your opinions of him?

See #5

5. Did you see anybody in that game that might be able to make the leap from MLS to a top-league in Europe?

I would love to have some good answers here, but I’d like to reserve some statements like that until I can see another game. I will say that Juan Toja has the skills based on my first viewing. Awareness of the game and passing are two strong points i saw from him.

6. MLS may never be as respected as the top-tier leagues over in Europe and in my opinion it doesn’t have to do that, but what will is take for people across the pond to not view the league as basically a former-star scrap heap?

This is a question about which I have thought long and hard. Especially with Beckham’s American adventure coming up, the English press is really piling it on right now. Since he’s been called back into the national team, they seem to feel some sort of insecurity about him not returning to their league or being in one of the top Euro leagues, and have a need to trash the MLS since they suppose we are an easy target.

I think that we are right on course for where we should be in realizing our own growth potential, no matter how we are viewed over there. It could be argued that there were a few mistakes with guys like Lothar Matthaus coming over to MLS, but those have been few and far between. What our focus has rightly been on and should continue to be on is grooming and developing young American and other North American players to improve the quality of our league. So far, I think we have had a good balance of those players who have started to show their potential between going to Europe or staying at home longer. MLS and US Soccer need to continue to work together and on their own in identifying and then developing these players so we can continue to grow the quantity and quality of our player base.

As we continue to send some of our better players over and they make their inevitable impressions in European football, we might get afforded more respect or we might not; in either case, those of us who watch football from both sides of the Atlantic without a bias can make the best judgments.

6. Although we probably know the outcome what are you grades for the offense, the midfield, the defense and goalkeeper Dario Sala?

Don’t know if you really want to use these, I don’t really stand by them all that much…feel free to combine them with your own, hehe.

Sala 5
Moor 4.5
Goodson 4
Yi 4
Gbandi 4.5
McCarty 4.5
Saragosa 4
Toja 4.5
Alvarez 4.5
Oduro 4
Thompson 4

7. The new stadium forced Arsenal to cut costs this year and go young, and while they weren’t ever in the premiership race 4th place isn’t bad for a team of talented upstarts. What are you expecting for next season and how much does keeping Thierry Henry change expectations?

First of all, I expect Henry to stay. He still has a few years of worldclass play left in him, which wasn’t the case when Arsene Wenger let Vieira go a few years ago. He is smart enough to know that this team can be incredible very soon, and will be happy to stick around and be the leader for that. I don’t think any significant buys will be made in the offseason, because provided that we stay injury-free, our talent and depth is quite good already. This team fired on all cylinders in a few games last year, and beat Manchester United (which has always been our bogey team of the other top tier ones), which indicates to me that they were still just a half-season away from doing it consistently. In my (and Arsene’s) ideal starting 11, Gallas and Rosicky were new additions, so acclimating two new players into the side last season was part of the slow start.

That’s it for now Hoops fans, there’ll be more later because this is Dallas where the FC stands for “Forever composing.”

HOOPS PRIDE!

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