Ismael Kenneth Kone

[Stryker911]

1 hour ago, Cicero said:

Both to teams owned by Americans. Tessman a secondary player at Venezia, with a grounds capacity of 11,000, now relegated. Reynolds now playing at Westerlo in Belgium with a capacity of 8k. Aside from being closer to Euro managers' eyes, how are these moves beneficial to the players? Just businessmen taking a flyer, hoping for the big score. At Montreal, Kone has a good coach and plays with Wanyama and several others who play international football. If it were even true, at Norwich, or some other lower division team he may be loaned to, who would he play with? A bunch of journeyman Brit and Euro players. I don't see the benefit, unless he got an immediate, large raise. 

My comment was in regards to the price even with limited appearances.

[Cicero]

4 minutes ago, costarg said:

OK, but we're underestimating "the systems" in the EU vs MLS.  Sorry man, but we just ain't at their level of development.  It's not just about getting minutes, the training is just all-round better.

Davies and David don't become who they are by toiling away in the MLS.  The younger the potential stars move, the better.

In Davies case, he did develop in MLS to some extent, then went to a team in the top five of global soccer clubs. Norwich City ain't that. David has done well, but I'd point to Alberth Elis who scored nine in twenty games for a terrible Bordeaux side. There's a guy who 'toiled' in MLS. There's a large gap between the superleague-type teams and the rest of Europe in terms of resources. Good MLS organizations are equal or better than the rest excepting a few teams sitting below the elite in each of the big four leagues. Maybe you could throw Monaco and Marseille in there. Lille's recent spending and success are almost certainly unsustainable. In terms of development, I suspect the real difference is just the sheer number of Europeans and West Africans who focus on soccer as opposed to other sports. I've seen no evidence that North Americans go there and suddenly become exponentially better than they would have here. Is Josh Sargent overachieving compared to playing at his home-state club Sporting KC? We'll never know, but I doubt it based on what I've seen in international games. The days of just mailing it in and succeeding in MLS are done.

[Cicero]

16 minutes ago, Stryker911 said:

My comment was in regards to the price even with limited appearances.

Sorry, I took your comment and went off on a development tangent. Those numbers do seem fishy though, given who was paying them.

[costarg]

6 hours ago, Cicero said:

In Davies case, he did develop in MLS to some extent, then went to a team in the top five of global soccer clubs. Norwich City ain't that. David has done well, but I'd point to Alberth Elis who scored nine in twenty games for a terrible Bordeaux side. There's a guy who 'toiled' in MLS. There's a large gap between the superleague-type teams and the rest of Europe in terms of resources. Good MLS organizations are equal or better than the rest excepting a few teams sitting below the elite in each of the big four leagues. Maybe you could throw Monaco and Marseille in there. Lille's recent spending and success are almost certainly unsustainable. In terms of development, I suspect the real difference is just the sheer number of Europeans and West Africans who focus on soccer as opposed to other sports. I've seen no evidence that North Americans go there and suddenly become exponentially better than they would have here. Is Josh Sargent overachieving compared to playing at his home-state club Sporting KC? We'll never know, but I doubt it based on what I've seen in international games. The days of just mailing it in and succeeding in MLS are done.

There are a few things to take into consideration here.  Davies is on the world top 11, I think we can all agree he would not be there if he had stayed in BC two more years. He left at that critical 18-21 range. 

Norwich is not Ajax or Sporting Lisbon, but i'm pretty confident they're better off than CFM in the player development side.  I can't imagine any 18-21 player being better off at CFM, TFC or VWC compared to developping in EU.  The coaching and training is just on another level.

There are some obvious outliers in MLS (Dallas and Philly i guess), but no Canadian team comes close to that.  The one thing I will give VWC is they handled the Davies situation perfectly.  They played him slowly yet consistently, and let him go at the obvious and right time.  

I'm not a particularly stubborn guy, but it'd be difficult to convince me any 18-21 year old should stay at any of the Canadian MLS teams from a development perspective..

 

[kohanz]

1 hour ago, costarg said:

There are a few things to take into consideration here.  Davies is on the world top 11, I think we can all agree he would not be there if he had stayed in BC two more years. He left at that critical 18-21 range. 

Norwich is not Ajax or Sporting Lisbon, but i'm pretty confident they're better off than CFM in the player development side.  I can't imagine any 18-21 player being better off at CFM, TFC or VWC compared to developping in EU.  The coaching and training is just on another level.

There are some obvious outliers in MLS (Dallas and Philly i guess), but no Canadian team comes close to that.  The one thing I will give VWC is they handled the Davies situation perfectly.  They played him slowly yet consistently, and let him go at the obvious and right time.  

I'm not a particularly stubborn guy, but it'd be difficult to convince me any 18-21 year old should stay at any of the Canadian MLS teams from a development perspective..

 

Those are fair points and I don't wholly disagree, but I think it can be dangerous to refer to Davies with respect to any kind of blueprint. As you noted, he's truly exceptional and few others could be expected to handle the transition at that young age as well as he did. 

[Jack1997]

I think if he’s in the lineup today will be very telling whether he gets a transfer or not

[Kadenge]

2 hours ago, kohanz said:

Those are fair points and I don't wholly disagree, but I think it can be dangerous to refer to Davies with respect to any kind of blueprint. As you noted, he's truly exceptional and few others could be expected to handle the transition at that young age as well as he did. 

I would say David's transition from youth soccer to Belgium 1st tier and  performance in his first season at Gent may have been even more impressive 

[kohanz]

4 hours ago, Kadenge said:

I would say David's transition from youth soccer to Belgium 1st tier and  performance in his first season at Gent may have been even more impressive 

I agree if you mean it exceeded expectations even more, but I wouldn't call it a greater accomplishment than working your way into the Bayern starting 11 as quickly as teenager Davies did.

[Free kick]

TVA sports is reporting in their pregame show of Mon-NYC that Kone has decided not to pursue the transfer to Norwich

[Chad_Impact]

On 7/30/2022 at 6:56 PM, Free kick said:

TVA sports is reporting in their pregame show of Mon-NYC that Kone has decided not to pursue the transfer to Norwich

Smart

[gigi riva]

I think its wise for him to stay in Montreal for at least one more season . Who knows if he improves even more maybe his tramfer fee may be double 

[Daniel]

He's clearly looking to break into the WC squad, which would increase his value and attract suitors. He has a better chance doing this at a club where he's established and has a development plan than heading out to warm the bench in an inhospitable environment in an extremely competitive league. Let's call it "Learning From Ballou".

[InglewoodJack]

Wasn’t Ballou’s thing that he went to Barcelona and just became a party boy? Felt like he said something about finally taking his career seriously when he signed for Ottawa

[frmr]

12 minutes ago, InglewoodJack said:

Wasn’t Ballou’s thing that he went to Barcelona and just became a party boy? Felt like he said something about finally taking his career seriously when he signed for Ottawa

Talk about killing the golden goose.

[narduch]

46 minutes ago, Daniel said:

He's clearly looking to break into the WC squad, which would increase his value and attract suitors. He has a better chance doing this at a club where he's established and has a development plan than heading out to warm the bench in an inhospitable environment in an extremely competitive league. Let's call it "Learning From Ballou".

Or Laryea too

[Unnamed Trialist]

6 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

Wasn’t Ballou’s thing that he went to Barcelona and just became a party boy? Felt like he said something about finally taking his career seriously when he signed for Ottawa

We're the hell do you come up with that?

No foundation in truth, do we really have to shit on our own guys this way? 

Apart from Ballou being shy, discreet and not a partier at all. 

Sorry, but I know, because I made a point of it, and not only that: at that time I had a personal friend in upper management at the club and we spoke. BTW my friend now is head of pro competitions at the Spanish ministry of Sport and Culture. 

Ballou could have returned to Barça after the Albacete loan and continued, as he was on contract. 

Edited August 2, 2022 by Unnamed Trialist

[InglewoodJack]

8 hours ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

We're the hell do you come up with that?

No foundation in truth, do we really have to shit on our own guys this way? 

Apart from Ballou being shy, discreet and not a partier at all. 

Sorry, but I know, because I made a point of it, and not only that: at that time I had a personal friend in upper management at the club and we spoke. BTW my friend now is head of pro competitions at the Spanish ministry of Sport and Culture. 

Ballou could have returned to Barça after the Albacete loan and continued, as he was on contract. 

Pretty sure it was mentioned here, and beyond that, I think he had mentioned in interviews on his way back to North America that he was ready to focus on his game or something to that effect. Either way, not important, it’s not “shitting on our guys”, hope he continues his comeback and ends up back in Europe some day.

[Unnamed Trialist]

3 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

Pretty sure it was mentioned here, and beyond that, I think he had mentioned in interviews on his way back to North America that he was ready to focus on his game or something to that effect. Either way, not important, it’s not “shitting on our guys”, hope he continues his comeback and ends up back in Europe some day.

Yes, it's shitting.

No, it was never mentioned. 

It is just the typical sign of our times, people making shit up to seem cool or whatever. Enjoy that.

[InglewoodJack]

3 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

Yes, it's shitting.

No, it was never mentioned. 

It is just the typical sign of our times, people making shit up to seem cool or whatever. Enjoy that.

For sure, I made something up to sound cool to the two dozen active posters here. A more accurate sign of our times is someone being this emotional about an Internet forum post. It’s fine, it’s not a big deal.

[frmr]

There are/were plenty of comments regarding his attitude/work ethic. Both in articles and in comments around the internet. Not saying it's true or not, just saying that it's nothing new.

[Dominic94]

13 hours ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

We're the hell do you come up with that?

No foundation in truth, do we really have to shit on our own guys this way? 

Apart from Ballou being shy, discreet and not a partier at all. 

Sorry, but I know, because I made a point of it, and not only that: at that time I had a personal friend in upper management at the club and we spoke. BTW my friend now is head of pro competitions at the Spanish ministry of Sport and Culture. 

Ballou could have returned to Barça after the Albacete loan and continued, as he was on contract. 

I believe it was actually Ballou’s reps that gave him poor advice.

[HochelagaFC]

2 hours ago, frmr said:

There are/were plenty of comments regarding his attitude/work ethic. Both in articles and in comments around the internet. Not saying it's true or not, just saying that it's nothing new.

From what I always understood from the comments of his past coaches in MTL was that it was mostly a lack of effort/commitment during practice/games. 
 

I never heard anything about partying too much.

[frmr]

Just now, HochelagaFC said:

From what I always understood from the comments of his past coaches in MTL was that it was mostly a lack of effort/commitment during practice/games. 
 

I never heard anything about partying too much.

Again, I'm not saying it's true, but this article mentions both his attitude/work ethic, and partying.

https://www.mountroyalsoccer.com/2021/3/24/22348200/tablas-time-to-rise-from-the-ashes

[Chad_Impact]

39 minutes ago, frmr said:

Again, I'm not saying it's true, but this article mentions both his attitude/work ethic, and partying.

https://www.mountroyalsoccer.com/2021/3/24/22348200/tablas-time-to-rise-from-the-ashes

Yeah never heard anything about partying either, just work ethic and being surrounded by the wrong people

[GasPed]

4 hours ago, frmr said:

Again, I'm not saying it's true, but this article mentions both his attitude/work ethic, and partying.

https://www.mountroyalsoccer.com/2021/3/24/22348200/tablas-time-to-rise-from-the-ashes

The article says "The partying must stop..." but it's hard to know if that's a literal statement or a figure of speech.  Certainly there are no specifics/details mentioned, so I'm inclined to think it was the latter...