York United - 2024 Season Thread

[Big_M]

.

[Kent]

Time for this team to smarten up and do its part to prevent Forge from making the final in 2024.

Edited October 31, 2023 by Kent

[Big_M]

McNab moves on...a success as far as giving youngsters playing time and players moving on to higher levels and a failure on results and bringing spectators to the home games and maybe also on the overall international player recruitment

 

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

Surprising he lasted as long as he did. You have the top hotbed of Canadian talent to draw players from, but instead of looking locally for answers, the formula York United came up with was a club president from the UK and a coach from western Canada.

[SoccMan]

4 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Surprising he lasted as long as he did. You have the top hotbed of Canadian talent to draw players from, but instead of looking locally for answers, the formula York United came up with was a club president from the UK and a coach from western Canada.

Yup I’ve been saying this forever , never understood this McNab hiring and even the Nash hiring , bringing in guys from outside the country to manage the team and a coach from the west . Like you said you are in the hotbed of soccer in this country where I’m sure they could have gotten someone more familiar with the local soccer scene here in the GTA to be a general manager . Moreover , no need for a Nash when there are many qualified local coaches who should be given a chance and who may know the local talent a lot better. Forge has definitely taken advantage of being in a soccer hotbed in regards to coaching and the management side . Hopefully the new owners take better advantage of the southern Ontario area when it comes to players , coaches and general manager hires and start putting a winning team on the field .

[SpursFlu]

Just from the talent pool available to them York should probably be the most financially viable team in the league with 0 fans in the stands. 

[Stoppage Time]

6 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Surprising he lasted as long as he did. You have the top hotbed of Canadian talent to draw players from, but instead of looking locally for answers, the formula York United came up with was a club president from the UK and a coach from western Canada.

Surely the club can establish a strong scouting presence in the GTA and southern Ontario to identify and guide eye-catching talent. Anything spent on a good scout or two would be money well spent (if your plan is to develop, play, and sell).

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

Why not hire someone like Patrice Gheisar who knows the local soccer scene inside out to be head coach and GM? All the guys he took to Halifax would likely have greatly preferred to have stayed at home in the GTA if they could and at that point you have no transport and accomodation costs counting against the cap.

The problem with Jimmy Brennan from that sort of regard in 2019 and 2020 was likely only that he was hired mainly for his celebrity status with an eye more on what he could do from a marketing standpoint given he was TFC's first signing rather than his coaching ability and contacts with local players and coaches.

Carmine Isacco appeared to me to have a bit of a track record during his brief stint at TFC of favouring only the youth players he had coached previously and didn't last long in that context. Just because going local didn't work out too well with them didn't make it the wrong strategy when the Forge were doing so well with Bobby Smyrniotis.

Angus McNab and his wheeling and dealing in the international transfer market was the sort of hire that would have made more sense in Winnipeg if the Blue Bombers were willing to spend up to the cap. Imports are more important when you are a lot less likely to find the answers locally in the MMSL. 

Even then I'm skeptical though because the domestic portion of the roster is still more likely to be what makes or breaks a roster in competitive terms given the league's roster rules. There's a reason that Oliver Gage and the agency that was vetting import signings are no longer flavour of the month in CanPL circles.

Edited November 4, 2023 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[Shway]

@Ozzie_the_parrot you are spot on in all these posts. 

I will be very interested to see who they bring in as owners...because it should be massive news and massive advancement for this team. 

The new owners have to come in with money that they are willing to spend. Maybe even a relocation to a more ideal stadium/part of the city 

[Aird25]

On 11/4/2023 at 12:13 AM, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Even then I'm skeptical though because the domestic portion of the roster is still more likely to be what makes or breaks a roster in competitive terms given the league's roster rules. There's a reason that Oliver Gage and the agency that was vetting import signings are no longer flavour of the month in CanPL circles.

While I don't necessarily disagree with this, it's perhaps important to note that the last 3 MVPs, the last 4 Golden Boot winners, and the only 2 defender of the year winners ever have been international players. Coach of the year in all 5 seasons has also gone to an international coach. 

[narduch]

 

 

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

We've known about the 777 group for months on here thanks to Rocket Robin but Onesoccer dudes seem to think they have a scoop in that regard:

 

[Kingston]

17 hours ago, Aird25 said:

While I don't necessarily disagree with this, it's perhaps important to note that the last 3 MVPs, the last 4 Golden Boot winners, and the only 2 defender of the year winners ever have been international players. Coach of the year in all 5 seasons has also gone to an international coach. 

It's logical to think the international players will generally be better than the domestic players.  It takes more effort to get an international player so you're only going to do it if he is better than what you can find at home.

[narduch]

The fact that Platt is being coy and not naming the group is a good sign that this is happening. And soon.

I'm guessing last week's McNabb news is related

[narduch]

Huh. This Northern Tribune article from a few weeks ago says it isn't 777. Interesting. 

https://northerntribune.ca/canadian-premier-league-state-of-the-league-address-2023/

 

[Shway]

If it is 777 partners, it's not very exciting.
But like any ownership that comes in, I'll wait to hear their plans. 

[nolando]

26 minutes ago, Shway said:

If it is 777 partners, it's not very exciting.
But like any ownership that comes in, I'll wait to hear their plans. 

York 777 United

[Aird25]

1 hour ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

We've known about the 777 group for months on here thanks to Rocket Robin but Onesoccer dudes seem to think they have a scoop in that regard:

 

Did they suggest it was 777 Group, or is that who you're speculating because they said North American?

[Aird25]

1 hour ago, Kingston said:

It's logical to think the international players will generally be better than the domestic players.  It takes more effort to get an international player so you're only going to do it if he is better than what you can find at home.

Probably fair, but I also don't know if any of the award winners won in their first season in the league. Maybe Morelli? I think most showed growth while in the league before shining. Many of the foreign signings have been duds as well

[SpursFlu]

3 hours ago, narduch said:

 

 

Looking at that crest (very nice crest) Why not just stretch up that Y in to a T

Edited November 7, 2023 by SpursFlu

[Kent]

6 hours ago, nolando said:

York 777 United

The 777 stripes. Who here is going to do a mock up with the old York 9 logo, but with 777 stripes instead?

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

If it's not 777 Partners and unlike even just a few weeks ago plenty of people online now seem to be very insistent that it's not then I guess that explains why weasel words like "update" and "potential" are being inserted whenever York United's potential ownership change is being discussed at the moment.

Having a club owned by a group that also owns Everton, Hertha Berlin, Genoa, Standard Liege and Vasco da Gama would have been a significant boost for the league but I guess it's difficult to disguise the shape things are in at York Lions when would be investors actually show up for a home game. Even their Red Star Paris crowds would look good by comparison.

Edited November 8, 2023 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

Wasn't aware that Angus McNab ran York United from New York rather than North York:

but it explains a lot on how they weren't taking advantage of having the inside track on talent from the GTA. Guess a remote consultancy type hire was in tune with the Billy Beane type stuff Bob Young seemed to be enthused about at one point. Everybody who does it the conventional way like the backward dinosaurs at Atalanta and in MLS thought Andrea Lombardo ran about aimlessly like a headless chicken so his professional career soon ended but our analytics dude noticed that he actually had potential and could have been the next Paolo Rossi if only CanPL had been available during his career etc etc.

Listening to what was actually said on this clip about new ownership I don't think it's safe to assume that they actually do have anyone solidly lined up as a buyer yet. After about eight months of having this club on the market, that's the last thing they were actually going to say though. Hinting that there's somebody potentially coming in soon from outside Canada in a manner that's near impossible for anyone in Canadian soccer circles to refute is a good way to create a you better get in quick because this club is only available while stocks last sort of vibe.

[ironcub14]

Just catching up here with my Y9 avatar and such, I used to be very active on here pre-pandemic, from my work desktop and such, but during the pandemic, working from home and such, think a lot of the best CPL rumours have moved onto CPL Discord now, it's even faster there than it is on say CPL Reddit. Thought I'd give the quick PSA because here and the V's forums was definitely where we got our start for sure, but there are other forums now to complement here. 

On 777, we've guessed or known about it since the spring, ever since the YU academy partnered up with Genoa. Right now, based on Northern Tribune we're likely guessing no to 777, though not 100% ruled out. The latest rumours on Twitter/Discord is that the group may be Mexican, or less likely American. 

About Angus, we'd been complaining for years that he was based in NYC, but we believe he was hired by the league to take over for the mess that Jimmy and Ganzhorn left in 2019 as an emergency fill-in, and just stayed. My guess is that Y9 was "too local" or "too GTA", whatever that could mean, I have my theories, back in 2019, and CPL wanted Y9 to be a bit more professional. But yeah, all YU fans agree we want to see somebody TO/GTA-based for sure. My personal hope is that our new owners hire 1 person specifically to do the President/CEO role, and 1 person to specifically do the GM role. Think it was too much for Angus to do both roles, working from home. 

[Trois Reds]

2 hours ago, ironcub14 said:

On 777, we've guessed or known about it since the spring, ever since the YU academy partnered up with Genoa. Right now, based on Northern Tribune we're likely guessing no to 777, though not 100% ruled out. The latest rumours on Twitter/Discord is that the group may be Mexican, or less likely American. 

When Ollie Platt mentioned "North American, but not Canadian" I immediately thought "Mexico?" for some reason.

My way-out-on-a-limb dream would be Chivas buying York, rebranding them the Toronto GOATs (obviously) and making the team all-Ontario born or something, since an all-Ontario team would actually be a contender in this league.