Caleb Porter announced a 19 man training camp roster for the US U23 team ahead of Olympic qualifying in 10 days. Porter will add a 20th player after he is cleared by his club. Sporting KC forward, Teal Bunbury has been included as one of 5 forwards on the roster. Bunbury joins Juan Agudelo, Terrence Boyd, Joe Gyau, and Brek Shea as the forward line for the US team.
The training camp begins tomorrow for the US team and goes through their opener in group play in Nashville against Cuba. Bunbury could miss up to 3 games while with the Olympic team. If he reports this week, he'll miss the home opener against New England. He'll also miss next weekend's game against FC Dallas, and if the US advance to the semifinals and finals, the 4/1 game against Chivas USA. Fans can argue the blow this causes to the team, especially after Bunbury's less than stellar performance against DC this past weekend. Bunbury's call up puts CJ Sapong into the starting lineup, and could open playing time up for Soony Saad and Dom Dwyer.
On opposite teams, KC is getting a bit of a boost next weekend, as Shea will not be available for Dallas when they take their trip to KC. Chance Myers is likely breathing a bit of a sigh of relief while at the same time wishing he could get revenge for last year when Shea ran over Myers. The following weekend, Chivas will be without Jorge Villafaña in their game against KC.
Rumor of Sporting KC after former Madrid defender?
File this under totally baseless and extremely unlikely. Mirror Football (h/t The Daily Wiz) is reporting that KC is interested in Michel Salgado. Salgado, a right back is currently frozen out at relegation threatened Blackburn Rovers, even though he claims that he's recovered from an injury. The Mirror is reporting that KC and Toronto after after the 36 year old's services.
With Chance Myers firmly planted in the starting role, and Sporting paying Michael Harrington over $100K while sitting on the bench it seems unlikely KC would look to bring in another right back. And that's not including Kevin Ellis in the conversation.
Salgado, a former Spanish international that appeared over 200 times for Real Madrid just doesn't seem to fit with the younger team that Sporting is putting out. He'd automatically become the oldest player on the team, and would be the 3rd oldest player to ever appear for KC should he actually play.
this is just like the Guti conversation/fight
ReplyDeleteYou seem to have a lot of hate towards Bunbury
ReplyDeleteI don't think there is any hate towards Teal. His touch has been questionable. In fact, at times he seems to have feet of concrete.
ReplyDeleteI, for one, was very surprised he started at DC. Seems to me that Teal needs to expand his abilities since he cannot play with his back to goal with any consistency.
I would much prefer to see him in a wing role but that puts him behind Kamara and Convey to start. But Teal's speed and his ability to run off the ball are not in good use as a center forward most of the time -- especially if he can't consistently hold the ball up.
Don't get me wrong, I love to see Teal getting a run on the ball and making defenses pay. I just think he can be more effective going outside and coming in. I really think CJ should be the starting center forward since he has superior ability to hold the ball and make creative turns and passes from that position.
I just wanted to put it out there that Myers is getting a bit too much credit for having his spot locked down. He was our worst player on Saturday. He put DC in more dangerous situations than he took them out of.
ReplyDeleteOn the other side, Sinovic was consistently eaten up by Najar. No one cared to notice because Najar was clueless what to do with the ball after he blew past Seth. Even with that, I'm more comfortable with Sinovic than I am with Myers right now.