New Red Bull sporting director Erik Soler has had just a few weeks to learn MLS and his team, while coach Hans Backe has had even less, just a handful of practices to observe his players. But in that short time, those players claim they’ve been impressed with what they see in their new braintrust.
Veteran defender Mike Petke talked about Backe’s short-and-simple approach to practice, which sounds diametrically opposed to Juan Carlos Osorio’s meticulous _ and at times tedious _ tinkering. Captain Juan Pablo Angel was impressed by Soler’s breadth of experience and heartened by his great relationship with the front offices in both New York and Austria, something Osorio never enjoyed.
“Erik is a guy he knows the game inside and out: He’s been in different positions, in different jobs. You don’t come across people like that very often…We’re finally starting to get a plan together, and hopefully things will start to happen,” said Angel, confident that plan will help Red Bull overcome the horrible history of failure by foreign coaches in MLS.
“I wasn’t concerned just about one individual being from here or from abroad; my concern was about organizing the whole organization. If you surround yourself with good people, if you understand the game, the game is the same game here or somewhere else. It’s not just about a coach or a GM; it’s about a whole team of people working together for the same objective. That’s what I’m seeing right now.
“The channel of communication with Austria is direct, which we didn’t have before. That is going to hopefully make a big difference. (Soler) is a guy that understands and knows the game, and he’s bringing people that he feels comfortable working with (along) with the people already here that he feels are going to help with this project. I’m sure they’ll learn the way things work in this league. It might not happen in one day, but I’m sure in time he’ll adjust to it.”
The fact is, Osorio not only had a shaky working relationship with since-demoted sporting director Jeff Agoos _ which made player-acquisition a nightmare _ but couldn’t even get return phone calls from Red Bull’s Austrian office. Soler is on a friendly, first-name basis with Dietmar Beiersdorfer, who is now the head of Red Bull Global Soccer, from Salzburg to New York, from Ghana to Brazil.
I’m thinking he gets his calls answered.
And both Soler and Backe have shown a willingness to operate as a _ gasp _ team. They listened to the input of retained assistant coaches Richie Williams and Des McAleenan heading into this month’s SuperDraft, and are frequently seen conferring; down the stretch last year, one rarely saw Agoos and Osorio in the same room.
“They’ve got as big job to do and they’re going to jump right into it, see what were made of,” Petke said of the pair. “It’s only been a week, small-sided stuff. It’s been good. We’re getting familiar with each other; but it’s been good. (Backe) likes short and sweet practices, but intense. You can tell he’s watching and picking things up as far as what our tendencies are, and what he’s going to be working on us with.”
One of those things is clearly defensive organization, which is what they drilled on for the second of their two practice sessions today in La Manga, Spain.
“Coach has a very structured system, which I like. He has been teaching us how he wants us to defend and cover,” centerback Andrew Boyens told Red Bulls Reader. He’s been working in the middle of the backline for the past four training sessions, and praised Backe’s defensive system, as did McAleenan.
“I like the methodology and the way we’re going about laying the foundation for defense and defensive organization,” McAleenan said. “(We were) a team that allowed 47 goals last year; that’s not acceptable by any standards. Obviously our starting points were not correct. Hans has done a good job in slowly implementing his ideas and given us the framework in which we’re going to go forward.”