Coach: Better days ahead for Toronto FC
Defending MSL champions look to climb out of early-season hole as injury list grows smaller
Toronto FC’s list of walking wounded is beginning to thin. And not a moment too soon.
A quarter of the way through the regular season and the MLS champions are second-last in the standings at 2-6-1. Injuries have forced coach Greg Vanney to use 14 different players including captain Michael Bradley, a holding midfielder by trade, in the backline.
TFC has already lost one more game than it did all of last season when it led the league at 20-5-9.
Toronto has given up five goals in the first 15 minutes of a game, tied with New York City FC for worst in league. Given TFC actually conceded those goals in the first seven minutes of the game, it can probably claim the record.
Toronto has also yielded five goals in the first 15 minutes of the second half. Only Vancouver had been scored on more during the same period.
But knowing the class of his squad, Vanney sees brighter days ahead.
He should be able to draw from defenders Chris Mavinga, Gregory van der Wiel, Jason Hernandez and Eriq Zavaleta on Friday against visiting Orlando (6-3-1), meaning Bradley can revert to his normal midfield perch.
Mavinga (hamstring) and Zavaleta (quad) are returning from injury. Van der Wiel has been playing through an ongoing Achilles issue while Hernandez, who rejoined the team in late March, has been working himself back into shape.
On the minus side, Toronto will be without its US$12-million strike tandem with the suspended Sebastian Giovinco joining the injured Jozy Altidore (foot) on the sideline.
Nico Hasler (quad), Justin Morrow (calf) and Drew Moor (quad) remain out. Defender Nick Hagglund (hamstring) trained by himself Wednesday and will likely need a little more time.
The lengthy injury list has been a concern. So is the extra work load on the remaining healthy players.
“As long as we can stop the bleeding, we’ll start to pull the group together, little by little,” said Vanney.
Toronto faces a challenging stretch, starting with Orlando whose six-game winning streak was snapped in a 2-1 loss by league-leading Atlanta on Sunday. FC Dallas (4-1-4) visits BMO Field next week before TFC heads to Columbus (6-3-3).
“We know we have a good team but it does us no good to be sitting in here after every game talking about the same things,” a stone-faced Bradley said after last Saturday’s 3-2 loss at New England.
“We’ve got to find the right ways to play ourselves back into things and regain the momentum that we’ve had for the better part of a year and a half or two,” he added.
A gruelling CONCACAF Champions League schedule, not to mention back-to-back MLS Cup appearances, has meant that Toronto has had next to no down time.
TFC poured all its resources into the Champions League run, looking to fill the last remaining empty trophy case at its training centre. A win and the MLS club would have headed to the FIFA Club World Cup, with prestige and dollars on the line. FIFA says prize money will range from US$5 million to the winner to $500,000 for the seventh-place team.
Thanks to the Champions League demands this season, Vanney says the team travelled more than 32,000 kilometres through April - making more long trips than an entire MLS season usually brings.
It didn’t help that after the heart-breaking penalty shootout loss to Chivas Guadalajara in the Champions League final, Toronto was thrown right back into the MLS regular-season grind.