Impact hopes to have found sleeper in draft
Delpiccolo currently on German tryout
Impact technical director Nick De Santis thinks the club may have found a sleeper in the second round of Thursday’s MLS SuperDraft.
The club used the 27th overall pick to select Paolo DelPiccolo, a midfielder from the University of Louisville.
“He was available because he wasn’t offered a contract by MLS and he’s currently on a tryout with Eintracht Frankfurt in the German Bundesliga,” De Santis said. “From talking to his coach, he’s doing good there, but we’re hoping that we can bring him in and see how he works with our first team.”
DelPiccolo’s tryout with Eintracht ends Saturday, and while De Santis said it was unlikely the player would be in Montreal for the start of training camp Monday he added, “we know he has the will to play in MLS and we hope we can work something out.”
DelPiccolo set a school record for assists at Louisville, which was ranked in the top 10 in U.S. colleges through the 2012 season.
The Impact used the eighth overall pick to take midfielder Blake Smith from New Mexico. With the 18th pick, the Impact took UCLA midfielder Fernando Monge before wrapping up the draft by picking goalkeeper Brad Stuver from Cleveland State.
“Smith is a left-footed midfielder with the ability to deliver crosses into the box,” DeSantis said. “He’s one of those players who can adjust when things aren’t going well. He can also get in be- hind the defence and create something. We saw that in the combine when he scored a goal.”
Monge is another midfielder with an offensive upside. He also played forward at UCLA and had five goals and an assist in 19 games as a senior.
De Santis said Stuver will provide the team with a third goalkeeper behind Troy Perkins and Evan Bush. Scouts describe the 6-foot-3 Stuver as “long and confident with good control of the box.”
“We’ll get all these players involved with our academy program and see how they develop,” De Santis said.
The New England Revolution had the first overall pick and took Louisville defender Andrew Farrell. Toronto traded the pick to New England on Wednesday in exchange for the fourth pick and allocation money, which helps Toronto expand its salary cap.
Chivas USA used the second pick to take Connecticut midfielder Carlos Alvarez, adding a player with a Mexican-American heritage.
Toronto, using a pick acquired in a December deal with the Portland Timbers, used the third overall selection to take Canadian midfielder Kyle Bekker, who is from Oakville, Ont., played at Boston College and turned heads at the recent MLS Combine. Toronto then swapped the fourth pick for Vancouver’s 16th pick and allocation money. Toronto used Vancouver’s pick to select the other available Canadian, Oregon State striker Emery Welshman.
The Whitecaps used the fourth pick to take Gambianborn forward Kekuta Manneh and also took Santa Clara forward Erik Hurtado.