Skill, talent on display during win streak
Head coach Garde decried ‘lack of skill’ in May with team floundering at 3-10
After the Impact lost 2-0 in Minnesota on May 26, head coach Rémi Garde said: “We had opportunities, but there was a lack of skill, talent and willpower tonight.”
Garde stood by those words a couple of days later before practise, saying: “Yeah, I think we’re missing talent. I don’t think I have to correct what I said after the game.”
The loss to Minnesota United FC dropped the Impact’s record to 3-10-0 and they were nine points out of the sixth and final playoff spot in MLS’s Eastern Conference. Now, the same Impact team that once lacked skill, talent and willpower has won four straight games and is 5-1-0 in their last six, improving to 8-11-0 and now sitting in the sixth and final playoff spot.
After last Saturday ’s 2-1 win over the Colorado Rapids at Saputo Stadium, Garde was asked if he has had to change his coaching style a bit during his first season with the Impact.
“I think I didn’t change too many things,” he said. “From the beginning to now, of course, I know the players better, I adapted a little bit — but I didn’t change completely the way I train, what I say to the players. I haven’t got certainty in football … I have principles. And then we work on that. They didn’t work as soon as I came here, but I didn’t discourage myself or say I have to change everything. Football is everywhere the same. The league has some characteristics, but it’s still 11 against 11. I thought that the best way for me to grow out of this bad period for the team was to keep doing the work that I have to do.”
When asked what has impressed him most about his players during their current win streak, Garde paused for a few seconds before saying: “They listen very much to what I say before the game now.”
The Impact will be looking for their fifth straight win when they play New York City FC Wednesday at Yankee Stadium (7 p.m., TSN, TVA Sports, TSN 690 Radio). NYCFC is in second place in the Eastern Conference with a 10-44 record and is unbeaten at home (8-0-1).
“It’s not the personnel that used to be the problem,” Impact midfielder Ken Krolicki said before practice Tuesday morning at Centre Nutrilait. “I think the mutual
I thought that the best way for me to grow out of this bad period for the team was to keep doing the work that I have to do.
understanding of where to go in regards to the ball, I think that was the problem. We didn’t have the same understanding in our defensive principle and so I think that was the problem, not the personnel, necessarily. Again, a lot of injuries at the beginning of the season, but now everybody’s getting healthy so I’m looking forward to the next game.”
Krolicki added that having the coach say they lacked skill and talent might have motivated some of the players to be better.