Optimism surrounds Impact heading into season
Coach laments slow start to season, still hunting for proven scorer, midfielder
The Impact has missed the Major League Soccer playoffs in each of the past two seasons, but there will be a sense of optimism when the team assembles in Florida for the start of training camp on Jan. 21.
The optimism stems from the way the Impact finished their 2018 campaign. After losing 10 of their first 13 games, the Impact posted an 11-6-4 record over the remainder of the season and were in contention for a playoff berth until the final day of the season.
A series of mid-season acquisitions changed the character of the bleu-blanc-noir and first-year coach Rémi Garde had only one regret after the season ended with a 1-0 loss to the New England Revolution in Foxborough, Mass., on Oct. 28
“I wish we didn’t have such a slow start,” said Garde. “I like the group we had at the end of the season.”
Defender Daniel Lovitz put the season in perspective when he said it was tough for the team to dig itself out of the hole it was in at the end of May.
“At one point, we played nine games and we picked up only three points,” said Lovitz. “It’s difficult to recover when you start like that.”
One of the problems facing the Impact last season was a slow start in assembling the team. Players were being signed in the latter stages of training camp and the starting XI for the final game in New England included four players who were not available for the season-opener in March.
This time around, Garde will have the nucleus of a team that showed that it was capable of winning. As the 2018 season wound down, he said, there were only two items on his wish list for the coming season — a proven scorer and a midfielder.
Garde was not happy with the production from his strikers last season. He wants to find some support for attacking midfielder Ignacio Piatti, who had a teamhigh 16 goals and 13 assists, and is the team’s all-time leader with 100 goals. Matteo Mancosu managed to score only three goals from the striker position, while homegrown forward Anthony Jackson-Hamel had two goals before he was banished to Garde’s doghouse.
The coach received an early Christmas present with the acquisition of Argentine striker Maximiliano Urruti from Dallas FC.
When it comes to what Garde was looking for, Urruti checks all the boxes. He has 44 goals and 25 assists in 162 MLS games and has played on winning teams. He led the Portland Timbers to an MLS title in 2015 and, a year later, he was part of a Dallas FC double as the Toros finished atop the MLS standings and also won the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. In the Cup final, he scored twice in a 4-2 win over New England.
Urruti, who has good size at 6-foot and 165 pounds, is only 27 and he doesn’t count as an international player because he holds a U.S. green card.
Filling the other hole in the lineup might take a while. Without going into detail about the qualities he’s looking for in a midfielder, Garde has said he’s willing to take the time to find the right player. He’ll be looking closely at players who might be available during the coming transfer window for European players. Garde does say that he wants a midfielder who will fit into the current lineup because he doesn’t want to disturb the chemistry the team developed during the stretch run.
The Impact also moved to retain the services of two players who made key contributions to last season’s success — goalkeeper Evan Bush and right-back Bacary Sagna.
Bush was on the pitch for every minute of every MLS game and led the MLS in saves, with 132. He passed Greg Sutton as the team’s all-time leader in appearances and wins. At his end-of-season post-mortem, Garde said signing Bush was a priority and Bush was rewarded with a three-year contract.
Bush credited goalkeeping coach Joël Batts with helping him develop his game. Batts will be back as Garde’s right-hand man and the head coach has tapped his connections with Olympique Lyonnais to add Batts disciple Rémy Vercoutre to work with the goalkeepers.
The 35-year-old Sagna signed a one-year deal. Sagna, a French international who was a star with Arsenal in the English Premier League, joined the team in early August and added leadership and stability to the back line.
There will be some changes off the field.
For starters, the Impact has abandoned its tradition of starting the home season indoors at the Olympic Stadium. The team will play all of its games at Saputo Stadium, which means they’ll open on March 2 in San Jose and won’t play a home game until April 13, against the Columbus Crew.
Team owner Joey Saputo is hoping to raise the season-ticket base from 9,000 to 13,500 in an effort to offset losses that have averaged $11 million a year since the team joined MLS in 2012. The average price of an Impact ticket is $32, which falls short of the league average of $46. Saputo is hoping to attract more corporate sales and cut down on the number of group sales, which are discounted.