MALONEY NOW THE MAIN MAN
In Chicago, modest Maloney is face of the Fire and must adjust to life being...
THERE is no such thing as a one-man team, we’re told, but that doesn’t stop promoters of American sports singling out one star to the exclusion of his colleagues in order to rope in an audience. It’s common practice to bill an NFL game as ‘Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos’ against ‘Tom Brady and the New England Patriots’ or talk of ‘LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers’ in basketball.
For the self-effacing big signing of Chicago’s soccer club this summer, landing the gig as the poster boy of a franchise might initially seem to be an uncomfortable fit. Chicago Fire will be using Shaun Maloney to front their publicity and the 32-year-old has been deposited straight into being the role-model figure of a team seeking to rebound from a dreary 2014.
In a sports-daft city, soccer is well down the pecking order behind two baseball outfits — the Cubs and White Sox, the American Football Bears, ice hockey’s Blackhawks and the Bulls of basketball. So the Scotland international could dribble a ball up and down the Magnificent Mile at lunch hour and not be recognised by a soul.
However, for followers of the Fire, Maloney’s English Premier League experience makes him the star attraction and beacon of hope for better times. Within the club, that marks him down as a leader and the man to set professional standards by which others — particularly raw, young talent from the United States and Central America — should abide.
Designated Players (DPs), of which Maloney is one, are viewed differently. They are the signings for whom the club has pushed the boat out to tempt the league, paying a salary outwith the cap limit. That leaves the player wide open to greater scrutiny and, therefore, if things go wrong, criticism.
Scotland’s most naturally gifted export to Major League Soccer has excess baggage — in the shape of a welter of added responsibility — to declare on his early travels in a new adventure that began when he left Wigan for the United States in January.
‘It’s a different dynamic for me,’ said Maloney. ‘And you probably don’t realise it until you start training with your team and socialising, then you see the responsibility on you. And, on the pitch, there’s a level of performance they are expecting.
‘I think that is part of the role that I got brought in to play. Off the park, and things like that, I am used to a certain standard of recovery and preparation, so I think they look to your opinion on things like that.
‘Obviously you have to be careful not to overstep the mark. Because the coaches are there. I wouldn’t really get involved on tactical instruction, that is completely down to the manager. But they do expect to learn. That’s why I got brought in — they expect a certain level of experience, vocally at least.
‘Although I’m quite quiet when I do media, once I’m in training and matches, while I wouldn’t say I am overly vocal, I can speak when the time is needed.
‘I’m not too bad at that, in terms of speaking in training. The general thing in the majority of American sports is that they seem to focus in on certain individuals.
‘The media requirements have been more than I’ve been used to. That’s just part of the responsibility of being a DP.
‘You don’t really get “asked” to do the Press, it’s expected of you. The league and team are trying for as much exposure as possible because of all the other sports they’re up against. We’re probably the fourth sport and the fifth team down the pecking order.
‘But you know me, that probably suits me fine...’
Maloney’s recruitment as a marquee signing was key to a frantic off-season designed to bolster the forward areas, which was necessary following a 2014 campaign that featured an MLS record of 18 draws and just six victories. Pacey strikers David Accam, 24, and Kennedy Igboananike, 26, were the fellow DP talents added.
FOR the first time in the opening three weekends, all three featured at the same time as Fire went down 2-1 to San Jose Earthquakes and Frank Yallop’s second season in charge began with a trio of defeats.
‘It’s not been a great start, with the results, but we’ve got better with each game,’ said Maloney. ‘We’re trying to change the culture from last year. It hasn’t happened as quickly as we’d have liked. I think there have been a dozen players who have come in, which was a pretty big turnaround.
‘I don’t think the number of players has been the issue. What has probably helped us is that, in the last couple of weeks, we have had a fitness coach in. We didn’t have one in pre-season, which is a pretty important time because that’s when you are bedding in. We are probably about two or three weeks behind.
‘I played deeper in the first game and the last part of the second game. Then there was a change in emphasis in the last game to get me higher up the pitch, where I’ve played the majority of games for Scotland.
‘The standard is very good. I think the days have gone where you would say there is a real discrepancy between the standards of the MLS and British football. They are definitely trying to be a bit more technical in terms of passing and starting moves from the back.’
Chicago will be trying to thread those passing moves together without Maloney this evening when Philadelphia Union, featuring former Rangers midfielder Maurice Edu, visit Toyota Park. And the Scotland commitment of the return game with Republic of Ireland will dictate that the Fire will be without his services for their trip to New England Revolution on June 13.
There are no shortage of exciting trips and intriguing match-ups for Maloney to enthuse about in his new adventure, following three-and-a-half years with Wigan. He’ll face former Scotland colleague Steven Caldwell on Saturday when Toronto FC are in town, travel to expansion franchise New York City FC in May and be confronted by the stifling heat of Texas in July for a clash with Owen Coyle’s Houston Dynamo.
‘New York at Yankee Stadium is a pretty good game to look at,’ said Maloney. ‘I guess our first game really stood out, too, because we were at LA and they were the champions.
‘It’s brilliant looking at it on paper but when you get there and the game is not going as you would like and you get beaten, then the trip is a lot less enjoyable than you thought it was going to be. But it’s still all new and exciting.
‘The play-offs are our ambition and I don’t think that’s beyond us.’
They expect to learn. That’s why they signed me — they want a certain level of experience