More and more I’m hearing grumblings about Mo’s ongoing search for talent and his apparent bias towards those players from the British Isles. In fact, as the transfer window close approaches, the opinion that Mo hasn’t looked far nor wide enough is cropping up in all corners of the Toronto FC supporters’ network.
Let’s look at this issue for just a minute, and I’ll give my take on what I believe is going on.
Firstly, on his bias, I couldn’t agree more. Save for his trip to South America at season’s end, it appears that he hasn’t taken any trips to exotic locales in search of the proverbial “diamond in the rough.” England, Scotland Ireland, and Wales are what Mo knows from his history as a player; North America, he has learned from the end of his playing career and from his time in management.
As universal as soccer is, once on the pitch, there are obvious benefits to knowing a player’s background, the systems in which they were trained from youth, and the mentality by which they were brought up. All those things help put a team together that will play like, well, a team. So, I can’t blame Mo for sticking to what he knows and not risking more fruitless trips to unknown regions.
However, that doesn’t completely excuse an organzation from scouting a region. Other organizations, those in Europe surely, have scouts in all sorts of locations watching the developement of players from the lowest levels and up. Manchester United is building a training facilty in Oakville! So why can’t Toronto FC put a scout in Africa, Asia, Continental Europe, and South America?
Here, we get to the heart of the matter. Resources: Time, people, money. All are lacking for a wide and deep search.
Take personal player biases out of the picture, there is no way that Mo could have visited and gotten anything approaching a quality look at every player that might be of benefit to the team, all across the globe. Ideas that he should’ve seen so-and-so play in Egypt and some other guy play in River Plate, is great in theory. But what would be better is a team of trusted scouts that have a specific job. Big teams have them, but Toronto FC is not a big team.
Yet, anyway.
MLSE certainly has the resources, but to be honest TFC is still the organizations third tier franchise. Proving a need to further the search so that the team can achieve the “next level” will (assuming that MLSE actually cares is TFC wins) bring the resources, in scouts, money, and time, to find those palyers. BUT, there’s not great evidence that such an extensive search is necessary to win at the MLS level.
So, while everyone is probably right that Mo isn’t looking at their favourite player in Guatemala, Slovenia, or Laos, understand that it takes local knowledge to make informed approaches of players. It may come one day, but I’d stop holding my breath.
Seriously, you’re turning purple.
Looks like both Darren and his manager, Glen Roeder, are resigned to 
