Also, let us not forget that it is not as if Insigne was an unknown commodity, especially with the Italian national team and the exposure it gets from heritage/community members and football aficionados around the world.
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I'm pretty sure Curtis' dysfunction was in communication capability. I note that Manning immediately went to D'Amico back in September & got local knowledge & experience to seal this deal - probable lesson learned from Belgium.
How Manning landed on his target list is not as important to me as that the signing happened.
Bye, Dom.
Check out this tweet at https://twitter.com/MichaelSingh94/status/1479930491960795147?s=20
BTW, nearest I can figure, the first mention of Insigne in here was somebody posting this tweet
Check out this tweet at https://twitter.com/_GIFN/status/1457669068249468934?s=20
well, seeing as it did, who do we think is the next DP?
manning said in his interview they were still looking at players on their original list.
we really need to get the 3rd DP in before the start of the season imo, we can't be relying on POZ alone for half a year, especially as ayo isnt back til july.
Going back and looking at the start of this thread... Some of you guys refuse to believe anything. ;)
I went back to the 2021 in season thread. The first mention of Insigne was MikeForbes comparing Soteldo to Insigne after signing Soteldo. What foresight! http://forums.redpatchboys.ca/showth...=1#post1932606
The first real mention of interest in Insigne was October 13. Most of posts were of disbelief. http://forums.redpatchboys.ca/showth...=1#post1945817
EDIT: Looks like MikeForbes was the first to confirm news of Insigne coming to TFC. We have an insider amongst us. http://forums.redpatchboys.ca/showth...=1#post1945837
https://www.getfootballnewsitaly.com...g-napoli-star/
This was the first mention of interest between TFC and Insigne. It mentions that Lino Di Cuollo was at the meeting and says a TFC rep may have also attended the meeting. Today Manning said he brought on Di Cuollo as an advisor to the team to help with this transaction. I think this basically confirms that the Oct 13 meeting was real.
I think Bez indirectly deserves some credit too. He laid the groundwork for this transaction by signing Seba. Manning alluded to the fact that the allure of playing in Toronto due to the lifestyle and the large Italian community were significant selling points for Insigne.
so if dwyer is gone, ayo out until june/july...the only striker TFC currently have is perruzza.
need to get moving!
I have to say, I don’t get why people would be upset about Manning stating that he looked at transfermarkt to see what players are on expiring contracts. There is literally nothing wrong with that. It’s a data storage site that tracks contracts for players across the globe. If it wasn’t him doing it you can bet people underneath him would especially since they’re looking to avoid transfer fees.
To me it’s not different than an NHL GM quickly checking capgeek on what a player is currently making plus their contract length to start the process of determining if they should trade for them.
If information is out there, free and generally accurate of course you’re going to make use of it.
It’s certainly a bad omen among those who understand the sport. Akin to Paul Mariner’s YouTube scouting reports.
But let me say this, you would hope we are at the stage as an organization where we have scouts and plenty of other people are are taking care of the dirty work. Manning would be the guy who thinks of a vision and others make sure it checks out.
Databases are part of every job. I am sure TFC are on this site and many others hundreds of times a day. Of course all MLS Personnel use sites like this to look stuff up.
It is about how Manning said he was using the data. Scrubbing databases isn’t a serious person's expectation of how “idea generation” should work for major investment decisions of this kind.
(OK done for now on this, for real. Except to point out that now we know how we wound up with Soteldo, a player whose style very clearly conflicted with Poz, as many on here talked about from day one. But hey, he was a top player, people seem to like him, we had the money, and he was on the transfermarkt list we did…)
Remaining priorities for the off season:
Sign a cornerstone CB
Move Jozy and sign a forward
Need a replacement for Richie at Fullback - I would also look at Abzi and Mo Farsi from the CPL for fullback depth. It will be interesting to see if Kemar Lawrence is better next year, he wasnt great this year, but no one was.
Need additional defensive depth - Lukas McNaughton from Pacific FC rumoured to be on the way
Resign Ayo Akinola (rumoured to be close)
this meeting was when the first concrete offer was made from my understanding… Insigne’s camp said not cause it was around 7-8 gross. Then the new offer was given at a later date and it was too much to refuse and Insinge started to think seriously as tfc asan option
Do we “need” a fullback? Can't we go with Lawrence on the left and Auro on the right?
(I certainly understand an “upgrade” conversation, re Auro particularly.)
They need player to develop at lb or rb and an mls journey man for depth (I would convert shaff to lb personally) make him into the new Richie with his speed and the space Insinge will create
major needs 1-2 cb and a 9 that can score 15 plus goals
One priority I'll add is clarifying Pozuelo's contract situation. Ideally we don't run into a situation where his contract runs out and he leaves for nothing. Giving him an extension for a year or two would provide some continuity to the team and let him develop a partnership with Insigne.
It’s not that Manning used Transfermarkt but the statement around that that is surprising. The quote seems to say that a board meeting was coming up, Italians in T.O.were following the cup run so he decided to go Italian. So good thing North Macedonia wasn’t on a Cinderella run at the Euro.
It worked out amazingly, we get a fantastic player, Manning deserves credit for pulling it off but it is an absurd genesis for club building at the same time.
In terms of fullback. We have reportedly signed Kobe Franklin and Luca Petrasso, to go along with Kemar and Auro. I'm good with those two as starters. I'd say we need a 5th player who can be depth such as an Ashtone Morgan type. If we do continue with the 3 at the back, probably should get a left sided player as Kemar is better suited for LCB than LWB.
It's only absurd if your only goal is the best team possible.
If you are Manning, your job involves building a good team, but also marketing is part of the job description. In that case his approach totally makes sense.
Those of us who are long time residents in the GTA have been saying for years that TFC needs at least an Italian player or two because we see the passion in the local Italian community, and what a better way to have more people follow our local club? Manning as an American just learned this recently.
The Toronto Egyptian community is equally stoked over Bradley taking over as coach. The work he did with the Pharoes is legendary.
It makes sense to make contact with as many communities as possible.
All for One.