Insigne will be fine. He is far more of a professional, without the emotion. He's been posting training photos of him with Vazques, Petretta, Ibarro etc. He's been playing great since that athletic article.
Berna I have no idea though. He's been silent. Seems to make more rash decisions that aren't as calculated. Maybe he will also have a revelation and just stfu and play hard each game. I mean the guy is getting all his wishes on change. If he mopes around all game again, Dunfield should just bench him. Play Kerr.
I'm not saying you're not right, because who knows how much I'm told is true, but I'm given the impression he's actively involved in finding us a new manager. If he's still got that authority, they're not going to prevent involvement with lower hires.
I think it's more likely they just work at a snail's pace compared to what we expect because their expectations are different. This season is already a write-off. It's more likely that they are looking for, by my count, at least four front office staff plus a new web guy, and they are just taking their time.
They have a full-time communications director and staff. Those jobs are not empty. But they clearly also aren't paying attention/picking up the work of Eric, who just left.
My sense is their PR people are strictly corporate communications at this point. They clearly have ZERO idea how to manage press and public interest, so they're just ignoring it.
I've also been told directly several times that Manning knows this his last shot to get it right.
I doubt I'm being told that if the plug has been pulled on him already. Plus, they let him pick Jason as the new GM and that was AFTER most of this went to shit, after the article. If he were already dead man walking, they probably would've let the next president pick his own guys.
This is probably what it is but I think his leash is already shortened and Hernandez probably has a lot more power over roster decisions than Manning does.
Also if Singh's conjecture about their choice of manager being known to TFC/Canada supporters then I think this next hire will be the final nail in the coffin. That line did not fill me with confidence at all.
It shows. The social media stuff they are putting out right now is horrific. Get ready for Bernie and LI to be passing the ball to strangers on the TTC next week.
As for Manning, I know I’m speaking to the choir here but it’s laughable he even has another shot. An astute ownership group would have seen the signs fired him several years ago, an average one would certainly have ranked him after Bradley. Only the perpetually sleep MLSE board could engineer a situation this ridiculous.
Berna I've noticed seems to be a bit more of a loner on the team.
Like Insigne is constantly posting stuff with Petretta outside of TFC, their partners are friends and things like that. He's done this with a few folks on the team.
I've never seen Berna hang out with any of his teammates outside of training.
He strikes me as a gregarious person who has been a star since he was a teenager, and no longer is. So he tries to wear both faces; he tries to be the gregarious "I love Toronto" guy with the public, while on the team he tried to play "top dog" with the ignoring rules, calling out other players etc.
He had a bad knee injury in 2018. He has statistically never been the same since. He had three league goals in three years before coming to us.
So he was already crocked, compared to his best, and he hadn't adapted to being an upper-level journeyman/role player and not the star. I have some sympathy for him, to be honest. This was probably supposed to be a walk compared to Serie 'A'. He took a serious pay cut from his Juve salary when he came here, at least $2M a year.
But if someone had wanted him at that money in Italy, he would still be there. We only got him because the best years are done.
As it is, I suspect the combo of "I'm a star!" and the money, and the lack of production makes him a locker-room cancer. The other players don't want to play with a ball hog who disrespects their abilities, particularly if the team is less productive as a result.
I got angry about it in another post online, because when I first considered it, it seemed a little like a con. He's smiles and laughs publicly but talks down to people at the club and ignores rules.
But the more I think about it, the more I can empathize with it. He's at a desultory point in his life, where it doesn't mean what it once did and he can't do it anymore the way he'd like anyway.
He was a star striker and left winger at Fiorentina. At Juve, he was one of several stars.... and then blew out his knee and became a "role player". Now he's older, not quick, and hasn't adjusted.
Think how much productive and team-oriented Pablo Piatti was, for how much less money. And we didn't keep him.
I have no insight to offer than this: it is weird to fire comms people and not replace them. It is truly weird. You can always battle field promote some kid making 60K, and sort it out later. I mean, we play Messi's team in two months, the league has a billion dollar investment in the guy… and a big market team is going to stand around with its pants around its ankles for a few months, and not have a comms function at all… because Bill Manning isn’t “comfortable”?
The narratives inside any organization where the boss is about to be fired are always false. They have to be. The owners cannot tell the truth, and it's not because of a moral failing.
So it can be very hard to know what is “true” in these endgame scenarios.
"There are some people who might have better technique than me, and some may be fitter than me, but the main thing is tactics. With most players, tactics are missing. You can divide tactics into insight, trust, and daring." - Johan Cruyff
Yeah, good point. He might know that sword of damocles above his head is hanging from threads, not rope.
They might've left him in place to get us to just stable enough a position that we don't look like a total shitshow for a new hire.
But my sense is that they're just understaffed and not focusing on what they see as non-priorities. Many companies -- most, I would say -- do not value their forward, public-facing PR as much as they do their internal communications.
From the perspective of those senior to the comms people... they have staff. Someone else could be doing it.
But most communications people come straight out of school into the job or have minimal actual real media experience, so when someone who handles it goes, they are incapable of picking up the slack. Typically, they also hire people as poorly qualified as they are.
Getting someone who actually knows how to craft effective media relations is tough when firms hire people who've never had to deal with an assignment editor and convince them to run something.
The inter-personal nature of giving the media what they want and need, and making it as easy as possible, and controlling media threads by feeding them stuff that suits both sides' purposes, is a lot more complicated than most flaks I've ever dealt with understood.
So if they just leave hiring a PR person to the current comms people, we'll get shit messaging, in all likelihood.
Last edited by jloome; 07-25-2023 at 11:07 AM.
So Insigne out for two more weeks lol you just can’t even make this shit up even if you wanted too !
They claim they spotted a small tear during his most recent MRI. If so, you'd wonder who missed it in the prior two scans, as Dunny has already said they were clear.
If there's any legitimacy to his injury at all (and who wouldn't be dubious at this point), then if I'm Insigne I'm wondering how incompetent our medical staff are.
It's the hottest tournament in world right now and we are gonna score one of those ball in net dealies tonight. Oso is due.
I’m gonna suspend reality for one day, it’s game day, our first match of this mini season, we are so far undefeated so come on TFC
"There are some people who might have better technique than me, and some may be fitter than me, but the main thing is tactics. With most players, tactics are missing. You can divide tactics into insight, trust, and daring." - Johan Cruyff
If it was the Italian interview posted here: it’s not a video interview. It’s just text and he certainly didn’t seem anxious. He just didn’t say much. Mostly he was asked and talked about Italian football. The Italian sites/news sources have little interest in MLS. They like to talk Italian football with Italian footballers as you probably know.
Anyone who hates Leagues Cup today isn't allowed to like it when we actually score a goal tonight. These are the rules.
Ibarra gone already. Summer of Perruzza starts a month late. Dunfield loves generic defenders who he would of played with in League 1 in 2005.
Check out this tweet at https://twitter.com/TorontoFC/status/1684333715852349440?s=20
Check out this tweet at https://twitter.com/TorontoFC/status/1684333715852349440
Any word on Ibarra? Did he pick up a knock in training?
Remember The Man, The Legend, The Goal 5-12-07 and All That #9 Left On The Pitch, Thanks For The Memories !!!
Is this a 4-4-2 with Oso and Blessing playing as wide midfielders?
Looks like it- berna in the middle with Peruzza.
How many beers am I gonna have to shotgun this match whenever berna drifts out of the middle space and starts clinging to the sidelines, then servania or Oso has to play up top.
Thinking tho out loud… that could be the play - Oso up top with peruzza, berna out wide. Think he already tried it with servania up top and it was a fail
Or is blessing also a LW?
Sooo much much tired of any decent player we got getting injured before their 2nd game.
Was looking forward to see Ibarra start. Dang.
Rosted and O'Neill at the back..yeeks. Busy night for Johnson. Why the heck is Mabika not starting?