Originally Posted by
ensco
^This is a good discussion to have, because it gets at the difference between having good people doing something for the first time (Dichio and Dunfield) vs having someone who has been doing something for a long time (Herdman).
Two things that make him unique:
1) Herdman is a teacher of kids. For many years. He started as a school teacher. He was also, first on the side, then as a career, coaching school kids in Sunderland starting age 22 in 1997. He became known for unorthodox methods and made enough of a name for himself that he was coaching U9s at Sunderland AFC by age 24. From there he went to New Zealand to coach semipro (he had been told he couldn’t advance in England because he wasn’t a former player, and followed a Sunderland AFC mentor there). He would up, pretty quickly, running one of the biggest youth development systems down there, one that put a bunch of NZ players in Europe. He also simultaneously started working for the national womens team there, becoming fulltime in that role in 2006. So he spent 9 years in purely youth development roles before becoming a manager. A lot of that with U 12s.
2) Then there is the record of CMNT youth development post 2018. His record is staggering. I am putting Davies aside, he is such a special case. But the stories of David, Buchanan, Johnston, Miller, Adekugbe, Laryea … each one is unique, the credit obviously has to be shared elsewhere, but still, in total… wow. Anybody who was following the CMNT in 2018, when Herdman started, knows that NONE of these guys were seriously in the CMNT picture back then. (I could add all kinds of other names, Kone, Waterman, St Clair, but I am trying to keep this simple). Guys coming through his team improve and keep getting better.
I think Herdman has a unique ability in a leadership role at TFC to both attract serious youth talent, and then actually teach those players something and make them better. I believe he will also have credibility in selling players on, as he would have developed relationships with all the clubs CMNT players are with (to discuss injuries, scheduling etc) which is something that TFC has been, not just bad at, but so horrible at, that it must scare youth players away in droves.