trioalpha.blogg.se

One such trend - and a source of the displeasure with Klinsmann - has been the pursuit of U.S. While clubs are largely self-determining, the single-entity structure of the league means that certain trends rippling through the MLS ecosystem can often be traced back to conversations at MLS board level. That has transformed the culture of the ownership group - in both how it functions and how it sees itself. These days, that group has expanded beyond recognition, to 19 owners and growing, as the handful of owners who existed in 2002 have divested their multiple club ownerships and been joined by expansion owners. In particular, Garber represents the MLS ownership group - at one time characterized by the conservative vision of sports industrialists incubating the league through a shaky early incarnation after World Cup 1994 and the painful contraction it went through in the post-9/11 economy. In some social media circles, the spat was treated as Garber inserting his opinion into a personality clash between the league’s golden boy and the head of the national team, but, entertaining as such soap opera narratives were, they tended to obscure deeper structural fissures and concerns for which Garber was only a mouthpiece. Garber cited Klinsmann’s “inexcusable” treatment of Donovan among the his concerns. In October, Garber made an uncharacteristically confrontational statement at a press conference where he talked of his “personal disappointment” and issued a “demand” that Klinsmann stop denigrating the league and consider how he “conducts himself” in public. professionals of what a successful American soccer career could look like is undermining the league - particularly with Klinsmann extending his critique to other top players, such as Clint Dempsey and Michael Bradley, who have started to return to MLS from Europe in Donovan’s wake.

World Cup squad this summer, has been that in electing to return to MLS rather than challenge himself in Europe, Donovan has undersold his talent and not demonstrated the level of desire necessary to become a truly top international player and an example to others.įor his part, Garber believes that Klinsmann’s slighting of Donovan’s choices and the groundbreaking example they set for U.S. Klinsmann’s persistent take on Donovan, one that reached its controversial conclusion with the coach dropping the player from the U.S. Soccer Federation) and Don Garber, the commissioner of MLS, the country’s top domestic league. national team boss Jürgen Klinsmann (who is also the technical director for the U.S. star to elect to build his career in America rather than Europe, has become something of a lightning rod for an ideological battle between U.S. and Major League Soccer icon will not be celebrated unequivocally in some key quarters. When Landon Donovan walks out to play the final game of his career in what could be a record sixth MLS Cup win on Sunday afternoon, it will be the culmination of weeks of staged farewells, tributes, documentaries, commemorative presentations and ceremonies to honor him.īut Donovan’s legacy as a U.S.