In what should come as a shock to absolutely no one, it appears as if Revolution defender Gabriel Badilla will soon be headed back to Costa Rica to play for Deportivo Saprissa. According to several articles in the Central American press, the player and the club have already agreed to terms, but Saprissa has yet to agree to a deal with the Revs.
Safe to say, I won’t be shedding any tears over this.
The Revs have resigned Kenny Mansally, Sainey Nyassi, and Kheli Dube. No word on contract terms.
Midfielder Mauricio Castro has been suspended for the first two games of the 2010 season for kicking a ball into the stands in the season finale against Chicago. You may remember that Castro blasted a ball into the Toyota Park seats after being taken hard into the sign boards by a Fire player. The sign boards had intentionally close to the field by the home team to limit the effectiveness of Darrius Barnes’ long throws. Castro cut his hand on the play; the offending Fire player was not even whistled for a foul.
Midfielder Mike Videira has had offseason hernia surgery that will keep him sidelined 6-8 weeks.
With the season opener now a week away, (…can you believe it?) let’s take a brief look at all of the players on the Revolution roster and see where they stand.
Chris Albright, D – A lock to start on Opening Night… if he weren’t suspended for a red card tackle of Cuahtemoc Blanco last year. Totally worth it.
Kevin Alston, D – Generation Adidas status makes him a lock to make the team. However, we’re hearing that Alston has had a tremendous camp, impressed the staff, and could very well find himself in the starting lineup against San Jose.
The Official Revs Blog tells us that Dado Hamzagic and Chris Salvaggione have been “released from training camp”, which I don’t believe should be confused with simply being released. At least not yet.
For now, we’ll still classify both players as Unsigned Draft Picks on our roster page.
The Revolution are in the advanced stages of negotiations with a defender and a striker of African descent and are hopeful of sealing their signatures, according to vice president of player personnel Michael Burns.
Nicol said he spotted both players during the course of scouting trips to Ghana. The defender could be expected to step right in and play if signed, while the striker is a younger player who may need some time to adjust, the coach reported.
Nicol returned from a trip to Ghana earlier this week and said he saw a couple of defenders and a striker he liked, and the team planned to make offers this week.
Both the Globe and the Herald quote Steve Nicol as having offered contracts to a young forward and young defender from Ghana. Obviously, Nicol doesn’t give too much away beyond that…
“They’re young guys,” Nicol said. “They’re only offers. They might take them, they might not.”
Taking public speaking lessons from Captain Obvious, eh Steve?
Not much to work with, but that won’t stop us from making an educated guess about the identity of one of the players in question…
In what appears to be a stroke of good fortune, the Revs have signed former UMass All-American goalkeeper Zack Simmons as an undrafted free agent. Simmons will be a part of the Revolution’s developmental roster. To make room on the Developmental Roster for Simmons and Generation Adidas defender Kevin Alston, the team has also promoted goalkeeper Brad Knighton and defender Chris Tierney to the senior roster.
You know, I really wanna like Mike Burns. I think he was a pretty decent player in his day, and he takes WAY too much crap about not being on the post in the ‘98 World Cup.
Sure, it’s a good thing that Burnsie’s taking questions from fans. But if you had given me the questions a day ahead of time, I could have practically predicted his responses.