Will Jesse Marsch's move to Europe stop the jokes about US coaches?
Coaches who start their careers in MLS have often been treated as walking punchlines in Europe. But that perception may be changing
Minutes before kick off, Domènec Torrent and Chris Armas shook hands on the touchline. This, a derby match between New York City FC and the New York Red Bulls, was a new experience for both of them. Torrent had only been in his job a month, while Armas had been appointed just days before. Following the exits of Patrick Vieira and Jesse Marsch, this was the start of a new era for Major League Soccer in New York.
There was also a wider significance. Vieira was appointed Nice manager at the start of June, with Marsch following the Frenchman across the Atlantic a few weeks later, landing a job as RB Leipzig’s assistant manager. Next season, there will be two former MLS coaches in prominent jobs at ambitious clubs in two of Europe’s big five leagues. This is a landmark moment for the North American coaching scene.
Of course, some caveats are attached with the two appointments. Vieira is a World Cup winner, one of France’s greatest ever players. His name alone may have been enough to win him a coaching job in Ligue 1. Nonetheless, Vieira viewed NYC FC as a proving ground. It was his first job in senior management, and success in MLS was enough to get him the Nice job, also putting him on the shortlist of potential successors to Arsène Wenger at Arsenal.
Marsch’s position at RB Leipzig is peculiar. The club has risen from the fourth tier of German football to the Champions League in just five years, and next summer will see the arrival of Julian Nagelsmann, arguably the most sought after young coach in Europe. Until then, Ralf Rangnick has been placed in charge. But Rangnick is also Leipzig’s sporting director and so Marsch has been hired to train and coach the team day-to-day. He is de facto manager.
What happens to Marsch after the arrival of Nagelsmann is unclear, but the fact a club like RB Leipzig looked to MLS to bridge the gap is notable. Yes, a certain energy drink might have helped lubricate a deal between two clubs under the same corporate umbrella, but this isn’t a move for the sake of good relations. RB Leipzig are known for their shrewd recruitment and they have done their homework on Marsch.
The move underlines the change we are seeing in MLS’s profile. While the league has made strides in selling itself as a stepping stone, particularly for South American players looking to make the jump to Europe, it has lagged behind in attracting a high calibre of coach.
Now, though, young coaches from around the world are being lured by what MLS can offer them. Marsch and Vieira’s recent appointments show that European clubs are not just paying attention to what happens on MLS pitches, but what happens in the dugout too. That could be a game changer as young coaches view North American soccer as a viable launchpad for bigger and better things.
Take Torrent, for instance. As a key member of Pep Guardiola’s coaching team at Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City, he likely would have had no shortage of potential destinations to pick up his senior management career again after a 12-year hiatus. And yet the Spaniard went to New York City FC.
He joins a host of managers fledgling managers in the league. There’s Anthony Hudson at the Colorado Rapids, James O’Connor at Orlando City, Mikael Stahre at the San Jose Earthquakes, Veljko Paunovic at the Chicago Fire, Carl Robinson at the Vancouver Whitecaps and Brad Friedel at the New England Revolution.
Anyone looking to MLS to start their coaching career must be wary of the idiosyncrasies of the North American game. Travelling to away games often entails journeying across a continent, frequently on commercial flights. No league in world soccer has such a wide variety of ability and stature, with superstars like Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Wayne Rooney playing alongside youngsters straight out of college on $50,000 a year – getting those players to gel is not always easy. Coaching in MLS is not like coaching anywhere else. Anything less than full commitment to the cause will see a manager, no matter their reputation or background in the game, found out (see Ruud Gullit at the LA Galaxy).
American coaches are still the subject of derision in European soccer circles. Bob Bradley, for instance, is still a caricature, quite literally, in England - Sky Sports’ Soccer AM show still runs a regular segment called Brad Bobley’s Soccer Camp, featuring a bald American talking cartoonishly about “soccerball” and “midfield stripes.” The likes of Clint Dempsey, Tim Howard and Christian Pulisic have moved American players away from this sort of ridicule, but coaches are still considered fair game.
This is why the appointment of Marsch at RB Leipzig in particular matters so much. But changing lazy perceptions is about more than just creating a route for North American coaches to follow over the Atlantic, but about changing the coaching landscape of MLS in the process. Going on what has happened this summer, there will be more like Marsch and Vieira.
