Alongside the regular season in MLS NEXT, the annual calendar for the TFC Academy is interspersed with a series of major events.
In early December MLS NEXT Fest was held in Indio, California. A few weeks ago Generation adidas Cup wrapped up in Bradenton, Florida. Toronto FC has three teams headed to MLS NEXT Flex in Boyds, Maryland this weekend, and the MLS NEXT Cup Playoffs and Showcase will be held in Nashville, Tennessee to wrap up the season in June.
It’s a busy year of football for these young men.
“Each event is unique,” laid out Academy Director Anthony Capotosto on Tuesday. “For example at Fest the pro player pathway games, U-16 and U-18, actually count towards the league standings, so it's not simply a showcase. The GA Cup is the premier event for most MLS academies in so far as putting our best teams forward. You'll see a lot of MLS NEXT Pro players coming down to play with the U-16s and the U-18s and then, of course, we're playing against international competition, so it's a fantastic benchmark to see where our players are at and to continue to assess our players.”
“The event in Maryland, quite a few NCAA schools will be there,” he continued. “This is also part of our pathway. In the Academy when we talk about having outlets for players there's going to be a small percentage that will continue on to the pro game, but the majority of players will end up going to school and so the Flex event provides an unbelievable platform for them to be seen by countless NCAA coaches over the course of the weekend. And then the playoffs is a culminating event at the end of the year where we're going there to compete for a championship.”
In addition, between U-15, U-16, U-17, and U-20 international competitions, where a player will be playing from week-to-week, month-to-month, can be hectic.
Capotosto and the TFC Academy have a simple guiding principle to bring clarity.
“It always comes down to the best environment for the player,” he explained of how the rosters are assembled for each event. “You would have seen some players coming down to play [at the GA Cup]. Stefan Kapor, a 2009, could have actually played with our U-16 team, but to have him in that environment is not the best for his development, and so we had him up with the U-18s.”
“It also depends on the TFC II schedule, the makeup of that roster, and how we can best support the second team with the understanding that there may be a series of games that might add more value to their development than being at a GA Cup,” Capotosto balanced. “As we go into Maryland, we won't be playing with our strongest teams, just looking at the players that are required to be with the second team, but also we have eight players that will be with Canada that are going to Poland for an international event. We felt that those players needed to be in that environment, as opposed to coming to the Flex event with us.”
Canada’s U-16 National Team will face Egypt on May 13, Ireland on May 15, and Poland on May 18 at the UEFA U-16 Development Tournament. Kapor will be joined by Demitre Adamson, Devon Jr. Allen, Quinton Belfon, John Chukwu, Kervon Kerr, Edwin Omoregbe, and Ty Williams in Poland.
Whether against Tokyo FC or Palmeiras at GA Cup or international competition with the national team, these opportunities to step outside the usual provide a valuable opportunity.
“Expand the horizons,” agreed Capotosto. “They're going to see things that they would normally not see as part of the NEXT platform.”
“When you're speaking about the international level, you're talking about the best in the world and to be able to test themselves in that environment, get a look at how other countries in this case approach their football, it's a very unique experience,” he continued. “We see the national team as very much a compliment to what we're doing in the Academy. We work very closely with the youth national team program and for us to release our players, even though we have a major event, just goes to show the value that we place on international competition.”
Results always matter, but they are not the ultimate goal.
Toronto’s U-18s advanced to the Championship bracket at GA Cup undefeated through the group stage before getting knocked out on penalty kicks by Real Salt Lake. The U-16s finished third in their group, playing the remainder of the competition in the Premier bracket.
“Of course we're going down there with the intention to compete, to win the event. There's no doubt about that,” levelled Capotosto. “But the real value that comes out is the information that we're able to get on our players.”
“Due to the quality of the games we're going to be able to see the things that come out, in terms of areas of strength, the deficiencies in our players. We're going to confirm information that we already know about certain players and then we're also going to see some surprises,” he detailed. “We're forced to rotate players, whether we want to or not. Players are going to get playing time, perhaps against an international team, and they may turn some heads in a situation like that. We did have some surprises at GA Cup, where players emerged.”
“Those high level games – we call them the benchmark games,” added Capotosto. “Reveal a lot of information on players.”
The coaches are watching every detail closely.
“We can look at the four moments of the game, when we have possession, when we're out of possession and we're defending, in transition moments, how players are able to cope with the speed of the game,” detailed the Academy Director. “This is a big one – we know in these high level games, the speed is quite fast, and some players can cope with that and others have difficulty.”
“You're able to see the technical deficiencies that may come out, but you're also able to see players that are able to handle situations that they wouldn't normally see in league play: the player is able to get out of pressure, they're able to play with a high level of speed, get the ball off their feet quickly, they're able to make runs in behind the last line and influence things in the final third,” outlined Capotosto. “These are just some of the things that we're able to see when we watch these games.”
Players can emerge better for the experience.
“What we see is growth for sure. One example I can cite is Demitre Adamson, a player that comes to GA, didn't necessarily play a whole lot of minutes during the regular season, but now has emerged as a pretty good centre-back with our U-16 group and also caught the eye of the national team staff while we were down there,” highlighted the head of the TFC Academy. “That's why he's going to Poland with the U-16 group.”
And the coaches will use all that information to help ensure they do.
“After the GA Cup, we engaged in individual player interviews, set up a series of meetings across the entire Academy, but specifically the players that went to GA Cup, where we're doing a review by video analysis of their performance,” recounted Capotosto. “What we're trying to do is identify trends in their game, areas of strength, areas of improvement. And each coach, or set of coaches I should say – head coach and assistant coach – are meeting with players on an individual basis for a minimum of 30 minutes with all that information up on the screen. They go through a series of clips throughout the event, and even some of the games that we played prior to GA, speak about performance in a very objective way.”
“We want to be able to provide that feedback,” he continued. “The opportunity that we have through the Flex event is application of that feedback now – it's up to the player to put it on display. We have another series of meetings that we're going to have in June where we're going to go through the exact same process. For us in the Academy it's always about teaching and learning. We immerse ourselves in that process.”
“There is no learning without meaningful feedback,” Capotosto added. “So it's something that we prioritize.”
“The other thing is we're coming off a lot of games in a short period of time,” he reminded. “We played 14 games between both teams while we were down there and so the recovery piece is also very important because it's a quick turnaround as we go into this next event.”
10 days after GA Cup came to a conclusion, nine days before MLS NEXT Flex gets underway, Dékwon Barrow made his first team debut against CF Montréal in the Canadian Championship.
The pathway in action.
“It's extremely satisfying for our staff to see that – that's the reason we get out of bed in the morning, drive to the BMO Training Ground, and put in the shifts that we do every day, to have these kids come through our pathway and to open up bigger pathways into the first team and hopefully beyond one day,” closed Capotosto. “It was great to see Dékwon get in the game against CF Montréal. He's been doing well with the second team this year. He's really matured and grown into his own as a player. For us, that's exactly what the goal is and we look forward to more players following in his footsteps.”
