SoccerToronto FC still alive and upgraded

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On the day Julian de Guzman watched his new teammates at work for the first time, it was fitting the spotlight fell on the Canadian content. Dwayne de Rosario scored one, made one, and could have had a couple more, O’Brian White showed poise and panache to enhance his reputation, and Nana Attakora won the game with a header of which another spectator, Danny Dichio, would have been proud.

At the other end, more careless, irresponsible defending made the game closer than it should have been. On another day it would have been more costly but, in the event, Toronto achieved what it had to do, adding another three points to the season’s tally and keeping alive the playoff dream a while longer.

Back-to-back dynamic duos

Just how much longer depends on what the players took out of the victory and how they will use it, first in Los Angeles and then in Chicago. How do you stop Beckham and Donovan one week, then Blanco and McBride the next?

Apparently you take a leaf out of the FC Dallas playbook. One of Major League Soccer’s poorer teams systematically took apart the Galaxy almost at will last weekend, proving once again that every team is defensively vulnerable. Indeed both LA and Chicago have better road records than they do at home, so perhaps the daunting prospect of back-to-back expeditions south of the border is not as intimidating as it first appears.

Then there’s the new kid in town. It’s taken LA’s Designated Player David Beckham close on three years to make the playoffs; Toronto’s equivalent wants to taste the post-season buzz in little more than three games. Julian de Guzman may not be match fit, following a period of inactivity stretching back to the Gold Cup in July, but the adrenalin of pulling on a TFC jersey for the first time will aid him, at least in the short term.

Starting Saturday night, de Guzman has the chance to begin unloading his considerable bag of tricks in a league he doesn’t know against teams which don’t know him. His strength on the ball and his ability, not only to retain possession, but also to turn defence into offence, could just be the missing link Toronto needs to help it sneak into the playoffs by the back door.

The realist in me is recommending us all not to expect too much too soon. Surely de Guzman’s arrival has come too late in the year for him to make his mark in 2009? Part of me is inclined to take my own advice, but perhaps his very presence is enough to reignite the belief that anything is possible down the stretch.

Salary, skill should go arm in arm

Money, by the way, is not and should not be a factor. Of course plenty is expected of de Guzman, simply because he’s a very good player not because he’s earning roughly five times the salary of Dwayne de Rosario. Let’s face facts: Without a substantial offer on the table, de Guzman would have stayed in Europe and would not have even considered a contract with Major League Soccer.

As we all know, ultimately you get what you pay for and I, for one, can only hope jealousy and envy does not become a factor in the TFC locker-room. He may have been on his politically correct best behaviour at the weekend, but de Guzman told me his decision to come home was based on the team “which showed most desire” to sign him and in that department, according to the player, Toronto FC had no peers.

General manager Mo Johnston has been vigorously pursuing his man ever since getting the green light from his MLSE paymasters that Designated Player money was in the budget. With de Guzman aboard, Johnston has delivered a player who ticks all the boxes and around whom the 2010-12 versions of TFC can be built.

Johnston takes an awful lot of flak, and there are plenty who will question the wisdom of spending DP money on a defensive midfielder. But Mo has said from day one he would never use it to sign an aging player from Europe in his mid-30s, however brightly his star might once have shone. Instead, he’s acquired 28-year-old de Guzman at the height of his powers and, for that, the Scotsman deserves some credit.

As Toronto’s next opponents have discovered, signing a Designated Player does not guarantee success, but it does guarantee surprises and isn’t that why we love this game in the first place?

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