TennZip

Congratulations to Victor Souto for his excellent entry pass....giving him his first assist in the pros

Richie Laryea improved so much from his freshman to sophomore years. Would be super for the zips if Reggie showed the same improvement. This initial ranking is the soccer coaches poll. The other polls...top drawer soccer and college soccer news....are typically done by reporters. To go from season ending 24 to pre-season 16.....while losing 4 kids playing pro soccer (Lewis, Najem, Ruhaak and Radjen)......says that the coaches voted the zips very high... 1) based on prior years....or 2) the coaches think that recruits like David Egbo, Faisal Ghaffur, DeClan Watters Daniel Strachan, and others are going to contribute tremendously in their first year. Denver is ranked preseason #3 in the country and was in the final four last year. The first weekend will be a stern test.

The zips ended last year #24 in the rankings and they lost in the round of 32 of the NCAA tourney. That team lost Jonathan Lewis....the #3 or #4 player drafted to MLS. That team also lost the MAC player of the year Adam Najem as well as the 2 center DB's that started on the 2015 ncaa semi team. I was also an enormous fan of the potential of Jesus Perez and was sad to see "Chino" transfer out. top Drawer soccer is never perfect when they try to rank recruiting classes. They had the recruiting class at #19 before a very highly ranked recruit (Wan Kuzain Wan Kamal) decided to go pro. To go from 24 last year....to #16 pre-season is probably a nod to Akron's storied history. Honestly, I was not expecting to see the zips ranked that high. Pre-season rankings are just that.... pre-season. The games have to be played on the field. SIU-Edwardsville is now in the MAC. SIU-E made it to the NCAA round of 16 last year and they return 7 of their 11 starters. They ended last year at #20 but they are nowhere to be found in the pre season rankings. I am sure their coach is using that for motivation and already has their October 13th game at Akron circled on their calendar. As I have said in other topics, last year's team did not have a healthy Stuart Holthusen. Like many others on this board, I think that Stuart Holthusen can do great things when he is healthy. This team will score goals. I am excited to see who steps up to fill the positions vacated by Ruhaak and Danilo. Let the practices and games begin.

http://unitedsoccercoaches.org/web/Rankings/College_Rankings/NCAA_DI_MEN/web/Rankings/NCAA/DI_MEN.aspx

https://www.fourfourtwo.com/us/features/caleb-porter-interview-portland-timbers-mls-i-thought-i-had-it-all-figured-out-punched-nose

congratulations to Zac Portillos for being selected to the eastern conference first team for the past week https://www.indomitablecitysoccer.com/2017/8/1/16073704/usl-eastern-conference-best-xi-week-19

Good topic.... thanks for starting the discussion... Stopping goals is going to determine the success of the season. If healthy, the zips have lots of fire power up top. Stuart Holthusen was never really healthy last year. Stuart was outstanding in the last part of 2015 and was a beast during the zips great tourney run. Stuart , if healthy, is capable of having a great year. Sam had a great summer with St. Louis. Ezana scored goals for Erie in the summer and Marcel Zajac did well for Sigma FC. When Nick Hinds was moved from outside Back to midfielder, he was a scoring machine in the last part of 2016. Manel Cordeiro, if healthy, can be a good distributor to the scorers. I have been told that Skye Harter is vastly improved.....and should contribute in the midfield. David Egbo and Marc Alexander both will be talented freshman pushing for time in the front 6. One would have to assume that Nate Shultz and Niko De Vera are the front runners for the outside back positions. Who will replace Danilo Radjen and Brad Ruhaak? DeClan Watters from Ireland is the recruit that we know the least about....If he can step in as a freshman and do very well as a center back, there will be a lot of happy zip fans at the end of the year.

2nd goal of the season for Victor Souto. He is really playing well for the Riverhounds

http://www.phillysoccerpage.net/2017/07/25/five-thoughts-on-the-union-the-universe-and-everything/ Najem: Najem put himself in decent positions, demonstrated good comfort on the ball, and displayed pretty good passing vision on a few occasions, though he didn’t always make the right decisions. On the night, he completed 87 percent of his passes, with two key passes leading to shots. Not bad, but not spectacular either. That said, it’s hard to measure his quality based on this performance because Jay Simpson spent the night gumming up the central channels with a static lack of movement. Like Epps, Najem showed enough to warrant more minutes and make you wonder what he could do when paired with a better attacking group around him.

great article.....glad to see Jonathan doing so well

thought this article might get missed if I posted in summer development league so I decided to create new topic http://buffalonews.com/2017/07/22/whose-city-prolific-kahsay-reflects-first-summer-erie/

http://www.goal.com/en-us/news/1616/concacaf/2017/07/22/37241782/darlington-nagbe-leaves-us-wanting-more-but-hes-still-delivering-

great cut back by JLew...followed by assist

Darlington is a great player...but he sure gets unfairly criticized

glad to see that Richie is doing well: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/orlando-city-lions/on-the-pitch/os-sp-orlando-city-soccer-insider-0720-story.html

Adam played in MLS tonight

Perry now active in Denmark

orlando paper ran a small article just about Reggie's older brother http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/orlando-city-lions/on-the-pitch/os-sp-orlando-city-richie-laryea-playing-more-20170706-story.html

truly a day late and a dollar short USMNT played in Cleveland sat...night....without local hero DNags Sunday, Darlington is named to the team http://www.ussoccer.com/stories/2017/07/16/13/39/20170716-news-mnt-bruce-arena-makes-six-changes-usmnt-gold-cup-roster

thought this article might interest fans of AN10....now known as AN24 http://www.phillysoccerpage.net/2017/07/11/unions-class-of-2017-looks-good-at-the-halfway-mark/ Marcus Epps & Adam Najem: Two other rookies who’ve earned playing time, Stewart actively maneuvered to acquire both Epps and Najem in what appear to be savvy moves. Epps flashed speed down the wing and a certain fearlessness, earning minutes at the wing in Fabian Herbers’ absence. Najem, meanwhile, looks like the sort of creative central midfielder that the Union sorely lacks. Though they both may contribute little this year, these two may have big futures as the team looks to grow through youth.

nice words about Richie : https://www.orlandocitysc.com/post/2017/07/06/young-subs-bring-new-energy-orlando-city

40 days until the exhibition opener....

Sigma FC won 2-1 yesterday with goals by Marcel Zajac and zip recruit Faisal Ghaffur How many days until Captain's practice starts for the zips?.....the fall soccer season....will be here soon !!!

Aodhan played an outstanding game. He had several good long passes due to his excellent vision on the field.