SAN DIEGO – We had the opportunity to talk to two club scouts this weekend at Surf Cup. One of them is Jorge Tello from Club Pachuca that plays in Lig
SAN DIEGO – We had the opportunity to talk to two club scouts this weekend at Surf Cup. One of them is Jorge Tello from Club Pachuca that plays in Liga MX and the other one is Jorge “Junior” Gonzales from the MLS club Seattle Sounders.
Jorge Tello told us that this is their 3rd or 4th soccerloco Surf Cup, and because they are a professional club they are always looking for tournaments to find players. For soccerloco Surf Cup, they are staying for the entire tournament (both weekends).
When asked if they came to watch a specific player Jorge said that their main objective is to have a sight of all the players participating in every division. Then from there, they look for talent that they think they can work with at Pachuca according to their necessities.
[quote_box_center]“TALENT, TALENT, TALENT”, Jorge says talented players eality distinguish themselves from the rest, and those are the players they are after. “If we are able to see value on a player we do not think twice when it comes to contact them and bring them on board.”[/quote_box_center]
As far as the Seattle Sounders, we talked to Junior Gonzales who has been with the MLS club since January. This is his first soccerloco Surf Cup with the Sounders, but he has been to the tournament for the past 20 years. He came as a Chivas head scout for the academy for the last years. So this is his 3rd year as a professional scout.
The Sounders are starting a pilot with housing and host families, so they are trying to bring 10 to 15 players to relocate to Seattle to play for the Development Academy and S2 teams.
The positions and characteristics of players they look for changes every year. In this case, his target for the older age groups are a goalkeeper, center back and center forward. They had other guys coming from out of state that are filling in the other gaps.
[quote_box_center]“When we look at our local market, what we have strongest are depth charts and then we figure out what we need from there.”[/quote_box_center]
Junior really enjoys coming to soccerloco Surf Cup, not only for the tradition that it has but also because the camaraderie between the coaches and the scouts. In is in his opinion this is the best non-academy soccer event in the U.S.
[quote_box_center]“I just think this has tradition, every time you get off on this road here to the fields it’s a great feeling,”[/quote_box_center]
Junior also thinks it is important to continue improving the tournament because even though the level of play is already high, there should be a place for every level to play in with the different brackets.
He really dives into the youth teams, specially the 2000s and 2001s, and also in this tournament he is watching the 15 and 16 year old boys. He said he really enjoys it as there are a lot of good games and the location is great, “on the personal side is never bad to be around San Diego.”
Junior already contacted a few players in the tournament and spoke to some coaches. So there is definitely some invites up to Seattle already out.
[quote_box_center]“The hardest part is getting them there but I believe once we show them what we can offer they almost always commit.”[/quote_box_center]
