Fire’s new head coach getting settled in
New Fire coach Frank Yallop wasn’t ready to break any big news Thursday.
He’s only been on the job a week, so when asked if the club might make a splash by signing a designated player this off-season, Yallop had to pass.
“Not sure,” he said. “Is that good? I don’t know. We’ll see. I’ve got a lot on my plate at the moment. I’m working through it. I want to just try to have a good team come Opening Day, wherever we’re at, and try to do well.”
Yallop said he’s still getting to know the organization and his players, four of whom — Jeff Larentowicz, Bakary Soumare, Logan Pause and Mike Magee — shared the head table with the coach at Thursday’s news conference. Those four could form the core of the 2014 Fire team when Yallop leads it onto the field in March.
“It’s just good to get to speak to all the players, basically,” Yallop said. “You see them from afar, coaching against them. It’s nice to sit down and meet them, and I think that’s important for me and the way I go about things, get to know the personalities, how they’re going to fit in with each other and the way I do things.
“It’s been good. I’ve been really impressed with the young men here, and I think that good times are ahead. We’ve got some good characters in these guys sitting here, for sure.”
Yallop, who also holds the title of Director of Soccer, still plans to hire two or three assistant coaches over the next couple of weeks, plus a technical director to handle paperwork and oversee scouting, especially during the season when Yallop is on the field.
“It’s not just running out on a Saturday night and playing,” Yallop said. “There’s a lot of budget issues we’ve got to get to, picking up people’s options and all those things that come into the role that I have. I’ll be busy with that stuff.”
As for hiring domestic and international scouts, “You can hire companies, you can do your own. There will probably be a scouting director, I would think,” Yallop said.
“I think it’s exciting building, not from scratch, but kind of a blank slate, if you like. Not many times you get to do that, so I want to make sure that I put the right staff together for these guys,” he added.
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