MLS player recruitment focus has switched from ageing stars to young talent as new breeding ground emerges

With former Atlanta player Miguel Almiron impressing at Newcastle and the teenage Jhon Duran involved at Aston Villa following his January arrival from Chicago Fire, the appeal of signing players straight from Major League Soccer is increasing.

The success of Alphonso Davies’ move from Vancouver Whitecaps to Bayern Munich no longer appears to be an outlier but a trendsetter. In the summer, Chelsea signed 18-year-old Gaga Slonina. In February, Barcelona brought in Julian Araujo from Los Angeles Galaxy.

A competition once cruelly dubbed a retirement home for Europe’s ageing stars has become a breeding ground for talent. “That is what makes it one of the most enjoyable environments to work in right now, in my opinion,” Neil McGuinness tells Sky Sports.

The former Celtic talent spotter is director of recruitment at Columbus Crew and has seen the transformation in the country since his arrival in 2019. “There are players being brought in that would not have been close to achievable in the past,” he explains.

“You now have a lot of the best young South American talent choosing MLS over Europe as a first move. European players much lower in age are arriving in the league in comparison to years ago when it was players looking for a final career stop.

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“I think this is maybe part of the myth that some may have about MLS not being a league that produces players because if you look back for years now , you can see how there has been a consistent pathway of players leaving the league to try themselves in Europe.

“Ricardo Pepi to Augsburg is another. Player sales are growing year on year. Within the world of football, teams across the world are well aware as to how much of a talent hotbed MLS is and I think bit by bit the everyday football fan is starting to realise it as well.”

Consider Columbus Crew’s own start to the 2023 season. It was two goals scored by Lucas Zelarayan, an Argentina-born Armenia international signed from Mexican club Tigres, that helped them to secure their first victory against Wayne Rooney’s DC United.

Cucho Hernandez, a Colombia international signed from Watford last summer, is further proof of a changing market.

Image: Columbus Crew's Cucho Hernandez is an example of the pulling power of MLS now

“It is a sign of where we are at that this league can attract and intrigue players of Cucho’s quality. It is great to have players of his level coming into the league to compete and improve not only themselves but the standard of opponents who play against them.

“MLS has always had a strong relationship with the South American market and teams have regularly recruited from Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Uruguay and right across the continent. But it is a completely open market now. Teams have eyes everywhere.

“Now, more so than ever, they are not focusing specifically on any given region but are looking for the best possible player and fit at the best possible price point. There is a much more global approach to recruitment and that has directly affected the standard.

“The improvement in the overall standard of players has been so quick over the last decade here and I can only see it continuing in this direction with more players from elite leagues choosing to come while still in the early to peak stages of their careers.”

Image: Neil McGuinness with the MLS Cup that Columbus Crew won in 2020

For McGuinness, a man with a recruitment career of some repute having helped to identify Virgil van Dijk for Celtic when the Liverpool defender was playing in the Eredivisie with Groningen, working in MLS, with its salary caps, represents a unique challenge.

“The rules make for a more competitive playing field as everyone is under the same structure. You do not have a team becoming overly dominant as can be seen in most of the major leagues across the world where two or three teams outspend the others.

“Here, it is a much more balanced and fair system that only allows for increased spending in senior designated player positions of which you can only have three outside of the salary cap. And all teams can have three, so it makes for a far more level competition.

“Personally, I find that the different elements involved in roster building here to be an enjoyable experience and it makes for an additional challenge which you do not find elsewhere in football. It makes the role that much more process focused.”

While that is a key difference, increasingly, it is the transferability of the skills in MLS that is most striking now. The next young superstar might just be making his name in the States. “I can only see it improving and getting bigger year on year,” adds McGuinness.

“I think it is just about continuing to educate people outside of the country who may not know enough about football in America to take a deeper look and see for themselves as to how much more developed MLS is today in 2023 compared to what it was.”

Neil McGuinness’ top scouting tip

On the importance of live scouting, McGuinness tells the tale of a time when he pulled the plug on a prospective signing because seeing the player in the flesh revealed insights that the video highlights did not…

“I remember that specific game well and how disappointed I was when I left the stadium as we had all expected a different outcome. To touch on the reasoning, in this instance it was all how around he conducted himself with team-mates, off the ball, communication and body language.

“Most of these things you can only see to an extent on video as the camera is following the play most of the time and does not focus on these elements. Regarding the player himself he showed things off the ball that raised concerns such as constantly complaining towards his team-mates, throwing his arms in the air and mouthing off at them when they made a bad pass or a mistake.

“His energy towards the team and body language was constantly negative and it was clear he was not well liked among team-mates. That is not to say that there may have been underlying reasons for his attitude in this game but it was an insight into what type of personality he could have and it was not indicative of someone who was overly professional and would always put the team first.

“The final straw was him shouting at a team-mate after he himself had played a long ball straight into the crowd and was gesturing that others needed to move better. Last I checked he was still in the same country but in a lower division. I was not shocked!”