Soccer <\/p>\n
The FIFA Club World Cup<\/a> has always been a curiosity for MLS fans, a distant spectacle save for one, fleeting moment back in early 2023 when Seattle Sounders FC<\/a> crashed the party.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Otherwise, it\u2019s been where the best of LIGA MX get a puncher\u2019s chance against the global elite, and where we\u2019re reminded just how big the gap still is. But with every tournament, especially now that the inaugural edition of the expanded version is almost in the books, the curiosity has started to feel a little more urgent.<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t just a proving ground for teams like Club Am\u00e9rica or CF Monterrey anymore: It\u2019s a test case for what\u2019s possible if MLS starts aiming a little higher. If you watched a few of these games from the past month \u2013 really watched them \u2013 you saw what the world\u2019s best are doing differently. The movement, the tempo, the spatial awareness, the ruthlessness in the final third.<\/p>\n You also saw some of that from the MLS entrants \u2013 more, honestly, than I was expecting (as I wrote about last week<\/a>). Along the way, it became clear that in order to close that gap, MLS teams would have to conduct themselves more like the Fluminenses and Flamengos of the world. Go after players in their prime, playmakers and goalscorers, backline generals and midfield orchestrators \u2013 all of whom can raise the ceiling and the floor.<\/p>\n That\u2019s the opportunity this summer when the Secondary Transfer Window opens. Can MLS teams use the Club World Cup to make a splash at the deep end of the global transfer pool and sign some of the guys we saw this summer? They are gettable. Some of them want to be gotten.<\/p>\n So this column is for the sporting directors, the scouts and the decision-makers. Here are a few numbers to call:<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Most of the center forwards are either out of reach for MLS clubs (though I would love to see somebody here make an obscene offer to Juventus for Du\u0161an Vlahovi\u0107) or probably not good enough to move the needle (looking directly at you, Facundo Colidio at River Plate).<\/p>\n There are two guys, however \u2013 at very different price points, it should be clear \u2013 who make a lot of sense.<\/p>\n \u201cFlaco,\u201d as he\u2019s known, is already on MLS radars \u2013 there was some real heat about a potential move to Columbus<\/a> this past winter after Cucho Hern\u00e1ndez<\/a> was sold to Real Betis.<\/p>\n Flaco, like Cucho, is more of a No. 9 than not, but he\u2019s also not purely a 9. He can drift very easily off the line and into the half-spaces as a playmaker, and even flares wide a little bit (though not as much as Cucho does).<\/p>\n He\u2019s just 24 and his contract runs to the end of 2027, so this won’t be a bargain buy. But he\u2019s surplus at Palmeiras (he started only one of his CWC appearances), and the MLS links are already there. It might not be Columbus in the end, but if the Crew do get this guy, I wouldn\u2019t bet against them adding another trophy to the cabinet.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n \u2014 DAZN Football (@DAZNFootball) June 19, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n The Ivorian was purchased during the height of the Spending Madness that infected Chelsea\u2019s front office and ownership structure a few years ago, and like so many that came to West London during that time, 1) he never really got a chance to settle in and 2) he\u2019s already been recruited over, time and time again.<\/p>\n Fofana\u2019s gone on multiple loans over the past two years, none of them productive. He\u2019s under contract until 2029, which is a long time.<\/p>\n A loan to an MLS club \u2013 this one with an eye toward a permanent switch in which said MLS club simply assumes Fofana\u2019s Chelsea deal (his salary is not onerous; reportedly it\u2019s less than a max TAM deal), and Chelsea recoup part of their initial transfer fee \u2013 makes a ton of sense. One of the main virtues of this league of ours is stability, and some of the best goalscorers in league history (Josef Mart\u00ednez<\/a>, Bradley Wright-Phillips, etc.) found exactly that once they arrived here.<\/p>\n For what it\u2019s worth, I\u2019d imagine Fofana would cost about a third of what Flaco would.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Lots of wingers to choose from, young and old. This list could easily be three times as long as it is (with half the additions being \u201cguys who are underperforming for Boca Juniors right now,\u201d to be fair).<\/p>\n The 28-year-old playmaking winger has been a mainstay at Porto, playing basically everywhere in the attack, and playing well throughout most of his time. So well that he\u2019s on the fringes of La Sele\u00e7ao. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s a stretch to say he\u2019d be one of the very best players in MLS.<\/p>\n But here are a few things that seem to be lining up that make him gettable:<\/p>\n Porto want to hold onto their two young stars, center forward Samu Aghehowa and winger\/attacking midfielder Rodrigo Mora, for one more year. Getting a big fee for Pep\u00ea \u2013 and to be clear, he\u2019d probably become the MLS-record signing \u2013 would likely allow them to do that.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n \u2014 DAZN Football (@DAZNFootball) June 24, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n I\u2019m generally not a fan of taking on over-30 Euros \u2013 the success rate of those kinds of players has been very low since about 2018 or so (though the quartet of legends in Miami<\/a> have obviously shown it can work if everyone\u2019s bought in).<\/p>\n Someone should knock on the door about Sterling, though. He struggled to imprint himself on Arsenal\u2019s 2024-25 season, where he played on loan, but still produced an assist about every 200 minutes across all competitions and had very good underlying chance creation numbers. And his 2023-24 season\u2026 10g\/11a in about 2,700 minutes across all competitions for Chelsea. That\u2019s excellent stuff.<\/p>\n His salary is extremely high, in line with what Leo Messi<\/a> earns down in Miami, and runs through the summer of 2027. Somebody here would have to be willing to really, really pay.<\/p>\n But the dude is one of the best wingers of the past decade \u2013 the type who gives his forwards tap-ins. He can still ball.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Mart\u00edn is a 23-year-old product of Atleti\u2019s youth set-up who\u2019s been a prolific goalscoring winger (and sometimes center forward) first at the youth levels, and then in LaLiga 2. He\u2019s never been able to translate it to the top flight, though, and is almost certainly slated for a move this summer.<\/p>\n He\u2019s under contract until the end of the decade and will most likely have interested parties elsewhere in Iberia, and he doesn\u2019t have the kind of profile that makes him feel like a sure-thing MLS success just waiting to happen. As Myrto Uzuni<\/a> has shown in Austin<\/a>, prolific LaLiga 2 goalscoring does not automatically translate here. Signing Mart\u00edn would be a risk.<\/p>\n But it\u2019d be an interesting one. Lots of MLS teams need goalscoring wingers, and if you have the right structure around him (a true playmaker, an overlapping left back who can actually pass the ball), I think he\u2019d be very good here.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n The guys who make the game. True No. 10s have always been in style here in MLS, even if they\u2019ve gone out of fashion in Europe.<\/p>\n Kennedy, who just turned 23, had an excellent 2023 for Fluminense, fell off the face of the earth in 2024, and then went on loan to Pachuca where he was among the leading scorers while toggling between center forward, winger and attacking midfielder.<\/p>\n He is, in other words, a No. 10 in the way Diego Rossi<\/a> has played the role this year in Columbus, rather than a more classic No. 10 like Carles Gil<\/a> or Evander<\/a>. So a team that plays a more fluid, attacking set-up makes a lot of sense, rather than one that would want him to drop into the midfield and orchestrate.<\/p>\n Santi had a breakout year in 2024 with New York City FC<\/a>, which he parlayed into a big move<\/a> to the big-spending Brazilian side. They made both him and NYCFC an offer they couldn\u2019t refuse.<\/p>\n And it just has not worked out. Santi managed only 42 minutes at the Club World Cup, and has played 430 minutes in total since the move. He’s about the 25th man on that roster and is further from breaking into the Uruguay set-up than he was a year ago.<\/p>\n Whispers out of Brazil are that both the player and the club are unhappy, and both might be looking to move on. If you\u2019re an MLS side in need of a No. 10 and you want a sure thing \u2013 someone you know can succeed at a high level in this league because he already has, and is just entering his prime \u2013 this is about as obvious as it gets.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Solo un chico y su amor por el juego \u26bd\ufe0f pic.twitter.com\/FKxd5tTXab<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 New York City FC (@newyorkcityfc) February 22, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n The Brazilian was incredible as a 17-year-old for Flamengo back in 2019, so good that Real Madrid bought him for reportedly $30 million the day after he turned 18 in January of 2020.<\/p>\n It\u2019s been an unhappy five years since, as Reiner, now 23 \u2013 still very young! \u2013 has bounced from one unproductive loan to another. This past season that meant a stop at Granada in LaLiga 2, and while he was relatively productive as a playmaker, with good underlying numbers, he fell out of the lineup almost entirely by the end of January.<\/p>\n He\u2019s now entering the final year of his contract and could be had very cheap. He\u2019s still got talent, but this is very much a reclamation project.<\/p>\n The mother of all reclamation projects here. Make this kid your No. 10, and you\u2019re not just betting on him, you\u2019re betting on your training staff. His career has been almost completely derailed by injuries (and some off-field stuff you know about, and I know about, and thus I don\u2019t feel the need to get into).<\/p>\n But that talent\u2026<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n ???????? \u00a1Gio Reyna se comi\u00f3 a Maradona!<\/p>\n Se quita a medio equipo de la Selecci\u00f3n Mexicana, aunque no puede terminar la jugada como esperaba. \u274c\u26bd pic.twitter.com\/nGVe2dDxtZ<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2014 TUDN USA (@TUDNUSA) March 25, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\nJos\u00e9 Manuel L\u00f3pez – Palmeiras<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
David Datro Fofana – Chelsea FC<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
Pep\u00ea – FC Porto<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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Raheem Sterling – Chelsea FC<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
Carlos Mart\u00edn – Atl\u00e9tico Madrid<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
John Kennedy – Pachuca\/Fluminense<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
Santiago Rodr\u00edguez – Botafogo<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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Reinier – Real Madrid<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
Gio Reyna – Borussia Dortmund<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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