A ‘proud’ day for Bradley
Bob Bradley officially became the 33rd coach in the history of the U.S. men’s national soccer team Wednesday, casting off the interim tag that had hung albatross-like around his neck since December.
Bradley’s contract will keep him in the position through the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
“I’m proud today,” Bradley, 49, from nearby Montclair, N.J., said at his introductory news conference in New York. “I’m excited. I’m honored to be named coach of the U.S. national team. But more than that it’s probably not a day when I have anything enlightening to say.”
Bradley had said it all, he pointed out, when he was named interim coach Dec. 8 after Germany’s Juergen Klinsmann had taken himself out of consideration as the successor to Bruce Arena, the U.S. coach for the previous eight years.
Sunil Gulati, the president of U.S. Soccer, had pursued Klinsmann long and hard after the 2006 World Cup, but said Bradley was by no means a second choice.
“In the early days of Major League Soccer, I had the notion that Bob could, should and would be the national team coach at some point in the future,” Gulati said. “It was just a question of when.”
Bradley’s performance over the last five months -- during which he started rebuilding the U.S. team and compiled a 3-0-1 record while introducing new players, including a victory over Mexico -- had only reinforced that belief, Gulati said.
“There haven’t been any missteps and I absolutely think we’re in the right place with this program,” he said. “I think it’s fair to say that from the first day Bob has treated this job as if it were his. That’s been a big plus.”
Bradley has spent the last few weeks trying to finalize his player choices for two major summer tournaments that will provide his first real tests as national coach.
He said he would name a roster next week for the June 6-24 CONCACAF Gold Cup in the U.S., with the players gathering at the Home Depot Center to begin final preparation on May 27.
The U.S. will go straight from the Gold Cup into the June 26-July 15 Copa America in Venezuela, but the roster will differ for that tournament.
“Our hope is to have a handful of players play in both events,” Bradley said. “That would include some MLS-based players and some European-based players. We’re hopeful that the discussions that have taken place in the past month have paved the way for us to put two very, very good rosters together.”
Gulati and Bradley also revealed that sometime in the next year the U.S. would hire a technical director to oversee all national team programs, that one of Bradley’s assistants, possibly Peter Nowak, could assume charge of the U.S. Olympic team in place of Bradley, and that former national team player Mike Sorber might be added to the national team staff as an assistant coach.
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Chivas USA unveiled Mexico’s Comex Group, the fourth-largest architectural paint manufacturer in North America, as its jersey sponsor in a multiyear contract believed to be worth $2 million a year to the MLS club. The name Comex will appear on the front of Chivas uniforms, while one of the Comex Group’s U.S. subsidiaries, Frazee Paint, will become a presenting sponsor for Chivas.
