St. Louis’ Taylor Twellman will be staying with New England after MLS turned down a transfer offer from English club Preston North End, says Frank Dell’Apa of the Boston Globe and ESPN.com.
Meanwhile, Borgia’s Matt Pickens was given permission to leave the U.S. national team camp in California, so he won’t be on the roster for this weekend’s game with Sweden.
I agree about Taylor shooting himself in the foot in hindsight. I just read Ives Galarcep’s “No Dice” on ESPN last night which was a good insight on what happened. Of course Taylor didn’t know he was going to have such a good year, but I still don’t feel sorry for him. He should have considered that when he negotiated the contract. England or no England, he still gets paid 6 figures to play a game - sounds like a pretty good situation to me!
I also read that Matt Pickens has been training with Norwich City, which I assume is why he left the US National team.
It’s too bad Twellman can’t go to England, but honestly, he deserves better than Preston. He could contribute to a Premier League club, and England knows it. He had offers from Leeds (though they’ve dropped down now) and Everton before the World Cup.
While it’s a shame that Taylor may not get a shot to go to Europe this year, to some extent he set this up by signing a longer term deal (3 years?) with MLS before the 2007 season. I’m sure he was going for job security, but at the same time it now looks short-sighted … or perhaps it could have had a buyout clause built in? But hindsight is always 20/20, right?
It appears that another St. Louisan on the Revs could get a shot overseas. Apparently Pat Noonan’s option is not being picked up. I’m curious to know why as I thought he played quite well last year for them.
http://www.fannation.com/truth_and_rumors/soccer