Rumor Roundup

A bit of news and rumor from the first week of the offseason.  The primary source is from Padraig Smith's interview on the Vic Lombardi radio show on Wednesday morning.

Most notable, to me, was Smith's talk about how Gashi's play was disappointing this year and how it stemmed from him not following the offseason plan laid out for him after the 2016 season.  He also said they had had conversations with Gashi about it and he has accepted responsibility and pledged to do better this offseason.  So it sounds like Gashi is in the plans for next season and we should see a better Gashi than we dd this year.

He also said he had a talk with Howard after the game on Sunday and Tim is already ready to get back at it.  There was concern that after the World Cup Qualification failure Howard would decide to retire (or maybe want to end up at LAFC) but Smith made it clear that Tim was excited to lead the team in 2018.

Finally there was a good deal of talk about the new coach, what they're looking for, etc.  Smith said they're in final talks now and expect to have an announcement in the next couple of weeks.  He wouldn't name names (obviously) but talked about looking in the U.S. Europe, Oceania, and other locations.

Oceania stands out because of the rumor reported by Steven Goff yesterday:

Getting word @ColoradoRapids took interest in @NZ_Football manager Anthony Hudson, who's preparing for World Cup playoff vs Peru next month

— Steven Goff (@SoccerInsider) October 26, 2017

Today Ives is "reporting" that Hudson is the lead candidate but given his article just cites unnamed sources and otherwise just repeats what we've already seen from Goff and the Denver Post about the Rapids coaching search I'm taking that with a large grain of salt.

New Zealand is currently preparing for a playoff with Peru for a World Cup spot next month.  I can't image Hudson leaving New Zealand if somehow they upset Peru so I can't see how this is Plan A for the Rapids.  Add to that that Hudson's coaching career isn't all that impressive.  3 years with a PDL team in Maryland, 1 year in non-league football in England, and 7 years coaching for the Bahrain U23s and then the full Bahrain national team before making the same jump from U23s to full team with New Zealand.  I would hope our sights are bit higher, even though I appreciate the Rapids going outside the box to look a a candidate like this.

So the tl;dr version of this week:; Gashi and Howard back in 2018, coach announced in the next couple of weeks, New Zealand coach Anthony Hudson was discussed for the role at some point.