Chicago Stars GM Richard Feuz On Lorne Donaldson Dismissal
Stars General Manager Answers Questions About the Club's Future Following Release of Lorne Donaldson as Head Coach
The day after announcing the dismissal of Chicago Stars FC head coach Lorne Donaldson, GM Richard Feuz faced the media in a press conference to answer questions related to the dismissal and the future of the club’s on-field product.
The overall tone of the press conference was one of attempting to reassure the staff and players that the club is in stable condition, while also trying to assure fans that the club will be better in the coming weeks. Obviously, the jury’s still out on if that will be the case.
Feuz also wanted to drive home the fact that he sees Donaldson as a great person who established the right environment and brought “joy” and “self confidence” back to the locker room at the beginning of the rebuild.
He emphasized that the decision to remove Donaldson was one based on performance and nothing else.
Press Conference with Richard Feuz
All quotes included in the article are attributed to Chicago Stars General Manager Richard Feuz
Decision to dismiss Lorne Donaldson
“Soccer is related to performance, and when I talk about performance it’s not only the results on the pitch but also about the progress that the team is doing. At some point we judged that the team needed to take another direction.”
“The contribution of Lorne from the beginning here in helping the club and the organization to rebuild, to bring those kinds of things that was missing in this club, meaning joy, energy, culture, that was something priceless. And we again thank him for that.”
“We tried to make the best decision for the club and the future of the club. It’s never about ego… It’s a difficult decision when you have to take those decisions with good people and a good human being like Lorne is.”
Relationship with Lorne Donaldson
“When I signed my contract here, I knew he was hired. Everything has been always pretty clear from the board and the president. So everything was clear. My relationship with Lorne was and is still good. I think I have to just reiterate that he's a good man. The decision is solely made on performance… When we have to make some choice, I think the fact that sometimes we can disagree, I think, in a soccer club is something pretty healthy. I want people who disagree with me around me. I don't want just people to agree on everything I say. That's the only way to go forward.”
“We built a strong support committee, formed by the head coach, the assistant coach, my assistant Babette, and our chief scout, where we basically meet every week talking about the player we want to recruit the way we want to develop the club. No player is signed to this club without the [consent] of all these people. Because that's the way we want to build this club. I never believe a coach or players work for the GM. We all work together for an organization and that's the only way to be to be successful. I work for my head coach as much as he work for the organization.”
Head coaching search
“We didn’t set any timeline.”
“We’re starting the hiring process. We want to take our time to find the best fit, not only on the principle and methodology we want set for this club, but to also make sure we get the best fit in terms of person, in terms of human… We’re not just talking about soccer players and staff members. We’re talking first about a human being.”
“…in the future, we’re going to look at first of all bringing in a tremendous human being, as Lorne is, and I thin that would be the first priority of this club. Obviously, having someone who shares the values, not only on the pitch but off the pitch, of this club and their ambition. And part of it will also be their playing style and identity that we’re going to give to this team, not only in the next couple of months but in a couple of years. Because we want to build something with identity… but we want to build something that when people see our team playing, they’re going to be able to say “that’s the Stars playing” because we have a strong identity on the pitch.”
Coaching staff moving forward
“It’s not new in soccer when you have to part ways with a coach, it’s not only about one individual. Every single person in the organization has to look into the mirror in those moments, reconsider everything, [raise] their standard, be united together…”
“We decided to keep those four [people] in the coaching staff, meaning Mak (Masaki Hemmi), Ella (Masar), Karina (Baez), and Brendan (Saylor), because we truly believe in them… I trust those four [people], and I trust my full roster to get back on track in the next couple of weeks.”
“I think the decision on bringing Mak, Masaki Hemmi, to the interim head coaching position was good for us… we have one of the strongest assistant coaching teams in the country. We have potentially three people, talking about Ella, Mak, and Karina, that could already be head coaching other teams…”
“We already had a hierarchy set with the coaching staff. [Hemmi] was the first assistant coach, and we thought at this moment that he was the one knowing the culture that Lorne and I wanted to set in this team, even if the culture is built by everyone, not only by two [people]. I believe he is deeply trusted by the locker room. That was something for me that was important the moment you make this decision… I think Mak has this ability to lead and to communicate properly with everyone, not only players but staff too.”
“We want [Hemmi] to be the captain of this coaching staff, but we count of the [entire coaching staff] to flip the situation.”
Thoughts on current roster structure
“I truly believe in this roster… We know some of them are young players… [There’s a] balance between use and development of a player to bring this club forward. But that doesn't mean we don't expect performance right away.”
“The only stars here are the name of the club and the four that we have on our flag. I think [we have tremendous] players on this roster, we talk about them, you know them. But I always want to talk about the collective.”
“We are Chicago… we cannot expect any or try to sell any transition year. I believe in this roster. I believe in the people I have in this locker room… We still have 20 more games in this regular season and we want to do something this season.”
“Our aim is to build a club around the team, supported by the players. Not the opposite.”
Future play on the field
“Obviously we aim to have more possession, more control, I think we’re a team who aim to be proactive on the pitch and off the pitch… We work with humans but data never lies and we can also see that, in terms of data, we’re not controlling the games… Sometimes we're basically passive on the pitch. And with the players we brought in, I think we’re able to control more of the game, to control more action, to have more control over pace during the game...”
“We need to get more in front of the box. We need to get more [player] inside the box. We need to get more shots. We have been progressing a bit in xA and xG in the last couple of games, in our opinion not enough.”
Recruitment of future players
“We’re looking first of all at our own market, the American market… [secondly] we’re never looking at any flag on the passport, anything like that when we want to recruit someone. We want to bring people that want to fight for Chicago, fight for this club, and make this club better… We want to reflect the city, and this city is a multicultural city and we have to go forward like that.”
Mentions of Mallory Swanson and other absences
“We know that we had a lot of absences at the beginning of the season. You know the names and obviously it’ll never be an excuse. But at some point we know we also expected more progression from the team on the way to play and the way to control the game and the way to be more proactive on the ball.”
Reports of Lorne Donaldson “losing the locker room”
“Discussing about losing the locker room is always like a sensitive answer to give. I think it’s difficult to say someone loses respect when you have in front of you a good person and a good human. So, in that regard I will answer no [to Lorne losing the locker room]. We know something in this locker room is gong on. I’ve never seen a good atmosphere like that with a team even losing.”
What Now?
Chicago will play their first match under interim head coach Masaki Hemmi on Sunday at 12pm CT.
The club has made it clear that no timeline has been set to find a replacement for Lorne Donaldson. Don’t be surprised if the next several matches are an audition for Hemmi to earn the permanent role as head coach.
I wouldn’t expect much to change when it comes to the team’s play on the field. It’s not easy to implement a new style of play with just a few training sessions under a new coach. Look for some changes though, such as different starters, different rotation players, maybe moments of players progressing the ball in a different way than we saw under Donaldson.
Feuz made it clear that he’s expecting the look of the team to be different on the pitch in the coming weeks, so I wouldn’t expect Hemmi to use the same style as Donaldson, but people can surprise you.
LT’s hopes moving forward
I want to see a head coach come in who can utilize the players to the best of their abilities and not attempt to insert a player into the coaches style of play.
This is a very young roster and at this moment I’d rather see more of the young players see more playing time to further their development. We’ve obviously seen Micayla Johnson utilized often off the bench, but someone like Mana Hayashi shouldn’t be on the bench for a full match (sometimes she’s not even on the match day roster) week in and week out. They signed her to a three year deal for a reason, utilize her.
I also want the club to find a spot for Hannah Anderson in the starting lineup. This is a player who grew tremendously quickly as a starting center back in this league after replacing an injured Sam Staab last season, only to lose her starting spot to Staab once she returned from injury. Why is a young, talented player under a three-year contract sitting on the bench? Find a way to get her into matches, even if it has to be at outside back.
I think the club has finally found something in the midfield with Bea Franklin and Maitane, at least the best combination of players they’ve played there in several years. Their ability to clog the middle of the pitch and stop the momentum of the opponents in the last couple of matches has been impressive. They now need to work more on progressing the ball forward.
Obviously, absences of players like Mallory Swanson or Natalia Kuikka have been felt, and fans can use it as an excuse for why the team is playing so poorly, but the club can’t use that as an excuse. It’s an insult to their own players that were recruited for their talents. Those players now need to prove that they can win matches under a new coach and system by stepping into those roles that have been left (hopefully temporarily) vacant.
The front line of Jameese Joseph, Ally Schlegel, and Ludmila (with Julia Grosso falling into that line at times) was not working out in Donaldson’s style of play. Either it’s time to see how a player in that group does coming off the bench or Hemmi needs to come in and find a way to build connections between those players or the players in the midfield to the players up top.
Overall, I’m just looking to see rotations of players and different combinations of lineups to see who the best players are when it comes to starters and off the bench. The club has struggled late in matches with substitutions that didn’t bring much off the bench in recent matches. A strong bench can help hold a lead or take the lead late in a match, you just have to find the best players for the job, and some of those players may currently be starters.