After an excitingly futile 2009 season, the dire need for change within the Red Bulls front office has been clear to anyone following the team. Still, despite the rapid speed with which information (including the apparently petty opinions and desires of New York's soccer fans) travels, the team's overlords in Austria took a long time to shake things up.  This can be chalked up to patience, incompetence, ignorance, or any other number of adjectives I am far too lazy to list. Regardless of why, Red Bull took months to replace former coach Juan Carlos Osorio and hire a new GM, but since they finally got around to making these changes I can't complain too much.

Solér, our shiny new Norwegian general manager, has the exciting task of building up the coaching staff and front office as he sees fit, as well as learning the obscure and often arbitrary rules that accompany roster building and player acquisition within MLS. Solér is an ex-player, agent, and commentator. He was on the board of Norway's IK Start from 2002-08 so he does has some experience running teams.  He seems to be pretty intelligent and realistic about the team, and although he has only been here shortly he hasn't done a terrible job of building up the coaching staff, which includes:

Hans Backe
Foreign coaches have not been extremely successful in MLS, and the fact that Sweden's Backe is working with a European GM is another strike against him. Still, Backe is experienced, having coached successfully for years in Scandanavia and a stint under the high profile (although his talent is debatable) Sven Goran Eriksson. Still, like Solér, Backe has coached in leagues with fairly similar budgets and levels of play to the American League, and he has seen some success. Both Backe and Solér will be easier to judge when they start making significant player acquisitions and as the preseason continues.

Familiar Faces
Two of the main reasons this post hasn't been a near suicidal tirade against the new staff members is because of two old ones: Richie Williams and Des McAleenan have both been retained. Richie stays on as an assistant coach, while McAleenan, who has been Metro's goalkeeper coach for years, appears to have received a more prominent role in the coaching staff. Having two experienced coaches who are both familiar with MLS and the team itself will be extremely important in maintaining continuity and easing Backe and Solér into the league.

Rounding out the Crew
The tri-state area's least favorite soccer management member after the departing of Juan Carlo Osorio, Jeff Agoos is sadly still working for Red Bull. Still, the Goose has been demoted to head of scouting, where I am hopeful his ability to destroy this team from the inside will be significantly reduced. Another hot rumor on the interwebs has Swedish coach Goran Aral joining the team as an assistant. Since this has yet to be officially confirmed and I know little about Aral, I wont comment on the signing. Except for that sentence that just stated I wouldn't comment on it. And the last one which clarified the extent to which I would comment on his signing. You get the point.

The team is currently on preseason in La Manga, Spain.  Red Bulls tied CSKA Moscow 1-1, will play Poland's Lech Poznan on Wednesday and finish up with a friendly against Norway's Stromsgodset on February 1. Due to slight budgetary limitations, I am not in Spain.  Redbullsreader.com, the teams official blog, is the only outlet reporting directly from Spain, but expect further highlights and opinions from the Daily Harrison.

Dave Braneck is a blogger and an all around soccer fan who represents North Jersey to the fullest and contributes to Dailyharrison.com

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