BRADENTON, Fla. — Alan Koch looked stunned when he was reminded FC Cincinnati has only practiced for one week. There’s a reason for that.
In seven days, the club has had nine training sessions in two states. Currently, there are 31 rostered players competing not only for a spot on the Major League Soccer roster, but to play in Wednesday night’s preseason friendly against the Montreal Impact at IMG Academy.
“We’ve got a lot done in the space of a week,” Koch said. “We’d like to do even more during that week, too. You can tell players are chomping at the bit; Coaches are chomping at the bit. We want to get as much done as quickly as we can. But obviously we have to be realistic and there’s only so much you can take.”
Here are more notes from day four of training at IMG Academy:
Morning session
The team played an 11-on-11 scrimmage for the first time this preseason. Under Koch, FCC normally scrimmages the day before a match.
Regarding the game against Montreal, Koch said two lineups would play one half each.
“There were some very good moments and some difficult movements too, which you should expect,” Koch said of the scrimmage. “We’ll move into the exercise tomorrow now and we’ll try to do as much as we can.”
Koch said the friendly with the Impact isn’t about winning — it’s about playing well and showcasing the ideas the coaching staff have tried implementing.
Additionally, left back Greg Garza had a limited training session and practiced passing and working with teammates during the session. Wednesday marked the most involvement he’s had on the field to date.
“He’s not that far away, which is great,” Koch said of Garza. “It was a minor injury. With him being a very important part of our team, we’re being very conservative. We anticipate having him back very, very quickly. Hopefully, we can get him some playing time maybe next week.”
Afternoon session
Similar to Monday the second session was a lighter one.
Players split into two groups and worked on a few drills and set pieces.
“We broke up into two groups in preparation for the game tomorrow,” Koch said. “We already know the two groups are going to play 45 minutes each, so we just wanted to develop a little more of an intimate environment by making a smaller group in the second session. But you could see the guys were excited before playing the game tomorrow.”
The afternoon session was the first time the team has practiced set pieces during the 2019 preseason.
“Just a little bit of a taste,” Koch said about them. “We probably did more than we needed to, but it’s just giving them a base going into the game tomorrow.”
