NEW YORK -- MLS Commissioner Don Garber reiterated the league’s intent to continue pursuing top American players in Friday, telling the Associated Press Sports Editors on Friday that USMNT players represent an important driver of the league’s growth and improvement.
"We will do whatever we need to do to ensure that we have the best possible American players here, because we have to be a league of choice for everyone that cares about the game – that is players and fans," Garber said.
Over the past year or so, MLS clubs have signed many top US internationals, including Seattle Sounders’ Clint Dempsey, New England Revolution’s Jermaine Jones, and Toronto FC’s Michael Bradley and Jozy Altidore.
Some of these moves have led US national team coach Jurgen Klinsmann to suggest that USMNT players would be better served playing at top European clubs, a view that sparked a strong reaction from Garber last fall. On Friday, Garber stated that the difference of opinion on certain topics comes down to different objectives for the league and for the national team coach.
"My job is to do everything that I can to grow Major League Soccer and to ensure that MLS is going to be a driver of the growth of soccer at the highest level in the U.S.,” he continued. “It's not a short-term goal. It's a long-term objective. And I do believe our national team coach has a short-term objective. That's what he's hired to do. That doesn't mean next week, but it's to win the Gold Cup, it's to have the best possible team in 2018.
“And our goals and objectives are broader than that, and that's why we agree on some things but don't agree on others."
Some observers have claimed that there is more pressure on players in the top European leagues, such as the English Premier League and the German Bundesliga. Garber, however, rejected that notion on Friday, particularly for American players who are struggling to get regular playing time overseas.
"I just don't accept that a guy who's not playing full time and is sitting on the bench and struggling to make the first team is going to become a better player than being the star of an MLS (team) and having to read about himself in the Toronto Sun and having his owner and his coach beating him up every day because he's got to deliver," Garber said.
