Since Chris Cummins took over as Toronto FC's interim head coach back in April, it was widely assumed that his future in the position would be entirely dependent on whether or not the Reds made the MLS Cup Playoffs. As it turned out, Cummins was planning on leaving Toronto even if TFC hadn't just made the playoffs, but had won the MLS Cup itself.
The club announced on Tuesday that Cummins' contract would not be renewed for the 2010 season, a decision made due to the former coach's desire to move back to his native United Kingdom to be closer to his wife and five children.
"I hope my wife and children will still have me," Cummins joked. "I'll go back and learn from the experience.
"It's nice for the first couple of weeks to get a bit of peace and quiet, but it's difficult. I don't like my own company, and I always like my wife around or to go over to my mum's for a cup of tea. I spent five months on my own and it was tough. ... Until you actually do it you never know. What I've learned is that I'm not the kind of man who can go all over the country working and just see the wife every now and then. I have to be near my family. The hardest thing is probably when you lose games and you need somebody to talk to, even if it's nothing about football."
Cummins' family visited at various time throughout the season and at one point, they looked into finding Canadian work visas for his two eldest sons. But when those plans fell through, a straightforward decision for Cummins was made even easier.
"I can't be in another part of the world without my family," Cummins said. "No job is worth losing your family over."
The 38-year-old native of Watford, England was named the third head coach in TFC's short history when he was elevated to the position in the wake of John Carver's surprising departure last April. Cummins and fellow assistant coach Nick Dasovic co-managed the team to a 1-0 win over Kansas City on April 26, and Cummins was given the top job three days later.
When Carver left, Cummins questioned whether or not he should return to his home country right then, but decided that he "owed it" to TFC to take on the responsibility of running the club.
"I was asked to come in and do a job and I feel I've done it to the best of my abilities," Cummins said.
Striker Chad Barrett was one of several Toronto players who said he was sorry to see Cummins leave.
"His family has been in the UK all year, he's had a tough year here and it was hard filling in for John Carver right away," Barrett said. "He took that in stride, he did what he could with it, and I think we kind of failed him a bit. We could've helped him out a lot more. I wish him the best, he's done a lot for the club as an assistant coach and a head coach and he's going to go on to do good things."
TFC manager and director of soccer Mo Johnston said he offered Cummins a job on the 2010 coaching staff, albeit not as the head coach, and said that Cummins helped the club avoid what could have been a difficult situation when Carver abruptly resigned.
"When JC left, it left a bit of a hole," Johnston said. "We felt our preseason was very good, and then we didn't want to go outside [the organization] because there weren't many candidates. We hired Chris and moved on from there. Under the circumstances, he did a hell of a job.
"We'd have loved to have kept Chris on an assistant coach but he wants to be closer to his family. We respect that. He's done a hell of a job. It's just unfortunate we didn't get to the playoffs."
Cummins finished with an 8-9-7 record with Toronto in MLS play, as the Reds came painfully close to reaching the postseason for the first time in club history. A 5-0 thrashing at the hands of last-place New York last Saturday ended TFC's playoff dreams and left the club just a point shy of the eighth and final postseason spot.
"I wouldn't have stayed even if we'd have made the playoffs, but I wanted to make the playoffs so desperately because I didn't want to go away feeling like a failure, as such," Cummins said. "Don't get me wrong, we got the first trophy in the club's history, but I still feel as if I've failed since we didn't make the playoffs. I wanted to walk away developing the club, putting things in place."
As Cummins noted, his tenure did result in TFC's first piece of silverware, the 2009 Nutrilite Canadian Championship. The victory was capped off by a stunning 6-1 win over Montreal on June 18, in a match that the Reds had to win by at least four goals in order to claim the title. The title earned Toronto the right to represent Canada in the CONCACAF Champions League, where the Reds were defeated in the preliminary round by the Puerto Rico Islanders.
Johnston said that the search to find TFC's fourth coach is already on, though he said that he may wait "until the dust is settled" in regards to the MLS Cup Playoffs. It's possible that Johnston could have his eye on one or two of the managers still alive in the postseason tournament -- the Reds boss said that the next coach will have to have MLS coaching experience and spoke briefly about the difficulties of getting permission from some other club presidents to talk to under-contract coaches.
While Johnston was expectedly mum about his hiring plans, he did confirm two things about next year's coaching staff. Johnston said that he would not be returning to the TFC sidelines himself, and that he wanted to retain the current coaching staff (assistants Dasovic and Danny Dichio, goalkeepers coach Mike Toshack and strength and conditioning coach Paul Winsper) to work under the new head man.
"He has to [inherit the coaches]," Johnston said. "Some young coaches don't get coaching again which we think is wrong. We believe in developing which is why we wanted to keep Chris on. We want to develop and move forward in the next five or 10 years, with or without me. When you have younger coaches, you don't just discard them."
Cummins wholeheartedly agreed with the decision to keep the assistant coaches, calling them "a great group of people." As for himself, he said he had no other jobs lined up in England, and his only order of business upon returning home was to take his wife on a vacation. After that bit of respite, Cummins said he would look to continue his coaching career with a domestic side.
"I'll phone up a few clubs to ask if they don't mind if I come in and have a look at what they're doing," Cummins said. "I'm aware and it's difficult to get jobs in football and don't get me wrong, I'd like to stay around and carry on coaching next year but I need to be back with my wife."
Mark Polishuk is a contributor to MLSnet.com.
