United States Under-20 national team manager Tab Ramos, longtime FC Dallas assistant Marco Ferruzzi and FCD academy director Luchi Gonzalez are among the candidates Dallas are considering to replace former head coach Oscar Pareja, sources have told MLSsoccer.com.
Pareja left FC Dallas after five seasons at the helm last Monday, reportedly to take over at Liga MX's Club Tijuana. Doug McIntyre of Yahoo Sports reported last week that he heard "rumblings" that Ramos was on Dallas' radar to replace Pareja.
Ramos, 52, has managed the US U-20s since October 2011 and has been U.S. Soccer youth technical director since November 2013. The former MLS and USMNT midfielder led the US to its second consecutive Concacaf U-20 Championship title last week. The team will compete at the FIFA U-20 World Cup in Poland next summer.
Ramos has frequently been linked to MLS head coaching vacancies over the years, and he reportedly drew interest from FCD before the club hired Pareja away from the Colorado Rapids following the 2013 season. He's achieved mostly good results with the U-20s, reaching the quarterfinals of the World Cup in 2015 and 2017 after failing to get out of the group stage in the 2013 tournament.
A former MLS, USL and A-League midfielder, Ferruzzi has been an assistant with FCD since 2004. The 48-year-old had a brief stint as interim head coach in 2008, coached the club's reserve team in the defunct MLS Reserve League and has, at various times during his tenure, been responsible for running first-team training sessions, evaluating prospective signings and scouting youth and college players.
Gonzalez, 38, joined the FCD academy coaching staff in April 2012 and was promoted to academy director in October 2015. The club has won four U.S. Soccer Development Academy national championships since Gonzalez was hired, with the former San Jose Earthquakes attacker personally coaching the U-16s to back-to-back titles in 2015 and 2016.
