Steve Cherundolo is finally coming home.
After nearly a quarter of a century playing and coaching in Germany, the US men’s national team great is returning to the United States for the next chapter in his career. The San Diego native joined LAFC’s technical staff to steer their newest development initiative, an intriguing affiliate partnership with USL Championship club Las Vegas Lights FC that was announced on Friday.
“It’s going to be a great adventure,” Cherundolo told MLSsoccer.com earlier this month as he and his family prepared for their trans-Atlantic move – a move long in the making.
“It's always been a goal of mine to come play in the United States,” he explained. “I was hoping to finish my career there, but due to injuries I got cut a little short. So then it seems only natural to me to make that move as a coach as well.”
The Lights have cultivated a more-than-respectable fanbase on a shoestring budget over the past three years, ranking fifth in their league in attendance in 2019 and drawing international headlines for llama mascots, halftime helicopter cash drops and various other promotions to catch Sin City’s attention.
Alas, like countless clubs around the globe, LVLFC have felt the bite of the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic consequences, and through four head coaches in three seasons still have not qualified for the USL Championship playoffs. So it makes sense for LAFC to give them a hand with on-field matters, considering that the 2019 Supporters’ Shield winners are building out their player pathway and can use a proving ground for the crops of homegrowns and developmental projects they’re beginning to stack up.
“I particularly am not too concerned where I'm coaching. To me, it's all about the project at hand,” said Cherundolo, “and putting myself in a situation where I can continue to learn things. And I think there's some things that I can certainly learn from in this, LAFC and Las Vegas as well.
“The way LAFC plays, it’s an attractive possession-based, successful way of going about playing the game, so it's very easy to fall in line there, and it goes along with a lot of things that I believe as well,” he added. “There are challenges there to get everybody on the same page, but this is something we'll work through. This is nothing more than sitting down at the table and discussing training sessions, discussing players’ attributes and how we can move them forward and get them ready to play for the MLS team.”
A relentlessly consistent right back over his 16-year professional career, Cherundolo played for LAFC boss Bob Bradley during his 2006-11 USMNT tenure, is a longtime acquaintance of executive VP of soccer operations John Thorrington and visited the club a couple of years ago to observe their practices and ideas.
Steve Cherundolo captaining Hannover 96 during his playing days | Getty Images
Cherundolo hasn’t yet held a first-team head coaching position, a fact that may have worked against him this winter when he was linked to the D.C. United and Toronto FC vacancies. Still, he’s probably more of a catch for the Black & Gold than you think.
“I've got to say I like the Americans and the way they rise to challenges, and that's what Steven did here,” said Martin Kind, at the time the president of Hannover 96, when Cherundolo called time on his playing career in 2014 due to a persistent knee injury. “It's quite extraordinary that one player spends so long with just one club, and always identifies with them."
“Dolo” made a whopping 423 appearances for Die Roten, the most any American abroad has ever logged for one club. That loyalty and longevity famously earned him the club captaincy and honorific title of “Mayor of Hannover.” He later worked his way up their coaching ladder from Under-15s to first-team assistant before joining Tayfun Korkut’s staff at Stuttgart in 2018.
Cherundolo worked a brief stint on the USMNT staff during Dave Sarachan’s transitional caretaker phase between Bruce Arena and Gregg Berhalter, then most recently served at the German federation as an assistant with their Under-15 boys national team. He’s completed the rigorous education process required to earn a UEFA Pro license, as well as the DFB’s Fußball-Lehrer (“soccer teacher”) certification. Media coverage out of Hannover has reflected some disappointment that leadership at his old club couldn’t agree on a coaching role for Cherundolo to keep him from pulling up stakes for North America.
He’ll have familiar and like-minded figures to work with at LAFC, where an aggressive, high-octane style has distinguished the young club from the MLS pack and prompted something of an artisanal approach to their fledgling academy. The Black & Gold signed their first-ever homegrown players in July, and the task of preparing such rising prospects to execute those concepts consistently at the professional level meshes well with Cherundolo’s journey to date.
“The idea in developmental soccer or academy soccer is to push as many players and get as many players as we can through to the first team. There really is no other way to do it,” he said. “Quality before quantity, in my opinion, is completely the right way to do it. Spend the time. Players need time, they need one-on-one coaching with coaches who know what the players need to get to the next level.
“It just can't be just trying to win games – it needs to be principle-based according to age and ability, and that bar needs to be moved forward continuously, up until they are ready for the [first] team.”
You can count him as a believer in Bradley’s uncompromising philosophy.
“As a coach, it's very important to have your own style and stick to it. I think the more time you spend with your own philosophy, with your own way of doing things, the better you will be at implementing it in the game,” said Cherundolo. “And when you spend time in the training field reacting or creating a match plan that would maybe mirror an opponent, you give your players less chance to feel comfortable and to learn their own system.”
Though the full logistics have not yet been announced, Cherundolo and his players are expected to train alongside their LAFC peers at the club’s downtown Los Angeles training ground. Then, like the legions of Californians who’ve sped across the Mojave Desert for freewheeling weekend escapes since Sinatra first hit The Strip, they’ll hop over to play matches at Cashman Field – a Vegas residency of sorts, a weekly party that’s hopefully a win-win for all parties.
“It's a fantastic staff,” said Cherundolo. “I’m really excited about the conversations, and getting details of how they work and picking the brains but also sharing some lessons that I've learned here in Germany as well. And to apply that to the Vegas Lights group as well. It's an exciting project, it's an exciting city.
“It could be quite a ride.”
