BURSTExpansion San Diego FC took UC Santa Barbara midfielder Manu Duah with the first pick in Friday’s MLS SuperDraft.
The six-foot-four freshman from Ghana started 14 games for the Gauchos. Duah also played for the Santa Barbara Soccer Club, helping it reach the MLS Next Cup playoffs in the under-19 age group.
“First and foremost Manu hits the key profile of the club,” said San Diego coach Mikey Varas “He’s a high-talent, young player with amazing character and values.”
Saint Louis University defender Max Floriani went second to the San Jose Earthquakes with Wisconsin freshman forward Dean Boltz going third to the Chicago Fire.
Duah and Boltz, both underclassmen, signed Generation Adidas contracts with the league ahead of the draft while Floriani signed a contract as a senior.
CF Montreal took Nigerian midfielder Michael Adedokun with the 13th overall pick. The five-foot-eight 160-pounder led Ohio State with eight goals and 11 assists in the regular season and was named Big Ten Midfielder of the Year, also earning All-Big Ten first team honours.
The Vancouver Whitecaps used the 15th overall pick on North Carolina freshman defender Tate Johnson, another Generation Adidas player. As such his contract won’t count against the Whitecaps salary cap.
Johnson started 16 games, playing the full 90 minutes in 13 of them. His father, Brian, played five seasons in MLS, which included winning the MLS Cup in 2000 with the Kansas City Wizards alongside current Sporting Kansas City coach Peter Vermes.
Fresh off an NCAA championship with the University of Vermont on Monday, Calgary winger Sydney Wathuta went 16th overall to the Colorado Rapids. Wathuta was named America East Midfielder of the Year after registering 14 assists, second most in NCAA Division 1.
With club academies playing a bigger role in roster building, the three-round draft has become less of a factor in recent years.
The Philadelphia Union demonstrated that earlier this month when it sent all of its draft picks for the next three years — eight selections in all — to the Colorado Rapids for up to US$600,000 in general allocation money.
New England and Nashville SC traded away the fifth overall and sixth overall picks, respectively.
Toronto FC, which landed Trinidad and Tobago wingback Tyrese Spicer with the first overall pick last December, traded away this year’s first-round pick (ninth overall) to San Diego in the deal that netted TFC Brazilian winger Thiago Andrade.
Toronto general manager Jason Hernandez said the ninth overall pick “wasn’t something that was incredibly relevant for us with our understanding of the player pool this year.”
