The LA Galaxy will look a little different when the club begins their preseason preparations this week.
When LA returns to training, they’ll be without mainstays like Landon Donovan and Marcelo Sarvas, but defender Omar Gonzalez believes the club is still primed to make another run at the MLS Cup.
The Galaxy lost the retiring Donovan, who was their longest tenured player and Sarvas, who proved to be the heartbeat of the team’s midfield during their run to an unprecedented fifth title, and was dealt to the Colorado Rapids last week. Both players enjoyed stellar seasons in 2014 as Donovan led MLS in assists with 19 while Sarvas tallied five goals and 13 assists throughout regular season and postseason play.
Gonzalez is bullish however saying that while the Galaxy will certainly miss the pair, they’ll be fine heading into the 2015 campaign.
“These changes will impact us, but I think that we have the core group in place that we’ve had for many years and with that, we can withstand these losses,” Gonzalez told a group of reporters assembled for the league’s media marketing tour in Manhattan Beach just a short bike ride away from the Galaxy defender’s home. “We’re confident in our ability and in the players that are still with us. We’re confident that we can still get there, get wins and still make a deep run in the postseason.
“We’re going to have new faces in the middle and guys in new positions with a lot more pressure on them because they’re going to be the main guys now,” he added. “I think that the guys are ready for that because they’re ready to be starters and they’ve been itching for that opportunity. It’s good to give them that chance now and see what they can do now. The good thing is that we’re not a team that’s just about a Marcelo or a Landon. We’re a team that plays as a group from top to bottom.”
One way that Gonzalez believes that the Galaxy can overcome the roster turnover is with a fast start to the season, which is something that has eluded the team in recent years. Since their Supporters’ Shield winning 2011 campaign, slow starts have become a nasty habit for LA who have found themselves adrift in the Western Conference standings in the early months before picking up the pace in summer.
This year, however, the roster turnover and the arrival of new Designated Player Steven Gerrard from Liverpool in July has put the onus on the Galaxy to start strong once the season begins in March.
“We have to hit the ground running before [Gerrard] gets here so that he has a smooth transition and we’re firing on all cylinders. When he comes, we want to him to assimilate quickly. He’s a guy that none of us have to worry about with how he’s going to come in. He’s true class,” said Gonzalez. “We still have a few months to go, take care of our preseason with the guys that we have here and start the season off right. Last year, we could have won the supporters’ shield if we started the season off well. You think that because it’s the beginning of the season, the games may not matter, but it could make the difference.”
In order to start strong, Gonzalez decided to skip the U.S. national team’s annual January camp in order to undergo proactive knee maintenance to assure that he was fit for the start of preseason. Although it was a shock to many that the World Cup veteran and USMNT regular was not included in the camp considering the fact the team will participate in the CONCACAF Gold Cup this summer, Gonzalez says that U.S. head coach Jurgen Klinsmann was understanding of his center back’s desire to focus on the Galaxy.
“I talked to Jurgen about missing this January camp to give my body a rest and make sure that I’m ready for the season,” said Gonzalez. “My job isn’t thinking about the pecking order, my job is to realize that I missed this January camp to take care of myself, get a good preseason in and look to start the season off well and focus on being there for the Galaxy. If I’m doing that then I’m sure that I’ll get a call-up for the Gold Cup, which is one of my goals this year.
“He was very understanding. He has always said that he wants guys playing 10 to 11 months out of the year and if you look back at last year, I went to the January camp, got back from the World Cup and got thrown back into league play and ended up playing till Dec. 7,” continued Gonzalez. “If you think about it I had a pretty long season and my longest season yet. Your body can take a beating playing that much and he was very understanding of that fact.”
The defender is also mindful of the fact that only a consistent performance in 2015 will see the Galaxy’s objectives met.
“You can have a fast start and fall short or start slow and finish strong like we have in recent years. I think the key thing is to just be consistent,” said Gonzalez. “We need to work out the kinks in the beginning and we recognize that because you don’t want to go into the middle of the year and still have the same problems. We want to be consistent from game one to the end of the season.”
Adam Serrano is the LA Galaxy Insider. Read his blog at LAGalaxy.com/insider and contact him at LAGalaxyInsider@Gmail.com.