Tall order
The post-Wilfried Nancy era crashes on Columbus
On June 1, 2024, the Columbus Crew lost to Pachuca 3-0 in the CONCACAF Champions Cup final. There was an asterisk attached: The visitors from America's heartland were food-poisoned, probably on purpose, presumably by kitchen workers at their Pachuca hotel. Montezuma's revenge has rarely been so violent. A dearth of toilet facilities in the visitors' locker room at Estadio Hidalgo had Crew players and coaches painting the floors of the place, not to mention the sidelines, with their disgorgement.
Yet, by the time the Crew landed back in Columbus a day later, they bestrode the continent.
In earlier rounds of the Champions Cup, they'd cut down Liga MX giants Tigres UNAL and Monterrey. Their 3-1 victory in the second leg of their semifinal against Monterrey – in Guadalupe – was one of the more resounding statements ever rendered by an MLS team on Mexican soil.
At the time, the Crew were the reigning MLS Cup champions. The Leagues Cup tournament – which they would win – was just ahead. They were No. 1 in the CONCACAF Club Rankings.
Their star was a technically brilliant, all-around attacker, Cucho Hernandez. Their central midfielders were Darlington Nagbe, perhaps the best No. 6 in league history, and young Aidan Morris, who contrasted the un-press-able Nagbe with his irrrepressable ball hawking.
Their architect was president/general manager Tim Bezbatchenko, who had three MLS Cups with two different teams by the age of 42.
Their coach was Wilfried Nancy, whose intricate brand of possession-based, offense-first soccer was rare, if not unique, the world over.
They're all gone now.
"All Together Now" was the wrong slogan for 2024
In the summer of 2024, Bezbatchenko took a job with Black Knight Football Club; he oversees a portfolio of teams, including Bournemouth of the EPL. Morris was sold to Middlesbrough of the English second division.
In February, Cucho was sold to Real Betis of Spain's La Liga.
Earlier this month, Nabe retired at the age of 35.
Earlier this week, it was revealed that negotiations between Celtic FC of the Scottish Premiership and Nancy had reached an advanced stage. Nancy is expected to take the reins of the Glasgow powerhouse any day now.
(It's also worth noting the departure of the Crew's scouting/recruitment director Neil McGuinness, who left to become Technical Director for LAFC in May, 2024).
How are Crew fans feeling? Here's one of the tamer views:
Very disheartened when I think about how Nancy talked big about his "one team" philosophy and remaking #Crew96 in his vision, only to bail at the first opportunity.
— Darby (@tokenliberal.bsky.social) 2025-11-24T19:27:32.844Z
The Crew lost a tightly contested, first-round playoff series to the New York Red Bulls (2024) and to archrival FC Cincinnati (2025). Among the reasons for the shrinkage in their margin for error was the attrition of their elite talent. To use an overgeneralization, it's tough to win high-stakes games without Cucho.
The loss of Nancy is more impactful. He ushered in a golden era that turned out to be all too brief. He was at the foundation of everything – from the system that was installed throughout the club's echelons (academy, Crew 2, first team) to the winning culture that was fostered to the attractiveness of Columbus as a hub of recruitment for a certain player profile to, of course, his genius for motivating, game planning and on-field directing.
Michael Arace
Crew GM Issa Tall has had fewer than 10 days to ponder Nancy's loss and think about a replacement. I'll toss one name out there: Laurent Cortois, the former Crew 2 coach who was relieved of his head-coaching duties in Montreal in March. In my rare, brief encounters with Cortois, a Nancy acolyte, I was impressed by the man. For whatever that's worth.
The big question now is, what will endure?
How much of what has been built in Columbus is attributable to Bezbatchenko, to Nancy? To Cucho? To Nagbe?
Tall is coming off a roller-coaster of a season as a rookie GM. That said, he is not exactly bereft. He was Bezbatchenko's right hand at the league's front office and in Toronto and Columbus. He has had a hand in significant recruiting efforts, including the poaching of Nancy from Montreal and the sales jobs on Lucas Zelarayan, Cucho and Diego Rossi. He has some international stature through his work with FIFA.
I really like the guy. For whatever that's worth.
What now, Mr. Tall?
Six Tall questions (but we'll have to get to the coach later)
The Crew accrued 54 points and finished in seventh place in a hotly contested Eastern Conference. It was an up-and-down season, at times challenging due to injuries, at other times lack of inspiration. It ended in a disappointing fashion.
Tuesday morning (way too early) the Crew had a press conference to introduce their newest stadium-name rights-holder, ScottsMiracle Gro, the non-dispensary grass specialists from Marysville. Tall was there, off to the back, calling no attention to himself. As soon as the presser concluded, he vanished like Colonel Flagg. (Who out there is old enough to remember M*A*S*H? If you want to feel even older: The actor who played the neurotic CIA agent left us in 2001.)
On Nov. 14, I had a 22-minute one-on-one with Tall. At the time, the Nancy-to-Celtic rumors were flying, but not at warp speed. Tall wasn't going there. We talked about his roster plans. Here are some excerpts:
Q: When you look at your roster, what do you see and what do you want to bolster?
IT: I see a good core of players who've been here and been successful here. If you look at them individually and compare them to their peers across the league, I think they're some of the top players at their respective positions.
That being said, obviously we've just lost our captain, the best to have ever done it at that position. And secondly, we need to bring some competition to our roster. I think there are some positions where players are not that challenged, where we need to bring some competition. It's not easy in this salary-cap world, especially after the success we've had. You're bound to have paid (more) for contracts for players that deserve it.
Q: Do you feel like there was a missing piece this year?
IT: The missing piece was injured. (Striker Wessam Abou Ali, a DP striker for whom the Crew paid a $7.4 million transfer fee to acquire from Egypt's Al Ahly in August, suffered a hairline fracture in his right ankle Sept. 20, his fifth game with the Crew.)
You hate to say 'if, if, if,' but what if Wessam had played at the end of the season and in the playoffs? What would the results have been? How far would we have gone with him?
Now, is there a missing piece? Yeah. I think in terms of the profile in the middle, we need something different because we believe that – as much as they are different players – Darlington, Dylan (Chambost) and Taha (Habroune), Amar Sedic, or even Sean (Zawadzki) if he was to play there – are kind of similar players. We need someone to cover ground and be aggressive.
(Like Aidan Morris – that's me talking. Now, back to Tall ...)
Up top, we only had very few games of the guys (Abou Ali, Rossi and Daniel Gazdag/Taha Habroune) playing together. But definitely, if we can bring quality up top, that's something we'll be doing.
Q: What happened with Gazdag this year? A lot of fans look at that and say, "That acquisition could be a very expensive mistake."
IT: Look, I'm going to take it back to the time of his signing and the context of it. Looking at a player like Daniel Gazdag, it was a no-brainer for us. Based on what I was told, the excitement was also shared across the league, and (among) fans and all of those things.
So, it's a head-scratching season for all of us. If we had to do it again, we'd do it again. I cannot predict the future where Daniel can have a 20-goal season next year because now he has adapted to the system. ... It is a challenging system to learn and, to be honest, that's why I feel for him. If he was not a good person, you would be upset at him. But given who he is, you feel for him because he's the first one touched by this.
Look, Wilfried tried. He played him at multiple positions and sometimes there was a disconnect between what he was able to do in training and what he was able to do in a game, so time will tell.
Q: Were you missing somebody to drag the team into the fight, like Cucho and Aidan Morris did?
IT: You're right. Cucho and Aidan had that X factor. They had something where they were fighters. They had spirit, or personality.
Wilfried often used the (term), 'We lacked personality' this year. Especially in our stretch in August and September. One thing for sure is that Aidan and Cucho had that – and I can tell you that Wessam has that. But can we also bring more players that have that?
Q: How radically different will the roster be, come January-February?
I think we'll see a lot of guys returning from this year, but I also hope the we can bring in three or four new faces that we hope can contribute to our team.
Q: I assume you have your targets. How confident are you that you can hit some of them this winter?
Confident, because it's something we've worked for a few months now, with the right process in place, with the diligent process in place, and the hope of bringing in three or four players. And these players can come from different avenues, meaning MLS trades and MLS free agency, but also internationally. Yeah, we believe we'll be able to bring these players in.
Thanks for reading. If you're enjoying what you see and you are of a mind, click on the link below and leave a tip. If you've yet to subscribe, consider making a small hop over a paywall. It'll help keep local, independent media disrespected. Have a nice day.
Michael Arace
