Who’s Deian Boldor and how can he help the Montreal Impact

Announced by Adam Brazz Tuesday and officialized Thursday, r is coming to Montreal on loan from Bologna FC. The young 21-year-old central defender played last season with Verona in Serie B, in Italy, with whom he played 9 games and scored 1 goal. Even if he wasn’t participating in every game, Verona won the Serie B and was promoted to Serie A. Deian also played 9 games and scored 1 goal with the Romania U-21 national team. Furthermore, he was developed in AS Roma’s youth clubs from 2011 to 2014.

So, Boldor is a tall and powerful player (1,89m), he’s very good in aerial duels and he’s left footed. He’s the only central defender who is left footed in Montreal, as Ciman, Fisher, Cabrera, Lefevre, and Camara are right footed. So, on paper at least, Boldor would be the perfect fit with Laurent Ciman. Deian could take care of aerial duels and cover Ciman when he tries to intercept passes or when he commits himself in technical duels.

With this being said, there’s a question everyone is asking: what will happen to Kyle Fisher? Since 2015, the Impact tried to find the best CB duo. Ciman-Cabrera duo, which was the most used, is ok but suffers from the fact that Cabrera and Ciman are the same types of player. They like to intercept and to slide into tackles. This causes a lot of problems, especially when Cabrera has weaker games. Also, they’re not strong enough in the air. We perfectly saw the limitations of this duo in 2016’s playoff against Toronto. This year, the Impact tried to associate Ciman with Camara and it didn’t work either. Since the last 13 matches, Fisher and Ciman duo worked really well. In fact, it’s clear that the two players complete each other perfectly and that they developed an excellent synergy.

That’s why, for me, I don’t think Boldor will take Fisher’s place. He’ll take Cabrera’s. He will become the one who will be pushing Fisher to work always harder to keep his place. Cabrera isn’t doing it. With Boldor coming, I think it is time to trade Victor Cabrera. He’s highly paid with 260K$ and cost an international spot. He hasn’t been able to prove that Montreal should absolutely keep him. So, he’ll be traded during this season or the next one, because the Impact can’t afford to *waste* 2 international spots on the bench.

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Talking about the bench, Boldor will get his chance this year to show what he got. With international call-ups and the fact that we need to rest Fisher and Ciman (they can’t play every single game until the end of the year), Boldor will get some play time and we’ll see if he’s able to get before Fisher in Mauro Biello’s hierarchy.

In conclusion, Boldor has the potential to be a regular central defender in MLS, but, this year at least, his job will be to push Fisher to be even better than he is right now. For me, It is a good move by Adam Brazz and his team.