Down the Line to the 2018 Season: Fans Starting 11

Over the past few weeks we’ve been conducting polls to get the opinion of fans on whom they believed would make the starting 11. The results revealed some interesting statistics about what fans see as the recipe to success. The formation stills remains to be discovered and historically Garde does prefer a 4-3-3 formation, but this may not necessarily suit the current Impact roster (the lineup for this article is based off of what works best with the votes tallied).

First off, for the goalkeepers, Crépeau actually beat out Bush as the starter by 3%. Although fans won’t necessarily get their wish of Crépeau being the starter, since he has been loaned to Ottawa, Bush still seems to have the confidence of a good majority of fans. Evan Bush was a dominant goalkeeper a few season ago and the worry at the end of last season was that he no longer was of MLS caliber. It will be interesting to see if Joël Bats can recreate the Evan Bush who won best goalkeeper of the tournament in the CONCACAF Champions League.

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Secondly, for the defensive line the debate is mostly for the centerbacks. Diallo made his entrance after the poll so it is safe to assume that he takes one starter role by default. Fisher was preferred by 6% of fans as a starter over Cabrera, but given his surgery and recovery time fans will need to settle for Cabrera.

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Thirdly, the midfielders have a gap that leaves fans with a lot of questions. While the left-wing has a definitive starter in Piatti and interesting depth with players like Choinière. The right-wing does not currently have a definitive starter. A lot of fans saw Ballou filling this gap in the upcoming season, but with his departure to Europe the Impact will need to consider other options. Based on the votes provided by Impact fans the player they would like to see in the starting 11 is Raheem Edwards. While Edwards is a versatile player, he has mostly played on the left side; it will be interesting to see if he is tried on the right side. His Canadian teammate, Michael Petrasso, could also be a viable option but fans have no seen his quality as of just yet.

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In continuation, the forwards will be another interesting battle this season between Jackson and Mancosu. Fans although, do not seem on the fence about who they see as their starter. At least 81.5% of fans voted for Jackson to be a starter while only 58.5% of fans saw Mancosu being a starter. Jackson showed most of his success as a substitute last season, but hopefully if he is given the chance this season he can get that level of success as a starter.

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Finally, with all this being said the Impact line up would look something like this:

With the bench looking something like the following:

Diop, Lovitz, Donadel/Béland-Goyette, Choinière/Oduro, Petrasso, Salazar, Mancosu.