Caleb Porter’s intellect, his possession-oriented style of play and perhaps most interestingly, the patience the club expects from its fans, were some of the themes expressed by the owner and president Merritt Paulson, general manager and interim coach Gavin Wilkinson and midfielder Darlington Nagbe. Several key quotes are excerpted below.

Gavin Wilkinson:
“I know that he wants to play… he wants to dominate possession, he wants to play in a similar way to how we’re playing right now. He wants to keep the ball, wants to move the ball, create chances pretty much at will, and play dominating soccer.”

“No [Porter did not have any input into the way we're playing now.]”

“Caleb playing the way he wants to play—with the personnel that interests him—will be very effective.”

“He’s an intellectual individual and analyzes the game… he lives and breathes the game which is a big positive. For me, it was very easy to communicate with him about the team, about individual players. We agreed on a couple of things, and disagreed, and the disagreements were very healthy.”

“He approaches the game in the same way that the organization wants to see the game played. He gives us everything we need in that category.”

“Caleb was honest in his assessment [of his time as US U23 coach], he was honest in his assessment of the players and what he may have done differently. The fact that he reflected on it and actually would’ve changed things was a big positive.”

“I think it’s very, very important for the club to identify the pathway and to follow that pathway. The longer that we went without identifying a coach, the more speculation is that maybe we didn’t know the direction wanted to go in. But we were very clear in the direction we wanted to go in, we got the individual we were after and it’s a positive move for everyone.”

“The mindset we’re trying to develop is that any coach into a club has to look at it like a ten-year position and look to build for that timespan…With Caleb, he has to be given time to get the players that he wants and also to play the way that we want.”

Merritt Paulson:
“This is a coach who’s a cerebral coach. He’s a great leader, a great tactician, he’s extremely reflective.”

“He’s poised to do some great things, but we’ve got to give this time to grow as well—that’s something I want to be clear about from day one.”

“I always said it was a prerequisite to have a coach who understands MLS. I never said that we needed a guy who’d been an MLS coach. This is a guy who’s played in MLS, has coached MLS players recently, has a very good understanding of the league, respect for the league, and understands the American player.”

“Caleb will bring in his own system. But in terms of the philosophy of a possession-oriented attack and some of the things that Gavin was talking about, we’re going to be widening the field, those decisions, were certainly made prior to bringing in Caleb. I think that’s something we were looking for no matter who we chose to be the head coach.”

“[Media] is going to have all the access they could ever want and more to Caleb when he’s officially here.”

“We’ve got a good [coaching] staff in place. Ultimately it’s incumbent on the coach to come in and make his own evaluations and do what he needs to. He’s already spent some time with some staff and we’ve got in guys like Sean McAuley and [Mike] Toshack we’ve got some really capable folks here.”

“Since I’ve been here I have never once said a player plays despite your wishes. I’ve never once said trade for this guy, don’t trade for this guy. I’ve supported every move. I’ve really let the soccer guys do the soccer thing.”

Darlington Nagbe:
“He’s a great coach, loves to attack. He’s going to be honest with everything he does, he’s an honest guy. And he’s a winner, most of all.”

“Every single one of us who went to Akron trusted him. If you trust someone and believe in them, he’ll help you out.”