Impact coach DeSantis under microscope

[François]

Impact coach DeSantis under microscope
Homegrown hero was an inaugural member of Montreal's soccer team and has worked his way through the ranks. In his new job as skipper, the 36-year-old faces his toughest challenge as he prepares his players for the A-League season.

RANDY PHILLIPS
The Gazette


Friday, April 02, 2004


There's more pressure on Nick DeSantis than you might expect in his first season as head coach of the Montreal Impact.

While his new job, after coming through the ranks as an original member of the A-League soccer franchise to being team captain and then a playing assistant coach, will be to keep the club in winning form, his toughest questions this season might have to be answered at home.

It's what you get when you're not only married to soccer, but also have a wife, Anna Tsouluhas, who played soccer at Dalhousie University and at the senior club level here and knows a thing or two about the game.

"For sure, that's going to be a problem," DeSantis joked this week about his wife of 31/2 years, who is originally from Halifax and is a pharmaceutical product manager at Abbott Laboratories. "When I get home, there's going to be questions like 'Why didn't you do this?' or 'Why didn't you do that?'

"That's just one of the other things I'm going to have to prepare myself for."

The Impact kicked off training camp yesterday with more than 20 players, including 15 under contract with the club, at the Catalogna SoccerPlexe in Lachine, where it will be working out daily in preparation for the season opener April 25 in Puerto Rico.

Montreal's home opener at Claude Robillard Stadium is on Sunday, May 16 at 4 p.m. against the Virginia Beach Mariners.

DeSantis was named head coach on Nov. 20, succeeding Bob Lilley, who resigned for personal reasons after two seasons. Under Lilley, the Impact was 16-6-6 last season, won the Northeast Division title, finished first in the Eastern Conference and tied for first overall in the league before bowing out to archrival Rochester in the first round of the playoffs.

DeSantis, 36, a Montreal native who has been with the franchise since its inaugural season in 1993, is the first Impact player to become head coach of the team.

"Am I busy? The batteries in my cell phone get totally dead every day with all the calls I take," DeSantis said. "It's been a big change. It's been busy. Preparing for the start of training camp, trying to sign players and dealing with everyone.

"There are just so many people to deal with, especially with me being local. Everybody knows you. You get people asking you for tryouts. People calling you saying: 'A friend of yours told me to call to ask you ...'

"People asking for tickets? That's already started, too. I tell them: 'You didn't come to see me when I played and now you want tickets to see me sit on the bench?' " DeSantis said with a laugh.

"Actually, it's all been good," he added. "It's been a nice transition. I think I would have been worse off had I just stopped playing and not been around the team. But having been with the team throughout has helped a lot and I know I've got a lot of good people around me to help."

DeSantis prepared himself for the head coaching job by spending the last two seasons as an assistant to Lilley, but he was also a regular in the lineup at midfield.

A member of the 1994 A-League champions, he also was the vital link between players and the coaching staff as team captain from 1995 to 2001. In the final six weeks of the 2001 season, he served as interim head coach when the franchise was briefly taken over by the league while a restructuring of the ownership took place.

With at least a dozen former teammates on the roster, including close friends Mauro Biello, a forward who is also his brother-in-law, and defenders Lloyd Barker and Nevio Pizzolitto, the most difficult phase of the transition for DeSantis might be the line of separation required between coach and players.

"This is the year I'm going to have to make that separation," he said. "Even as an assistant trying to do that was tough (at times). Bob talked to me a lot about it, pointing out the times I seemed to be on the fence about things, instead of making that separation.

"But I know what the situation is and I've told the players that basically our philosophy is the same as it was when Bob was here, that we want a lot discipline and intensity."

Biello, 32, a native of Montreal who also has been with the team since 1993 and is the Impact's all-time leading scorer, is married to Tina, the younger of DeSantis's two sisters.

DeSantis and Biello roomed together on the road as teammates and are partners in an offseason soccer camp for youngsters 6 to 15, which they started in 2001.

"When I came to this team, with him being older, I learned a lot from Nick," Biello said. "We became close friends and then brothers-in-law when I married his sister.

"Our families are close. We spend holidays and things like that together. Tina is probably the assistant GM of this team right now because she knows everything that goes on. She never played soccer, but I guess hearing so much about it while growing up, well, it's soccer 24/7.

"When we were on the field together as players, it was always all business," Biello added. "That's the way it's going to be now. I know I have a job to do and I have to perform. He has a job and he has to perform, as well.

"I know he's going to rely on my leadership and experience to take control of things on the field and that's what I'm prepared to do."

DeSantis said one of his priorities is to make the team more exciting offensively, especially at home, but without compromising a defensive strategy that was the best in the league last season. And he knows he'll be under the microscope from the start.

"Will there be more pressure? Probably," DeSantis said. "But being local, going from player to coach, it all comes with the territory. I'm excited about that challenge."

rphillips@thegazette.canwest.com

Desantis File

Born: Sept. 11, 1967.

Place of Birth: Montreal.

Hometown: Montreal.

Marital Status: Wife, Anna Tsouluhas. (No children).

Position: Midfield (Has not officially retired as a player).

Amateur Club: AS Jean-Talon Rosemont.

Turned Professional: 1988

Career Statistics: 245 games played (236 as a starter), 22 goals, 31 assists.

Impact assistent coach/player: 2002, 2003

Named Impact Head Coach: Nov. 20, 2003

Profile of Nick DeSantis

[Daniel]

Excellent article, qu'on ne semble voir que de la Gazette dans la presse écrite. Reste à voir s'il sera vraiment "sous le microscope" cet été.

[Y]

Oui c'est vrai, sauf qu'il parle encore de la démission de Lilley, alors que l'on sait tous que ce n'est pas le cas. L'entrevue du public de Fret sur rds.ca démontre que Nick, volontairement ou non, aurait pas pu faire mieux pour nous passer le message. Message que l'on connaissait déjà quand même. D'ailleurs, j'en connais qui, depuis, on changé de camp (...).

[Daniel]

Ce n'est pas à Desantis de dire la "vérité" sur son prédécesseur et mentor Bob Lilley. L'histoire dictera finalement comment on se souviendra de Bob.

[Y]

Ce n'est pas à Desantis de dire la "vérité" sur son prédécesseur et mentor Bob Lilley. L'histoire dictera finalement comment on se souviendra de Bob.

Ce n'est pas ce que j'ai dit Dan, j'ai dit que dans ses réponses aux questions de FE, il a lâché qqs morceaux de réponses (indices), volontairement ou non, qui en disent très très longs sur ce qu'on sait depuis longtemps. Relire le texte et voir les contradictions totales entre ses propos au lendemain de l'élimination et ceux de cette entrevue: c'est tellement évident qu'un aveugle peut les sentir.