Doop Roundup: Philly teams unify, The final week of preseason begins & Suncoast Invitational play continues

The Philadelphia Union are in the thick of preparing themselves for the start of the 2018 MLS season. The Union are spending their Presidents day hanging out with the Philadelphia Phillies; they are subsequently hanging out with Super Bowl champion Jason Kelce. With only 12 days until the ball is kicked in Chester, the Union still have some major decisions to make on who their starters are. They’ll look to figure this out this week in training, and in their two remaining Suncoast Invitational games. In this edition of Doop Roundup: Philly teams unify, the final week of preseason begins and Suncoast Invitational play continues.

Philly teams unify:

This guy knows a thing or two about being bold.

Thank you to Jason Kelce for stopping by to talk to the guys! #BeBold pic.twitter.com/pjUY5HNjQM

— Philadelphia Phillies (@Phillies) February 19, 2018

Today is a truly unique day. Players from three of Philadelphia’s sports teams met with each other. Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce showed up at Phillies preseason to address the team.

https://twitter.com/PhilaUnion/status/965654818441322496

The Union were also scheduled to meet with Phillies for their annual hangout, when both teams are in Florida for their preseasons’. The two clubs look to be having a fun time trying out each others sports.

https://twitter.com/PhilaUnion/status/965632510519635973

The Union also got a chance to meet with Jason Kelce. Who knows maybe John McCarthy is convincing Kelce to come out to the River End. How cool would it be to see Kelce lead the “no one likes us” chant for the Sons of Ben.

Work still to be done:

Philadelphia have a lot of work still to be done in their final week of preseason. This is the time of finalizing the roster, and finding the best 11 players to be the starters for the start of the MLS season. As of now there seem to be seven spots out of eleven filled.

That starting 11 is missing some pieces:

Blake; Fabinho, (BLANK), Elliot, (BLANK); Medunjanin, Bedoya; Accam; (BLANK), (BLANK); Sapong. This leaves the left-center back, right back, right-winger, and center attacking midfielder spots all open.

While Auston Trusty looks to be the front-runner for the left-center back spot, a bad showing this week could change that. Keegan Rosenberry has shown well through preseason, and Ray Gaddis has not; however, there still seems to be a battle for the right back spot. The right-wing is a three-way battle between Fabian Herbers, Fafa Picault and Marcus Epps. All three have been good this preseason, the spot could be any of theirs based on performance. The #10 is down between youngsters Adam Najem and Anthony Fontana. Both are inexperienced but have shown their quality, one of them will have to truly impress to be the consistent starter.

Suncoast Invitational roles on:

The Union have two more games to help them figure out what their team will look like on March 3rd. Two more games in the Suncoast Invitational are on the slate for this week. Philadelphia take on Montreal Impact Wednesday, February 21st at seven pm; the Union then take on USL side Tampa Bay rowdies Saturday, February 24th at seven pm. These games should tell us all who the starters will be for the season opener. Let’s see who Curtin and the staff see as the best 11 of the group.

This week is vastly important, be sure to follow Philly Sports Network as we cover all the action closely. to catch the Union’s final games of the preseason click HERE to go to the Tampa Bay Rowdies YouTube page.