Community Corner: Choosing a number 10

There’s six games left in the 2019 regular season for the Philadelphia Union, and I decided to take a look back one of the bigger offseason stories that had fans biting their nails, who was going to play at the number 10 position? In 2018, Borek Dockal, on loan from Henan Jianye, left a huge impression on Major League Soccer, notching 18 assists to go along with his 5 goals.

But fans were always cautious about the fact he was on loan, and there was a good chance he would not return to the Union in 2019. In November of 2018, he was spotted training with his old team, Sparta Prague, and it was almost certain he would not be returning to Philadelphia. That led to the almost annual crisis of, who was going to be taking the reigns as the playmaker of the team?

That question was answered with less than a month until the 2019 regular season began, with the Union acquiring Mexican midfielder Marco Fabian from German club Eintracht Frankfurt in a free transfer. Fabian’s career at Frankfurt had its ups and downs, and his last few seasons with the club were hampered with injuries.

The signing was a risk for Philadelphia, who made Fabian the highest paid player in club history.

In 2019, Marco Fabian again dealt with injuries which have held him to playing 18 games with 13 starts, with a stat line of 6 goals and 1 assist. Not exactly eye catching numbers, but decent production and a few game winners sprinkled in. Fabian has mostly become a piece of the puzzle, rotating the position with Jamiro Monteiro and Brendan Aaronson.

The point in all of this is to ask, would fans prefer Marco Fabian or Borek Dockal? If the Union had kept Borek Dockal, would they have also been able to bring in a player like Monteiro at all (also Kai Wagner, Andrew Wooten, etc.)? Dockal’s transfer fee was rumored to be upwards of $3 million, far more than the Union could afford. One on one, Dockal seems like a no brainer, despite the fact that Fabian has a bit more positional flexibility, playing as a second striker when needed.

Let us know who you prefer and drop a comment below.