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Toronto FC names former Scottish standout Mo Johnston head coach
By NEIL DAVIDSON
TORONTO (CP) - Former Scottish star Mo Johnston hit the ground running Friday as head coach of Toronto FC, promising the expansion MLS team will play attractive soccer and win from the get-go.
The former attacker, one of the few to play for both Glasgow Celtic and Rangers, also pledged to bring top Canadian talent back home.
"We're going to have a very, very good team, right from the word go," he told a news conference in a midtown bar. "(Real) Salt Lake City and Chivas, yes, were very poor in their first year. It's not going to happen here."
Chivas, a Los Angeles-based franchise, was 4-22-6 in its debut season in 2005 while Real Salt Lake was 5-22-5.
There is plenty of work ahead. MLS has to decide on the roster rules governing the league's first Canadian franchise. Then there's an expansion draft, entry draft and training camp in advance of the team's debut season in 2007.
Like its 12 other MLS counterparts, the Toronto franchise will be allowed four foreign players, as well as a number of youth internationals. But unlike the American franchise, it will probably also have a quota of U.S. players as well.
Exact rules have yet to be announced, but a club official said one scenario would see seven to 11 Canadians on an 18-man playing roster.
Johnston knows the league. He has spent 10 seasons in MLS, six as a player and four in a coaching capacity.
While the 43-year-old Scot wasn't officially announced as coach until Friday, he has already spent several weeks unofficially on the job. He watched the Toronto-Montreal United Soccer League game Wednesday and has already talked to "numerous" players.
He plans to watch Canada play Jamaica in Montreal on Sept. 4 and spend the rest of the year travelling to scout overseas players.
"It doesn't stop. It's 24 hours a day," he said.
Canadian international midfielder Jim Brennan, currently without a team, is widely expected to join the Toronto squad.
Johnston said he is currently in talks with two international players "of the highest quality," one 30 and the other 26.
Johnston also said he has hired an experienced assistant coach, but would not identify him.
"He's wonderful. You are going to be blown away by who it is," he said.
Johnston was fired by the New York Red Bulls in late June. While he declined to go into what happened there, he did mention several times that he only lost four times in 18 games as coach. In eight months with the Red Bulls, his record was 5-4-8.
He retired as a player in 2001 following six seasons in Major League Soccer, earning three all-star selections with the Kansas City Wizards.
Prior to coming to the U.S., Johnston played 15 seasons in Europe. He scored 310 goals in 529 games for Scottish clubs such as Partick Thistle, Hearts, Falkirk, Celtic and Rangers, as well as England's Watford and Everton and France's Nantes.
The Glasgow-born forward-midfielder also scored 14 goals in 38 appearances for Scotland in an international career that included the 1990 World Cup in Italy.
In 2002, he
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