After signing defender Marcelo Silva, Real Salt Lake General Manager Craig Waibel explained why the Uruguayan center back is a great fit for the RSL family.
Q: What first drew you to Marcelo Silva?
Waibel: It was a long search for a center back and came very close to signing a couple. We have been looking around and doing our homework and as you reach out to agents and get relationships and really pin down the type of player you want, the names start coming in. Once Marcelo’s name was sent to us by an agent we have a lot of trust in, we did more homework. We found him to be technical, found him to be calm, found him to be a good presence. He’s captain of his team and has quite a few leadership skills that we want to bring in. We want to make sure that we’re always trying to challenge where we are on the roster and he certainly does that. He has a ton of experience and coming from Spain he’s going to fit right into the way we want to play, with the ball on the ground.
Q: When you see all of those things on tape and you hear things about him it’s one thing, but what impressed you when you met him in Spain?
Waibel: (RSL Scout) Dane Murphy and I flew over to meet him and when we sat down with him and his agents, it was really confirmation of all of the homework that we had done. It ended up all coming together. The thing I think we liked most about that meeting was his professionalism. He has confidence in the way he communicates. He has the ability to sit across from you at a table and look you in the eye and tell you exactly what he is – and he’s right. He has a very good sense of who he is as a person and as a player. That’s something that we talk about a lot. We talk about character. We talk about fit. We talk about the locker room and they all come together in this player. Marcelo has all of those things and when we sat down with him we spotted very quickly that he’s comfortable in who he is, he likes who he is and he’s confident and accurate in who he is.
Q: I’m sure it will be more evident when he plays with the team, but how do you see him fitting in with this group?
Waibel: He’s going to fit very well in terms of who he is as a person. He has a great work ethic. He is a great age. He’s a physical presence on the field. He’s not the biggest guy, but he plays his body very well against opponents. He will fit in the locker room very easy based on everything we know about him. Our job now is to make the transition off the field quickly and make him comfortable and present him to the fan base in the right way so people know enough about him that they can accept where he is coming from quickly and acclimate him into our club, not only from our locker room, but from the fan base.
The transfer window opens on July 10, at which point – and upon receipt of his ITC and visa - Silva will be eligible to play for RSL. Stay tuned for more news regarding RSL’s roster as the summer window approaches.
