Claudio Reyna story on SI.com

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Iballistic George said:
Great player and really nice bloke. I got to meet him at and have dinner with him once when I was working with a boxer. The boxer had a physio called Jim schultz and we had a dinner anned and he asked if his friend could come along as he was over from America visiting. We said yeah no probs so Jim turned up with claudio. I was like wow. Told him I was a mackem right away. He was happy to talk football with me and a few weeks later I had a package from Jim and it was a signed lads shirt. Still got it framed.
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really good player was Claudio,i seem to remember seeing him getting crocked away to Bolton one midweek game,or am i imagining that
 


chriswallace85 said:
I bet Michael Ballack was gutted.


Schwarz
Rae
Hutchison
McCann't
Roy

All far more effective for us in that era. Of these games Reyna allegedly ran I'd like to see how many we actually won. Not many I reckon.

I think he was a bit of a novelty 'cos he was 'Captain America' and had a bit of an exotic name, but he wasn't much use as I recall. He captained us to 17th place.
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Unlucky with injuries and Reid's decline/ Wilkos ineptitude.
 
b1gals said:
Great read. I was struggling with what words to use then I re-read your post ... "sad but beautiful" is very apt.

I thought Reyna was a cracking player for us. His performance for USA v Germany in the 2002 WC was one of the best individual performances I've ever seen.
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If Gerrard, Scholes or Lampard played like Reyna did in that game for their country, there would have been a national holiday. He was absolutely superb and will always be in the best SAFC xi of my lifetime so far(34).
 
He was a quality player who we always missed when he was out with injury.

Frustrating that injury deprived him of playing more for us but my abiding memory of him isn’t any particular performance but seemingly spending ages checking when Reyna will be fit enough to play again.
 
Another sick-note, but a decent player when fit. And another player we lost money on when eventually transferred.
 
Tony Towers Fanclub said:
I don’t think there were many of us who saw Claudio Reyna play for SAFC who didn’t think he was one of the classiest midfielders, and characters, we’ve had play for us over the past two decades.

Fairly sure this isn’t SEB, but there’s a sad but beautiful story just come on Sports Illustrated’s .com site about the death of Claudio’s son, Jack, at the age of 13 and how his son Gio is now a top footballing prospect back home in the US.

Anyway, if you fancy a read, you can find it here:

https://www.si.com
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Class player, shame about the injuries.
Schwartz should be our manager.
 
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The trouble was when Reyna came here we’d been spoilt a bit with Rae..Hutch..Schwarz..and the team he went into was on the decline..he was a canny player but I think some on here go a bit overboard about him.
 
I really can't pass up commenting on this, can I? :)

I only saw a handful of his appearances, we only had three or four matches a week televised here then and Sunderland wasn't exactly at the top of the list. Most of the time it was online radio, so I'm a bit limited. Did have the sense at the time that the 19-point season wouldn't have gone nearly as bad if he hadn't been hurt. Compared to some of the others mentioned, the only one I'd absolutely put in front of him was Hutch, who was a massive loss we never really recovered from.

His legacy over here is a bit muddled. His contribution in 2002 was massive, but by 2006, there was a sense that he was a hinderance, that he wanted to play at a slower pace than the rest of the squad and held them back. And to me, his time running US youth programs was a disaster, trying to shove our system into something far too-possession based and technical for what we produce, and sowing the seeds for the problems the US has now.

But having said all that, no one here questions his overall decency. And reading about his son, oh my. Hit home pretty hard.
 
Geronimo said:
Reyna was nowhere near the class of Schwarz.
Reyna made only 28 appearances. Usually injured or subbed.
Schwarz 62 appearances. Club legend
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wouldn't like to try and pick the better of the two,but i always thought Schwarz's best game was against Southampton @home when he played wide left,bloody untouchable in that game
Ramona1234 said:
Reyna and Schwarz were both very good players. Reyna more classy, Schwarz did the dirty work. I wouldn't say either wee legends.
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i'll gan along with that,wish we were watching them now like
Ohnonotagain said:
Class player, shame about the injuries.
Schwartz should be our manager.
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the future might just show that to be true
 
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