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New England Revolution centerback Antonio Delamea had spent most of the preseason trip to Bradenton, Florida away from the team. Now according to Jeff Lemieux we know why:
Antonio Delamea has received his green card and will no longer count as an international on the #NERevs roster, per Friedel. Delamea missed a chunk of the Bradenton trip while in Slovenia completing the paperwork.
— Jeff Lemieux (@jeff_lemieux) February 9, 2018
Delamea’s green card now opens another international spot for the Revolution though we don’t have an official count on how many international spots are taken currently.
Last year the Revs ended the year with five players using international slots. Krisztian Nemeth was not on that list and Gershon Koffie, Benjamin Angoua and Xavier Kouassi have left the team.
The additions of Gabriel Somi, Wilfried Zahibo and Cristian Penilla will almost certainly count against the Revs international allocation. Claude Dielna would be the only international holdover from last season’s roster with Delamea now being counted as a domestic player. Rookie draft pick and recent signing Nicolas Samayoa has dual citizenship with the US and Guatemala so we won’t be counting him as an international player.
The Revolution have, we believe, seven total international roster spots for the 2018 season. They traded one spot to the Columbus Crew until the end of the year as a part of the deal that landed New England Nemeth through the allocation order setup. Our unofficial math at the moment leads us to believe that just four of these spots are being used currently (Dielna, Penilla, Somi, Zahibo) but as always the roster rules in MLS are, how you say, rather fluid sometimes, so until we see an official roster let’s not quote this as fact.
(Update 12:05 PM - Jeff Lemieux says that Nemeth is on the international list, means the Revs are using a total of 5 of 7 Int’l roster spots.)
Regardless, it’s more than likely the Revs have at least a couple of open international spots and the Revs are still looking to add players at this point in the preseason. Having a few open international roster spots gives the team more flexibility not just for new signings but also trades within MLS.
We’ll see how the Revs fill out the roster as there’s about a month to go before the regular season kicks off.