Photo Courtesy of Philadelphia Union
CHESTER, Pa. (January 2, 2025) – Philadelphia Union today announced they have named Bradley Carnell as the fourth head coach in Union history. In his last role as head coach, the Johannesburg, South Africa native led CITY SC to become the 2023 Western Conference Champions with a 17-12-3 record, the first expansion team to win a conference regular season title and record 17 wins.
“Bradley has the attributes we were looking for in a manager and the experience needed as we commit to getting back to our identity as a team,” said Philadelphia Union Sporting Director Ernst Tanner. “With knowledge of both MLS and international markets, he is tactically astute and aligned with our sporting strategy. His approach emphasizes a high-press style of play while organizing a structured defense. Additionally, he shares the club’s vision for developing players. We are confident he will bring a clear sporting philosophy that elevates the team and delivers a competitive season. We look forward to welcoming him to Philadelphia.”
“I’m honored to be named Head Coach of the Philadelphia Union, and I would like to thank the Union ownership group and Ernst Tanner for their trust in me,” said Carnell. “Philadelphia is an amazing city, built on communities of hardworking and passionate people who truly love their soccer. I am excited for this opportunity to build upon an already solid foundation and aim to help raise the Union organization to the next level that our fans and city can be proud of.”
Carnell, 47, brings 10 years of professional coaching experience, including eight seasons in Major League Soccer (MLS). Most recently, he spent two seasons as manager of St. Louis CITY SC, the team’s inaugural head coach, after being named to the position in January 2022. He went 22-15-25 in 62 total regular season matches. St. Louis led the Western Conference and ranked third in the League with 62 goals and with a plus-17 goal differential during the 2023 campaign.
Prior to joining St. Louis, Carnell served as assistant manager and interim head coach with the New York Red Bulls from March 2017 to January 2022. As interim head coach from Sept. 5 to Nov. 19, 2020, Carnell went 6-3-5 in 14 matches to lead New York to their 11th straight postseason appearance and as an assistant manager, he helped guide the Red Bulls to the 2018 Supporters’ Shield.
Carnell began his coaching career as the head coach of the University of Johannesburg men’s team (2012-15) before serving as an assistant manager at Orlando Pirates (2016-17) and Free State Stars (2015-16) in South Africa.
The former defender played professionally for 18 years (1993-2011), making his debut at 16-years-old with Wits University in South Africa (1993-97). He most notably collected three goals and nine assists in 134 matches between VfB Stutgart (1998-2003) and Borussia Monchengladbach (2003-05), both part of Germany’s Bundesliga. He also played four seasons (2005-09) with Karlsruher SC and Hansa Rostock (2009-10) in Germany’s Bundesliga II, before making his final stop with Supersport United in South Africa (2010-11).
Internationally, Carnell represented South Africa in 42 national team appearances from 1997-2010, including three starts in the 2002 FIFA World Cup and four starts in the 2002 African Cup of Nations (AFCON).
Welcome to a new era.
We will see.
So he’s about the same age as Curtin and has about the same number of years of coaching experience, except that most of his has been as an assistant coach and most of Curtin’s was as a head coach.
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I guess he has the advantage of never having lost in the semifinals or later of a knockout tournament since in 2023 his team lost their second Open Cup game (and first against an MLS team) to Chicago and then lost both games in the first round of the playoffs to the number 8 seed. Kansas City. Then in the 2024 CCC they lost in the first round to Houston.
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So this doesn’t really seem to address the issues many people had with Curtin.
Maybe he can use his subs effectively or actually make them in some cases.
Of course, giving the younger players experience is what Tanner wants so presumably he will do that.
So how is Curtin’s job search coming along anyways ?
“His approach emphasizes a high-press style of play while organizing a structured defense.” I know another coach with this approach and a much much much better win-loss record.
I’m glad he’s in place before preseason so this didn’t drag into dramatic territory. That said, I don’t think this will excite anyone. There won’t be a season ticket drive based on the hiring. But I’ll withhold judgment until summer. Let’s see how Tanner shapes the roster now.
Underwhelming. Is this guy really better than Marlon LeBlanc? I guess we’ll find out, and I hope I am wrong.
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St Louis opened it’s first season with a 5 game winning streak, in part by playing a defense (high press) that did not exist in the Western Conference. Eventually teams adjusted and they exited the playoffs in the first round to the #9 seed. Carnell’s 1.31 ppg is good enough for around 7th place on the table. If you remove the 5 game win streak his ppg drops to 1.16, which usually good enough for 8th-10th, depending on the year. Perhaps that is not exactly fair to do, but to me it provides some perspective.
A franchise that doesn’t draft college players has a college coach for its second tier team and a college goalkeeper coach training up its players…and now a guy with less actual head coaching experience then the guy who was asked to leave who won more games over 5 years then anyone else in the league, who was on board with the protocol / program but also wanted to win and had to look his men in the eyes for 18 months… in an effort to do that.
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Whatever to it all. I care. Just not that much.
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Congrats MLS… your paywall, mindless money grab mid season event, killing US Open, and apathy injecting stop-start-stop-start season has worn me down. Congrats Union you too…. have worn me down.
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Radiohead… “it wears me out. It wears me out.”
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Hope the outgoing guy lands somewhere that has aspirations on greatness. Hope the incoming guy tows the company line.
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Meanwhile…
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…Just Play Well.
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We’ll see.
Thats all I want.
…Just Play Well…
Correction I guess Coach Leblanc is no longer coaching U2.
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I’ll walk it back one or two hopscotch places.
he shares the club’s vision for developing players. We are confident he will bring a clear sporting philosophy that elevates the team and delivers a competitive season. We look forward to welcoming him to Philadelphia.”
Per the sporting director I call attention to competitive team, respectfully please say a winning team, a competitive team with developing players is a losing team, a sporting director thinks that the philosofy of competitive will sell is a mistake for fan support.
but good luck Carney….
But the real issue at hand… is does the new head guy call it soccer or football???
GOOD POINt
Mediocre coach, mediocre team. To steal a comment, not caring as much as I did and I used to really care. Maybe they will figure a way to be top flight contenders again, maybe not.
…and only the union records an intro video in mono…
I wish Carnell all the success. I don’t really have an opinion on him. They need to give him several more major pieces and I hope they don’t wait until mid-February to do it. Get guys in as early as possible.
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That Tanner quote really rubs me the wrong way. Makes the Union sound like a crappy DII football program.
This is now Tanner’s team and we will see if his vision for the Union is viable for a winning the Cup. Young Cavan is the story of 2025 and how the new coach moves him into the first team getting serious minutes in the rotation. I have a feeling it will be up top as a striker.
I am willing to give him a shot. I agree with a lot of the sentiment here, that speaks to how he doesn’t appear to be much of an upgrade vs. Curtin. Winning cures all. Do I think the Union can be competitive – sure. I think the lack of desire to win a championship isn’t on the coach – not matter who that person is. El Pachy and others have said it best – I care… I just care less.
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I have gone through some stuff the last few months and I am finding it hard to get excited about the season again. I have my tickets and I really enjoy going to games. I am really hoping this team can excite and surprise me.
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Best of luck to the new guy.
I wish us all the best of luck but I’m from Philadelphia so I’m not getting my hopes up too high
Another Football Manager PC game-esque move? Union trade forward prospect Anisse Saidi to San Diego expansion team for cash. It’s in the Philly dot com Union section of the website.
As an Orlando pirates fan I find this hilarious ☠️
Bigger picture, I find it ironic that there’s such an organizational messaging disconnect between players (growth, development, homegrown, etc.) and coaches (Leblanc & presumably most staff let go). Isn’t it hard to have a promote from within culture in the squad if that’s not exemplified from the top down? How will that impact players’ attitudes towards committing to the team first?
Look… is this an exciting name? No. But coaching has as much if not more to do with fitting the environment as it does actual coaching ability. So you really can’t judge based on other experiences. If Tanner felt that Curtin had simply been here too long, too static. Then fine. Maybe new blood doing similar things is the shakeup that works. I for one am willing to see.
I hope I’m wrong, but the Union franchise feels headed for doom without new ownership.
The commitment of Union ownership to sell their best players and fan favorites… where the dynamic of MLS has changed to reward franchises buying talent… is unsustainable for this fan base.
Even for the Union doing an extraordinary job of developing and acquiring talent, that ownership ultimately expects the fans to cheer the Union being one of the best farm teams in / to the world is inane.
Hooray: we can all throw confetti and pop champagne when young Sullivan leaves.
Curtin might have frustrated at times, but I feel a scapegoat circumstance: given the loss of talent that he was dealt.
Ownership has already long lost a lot of hardcores… in the Sons of Ben… who inspired and ensured the existence of this franchise.
Drip, drip, drip is the sound of disgruntled Union season ticket holders and fans dropping away for the insults from an ownership that is mis-prioritized.
We are the fifth largest TV market in the United States, and the club makes it sounds like we’re Des Moines. Really, really bothers me. It all comes off like we’re an English club who is content to sit in League Two and happily sell off homegrown players to bigger clubs.
I hope to get proven wrong, but I don’t have much more faith in management’s version of Moneyball. Some of the blame could fall on Jim, most of Tanner’s recent player purchases (Carranza and Baribo aside) have been massive misses.
Are the players in the Academy (besides Cavan) that good, or is that just smoke and mirrors from ownership to keep us coming?
Doesn’t seem like a lot to get excited about.