Joka menneitä muistelee, sitä tikulla silmään. For us non-Finnesotans, its literal translation is “A poke in the eye for those who dwell in the past.”



As much as we like to kid ourselves that the best athletes will always dominate the soccer pitch, there's a grueling mental component to the game. A player in a goal drought might miss chances that would otherwise be tap-ins. A goalkeeper who's been caught once in tragic fashion is more likely to leak in further tallies — just ask Joe Hart or Brad Guzan.



The same goes for the defense and midfield. It's been well documented that Minnesota had a rough start to life in Major League Soccer. The defense took much of the blame, but the team's midfield performance left much to be desired as well. One major example from last year was Rasmus Schüller. After struggling for time early on in 2017, Schüller spent the summer and fall on loan back in Finland. Having...