Bay FC names Albertin Montoya as first coach in club’s history

NWSL growth facet Bay FC introduced it has chosen Albertin Montoya to be the club’s first supervisor.

Montoya, 48, is a long-time San Francisco Bay Area resident who has succeeded on the youth {and professional} ranges. He led FC Gold Pride of the WPS — the precursor to the NWSL — to a title in 2010. He most lately served as interim supervisor of the Washington Spirit in 2022.

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“As the inaugural head coach of Bay FC, I’m honored to be a part of the foundation upon which our team’s history will be built,” Bay FC Head Coach Albertin Montoya mentioned in an announcement.

“Together, we’ll create a legacy of determination, unity, and excellence. Our journey begins today, and I’m eager to recruit and lead an elite group of athletes towards a future filled with triumphs, and together, we’ll write the remarkable story of Bay FC.”

In an unique interview with ESPN, Bay FC common supervisor Lucy Rushton mentioned she had a listing of about 40 candidates from which to decide on, and met with lots of them. But in the method of touring across the league to get a way of finest practices, at any time when the subject of Bay FC’s first supervisor got here up, Montoya’s identify was at all times prompt.

“Every time I say I’d go to Kansas City or I’d go to Washington Spirit or wherever it was, I’d go and people would ask me about Albertin,” Rushton mentioned. “‘Are you looking for a head coach? I mean, haven’t you got Albertin Montoya there?’ I swear everybody knows Albertin, and so it was ironic to continually find myself in these places where people were telling me to make this guy the head coach.”

Rushton added that Montoya’s dedication to a possession-based fashion, as properly as his history of growing gamers satisfied her to make him the workforce’s first supervisor.

“I think two of the big things were the playing style and identity,” she mentioned. “We knew we needed a coach that would commit to playing the brand of football that we want to commit to.”

She added: “For us, this is about creating a legacy, and we recognize that we would rather take time to build a brand and build that legacy than have a short-term fix or hit. And so to find a coach that committed to playing football and a possession style that is in the same way that we are willing to commit to, that was the most important thing.”

Much of Montoya’s teaching profession has been in the youth area, particularly after the WPS folded following the 2010 season. In the following years he labored on the academy he based, Montoya Soccer Academy, as properly as Mountain View Los Altos Soccer Club. He additionally coached the U.S. U-17 girls’s nationwide workforce from 2011-12. But his brief stint with the Spirit gave him the starvation to get again in the skilled sport, and the truth that he can do it near his Bay Area handmade it an ideal match.

“I definitely missed it,” he instructed ESPN in regards to the skilled sport. “The competition, the level of play, the professionalism is outstanding. And just because of where my wife, my kids are, I’ve never been able to really leave California except for that short stint at Washington Spirit. And when I went there for that month and a half, oh, I got the bug. And just as things happen, how this all came about, it was a pretty incredible coincidence. And I said, ‘Look, why not?’ I love teaching. I love developing players.”

Rushton and Montoya can now deal with constructing the roster forward of the workforce’s inaugural season in 2024. Rushton has been immersing herself in all issues NWSL after having spent the majority of her profession on the lads’s facet of the sport. Montoya mentioned that with the NWSL free company interval open, they might begin making calls to gamers on Thursday.

“You get this experience and this opportunity once to build from scratch,” Rushton mentioned. “So for us, I think that what that means, especially from the football playing style side of things, is that we can go and recruit exactly the types of players that fit the brand of football that we want to play.”

That consists of making an attempt to deliver some Bay Area natives again dwelling.

“We’ve got a great list of players that have Bay Area ties on our list, and if things all work out, I think it’d be nice to bring some of them back home,” mentioned Montoya. “If we can land some of those, I will be a very happy coach.”