Dániel Gazdag’s departure makes room for the Union’s young prospects. When will they play?

One of the reasons the Union were willing to let go of Dániel Gazdag is their belief in the rest of the team’s attacking midfield depth.

There is certainly enough quantity: starters Indiana Vassilev and Quinn Sullivan, veteran backup Jeremy Rafanello, and young prospects Cavan Sullivan, CJ Olney, and David Vazquez. But it’s hard to know how much quality there is, particularly with the young trio, if they don’t play.

So it was notable that Vassilev and Quinn Sullivan were the only attacking midfielders who played in last Saturday’s 1-0 loss at New York City FC, the second straight game the team was shut out.

When manager Bradley Carnell sent in subs, Alejandro Bedoya was the only midfielder he picked, with strikers Mikael Uhre and Chris Donovan and outside back Frankie Westfield the other entrants. Cavan Sullivan and Rafanello were left untouched, while Olney and Vazquez weren’t even there.

That might have been influenced by the fact that Olney, Vazquez, and Cavan Sullivan all played in the Union’s reserve team game against Atlanta two days earlier — right around the time the club was finishing the Gazdag deal with Columbus. The timing of those talks would have made it tricky for Union brass to save the young trio for the first-team game by holding them out of the reserves’ contest.

But now the club has had a full week of planning to set who should play where. So it’s fair for the rest of us to ask: If we aren’t going to see the prospects now, when will we?

Those words were part of a lengthy back-and-forth in Carnell’s weekly news conference Thursday, where he said a lot of words but offered relatively few details. But the truth was in there, and it showed up at a key moment.

» READ MORE: Through noticeable change, Union coach Bradley Carnell has been determined not to show his hand

“The guys are not far off, to be fair,” he said. “The staff, we’re evaluating, we’re grading Union II games, we’re grading our games, and I think everyone has a fair shot of playing minutes. … There’s just different dynamics that we’re looking for at certain moments, and different relationships, and for me, I’m always a little bit more critical with work against the ball.”

Those last four words were big ones. For a moment, Carnell sounded like Jim Curtin when describing why certain prospects didn’t play under his watch.

“It’s totally human nature to only look at on-ball contributions,” Carnell said. “For us, in the game model, we look at both sides of the game, and all phases of the play. And we’re always critical of our work against the ball — and not to say that they’re doing anything wrong.”

But for all he didn’t say, or at least didn’t want to say, he said enough.

» READ MORE: Dániel Gazdag wanted to finish his career with the Union, until he couldn’t

“It’s a learning process and a growing process,” Carnell said. “For us to work against the ball first, to be then attacking, flexible, dynamic, versatile. These are the things we’re trying to instill and empower, and then let the guys grow from there. We’ve seen good things at Union II — they had a great game last time out against Atlanta, and they showed how it can be done.”

The question is when they will be able to show it for the first team. Carnell gets asked regularly these days, and knows Gazdag’s departure means the matter isn’t going away. Saturday’s visit of star-studded Atlanta United (7:30 p.m., Apple TV), always one of the biggest games of the year, will be another occasion.

“Each game, each scenario, each moment is thought about for the best of the team and the best of that moment, and then we make those decisions,” the manager said. “We have enough within our attacking firepower that we can play three 10’s [attacking midfielders], we can play two strikers with two 10’s. I think we’re pretty versatile and flexible, and as the season unfolds there will be more scenarios.”

Carnell did not sound optimistic that star goalkeeper Andre Blake will be able to return to action on Saturday, after he missed the NYCFC game with a flare-up of a groin problem.

» READ MORE: Philly and New York are rivals in sports, but not in World Cup planning

“‘Dre is looking better, is day-to-day,” Carnell said. “We’ll make a full evaluation [Friday] morning, and see if he can go to training and be with the group outside. And then we’ll go from there.”

The league’s official injury report, issued early Friday evening, listed Blake as questionable. Midfielder Jesús Bueno is also questionable with a minor hamstring matter, and right back Olivier Mbaizo is out with a hamstring issue that also sidelined him last weekend.

The Union will host Indy Eleven of the second-tier USL Championship in the U.S. Open Cup’s fourth round on May 7 at Subaru Park.

It will be the first time since 2018 that the Union have a home game in America’s oldest soccer tournament, the national championship for teams at every level from amateurs to the pros. Coincidentally, that year was the last time the Union made the Open Cup final, which they also did in 2014 and 2015.

» READ MORE: The Union will play in the U.S. Open Cup and not the Leagues Cup this year

Indy’s roster includes former Union centerback prospect Ben Ofeimu. He played three years with the club’s reserves, from 2018 to 2020, when the squad was known as Bethlehem Steel. There’s also midfielder Aodhan Quinn, a 2014 Union draft pick who never signed. In the years since then, Quinn has played for a number of USL teams.

The winner of this game will face the winner of the Pittsburgh Riverhounds-New York City FC matchup, set for the same night in Pittsburgh. The Union and Riverhounds have never met in a top-flight competition before, though the Riverhounds often played the Union’s reserves from 2016 to 2019 when they were in the USL.