New York Red Bulls head coach Mike Petk has various plans for exciting winger Lloyd Sam this season.
The 28-year old winger came off the bench to inspire the Red Bulls to a 3-2 win over Sporting Kansas City last weekend, providing an assist and scoring a goal, before going off late with a quadriceps problem.
Petke was asked if the former Charlton Athletic and Leeds United wideman would be frequently used as a sub following his MLS Player of the Week performance with this being his response.
"Listen, all the talk about what's the deal with Lloyd, how come he hasn't been playing much here and there: Lloyd did exactly what I see his strength being, which is coming off the bench and running at people and being very dangerous, which he has proven to be in a number of games this year," he said.
"Does that mean he's not going to be a starter? No, it doesn't mean that at all. There could be games coming up that he will start. But he did exactly what we wanted him to. And that wasn't a spur-of-the-moment decision. It's something that we talked about leading up to this game: When the time is right, you know, whether it be last 20 minutes or whether it be the second half. You know the whole second half, we feel that if the game calls for it, he can be someone that can do something special and he proved that."
