Craig Adelman Los Angeles, Calif. The Chicago Fire has four very good foreign players on its roster and Dema Kovalenko as a Project-40 player, who doesn’t count against the team’s allotment of four foreigners. Can Kovalenko stay a Project-40 player for another year or will the Fire have to make a decision on which foreign player to keep? It seems like Kovalenko could easily be a goalscorer as a starter. Ridge Mahoney: Craig, a few dynamics are in play with the Fire: 1) The entire MLS player allocation process is in a state of flux, as is the definition of a foreign player. The league may bend its rules to classify foreign-born players who join MLS after playing for American colleges as non-foreign players, for example. 2) Only Peter Nowak is contracted through the 2000 season. Kubik will be in the option year of his deal, and both Kosecki and Podbrozny signed two-year deals when they joined the league in 1998. If Bob Bradley leaves, Nowak might be the only returnee, although I think Kubik would like to play one more season. 3) I believe MLS will not re-classify a non-U.S. Project-40 player who leaves the Project-40 program as a foreign player unless and until he is selected for an international by his native country. But the guidelines that limit Project-40 players to those eligible to play for the United States are also not cast in stone. Part of the problem is that these Project-40 decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, and there’s no minimum threshold (say, playing eight games or 700 minutes in MLS, for example) that automatically “graduates” a player out of Project-40 status. The decision to renew, re-classify, or cut Project-40 players is a decision reached by collaboration among league officials, coaches and other executives. I don’t know if Kovalenko could jump right in and start, but if Kosecki and Podbrozny leave, he might get that chance. (If you have a question for a Soccer America Magazine editor, click “Q&A with SA Editors” in the left column of the home page under “Interactive.”)