Post-match: USA vs Jamaica CONCACAF Nations League (leg 1)

There's something there in Tanner Tessman. Nurture it, Poch.

 

Man, these stats of like 4 road wins in the last 50 years are depressing.

 

Considering we won by one goal and Pepi's goal was that goal, I think we can agree to disagree.

 

Also when assessing Pepi let's take into account the performance of his replacement Vazquez

 

The critique of Pepi's possession play on such a crappy field is silly. Ironically, he's getting less grace for the circumstance than anyone, when he has the toughest job to keep possession - bouncing ball fired at him w/ a man on his back. If he keeps possession it's a positive. I sometimes get mad at him for sending the ball back where it came, but that's under little pressure on a good field. He gets a pass tonight & is a positive for the goal.

Hard to evaluate much of the team's performance or individuals given the field. I'm just content w/ the win.

But a couple who were able to show themselves in spite of the field were McKenzie & Tessmann. You can show more off ball ability, namely w/ your d, in these situations; and McKenzie did it with his rotations to cover for Ream (who was bad in his defensive movement).

Then Tessmann had the gumption to face up the Jamaica pressure and play short or longer out balls with either foot. If he can carve out some space that's what he's capable of. Maybe he's gotten better at pressure resistance in France (let's send some more blokes there, it's where Mark plies his trade too). Don't know about the pitch control though. Our players in CM & throughout most of the pitch were chasing shadows of the speedy Jamaicans.

 

McKenzie was good overall but on the other hand this is yet another data point for "he has one bad mistake per game" (here on the penalty where there was plenty of blame to go around: Scally, Ream, McKenzie, Turner)

 

I was happy to see Zach Steffen included in the squad.

 

1. If what matters is the result, credit to those who scored a goal (Pepi, Pulisic) and prevented three (Turner PK, Turner olimpico, Musah clearance)...

2. Pretty sure that was Berhalter not Poch?

 

The pitch was so poor it is hard to tak much from the game other than this group found a way to win on the road. It isn’t much but it is a ray of hope after 2 years of hopelessness.

I look forward to matches on better pitches and having Dest back.

 

The other thing to keep in mind is that as good as Pulisic's effort was on that assist...and it was excellent, it would have been wasted if Pepi didn't recognize it and make the run.

That goal was a thing of beauty: Pulisic received the ball, split two defenders, ran at a third, who came out to defend...as he did so, he created a space and Pepi moved into that space and the run/pass was perfectly timed to put Pepi one on one. It is the type of goal we need to see more of. Create space in the middle and exploit it.

 

Yes indeed it was. And our new "world class" manager would theoretically be aiming even higher, no?

Happy to have Pochetinnno, but so far, let's be real, it ain't ground breaking

 

One of one.

 

We need to talk about this goalline tackle from Yunus Musah late in the second half to keep the USMNT up 1-0 against Jamaica on the road.

Play of the game. pic.twitter.com/sLuWVyHG83

— USMNT Only (@usmntonly) November 15, 2024

 

Berhalter bros are really having a tough go of it.

 

Glad they got the win! A tie would have been fair enough, so great result.

I thought CP, Tessman and Pepi were MVPs.

Ream will get stick but he was good.

McKenzie needs to know when to no nonsense it.

Tillman was crap again. Same verse.

Musah is too passive on the wing but what a great tackle.

Good saves from Turner.

 

i was really glad to see puli and jedi taking some late/cheap shots on jamaican players who were more focused on making this not a soccer match than hitting us.

the two of them, wes and pepi mostly in the first half and tillman were pretty good. i did not anticipate maliks first consistently positive performance for the nats being essentially a lightly defensive beckerman performance, but thats what it was. simple connecting passes, confident on the ball, positionally disciplined.

musah gives us nothing on the right. nothing. tesserman was good adjacent but we need more completed passes out of the cm duo, but it fairness hes just getting into this. its crazy to me that people are so dismissive of morris in light of how strong hes been there in 3 of his first 4 matches, the only down one being when we had absolutely nothing ahead of him to pass to. busio is at a pretty solid level for us over the last couple of windows so its interesting to see how thats going to shake out...

the "back 3" were a hot mess. incredibly bad performance from scally, multiple giveaways above the box and tried getting forward entirely too much. in this setup we need him connected to the cb and lcb at all times, and while i get that (back to musah) we have nothing on that side hes got to keep our shape strong. we arent good enough defensively to play with 2, so when the cms push up at all scally cant as well.

so all in all im over the moon with the result, but the ends dont justify all means. a clean sheet doesnt mean any of the backs or turner deserve a lot of credit, or prove they deserve their spot. we got break upon break upon break tonight- and dont get me wrong, take the money and run- but this was a very lucky, very small step forward for us couched inside the big result.

i think we did see some glimpses, though. the setup and how we are trying to play isnt going to be a quick transition but we saw some quick, flowing actions that got us into good areas. some only got us to the halfway line, some into pass before the pass before the chance territory, one complete example on the goal. i think we saw in the last window- as dreadful as it felt overall- we saw more in how this setup covers us defensively and helps us possess with the ideas to actually build into something...that took a step back here. i very strongly expect weah being back in on that right side is going to feel like a quantum freaking leap forward but its still a very long road on a very short timetable.

but also really lacking tonight? bigsoccer. half the posters here cant even see/grasp how we are playing. entirely too many are excusing defensive performances, "oh, we kept a clean sheet, must not be that bad" while unironically shitting on pepi, dismissing both the goal and the rest of the work he put in. the evaluation around here is legit dumber than a pile of rocks.

anyways, weah is almost certainly going to have a huge effect- essentially half a facelift for the team. wes spent more time on the right in this one than centrally, so that could be the most obvious knock-on effect of weah (an actual presence on that entire side of the field weve been without). the cms will be interesting, both in whos even available and who we go with.

we just need the backline to take a deep breath, shake it off and play cleaner. its new, we all get that, but there was no need for mckenzie and ream to go in so hot on nicholson on the pen, they need to recognize that the gaps are much smaller now. neither of them was late getting there- they were too early, too frazzled.

the "system" is going to need some tweaks along the way, some may be substantial (most likely if/when we get adams and/or gio back in). but i dont think we really have structural problems at this point. we still have to rehab our individual and overall confidence, we need to get familiar with this new shape, style, roles, etc. we need to get a few guys back in, and at some point get some guys out. musah and at least one of aaronson/tillman not having a starting spot that fits them (or vice versa) doesnt make them any less important, so weve got that to figure out. poch has to find the balance between psv and us tillman, or milan musah vs us musah, cause "most talented" and "ability to play a given role" arent the same thing, and no amount of belief or effort is going to change that.

let me put it this way- if musah could see and complete the passes malik did in this one hed be what too many people act like he already is, but he cant pass. and i dont mean well, he cant pass period. hes objectively bad. as useless as he is on the right for us (no one cares about the madrid match) i dont want him in the middle either, outside of a holding/seeing out a result 15 minute shift.

on the same hand if malik can take his performance tonight and his experience over 15 caps to adjust for the lack of time on the ball and physicality higher up the pitch maybe we could stop talking about gio so damn much (i say that as a huge supporter). we dont need psv tillman, we need a ball secure guy able to hold and move the damn ball so our forwards dont have to play at the halfway line, and let our wings cook. we need our cms to receive balls from him and play right back to him with a few more inches of space.

big steps forward are only going to come from a who lot of tiny, barely perceptible improvements. and we dont just need 11 guys.

anyways, im done. we got more breaks than we got improvements tonight- the big changes were getting pepi and wes in. heres hoping we get a little more of those, in addition to timmy, what is it, sunday? just keep working.

 

Why people dislike Pepi?

 

I was happy he wasn't on the field. Wondering if he is still ahead of Kochen.

 

Because ability to finish somehow doesn't look like a talent. And that's his only outstanding quality. People used not to like Miroslav Klose either.

 

You’re right. It is kind of “I don’t want him score goals, but just playing properly in the system” thing. I saw the #1 property for your #9 is to score goal and win games. Maybe I am wrong.

 

Any chance we play 442? Pendulum's gotta be swinging back, right?

 

It's all Haaland does.

 

Correct. From a brave 11 man backs to the wall underdog to a team that's confident in possession and can pass (but can't score).

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Pulisic take a corner with his left foot? An inswinger from the far left of the camera view in the 59th minute?

The ability to hit accurate corners with both feet has to be really rare. I didn't know he had that in his bag.

 

To me it seemed that he was going to take it with his right, but there was a huge puddle in th way. He switched to his left and hit a good inswinger.