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

Any of those turf surfaces that are temporarily installed in NFL stadiums during European pre-season tours... after use, can we just donate one to Jamaica?

 

I think the dodgy pitch = home advantage. They don't have the benefit of altitude or sub-freezing temperatures.

 

I was kind of shocked that there was only 1 Concacaf road win under Berhalter... I had no idea it was that bad. It seemed a fairly typical Concacaf game, hacking down players, terrible field, bad refereeing, so glad to come out with a win early. I think theres a bunch of players I would swap out but I can see what they are going for.

 

Actually, I have to disagree. He is much more muscular and tougher than he used to be. He is basically built like Modric. If the balance is good, no problems.

 

Musah passed to Vazquez instead of passing into his shooting lane. The ball was behind Vazquez

 

This is a bit of a sidetrack but most top forwards these days are finishing specialists. I can think of very few forwards who have all parts of the game. My favorite is R9. What a beast. He could it all.

 

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He’s still young for a striker. He should be getting more reps to work on the grunt work part of being a 9.

 

sounds like excuses. He fooked up

 

I didnt see the gaffe, but man, if that's true, and why wouldn't it be, it changes nothing with McKenzie. The problem has always been "a catastrophic gaffe a game" and just praying that it doesn't impact the bottom line. Until he can get his brain on straight, he's not startable for that precise reason.

 

I was using tongue-in-cheek. You're right about the advantage. But even more so, the climatic conditions of a Caribbean island (and also probably soil conditions) don't necessarily support the maintenance of grass types built to resist being pulled up easily from their roots due to heavy athletic activity.

 

I thought that was the play of the game as well. Musah can't do that playing cmid. Getting a good view of the way Jamaica was approaching the goal, he could see what would happen and intervened. Great stuff.

b.t.w., do you use Bluesky (used to be my handle on Netflix in the good ol' days)?

German soccer club St. Pauli is leaving X, saying it has become a 'hate machine' under Musk

 

Scally with another absolute nightmare. Dude completed more passes to Jamaica than US shirts, his ridiculously bad pass is what created their penalty opportunity (McKenzie helped like he always does).

Musah had to constantly bail him out defensively as well because no, he isn’t even in particularly good as a 1 v 1 defender either. My man is a turnstile, Cephus rounded the corner like he wasn’t even there.

 

Not saying Scally was good...

But he completed the most passes of any player in the match, 61/68 (90%)

 

Well the 7 he missed were all chances created for Jamaica. He was god awful.

 

Busio did well, surprisingly.
Scally just scares me as a fullback. His passing is only good if there is no pressure.
This is the type of game Tessman likes, down and dirty in the gridiron.
Puli played with a chip on his shoulder.
Tillman did ok for being a soft player, he put in a good shift.
Pepi did his thing as always.

Mckenzie did well with routine passes and interceptions, but because he is shaky when it comes to tough plays, I given give him a C+ grade. Trusty and Richards are better players with more size.

I noticed something. We need to improve our game when the opponent presses. Mexico figured it out and Jamaica took a page of that playbook.

 

Oh yeah that's a great point, I forgot about the PK. That does change the way these numbers read. cc @gogorath @Marko72

 

concacaf teams have garbage pitches because its the best they can do and to close the talent gap. jamaica doesnt overwater the pitch when trinidad comes to town cause trinidads pitch sucks too.

i dont have any problem with playing in cold-er places, but within reason. at some point its closing the talent gap on ourselves, and thats just dumb.

 

Surely AI can be harnessed to get us immediate all-touch videos for every player. What is the holdup?

I need them because the difference in views on a few players is wide enough to deserve a second look.

 

Well, look at the play. Vazquez is approaching the box

go to 4:34 of vid below where you see Musah just hesitating a little too much before trying pass to wide open Puli in the box and it's too late - on a pass similar to the one to Vazquez. I went back to have another look at Musah/Vazquez muck up and decided it was a pitch issue. (7:35 of vid).


Lest anybody think I'm being hard on Musah, let me add that he seems to have bought into Poch's plans and as you see, he is creating chances while also coming up with a huge defensive play. Poch is the first manager to manage that problem. That's why the guy gets paid a lot of money. He was getting Chelsea to play as well when they fired him, without cause imo.

I like that Poch is trying to get Scally to actually apply the gifts he has in the passing department instead of ending up a goofer. We need Musah to play "with" Scally to unlock Scally's passing. One thing I like about Musah / Scally combo is that neither is an injury prone player and they should have time to gel and create. Weah has had hamstring surgery. I'm not sure how fragile Paredes is. He hasn't played since Oly. Late Nov they said. IN any case, Kevin Paredes may be back up for ARob - if he doesn't flat out replace him - if he gets enough minutes between now and summer '26.

For me, 2 deep, considering Poch's style:

--------------------------------Balo/Pepi
-----------------brenden/busio----puli/gio (cole in "spare" for Gio)

----AR/kev--------------------------------------weah/musah

---------------tessman/adams/johnny/aiden

-------------ream/trusty/mcKzie/R/chds/scally (you figure it out, Poch)

-----------------------------------gk: Turner + 2

supernumeraries in 26 man squad: Hot strikers: Haji/Sarge/Paxten/Vazquez

Poch may find somebody in Jan camp who can hang and be added in here, considering we'll have injuries.

 

And passing out of the back is what we are looking for. Doesn't mean that young Scally will win his spot if he can't learn to avoid the "goofs". Scally actually has range on his left foot from the rb position but I dont think they ask him to do that at club. With good counterpressers like Aaronson, Scally could hit switches and let Brenden chase, e.g., when he (scally) gets in a jam or outnumbered with no outlet to moose/weah/balo/pepi nearby.

 

A flaw in using xG to determine which team had more/better chances is that xG only counts shots. For example, Pulisic's pass to Vasquez that he flubbed was a golden chance (pretty high xG if he takes a first time shot) but instead came to nothing. I feel like we had a decent number of good opportunities where we didn't even get a shot due to pitch, etc., whereas Jamaica's philosophy seemed to be shoot when you see the goal.

I think xG is a great stat, but I think "add up all xG and see which team was more dangerous" has real flaws in a single game sample.

 

this is how we need to answer the pitch BS ....

 

woke up in themiddle of the night and had a little trouble sleeping for a while so i tosssed some thoughts from last night through my empty head.

A few thoughts:
Musah. Started off the game very poorly. Gave the ball away cheaply in areas that weren't immediately dangerous but could have led to something dangerous. As the night wore on, he became more ball secure but still didn't add much if anything offensively. What he did do is he found a way to contribute and that is what good players do. When they aren't playing well, they find some other way to contribute. He worked hard on defense and came up with the big play and helped out on defense several times during the course of the night. As it turns out, he saved a goal which is as good as scoring a goal. That game, hopefully, is an indication of increased maturity.
Pulisic. The biggest thing that stands out to me is his decision making. Jamaica wasn't giving him a lot of space but he wasn't losing the ball and when opportunities came up, he was improving our position. The goal, which was obviously huge is an excellent example. In the past, he probably would have started the run exactly the same, split the two defenders and dribble toward goal but as the third defender stepped up to defend him I think he would have tried to beat him as well giving the defense to adjust and probably taking the ball. Instead, he recognized the spaces he was creating for Pepi and put the ball into that space. I haven't been watching him in Italy, but if that play is any indication of how he is playing there, I am not at all surprised by his importance to AC Milan. As good as Pulisic has been for us at times, if that play is an indicator of his new level, then we have raised our ceiling.
Pepi. People talk about his finishing but ignore or downplay some other facets of his game. I agree that he needs to improve in certain areas but many people (not all) seem to ignore his work. He runs and chases and presses all game. That being said, you don't choose a striker for his work effort you choose him for his goals and he gets them but not just because he is a good finisher. He gets them because he is very good at finding space. He is constantly moving, slipping into gaps and running off a defender's shoulder. Combine that with, what seems to be, a excellent ability to read our players to make it easier for them to make that killer pass and we have a striker with instincts that are difficult or impossible to teach. He's still only 21, so he definitely has time to improve in all areas.
Tessman. I didn't watch him too closely but I was impressed by his range of passing and the fact that he held his own in the back defensively. Many of the players were somewhat neutral in terms of what they offered. I guess you could say invisible. For the most part what Tessman's passes did, imo, was to relieve pressure and usually to a part of the field that was inherently less dangerous (ie further up the field to an open wing). Those passes ranged from very simple to suave.
Busio. I think he came in and epitomized "doing what was asked of him" in that situation. I was a bit worried but he came in, played big (or at least relative to his size), did his job and I think he earned a bit more trust.

Overall, I think the player above helped their position in the team. As for the rest, I don't think anyone really stood out in a positive way, I didn't see any performances that were horrible and the conditions were such that I don't see anyone being demoted based on this performance alone.

 

Probably also worth noting, when people are to some extent in the, "Take the win, but god that sucked" category, and conceding the field issues and what not that again, we are currently suffering under an unusual absolute litany of injuries:
Striker #1, #3 and #4 all out injured
Wing Forward: #2 out on a red card, and #3 out injured (Wright), #4 sick (Aaronson) and #5 out injured (Sargent?)
#10: Out injured (Reyna)
#6: Out injured (Adams)
RB: Out Injured (Dest)
CB#2/#3: Out injured (Richards)

I'm probably forgetting guys too, but it's quite easy to point out that this lineup was missing, at bare minimum, 5 of 11 starters.

The injury issues that washed over the October window, have also decimated the November window, the fact that a guy here or there has made it back, doesn't make up for the fact that Reyna, Balo, and Dest, 3 of our best 6 attacking players, are out), and that Adams, is working his way back to fitness, but not healthy enough to be called in after missing 18 months. Add in to that that basically 3/4's of our strikers are out injured, and nearly all of our backup WIng Forwards were either injured or sick, except for the one that was out on a red card.

We won this game away despite missing go to positional starters at every level of the team (defense, midfield and striker) and in all, half of the first XI field players in totality were missing.

We were already bad when these guys were healthy in '23-'24, add a new coach, and a tsunami of injuries, and there is a ton of nuance to explain away a great deal of the disappointment in terms of performance.