I actually would have liked to have seen Tillman earlier last night. I feel like he does well in terms generating scoring chances when the game gets disjointed like it did in the second half. Obviously they don’t really play the same position.
Trying to be as objective as possible I think the biggest difference/handicap the current squad has is no clearcut experienced, hardened and high IQ leader in midfield. The Bradley/Jones double pivot will forever be underrated. I easily take those two as a combo over any combo of Musah, McKennie, Adams, Cardoso, currently. It's the spine of the damn team. In general I completely agree we are missing the general vet presence dudes like Cherundolo, Bocanegra, Gooch, etc offered. Just a stabilizing presence while importantly- top 23 level players.
Have been watching and saying for several years that combining a bunch of mostly role players that get to defer at club and let other, better players lead, results in a worse team than one made up of leaders at lesser clubs. The MMA is great for 35 then 20 minutes in each half to shut down the other midfield and try to make something out of sheer tenacity, but it doesn’t create and it’s a liability the other 35 minutes. Players aren’t as good as many hoped/believed. But Gregg’s ideas have run their course and aren’t leading to anything. I think the team needs a new coach.
CONCACAF performance: 1. Panama 6 points, advance 2. Canada 4 points ,advance 3. Mexico 4 points, out 4. Costa Rica 4 points, out 5. USA 3 points, out 6. Jamaica 0 points, out
US won three NL titles: First one under Gregg: Semi — barely pass (a very late goal assists by Brooks\Wes, scored by Pefok) Final — nail biting over Mexico Second one under BJ: Semi — run over Mexico Final — beat comfortably over Canada Third one under Gregg: Semi — saved by a miracle own goal Final — beat comfortably over Mexico
I just think people for a long time have been looking at Richards with hope. The one guy we hope has a high ceiling. But he's not there yet. I'll never forget the Bayern Munich academy director saying the reason they loved and signed Chris Richards was because he's like an elite basketball player who happens to play soccer. Even for them, those kinds of athletes aren't easy to find. The two guys who Chris has been competing with at CB at Palace each started all of their nation's games at the Euros. Both teams that made the knockout rounds. Andersen of Denmark and Guehi of England. That's the way it goes at the PL level. And yet Chris still played 2500 minutes for Palace this season. They got him on the field. What I will say about the USMNT right now is this. We have a thread on our goalkeeping pool problems. We have a thread about our CB pool problems. We've talked at length about our fullback depth problems. We've talked about our #9 pool problems. We've talked about how our wing players aren't that great after Pulisic. We've talked about how Musah didn't have a great club season. De la Torre is being shopped by his bad Spanish club. There are people on this board who really don't seem to like McKennie. Adams is always hurt. I can keep going. And yet the same people who believe all of that with regards to the talent on this USMNT, still act like they're shocked we lost to Uruguay. Clutching their pearls in disbelief. Uruguay just beat Brazil and Argentina in WCQing. Beat Argentina 2-0 in Buenos Aires. The problem for the USMNT in this tournament wasn't this Uruguay loss. That was kinda expected when we saw the draw. We're not as good as Uruguay right now. it was the Panama loss. We can analyze that game until the cows come home, but the #1 reason we lost that game was the red card. Cuz the last time Berhalter and this "A" team played Panama at home, we blew them off the field 5-1.
The red card was a gut check and we were found wanting. I dont want to see it used as an excuse. We have chased all the good refs out of the sport and all we are left with are the bad ones. This goes for the Euros too. We need to find a way to hold the line while a man down and we failed to do that.
Agreed that we'll never again be overlooked underdogs now that we have so much more visible talent overseas. But why does that mean we can't meet expectations? Or at least not massively disappoint them? Or play to our level so that we beat opponents we should beat? Or play with a relentless, never-say-die intensity? Or perform well abroad in Concacaf? The thing we seem to have lost is much more than underdog status.
The #1 reason we lost that Panama game was the red card. Weah's actions. A whole analysis of the Panama game without that is idiotic. There are easily google-able statistics on what happens in international soccer when a team goes down a man in the first half. Even ones broken down by whether the higher ranked team is the one that goes down in the first half. Yes it would have been nice to have "held the line." Is that what happens in most games people watch in which a team goes down a man in the first half???? Panama ain't St. Lucia. Anway, as far as the Uruguay game goes....................Uruguay is better than us. That we already knew. Or at least I thought we did. There's a reason that before the tournament started, we were 5th favorites in Vegas after Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, and Colombia. Uruguay and Colombia are actually in better form than Argentina and Brazil. Is Colombia on a 25 game unbeaten streak now? And for a while some had Mexico as a higher favorite than us (based on their draw in the knockout round being perceived as potentially easier than ours. In the end that didn't matter on either account).
I suppose there's a chance Miles is not really back all the way, or Richards has still been better. Or maybe Berhalter is just stubborn.
He sees Miles every day in training so something is up. I can’t say myself but a serious injury he is coming back from.
Right. Berhalter's also a guy, though, who will stick with a guy he believes in, so Richards may be getting some of that as well. He's clearly the guy with the most upside.
Potter I could see but even he's a stretch, to say nothing of the likes of Klopp, Poch, et. al. unless some sponsor of USSF decided to pony up the money in order to sign someone of that caliber.
To be fair, Nunez got a yellow (that was a red if you ask me) which was Uruguay's first yellow of the tournament. Adams could be said to have been reckless on the play where he got stepped on. Since he had time to pull out of the play where Uruguay got to the ball first and followed through anyway, he got the yellow and his foot getting stomped gets interpreted as a legitimate defensive action. I feel like Colombia was the best team we played.
He's another player who could work as a 3rd cb man marking one side. In that way he ressembles Miles Robinson (or scally if we use scally as a cb). We lack an anchor back like Zimmerman or Ream.
Looking through the heat maps against Uruguay, the midfield offensively is interesting. McKennie doesn't stay back -- he goes wide and basically takes up the role Scally isn't doing because he doesn't come forward. He does this a lot at club, but it's also pretty clear that Uruguay didn't let him have the ball centrally. Adams actually didn't stay back -- he filled that central hole. But he's not a creator. Musah was freaking absent. His heat map almost doesn't exist. But where it doesn't he's not overly sitting back, either. Uruguay clearly did a good job of not allowing anyone to touch it centrally except Adams -- not shocking as Uruguay is good at that crap. Not entirely sure this was too conservative as much as it was good defense and perhaps a subpar match from Musah and McKennie. I say perhaps because Uruguay is not chopped liver.
We scored 2 goals on Bolivia. Panama scored 3 on them. Uruguay scored 5. We scored one goal on Panama. We scored 0 on Uruguay. Rinse and repeat WC peformance. If soccer were shampoo we would have no hair left. As for the red card, remember the criticism of Berhalter's in game mgmt after Dest's red card v. Trinidad? What do you think of his mgmt of Panama game? Say you play a 433 and get a red card: You can go into a 441 and effectively defend as well as a 442 (if not better since subs can be made to tailor the situation). Tony Meola pointed something similar out in his post game analysis. has anybody asked Greg what his thinking was?
He doesn't want to get criticized for using an MLS player in a game he will lose. He is choosing players to avoid black marks on his record. He is hiding behind team badges.
Perhaps it has been mentioned, however I read somewhere that Uruguay fielded more MLS players when defeating us on Monday than Greg did.
And when I said, at the earliest part of this process, that he should go to the Olympics instead of Copa America, I was argued down to my socks. Can't have that, because his feelings would get hurt. We need more leaders at the top, instead of people too cowardly to make the tough choices.
It's true, and people say the opposite thing about other players on less prestigious teams, but that do play regularly. That's why some people think I'm crazy for wanting certain less popular players to start. I watch them, they look good, what do I know