Every coach in every sport ever has said something like that. Bill Belicheck, Phil Jackson, Pep Guardiola. It's an excuse, and every coach makes them. The day of, or the day after, in an interview when everyone in the room wants to know why your team didn't perform as well as they could have, and the coach has to say something more intelligent than "we just didn't." However, saying it this long after the fact is embarrassing. Three of the four teams in our group made the semifinals of the tournament, and the other was us. Our opponents were better than we were, and it showed. No shame in admitting that. One guy that needs to never be part of this group again is Jack McBean. IMO, he's actually regressed since he made his first team debut at 16 years old. Let's cast the net in a direction completely opposite of him, please.
Klinsmann's comments about the U21s, the U18s, and YNTs in general: http://www.topdrawersoccer.com/the9...eaks-on-the-u21s-the-u18s-and-the-ynt-system/
This is why senior national team coaches aren't kept around for more than one World Cup cycle. I see a serious problem with Ramos having both the U21s and U20s. He will be biased.
I'm also a bit skeptical, but I'm not ready to sound the alarm just yet. Pretty much everyone in this camp is worth a look at some point in the cycle (except probably McIntosh) and it's not a crime to bring them in. The mistake isn't taking a first look, the mistake is developing tunnel vision with regards to the player pool down the road. It's not yet clear whether this is "same old, same old" or whether Ramos will bring in a different crew for the next few camps. We're still two years out and a lot can happen. I'd like to see a bunch of NCAA players brought to a camp in December or January after the college season when we should have even more clarity about who the standout NCAA YNT-eligibles are. BTW, does anybody know who Paul Blanchette is? All I know about him is that he's a 94 keeper at Loyola Marymount. He was on the All-WCC Freshman team in 2012 and was the GK of the Year in the conference in 2013....ahead of Kendall McIntosh at both steps. I have no idea how good Blanchette is, of course, but it doesn't bode well that McIntosh isn't even considered the best 94 GK in the WCC.
I am baffled by that choice and before I read your comment my first thought was "he must be blowing someone on the coaching staff." I know that's crass, but there are several current GKs in college soccer who are both US citizens and born in 93 or 94 who have out-performed McIntosh in college soccer. Most of y'all know the names, so I won't bother reciting them unless someone wants to hear them. As for the rest of the roster, nothing I can really quibble with, though I do find it interesting that only two current NCAA players were picked. Probably a few more late-bloomer or in college for school or a lack of a pro offer types who could warrant a look, though in reality not too many.
We're not there yet but we're getting close with the new CBA the money will convince players to sign with MLS or USL Pro teams for good money after 1 or 2 yrs of college. At some point if you want to be considered a top player convince a professional team to pay you to develop vs other pro players rather than amateurs.
If MLS allows them to enter the draft or otherwise sign. Still to restrictive in that regard, for reasons that aren't really clear. They need to be trying to get more underclassmen signed, not fewer.
Re: McIntosh, the simple explanation is that our youth coaches don't give a shit about reserve goalkeepers. Ever since the days of Curtis Spiteri and probably long before, our coaches have just stuck with the first names they settled on (the single noteworthy exception was Thomas Rongen with Sean Johnson). I don't think Cuevas ever even made the bench for a league match. They started him in their first Copa MX game (an event where teams run out a lot of reserves), but he didn't start again in CopaMX. Villarreal didn't do much better in the second division. I don't believe he made the bench until the last league game of the season, and in the end, he played something like five minutes.
Oops, I went to post the roster because for some reason I could not see past page 2. Now I see all pages and the roster is already out.
Best 11 from this group GK: Jon Kempin RB: Oscar Sorto CB: Shane O'Neill CB: Christian Dean LB: Dillon Serna LCM: Wil Trapp RCM: Luis Gil CAM: Alejandro Guido LW: Jordan Morris RW: Benji Joya CF: Sean Okoli
Yedlin, Miller, Salgado, Flores, Zimmerman, Lopez, Hernandez, Kovar, Jacole Turner, Okwuono, Robinson, Ambrose are some of the notable names left out of the camp. The first four of those guys probably would have been there if they could have attended. The rest are guys that I'd at least consider. There are probably some other NCAA guys that deserve consideration as well. Thats it for the North American guys that I can think of. Ramos probably should have called in more players, but its only the first camp. I'm not worried yet. If he's not casting a wide net a year from now, it will be a concern.
From reading the USSF releases on this, they seem (to me at least) to make it clear that Ramos is just taking over this camp. They don't say he's going to be the coach of this team long-term. We're two years out from qualifying for the 2016 Olympics. Hopefully when we get little closer to the competition, a permanent head coach will be assigned to the group. This particular camp just seems to be a way to keep the recent U20 group enganged with the national team program. It certainly doesn't seem like a 'casting the net' exercise. Ramos has been so busy with the U20's recently. Do we think he's actually had to time to scout/evaluate U21 players that he isn't familiar with? Probably not I guess........... I guess its possible that when the 2015 U20 cycle is over, Ramos will take over the U23s. There'd still be a full calendar year prior to U23 CONCACAF championships. And somebody else will be promoted to the U20s. Hugo Perez or Javier Perez or somebody like that. I'm not a fan of that idea, but we'll see....................
I would agree in terms of the draw, the draw was horrific, basically landing us in a group with a contender for champion (Spain), the actual champion (France), and a semi-finalist (Ghana-lost to France in the SF's). We couldn't have been more unlucky considering how that played out. But I don't see what breaks he's talking about. Ghana and Spain beat the piss out of us, and we got a lucky late equalizer against France (and btw, seems like Cuevas hype may have been placed a little too much on a right place, right time goal, all nice and good, but I didn't see anything else from him that separated him from other talents in the group).
So what euro players would be here if they were available? Thinking Rodriguez, Brooks, Packwood, Holmes (would be his first time representing US), Stanko.. can't think of anybody else
Had his first appearance since his injury two weeks ago. I think he came off the bench in their next game as well.
All we can say is that the coaching staff must see raw tools in McIntosh that they really like. Although if we come up with a list of other options that might be available for this camp, who would they'd be. This is an MLS-dominated roster. Not many young keepers in MLS to call up. I'd love to know if they called Richard Sanchez or Jesse Gonzalez of FCD to gauge their interest. As far as NCAA keepers go, I could only name keepers that we took a look at last U20 cycle. Tomas Gomez of Georgetown, etc.
I have no objection to debating the merits of a callup. For the record, the U20 GK pool last cycle was Cropper, McIntosh, Steffen, Gomez, Jesus Guzman, Kamil Kaminski, Jon Kempin, Jake McGuire, Daniel Medina, Tyler Miller and Andrew Wolverton.
And we have to remember that we ended up taking Zach Steffen "up a cycle" instead of selecting a player like Gomez. So the staff must not have been too impressed with that group. I've liked Gomez whenever I've seen him for Georgetown (which is admittedly only on 2-3 times.) Wasn't it Alex Bono of Syracuse that some people were calling for?
Yep. Another name that deserves mention is Bernabe Magana at Pumas. He's been their U20 starter for a long while now.
Two important details in this USSF release: http://www.ussoccer.com/stories/2014/04/21/09/25/140421-u21-mnt-gil-trapp 1) Midfielders Luis Gil (hamstring) of Real Salt Lake and Wil Trapp (groin) of the Columbus Crew will not attend U.S. Under-21 Men’s National Team camp as they recover from minor injuries suffered with their respective clubs. 2) The camp also consists of an international friendly match against Club Tijuana on Wednesday. I'm not surprised that Gil was withdrawn. He hasn't played the last several RSL games due to a hamstring injury. Trapp? Apparently he has a minor groin injury.