Unlike Yedlin he has skills other than being fast. He's an excellent passer, he's technically skilled in general on the ball, and as the winner scored against France via his rebound can attest, he has a scorching shot. Yes his defense isn't complete and still lacks consistency, but if you're gonna harp on his performance against Ukraine, and that moronic blown header that genuinely may have cost us the title (Ukraine's path as group winner was infinitely easier than ours as a runner up), you also have to give him credit for his radically improved performance in the games after that, particularly vs France. His defense isn't as good as his attacking game, but any and every player can be made to look bad if all you focus on is literally his worst ever moment in a uniform.
I’d add I don’t think anyone is saying anoint him best 11 lock starter either. More so bring him up and give him a taste of what the full team is. Run him out against the full team and see how he adapts. Give him some minutes in a game and send him home with a list of items to work on and see how he does with his club.
If Ajax views him as a starter or perhaps their 3rd Fullback, ready to step in at LB, or RB, we sure as hell can use him. You think Ajax is going to be slipping an offer for Lovitz to come on over as their first Fullback off the bench? I didn't think so. And again, I don't give a blank that he isn't a starter, that he doesn't have a club career. The MLS lifers we handed the keys too in 2017 humiliated the program worse than 1954-1988 did. I'd start the entire U20 WC team over our senior national team options GGG went with at Cupcake, and in March, and hell in June, at least there's hope with that U20 team, those January/March call ups, and a sizable chunk of the June/Gold Cup choices offer NOTHING, not a thing, in the present, or the future.
The season is still earlier let’s see how it goes for him. However, Lovitz is and has always been shit and not good enough. The issue is as long as 3G plays this system there’s only 2 spots open for an outside back. He’d be competing with Yedlin, Cannon and Lima. Now I’d still bring him up like I said and see what he’s got. I’d also stop trying to be cute and play a traditional 4-3-3 but that’s another story.
Pay attention to U.S. dual national Jens Cajuste. The Swedish-born American will turn 20 in 2 days and has locked down a starting job with a Midtjylland team that should contend for the Danish Superliga title. Plays a variety of positions but d-mid is his best. https://t.co/HGQSyC4dKg— Brian Sciaretta (@BrianSciaretta) August 8, 2019
I prefer my DMs leading their teams to failed qualification efforts and missing playoffs...Superliga titles are of no concern...
Philippe Sandler is on the books at Manchester City, and currently on loan at Anderlecht where he's started their last 2 games at CB next to Kompany. He's a 22 year old from Amsterdam who's mother is from Los Angeles. I've also heard people claim that he's eligible for South Africa though I haven't seen an official source on that. He does a have a few Dutch U20 caps, but he's too old to play for any Dutch youth teams, and the CB position is going to be tough to break into at the senior level. The USMNT and South Africa might have a chance at him. though we're not exactly struggling at CB either.
Re: Araujo, he was on a podcast expressing disappointment that he hadn't been in the original call up for the U-20WC, and then that he left his club team and didn't play. He's ripe for flattery from the Mex Fed. Imo, if they call him up, just to f*ck with us, so be it. B/c that is clearly what they are doing. JonGon does not appear to be in their plans. If they want to cap a 17 year old player with 7 club appearances (or whatever it is), whom they've never shown any interest in, so be it. On the other hand, as I've also said, the guys that are closer - the guys that showed well at the u-20 WC, should be capped immediamente. That is the blessing of the Nations League or whatever it is called. If Berhalter & Co, are not using that to captie emerging players, they are idiots. The crappy thing is, I've long said there is more money for MLS in developing players for the Mex Nat Team than the U.S. Them, hiring that guy that used to coach for Mex, and then him pow wowing with Mex Fed guy trying to poach a player is just evidence of where MLS's interests lie.
I think Araujo is being a bit of a diva here. There have always been younger players playing up who didn’t get time at the U20 WC. They usually were two or three of the stars at the next one since they were still eligible. Don’t ever remember bitching from any of them. Don’t remember Cerrillo griping this time and he had the same situation except he was starting every game and lost his spot for FCD and also didn’t play at all for the US.
Araujo was asked multiple direct questions about it on the Scuffed podcast, and answered honestly. Maybe you don't remember Cerrillo "griping" because no one has publicly asked him about it? If Cerrillo was asked "Were you disappointed to not play a single minute at the U-20 World Cup" what do you think he would answer? What kind of professional athlete with even the most humble ambitions would NOT be disappointed by that?? Do you want them to lie? Or just to not talk to the media at all? Because that is the difference between the two, one went on a podcast (that everyone from half a dozen of his U-20 teammates like Dest to his U-20 coach Tab Ramos has been on), and the other has not (likely because he hasn't been asked, sorry to break it to you Mr. FC Dallas fan but most USYNT watchers don't really care about Cerrillo). But apparently that's enough for you to hold up Cerrillo as the ideal and label Araujo a griping bitching diva. Edit: Also Cerrillo lost the starting spot he already had with Dallas to Servania who was also at the U-20 World Cup at the same time, so that's not really comparable to Araujo who had an opportunity to play for LA due to injuries but missed out on those minutes because he was busy not playing at the U-20 World Cup. Also also, Araujo has 426 minutes for LA over their last 7 games, Cerrillo has 56 minutes for Dallas over their last 7 games. You think Mexico has an equal level of interest in both... do they have any interest in your boy? If not, do you think that's because they consider one to be a better talent than the other, or because one went on a podcast and the other didn't? Think long and hard before answering. Comparing the two is just absurd on so many levels.
I'm of the mindset that at the National Team level, you take the guys who want to be there. You don't chase after people and beg them to like you. If they don't like you, tough...deal with the goals we're going to pile on your head and watch as we walk of the field victorious. Any other mindset is a losers mindset. I'm afraid that our USMNT culture is a loser culture with loser fans. Everyone cries about missed opportunities in coddling some kid so that they'll be liked. If they want to play for Mexico, let them...who cares. We need to quit caring about Mexico and start caring about our own again like we used to when we owned Mexico day in and day out and they chased our players around trying to hurt them because we had their manhood in a vice.
Soto was the star forward for the US U20s at the recent U20 World Cup (in the absence of Sargent). He's eligible for three countries. His father is Chilean. His mother is Mexican. He was born in the US. Played at the RSL academy before moving to Germany and Hannover. He's already made his first team debut, but hasn't had an impact on first team soccer just yet. Just another preemptive strike. We are producing a bunch of really good prospects from our domestic academy programs. Many, many of these kids are dual nationals. If we're producing good players, we should EXPECT other nations to call and kick the tires. All we can do is to continue showing our commitment to the players and let them know they're in our plans. Soto (along with Araujo and others) was JUST at the U20 World Cup with us. Chile has contacted U.S. U-20 international Sebastian Soto about playing for La Roja: https://t.co/hyDrkmROJb #usynt #usmnt— Jeff Carlisle (@JeffreyCarlisle) August 15, 2019
It's good that these nations are looking to US academies for their players. Its up to our players and coaches to make the USMNT a preferred destination for those with conflicted interests. I enjoyed watching Soto play, but if he chooses something else then he probably shouldn't have been here in the first place and shame on him for using the USMNT set up as a platform to audition for other countries while he should have been doing that through his club play. That would be unethical and would show poorly on him and maybe his parents.
Anyway, in most cases we panic on these boards for no real reason. We have a very high retention rate. Folks surely remember that Croatia was courting Pulisic for years across youth and senior levels. We as fans knows that we're colossal hypocrites in this regard, which is fine. We're fans. We expect our federation to be poaching all of the players they can from other programs, while at the same time we're enraged about similar instances in which players leave our program for elsewhere. Was anybody on these boards calling Tyler Boyd shameful and unethical? I doubt it.
It is professionally unethical to do what the player would potentially do in this circumstance. It's beneficial for the player obviously, but it would not have been handled professionally. The professional way to handle such things is to decline attendance in something like the U20 World Cup until you are committed to that program. A national team is not a typical job. It is an opportunity to represent your country. However, even in the case of employment in a typical workplace it is unethical to have an employer pay for training and development and then leave that employer for a competitor when the actual work begins.
This is going to sound tangential but I don't think it is. My response to people holding up B.1 treatment of our players as gospel on their form is this. How many times does a Landon or Steffen exit Germany from disuse only for the B.1 to come back calling when they hit their stride? There is some smug arrogance to this process. The player usually hasn't changed that much. But he plays now so he's good. Taking the thought over to USMNT, for reasons inexplicable to me GB seems wedded to a selection that is about 50-60% old or odd. That impacts the Landon equivalents coming up. But in their case they would make a permanent decision. There is no apologetic second act where you can say, oops. Our future is riding on the talent bubble coming up. If other teams raid the bubble, we're dead in the water. I understand this lame "prove it" mentality but we may begin losing players with choices to further the meh status quo. And, be real, the talent is coming up. It's not these veterans. We have the benefit of hindsight here. We can see how Zardes, Jozy, Bradley, Roldan, etc. look. I don't see how that passes for its own "prove it" show. And then the risk is we watch a team that couldn't qualify get an encore while the kids with choices vote with their feet. I do not believe the kids are objectively worse than the 23rd man on the roster, so to speak, and I'm going to get miffed if we double down on the present at the expense of the future. Last, I am getting annoyed with the self defeating self righteous "principles." We have to become a passing team that fields only the most loyal players. To make clear where that leads, I'd swear that some of the people pushing the "style change" literally said, I'd gladly miss a world cup to change the way we play. I worry we are starting to make snotty arrogant trade offs without as honestly acknowledging the potential consequences. That some would be content if it ran aground as long as we stuck to the mantras. I'd rather root for a winner. And the laughable part to this discussion is anyone with eyes sees this bunch isn't good enough and the talent is in the next generation coming up. If you start capping people the problem disappears. We are not yet in a phase where there is an absolute requirement to play our best. To me the cap tying is like an infinite roster slot and salary cap process. There is no payroll limit. You don't have to cut anyone out of the pool permanently. You don't even have to commit to the player for every game going forward. You just cap them and go from there. We act like we are marrying them. No, you give them the proverbial 10 minute sub in garbage time that defines their choice. You then see if they add to the team. This is all upside. To me the only downside here is you can be manipulative on both sides. Teams can cap people they're not sure they can use who might fit better on a smaller side. But that's ethical as opposed to strategical. Strategical, as JK showed, is cap AJ and Julian Green now and worry about the rest later.
My "ethics" are this: if they play hard on the field who cares. I think some of the critics have had their family tree here too long and don't get what it's like to have to negotiate choices. A friend of mine whose parents were from Ireland, and whose Irish roots were never all that present as kids, was sent back to Ireland for HS and college summers and in that process met and married an Irish wife. Was just a normal rock n roll and track n field guy for decades that I knew him. His parents were the very Irish ones. And then. Surely you can see how dynamics could work with other recent immigrant kids. That's not them hating on America or not being loyal enough. They are flying back and forth to different countries and living there. They have to negotiate a number of ties. If the USA doesn't show interest, but Ireland or Chile does? To me what matters is how they play on the field. No one would ever question Jermaine Jones in the shirt. Know why? We saw how he played. Drop the abstract bs and judge them by how they show up when we run them out. If we cut the political crap that field play is all we need to know.
Professionalism is not about feelings of loyalty. It's about handling yourself in a way that shows that you know how to make intelligent and ethical choices with foresight. If a player has multiple options, its perfectly reasonable to consider them all. However, it reflects poorly on someone to jump into a decision that they are not sure about, allow a National Institution to invest in you and develop you while giving you the opportunities that could be given to someone else, and then to change course and commitment because something else presents itself that you may feel better about when the time comes. That is a decision that never reflects well on you as a person. It reflects poorly on you because of your inability to resist your own impulses.
I think most on here are of a similar mindset. Show interest. Get young players involved in the academies and youth national teams. Give them call ups to the NT when they have gotten to that level. But its all about matters of degrees. Show interest but don't kiss butts. Give them chances but if they aren't interested move on.
Invite them to camps to see if its a fit. Leave the door open. If its a fit, then keep calling them in when they earn it. If not? Adios. Vaya con dios. There should be no need to coddle these kids or flatter them with attention. To play at this level they have to want it pretty badly anyway. I'll take 11 Landon Donovans (players who view the national team as more important than their club team) over 11 Fabian Johnsons every time (players who do well at their club, but never translate that well to the national team).