After a more objective second viewing of USA vs. Belgium...

Sort of like one hand clapping, isnt it.....

 

I'm sure you would find many who agree with you. I do not.

 

Be nice to have them add in all those crosses he cut out. Tim's hands were amazing. Heroic performance.

 

This is not how it happened!
Someone is trying to make Klinsmann look bad!!

 

Excellent.

 

I didn't particularly notice any technical improvement. Esp. with Bradley at AM

We got thrown off by the early lead against Ghana,
Rocked the house against Portugal
Played understandably dull against Germany
And then with the opposite of abandon against Belgium, which is standard intl fare for knockout games, no? (especially with our lack of legit attacking options)

Not exactly a nuanced in-depth breakdown, but I think thats a fair summation.

The team (slightly?) exceeded expectations given the group. I think no Donovan was utter folly, but overall JK did what he was supposed to do; and long-haul the team will be better for it.

 

Buoyed by Howard (though the first goal let in against Ghana was a bit disappointing -- got caught leaning far post), I think JK pulled all the levers cobbling our back line together

 

I didn't quote it all, but very good post.

That Klinsmann botched the Belgium match, very badly indeed, is now clear to all except those who are locked into supporting Klinsmann. The only real defense of Klinsmann for the Belgium game was the (alleged) tremendous disparity in talent that meant that the U.S. inevitably would be bombarded with shots.

Now that we've seen a full array of knockout round matches, that defense can no longer be offered.

Shots on target, premier teams against teams of roughly U.S. quality -

Brazil 13 (Chile)
Holland 8 (Mexico)
France 9 (Nigeria)
Germany 16 (Algeria)
Holland 15 (Costa Rica)

U.S. 27 (Belgium)

I think U.S. fans have every right to expect the U.S. to play Belgium as well as those teams played Brazil, Holland, France, and Germany. Are we really ready to let our coach off the hook by arguing that Chile, Mexico, Nigeria, Algeria, and Costa Rica have better players? Costa Rica? Nigeria? Really?

Come on now.

 

Vast wingnut conspiracy.

 

And a couple additional points to consider. First Belgium is not as good as Brazil, Holland, France and Germany. But looked better than any of those teams while playing against us. Second, I don't believe the shots on target data include all the shots blocked by defenders. They blocked at least half a dozen shots that would have tested Howard. I don't think it can be overstated how bad we were against Belgium. It was a shockingly bad performance. They are a better team than we are, but the gap in performance was due in large part to some very bad choices in terms of personnel and how the team was set up for that match.

 

No to mention the cross that Kompany missed after he ran across the entire field.

 

BLT, I always appreciate when you post, and thank you for the kind words about the USMNT. But this "Klinsmann has made soccer more popular in the U.S." meme is just not correct. Soccer in the U.S. is exactly where it would be given a round of 16 coach under any coach. The game is growing in the U.S. at a pretty straight and steep trajectory. There is no Klinsi cult of personality in the U.S.

As always, thanks for your post and your interest in U.S. soccer.

 

The new take on Howard that is being expressed on the BBC is "sure, he made a lot of saves, but none of them were particularly difficult and many of them were 'for the camera.'"

Which, of course, is laughable.

 

Well, I think the question is how much were the midfielders helping our D (too much? I'm not sure.) and did it prevent us from being able to get into the final third without a lot of effort. IT definitely means that we were not getting the ball in good position to counter quickly into the final third, which is how we score a lot of goals.

 

On second viewing, it was just as bad as the first.
We were shellacked.

None of the other round of 16 games had this much of a disparity.. we were theoretically only 2 places behind Belgium in the FIFA rankings (13th & 11th, respectively), which was the closest pairing regarding rankings I believe. Of course, Chile at 14, Netherlands at 15 and France at 17, before the tournament, only highlights the fried and peculiar FIFA math employed to assign these rankings).

The problem with trying to judge the US performance is that we went downhill so dramatically after the Portugal match, and the inverse progression of this WC leaves a huge question mark as to where we actually stand in world soccer. After reviewing the Belgium-US match, I would say our tactical and technical limitations were thoroughly exposed, Our propensity for giving away possession with unforced errors was nearly the worst, IMHO, of all the other teams at the WC (perhaps, save Honduras). This type of sloppy play was the benchmark of our games versus Germany and Belgium. Again, the fact that we went from the high of defeating Ghana to the shock draw conceded to Portugal, to bunkering and defending against Germany to barely keeping Belgium off the scoreboard for 92 minutes was a reverse viewing sensation over the course of the past two weeks. The US came in strong and got weaker as the tournament progressed. Not the right direction, and, yes, disappointingly successful, by the skin of our chinny-chin-chin.

 

Do you believe the mounting injuries, oppressive venues and schedule and talent disparity had anything to do with that? Belgium had to walk across the street for all their group games while we got a tour of equatorial Brazil.People are acting like Argentina blew Belgium off the table. Belgium are KIDs. They are a team of children compared to us and Argentina. They kick is right in the ass and then went toe to toe with the grizzled veterans of Argentina. Argentina totally controlled the game vs Swiss but only won by a goal at the very end of Extra time. Argentina was very evenly matched with Belgium. I'd say it was the most even match of the QF round. Both of those sides are light years beyond what we have to offer.

 

A real good post. I advocated for 5 mids before the game started and had no problem with Zusi and Bedoya starting. We were the weaker team, and Belguim had the much better mid field. We needed a fifth midfielder to defend. Also needed a fifth mid to increase possession in the midfield and defensive thirds of the of the field. The classic and perhaps pedestrian tactic for underdogs is to play defense, don't get caught in transition, take time off the clock, and then go for it late in the game. To win, you need to bury at least one of few chances that you'll get.
The strategy worked but we didn't bury the chance.

Ultimately the debate comes down to whether you think a really strong defensive formation is your best option to keep the score close or whether you can best keep the other team from scoring by forcing it to devote resources to your attack. My view is that we had a much better defense than attack, even before Jozy went down. A second attacker and your suggested line up would likely have taken much more from our defensive and added little effective
Offence.

Unfortunately, we don't live in a Men In Black 3 world where we can see all alternative futures before they happen, so we can debate this for a few more years.

 

Set aside talent disparity because Costa Rica, Nigeria, etc. had talent disparities too but yes sort of. I would say that the team suffered from, in rough order -

1) Roster selection that had no speed on the wings
2) Roster selection that lacked depth at key positions (forward, center mid)
3) Tactical decisions
4) Tired players because of the bad schedule
5) Tired players because of #1 and #2 led them to be overplayed

The perfect storm.

 

I see what this...


1)Klinsmann
2)Klinsmann
3)Klinsmann
4)FIFA
5)Klinsmann


Thanks for clarifying your position. I suppose we should have beaten Belgium, skill differential be damned, then we should have given Argentina all they can handle with our MLSers.

 

Or it could be as simple as Jozy going down twenty mins into the tourney and quitting thirty seconds before the final against Portugal caused 1,2,4,and 5 to be the case.

 

Right, but whose fault is it for either not planning for the possibility, or not taking steps to mitigate it with the players on hand?

People really trip all over themselves to make excuses for our coach. He has total control over player personnel and tactics, and yet it isn't his fault that our game plan was blown to crap by one guy getting hurt.

 

Then you must admit he has total control of us making it out of the PRE-TOURNAMENT group of death which was a PRE-TOURNAMENT minimum goal even from his detractors (I can data-mine the expectations thread if you want to argue that point)He is also responsible for bringing on Brooks, Besler, Yedlin, Green and will be responsible for bringing on Zelalem, Gatt and other young prospects under his tenure. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Either he is always responsible, all the time or he is somewhat responsible, all of the time. Which is it? Either way you choose he has done some good and some bad by any objective metric and more good than bad by any reasonable metric.

 

What in the world are you trying to say here?

 

Klinsmann did what the public, USSoccer and I expected of him. The basic objective for WC2014 was to get out of the group. We were not supposed to get out of the group. We got out of the group. Klinsmann promised a more attacking style and we showed that at times. The goal was to recruit dual nationals and Klinsmann recruited dual nationals. The intent is to overhaul the youth developments structure so we can produce world class players who are capable of taking us to the next level as a national side. Klinsmann is working toward that and it will be quite a long haul. What was your expectation for this cycle and WC2014 in particular?

It would better help me to understand your point of view if you would clearly define what you would have liked to see as opposed to pointing the finger, claiming:

• Decision A=Botched
• Decision B=Botched
• Decision C=Botched

And so on...

 

-Jurgen Klinsmann has f-all to do with "youth development". That's MLS's job.
-We attacked in spite of his set up and personnel decisions. Had he done his job more effectively, we probably would have played yesterday
-I saw numerous tactical shortcomings that need to be addressed.
-I must have missed where "the goal" was to recruit dual nationals.
-Getting out of the group was a bare minimum expectation. We've faced difficult groups before.


My expectation for the World Cup beyond advancing was for the players to do their jobs and play to the best of their ability, and for JK to put them in the best positions possible to do so. I think the players all lived up to that expectation and then some. I think JK's decisions let them all down at critical times, against Portugal late and definitely against Belgium. He failed to trust his own personnel decisions, panicked at the loss of his plan A and never found a plan B.

He made some good decisions and some very questionable ones. His decision to have the team press against Portugal with a minute left was borderline unforgivable. His decision to sit Beckerman against Belgium, and play both Zusi and Bedoya and expect them to attack is confusing. His delaying the Wondo and 3rd sub (whoever it was) was tactically bad. His press conference the next day where he blamed the players and their "mentality" for not attacking more, and taking zero accountability for anything that happened on the field is off-putting, to put it mildly.

I think he did an overall good job during the cycle and met minimum expectations, and should be on the same leash that Bob Bradley was after 2010. He needs to improve his player evaluation skills, improve tactically and start showing a modicum of self awareness and responsibility for what happens with the team. Wednesday wasn't the first time he took no responsibility for a loss.