I think this is an interesting lineup and would love to see it. I'd personally replace ARobinson with Miazga and Cannon with Yedlin, move Dest to the left as a winger, have Yedlin as a right winger and play a 352 but think your concept could well be better. Instead, we'll have a Bradley centered team that will negate the best qualities of our high ceiling players. sigh
Make your player diagram, select 'export image', copy the .png link, then select the image option here to post.
Too complete the tactical commentary--as Pulisic would be cutting inside, Robinson would be the more attacking of the fullbacks. Adams would slide over to cover for Robinson. Holmes would be a defensive-minded, possession-oriented 10 who would be mainly forming the cm trio, rather than looking to attack.
I was trying to think how this formation could fold into Berhlater's philosophy and am struggling. I know that you weren't intending this to be folded in but what elements/arguments could be made to incorporate this? It doesn't have a regista (not that we had one this year...) @gogorath thought the idea is to flood the midfield and ARobinson does that but I don't see how his preferred patterns of movement align with this lineup. Thoughts?
Given the cm talent coming through, I'm expecting Bradley to get phased out soon. In a 352, I'd like to see--- ----------------------------------Morris------ ----------------------------------Pulisic------ ------Robinson-----McKennie-----Holmes-------Dest--- ----------------------------------Adams-------- --------------------Ream------Brooks------Long----- ----------------------------------Steffen------ Adams was a bright spot in the friendly against Italy. Holmes and Adams would provide the platform to allow McKennie to get forward, as he did to great effect in the Portugal friendly. Yedlin can be effective, but his limitations would have to be tactically accommodated.
Robinson would likely need to be replaced by Ream, as Behalter wants more of a possession hub at LB. As the former's passing improves, he should get more chances, however. McKennie and Adams are starting in central midfield if healthy. Their profiles are too high, not too. 3G has long abandoned his gimmick rb/cm experiment. The Canada game, where we had 30% possession, showed 3G was further willing to switch up the tactics.
That was considering the injuries at the time. My "ideal" lineup (no one injured) was: --------------------Steffen-------------------- ---------Miazga----JAB---Ream---------- Yedlin------Adams----Wes--------Dest -----Morris--------Weah-------Puli------- Wow you posted the lineup I posted back in June. Five months is a very long time in soccer, since then I've posted at least other two (probably in a different thread, that's hard to keep track). Now some notes: --- Adams and Weah may not return as the players we knew. --- Yedlin is losing match form as the rests on the bench, so Cannon may already be a better choice. --- McKennie is a strange player, whose presence depends greatly on the rival. --- I'm keeping an eye on Lletget. He may push himself into the Best XI soon. --- I'm wary of the 3 CBs: while they are right now the best we got (and I've never been a Ream fan, but he's having his best season), Brooks and Ream can have trouble with dribblers and Matt is often caught too far up the field in counters.
i simply did as you asked: searched for your lineup in this thread. I’d be interested in seeing your list of pool players broken down by those we always should call and those who are in a bigger list of competition. As for this lineup, I thought you said that a midfield lineup of Adams, Wes and Alfredo didn’t have enough steel to defend in from of 3 CBs so it’s curious that your solution is to swap Morales for Weah. Not sure how that adds steel.
Against a good team, we’d waste Pulisic and Reyna by having them play defense constantly as neither are two-way players. we can only play two and at most three offensively focused players vs. good teams unless we have absolutely no defensive weaknesses in our GK, defenders and CMs. I don’t think we have that.
You see, this is why it's so annoying talking to you: I NEVER said that. What I said is that a midfield of Adams, Wes and Morales wouldn't have enough steel to protect a 4-man back line. It was clear from the context, in that other thread. Also, you were perfectly aware of the more recent formations I had suggested, and by taking away the context of the injuries, you made it look as if my preferred 11 was the one you quoted. That was never the case, because I was considering injuries too, and that was obvious in the page where that was posted. I dislike your style of debate, always taking things out of context and changing things slightly to make the person debating you seem foolish. It's passive-aggressive and very annoying. I'm too old for this, to have to go through my posts to check whether in reality I had said this or that and to make sure you're not lying. I'm putting you on permanent ignore. It's not worth it. Goodbye.
Here what’s i first wrote as I felt bad I misquoted you. first, if you said that it was in front of a 4 man defense, that’s my bad as I didn’t hunt down the post. next, as for the best XI, when I asked you for your best XI, you specifically said that you had posted a lineup “above” so I found the most recent lineup in this thread as you stated and didn’t go hunting around your posts in other threads. I literally did as you suggested after you ignored my request. and now I went and looked at what you actually posted which was a response to my best Xi which had a 3 man back line and Wes, Fredo and Adams in front of them. you, sir, are full of s***.
If you don’t have players who can be a threat in the offense; there’s no reason good teams won’t just overwhelm our defense.
fair enough but if you don’t have players who can defend, our offense won’t get the ball. the back five players are not among our best defensive groups historically IMO. Three of the four back line defenders are known for their attacking/passing prowess rather than being shutdown guys. Finally, Steffen isn’t as good as our historic keepers although I’m hoping he gets there. If we can’t can’t threaten with three attack minded guys then we should really be focused on our defense rather than hoping to add another offensive player and hope to win a shootout. YMMV.
If a midfield of Adams, Wes and Morales isn't defensively strong enough, what are our options? That feels like a very defensively focused midfield.
Agreed. If Adams is healthy then he is a no-brainer as a #6 IMO. Wes and Morales often man the same position and each are a serious step down defensively... although Wes is a stud on aerial duels and is better going forward. Adams and Wes would be pretty good... but not all three. Morales should be used as a backup for each. I am hoping Paxton takes a serious step forward and I would like to see Holmes get his chance as well. Ledezma intrigues me as well... but he is a little ways off.
I don't see a 3 man midfield with McKennie, Adams and Morales as overly defensive as both Wes and Alfredo have shown the ability to get forward via both dribbling and incisive passes - they are B2B midfielders. I'm not particularly concerned with the offense, particularly as I'd use them with Dest and either Yedlin/ARobinson as wingbacks. Even good opponents would have to honor the speed and/or attacking abilities on the flank. Combine that with Pulisic and Morris up front, that's a ton of speed and movement from our attacking 7 (6 if Adams is playing as a pure DM) for opponents to have to prepare for. Conversely, replacing Morales with a more attack minded player (thinking Lletget here) risks our defensive integrity: i am highly interested in Pomykal as he seems to be able to be a strong two-way player that has the potential to be an upgrade to Morales if his game advances.
many consider the 2-0 upset of Spain at Condef 2009 the benchmark US win. Davis Altidore Donovan Dempsey Clark Bradley Boca DeMerit Gooch Spector Howard I don't think any of our back 4 were shutdown guys except for Gooch in the air. In fact Boca and Spector were below average 1v1 defenders as FBs
Fair enough but Howard is a shutdown guy and I'd argue both Donovan and Dempsey were highly under-rated as defenders and certainly better than I think Pulisic and Reyna are. I do remember that game somewhat and I was thinking that "if we play this game 100 times, we win 10 at most, so I better enjoy this!"
Morales is a distributor/terrier with very limited bite protecting the back four. Wes lacks the discipline to be a solid defensive CM when under pressure. Tyler Adams may no longer be the same guy once he's back, and if indeed his condition is "chronic" and the foot surgery didn't alleviate it, we should plan for him missing many crucial games. At any rate, steel is something that often needs experience. That ability to tell where the real danger is and put yourself in the exact lane to avoid such danger. That's why you almost never see a midfield of young guys, you need one with the sixth-sense that usually only comes after years playing your position.
Morris started the year trying to play an inverted winger position and not looking that great. When results were needed, his job was simplified and he produced. The #9 position in "The System" seems so complicated it takes months to learn it, according to Gregg. I doubt if Morris could handle the positional switches and movements on the right, he could do what Zardes does. While the above seems tongue in cheek, it is sadly true in Gregg world.
I have not seen Reyna against men so I have no opinion of his defensive capabilities. The idea that Deuce was any kind of defender is odd. The smartest tactical decision that Klinsmann ever made was re configuring the shape from a 4-3-3 (with Deuce as a #8), to a 4-2-3-1 with Deuce in the hole. It took only 30 minutes in JK's 2nd match ever, v Belgium to reach that decision. Effective defense is less dependent on individual capabilities than on the overall team tactical scheme. BB played 4 attackers but the team defended very deep and compact with 2 dedicated #6s and conservative FBs. That led to the unfair moniker of "bunker bob". I believe that we can be very successful playing either a RBL style 4-2-2-2 or a Liverpool style 4-3-3 with 3 true forwards but the rest of our squad then needs to be very pacy/quick and very high work rate just like Leipzig and Liverpool.
Aren't we jumping th gun on Adams here? I'm not sure if you are mentally protecting yourself or whatever, but projecting that he's not going to be the same player is overkill. Wes is 21. He loses focus sometimes, but in three man midfield of Tyler, Morales and himself, he's the most forward of the central mids and would be considered a pretty good defender for more of an attacking mid. Morales isn't anything special defensively, but I wouldn't think he's some kind of liability with Adams at the six or next to him in a double pivot. I'm not sure what the standard is, but as far as our talent pool goes, I'm not sure we have a better three man defensive midfield.