It's really hard to imagine a coach in any other country failing to qualify for a World Cup, then writing a book about what's wrong with soccer in the country.
I think I’m in favor of us soccer fans NOT buying this book. I can’t imagine he has much good to say. Although the US/USSF/MLS/pay to play all deserve criticism, it seems disingenuous for it to come from a coach who failed to qualify for the WC. Then reward him with $? Do not feed the troll.
Tell ya what - this is one scenario where I advocate piracy. By which I mean we hijack a freighter carrying the first run of the published book and send it down to Davy Jones locker. Alternatively, upload a scanned copy to fileshare or whatever.
I am in favor of one single US fan buyin the book and then turning it into a pdf to upload for all to read. No need to give Bruce the douche any more money than necessary.
What's Wrong with Them: A Psychoanalysis of Two Deluded Narcissists Who Failed and Couldn't STFU Afterward
Isn't this the same guy who said after he failed that "he wouldn't change anything" and that "we don't need to make major changes"? Bruce being Bruce I guess, but the turn around even for him is staggering, as someone else said above. Plus you can bet there will be a lot of subtle and not so subtle jabs at "others" and barely disguised and even blatant defenses of himself.
1. The comments you reference at the beginning of your post, weren’t they about the qualifying campaign in general? 2. As to your last paragraph, OF COURSE that will be all over the book. I think it will be interesting. I’ll bet historians would love Herbert Hoover’s first person account of why he reacted like he did to the stock market crash.
i revered arena, but a very known weakness (too slow to make changes, over any timeline) did him- and us in- and i hate that he wouldnt just own that and shut the hell up. blaming everyone and everything else is horseshit. for me its cut and dry- anyone that was in any way ok with graham zusi as an international rb should have both a lifetime ban and gag order from us soccer. and to clarify- im not blaming zusi. zusi was a great servant to the national team for a lot of years, but thats the most glaring refusal of reality in the entire debacle of the last two, three years. more than bradley as a 10 or any other player we were too scared to move on from. you think gonzalez is/was terrible? he was at least 50% worse (as was any other right sided cb) who had to cover an entire side of the pitch (in front of an absolute legend gk who should have been given a gold watch 4 years ago).
One of my greatest problems with Jurgen Klinsmann was his absolute refusal to ever take responsibility, simple and direct responsibility, for the failures of the team. Not to do so is a deep flaw within one's character. Now I very much hope Bruce Arena takes responsibility, simple and direct responsibility, for the failures of the team. I have very little confidence he will, but the book is still out on that...until June. And if he doesn't, then he is absolutely no better than JK.
Definition of Hypocrite: Bruce Arena October 2017 "There's nothing wrong with what we're doing," he said. ...."Nothing has to change. To make any kind of crazy changes I think would be foolish. We're building a good system...." Bruce Arena June 2018 New book title "What’s Wrong With US? A Coach’s Blunt Take on the State of American Soccer ........
No. See post 16 below. And at least Hoover was a highly talented technocrat. And he came back into gummint with Truman and used his expertise and talent to help with post war reconstruction. Bruce failed in 2 out of his 3 "cycles". Not sure you can blame the whole depression thing on Hoover, esp. as FDR "solutions" made things worse in many ways. And likewise Bruce wasn't the whole problem but he certainly made things worse in the end. And now he is going to become hypocrite #1!
What was wrong with US soccer is that the National team became a soap box for a political battle in US soccer that should not have been going on. I've said before and I'll say again, while the 2018 player pool wasn't our best or deepest, I feel as though Jurgen and Bruce both showed too much arrogance in their decision making with handling the team.
Bruce's hand was forced in 2002, which is when he had his greatest accomplishment. Not a coincidence.
The Bruce quotes from this interview of his with the LA Times promoting his book are hilarious: http://www.latimes.com/sports/soccer/la-sp-bruce-arena-20180507-story.html "They just don't get it, the people that run the sport in our country. And U.S. Soccer has a major obligation to get it right," Arena said in a phone interview. "There needs to be a change in leadership." "It's not like you've got to have a clean sweep of everything and make all radical changes," he said. "You just need the right leadership with the right ideas and get going." "If we don't make changes," he said, "we're not going anywhere." "In all honesty," Arena said, "I think if I had come in in April, it would've been a heck of a lot easier for us to qualify for a World Cup." Reviews are in and they are... uhm... “mixed”: http://worldsoccertalk.com/2018/05/09/whats-wrong-us-book-retitled-whats-wrong-bruce-arena/ Arena seems unable or unwilling to see his own failings or, rather, that he is utterly out of touch with the contemporary game. In exploring his coaching ethos, readers will see a tendency to side in favor of intuition over reason. Like many coaches of his generation, Arena believes in finding “the right mix of players” pitting chemistry and talent against each other, “it’s not about finding the most talent; it’s about finding the right talent that fits together to form a larger whole.” While this may seem reasonable, nowhere in his book does Arena ever state or attempt to explain what makes a player ‘right,’ how they can best fit together, or even what the larger whole should resemble.
Well, I did think the chapter about how he delivered a baby while simultaneously fighting a pack of ninjas and making sure the bikini models' tour bus didn't go below 59 miles an hour or it would explode - that seemed a bit dubious. Especially the climax where the evil supervillain Klins-Man appears, wearing the Infinity Gauntlet, and he tears up all of Bruce's gameplans and that's why they were slightly underprepared against Trinidad.
I’m not aware of ANYONE at US Soccer EVER accepting responsibility for a failure. Accountability at US Soccer is nonexistent, which is not surprising considering that their governing organization, FIFA, is certainly in the conversation for “most corrupt sporting organizations in the World”. The endless flow of money into US Soccer, coupled with ultra low fiduciary responsibility and low standards of results, guarantees more of the same. Why should they change? The money is rolling in by the trainload.