Wow, I haven't thought of that name in a looooong time. One of the many would-be's that never did that so many suckers on here clamored about. I think we should really start a thread to list all the hyped players that got contracts at European clubs and never did squat. If we could include next to the player's name the names of BSers that claimed they were gonna be great, or inserted them into their current best 11, that would be even better.
Misleading. 2018 we had 11 games which if used more efficiently could have handled broader tryouts. We have probably 4-6 games before anything counts this year. You can use them to give Steffen 20 callups and prove and reprove who the starter at keeper is, or you can try several keepers. Ditto every other position, including, say, left back. People seem to forget the game is 30 players or so in the pool, not just 23, and certainly not just finding an XI. It matters just as much who backs up these guys if they get hurt or we ever want to sub effectively. We also do not have to engage in our ritual of over emphasizing winning mere tournaments as our goal. You can send an experimental team to GC like we have for Copa America in doubled up years. You can use LoN to test new players. We only really have to have the A Team for quali. I am not saying call up just anyone. But we run some people through camp and they get cut or play 20 minutes one game. And there are people like Gonzalez, Frei, etc. who have been available for selection and are not playing in the Finnish Beer League and they don't get called or play behind someone like Guzan, who repeatedly gets an email. That's more what I am getting at, is calling back meh backup types over and over instead of even trying the less called or unused guys. I think there should be more emphasis on performance and less on perceived league level. That being said I think a player any good is probably not stuck in the Finnish Beer League. But I think your snob take is used against players in places like Denmark, etc. which is where I start to think it's more of a pro big club bias than reflexively guarding against undeserving players from the Irish Republic first division. That's not what happens. What actually happens is we'll take a bench guy or loan player from England or Germany (nominally) before someone starting in Denmark or MLS. Parker or Amon can even look decent and it's basically treated like a pity callup. We have some need areas, mid, LB, CB, backup keeper. I think we are still trolling the usual suspects, which ultimately seems to reward the big club types whose underperformance is nonetheless the reason those positions are unsettled. This is how we end up with Omar and Cameron and Besler is convincing ourselves those are the only players with experience at big enough a club to handle this.
To me it's a pendulum or spectrum, one end is try anyone from anywhere. Other end is favor the big club players and U20 pipeliners like snobs and overlook how they actually play. I think the pendulum has swung too far in the fanboy direction. I don't want the other extreme. I want somewhere in between where we are more open to other options and more concerned with performance. I think Klinsi's fanboy snobbery is in the blood now, and the other thing I think is happening is most of these players are so young they are unproven and it's almost more like a U20 or U23 team where short of a Pulisic prodigy you are anticipating what type of pros they become. What the pro big club version of that misses is historically plenty of these U20 types don't pan out. There are players like Cooper or Kirovski who went to big clubs and ended up in reality back in MLS, with varying degrees of USMNT impact. I get the youth of the team forces us to be somewhat forward looking in selection but it should also call for a fair amount of accountability once they are on the team. You look at someone like Trapp and the whole attitude surrounding them seems to be not to judge how they play (mediocrely and sometimes bad) but rather to play out some theorized movie in our heads of what they are supposed to become. I want the focus back on performance. Objective and motivational as opposed to subjective and hopeful.
I also think some people are confused like this is a rebuilding team but they want to rebuild barely making much effort to look for new players, how does that work. We lost a lot of starters and have a young team, and it's odd that despite few results people want to act like we are the same old MNT with proven starters and endless results. The mdifield looks awful. The backline leaks goals. This cannot possibly be the endgame. The endgame is going to involve several more YNT iterations of new players as well as some veterans, dual nationals, switches, and surprises. Selection should be handled accordingly. I am an Astros fan. Altuve is all that is left from a point about 5 years ago where they just dumped anyone with a salary. He is joined by draft picks and free agents. But I also know that to get here there was a #1 pick pitcher who flamed out and was released, free agents who didn't take, players like JD Martinez we gave up on, etc. We didn't just call the first batch up from the minors and insulate them from competition. If you didn't perform we called up another batch and traded you to Peoria. It's an opportunity. That opportunity should be spread around looking for players who are special. You fail to perform and you're on the plane home, and it shouldn't matter what your name is. The US problem right now is it does matter who you are and where you play. To me, I feel like for a rebuilding team we have gone fairly lazy on scouting players as well as locking down dual nationals.
I could understand the reflexive defense of the known if this was a winning team with few holes on the field and most everyone playing well. This is a losing team where basically Pulisic, Sargent, and Steffen encompass the no doubter list. Yeah, some random guy from Denmark isn't taking their job. But no one thought they would. The sort of player we're really saying can't be challenged by people from smaller clubs or leagues is more like Miazga, Guzan, Horvath, Long, Acosta, Trapp, Roldan, Zardes, Robinson, Novakovich, etc. At that point to be debating -- and even laying down red lines of exclusion -- over whether Malmo is worthy to challenge Columbus or Brugge or Greuther Furth is....hair splitting? absurd? A lot of the people under challenge are not big club starters who perform high for us, it's frustrating guys on loan someplace, or sitting a highfalutin bench, or playing out of position, or themselves in kind of a prosaic league. So why does Columbus get to say Malmo can't play in the sandbox? Honestly buried beneath it to me feels like a status quo bias. We have who we need. Ignore the results. It'll work out with the new coach. it doesn't matter if the actual guy you are defending from roster pressure is Columbus or B.1 bench, let's act like what's really happening is big club Dortmund is being laid seige inappropriately by Malmo and NYRB. That's not really it. There is a very short list of our players actually on big clubs. Most of those nominally big club -- and insulated from competition -- are actually loan players who can't possibly be the favorite players of those big clubs -- or they wouldn't be on loan. And then in reality most of this team is MLS or in some less prestige league than EPL or B.1, either signed directly or on loan. But my thing is the more people can sign someplace like PSG -- even if to be loaned out -- we want to talk big and insulate those players from roster threat. Even if as of now they are really Celtic players and really then likely to be their bench. If we dig a half inch below the name brands this team is not a pile of big club starters entitled to incumbency. It's about 3 future stars and then a bunch of projects and workhorses. If most of this team is really more like at Celtic on loan I don't get how Malmo or such is a bridge too far. Does it undercut some image we like to uphold? It doesn't reflect someone has 20 goals a season at PSG and their own shoe brand, that much I know. Our best player is in Loan Hell. Any time we want to stop pretending.
At least he didn't rip a phone book in half. I like Berhalter - he seems to be more of the "friendly" coach. Klinsmann was more of the "get out there boys and do your best" coach (minus any tactical instruction). Bradley seemed more like a disciplinarian/hard man coach. And Arena seemed like the aloof/sarcastic coach. So at the very least we're trying something different.
Funny. Now you experts line up our coaches from his list with some close approximations around the world. I'll go first and say Arena is in the Mourinho lane.
All the tryout camps and broad net-casting mean nothing UNLESS you have the right pair of eyes watching and evaluating TALENT. I mean someone who can analyze the potential to be an asset at the international level, whether that's against Haiti or Holland. Take a Halilhodzic at Nantes. I'd trust his player evaluation before any of our current crop of US staff members.
Here's a scoop for the sportingly correct crowd: a coach isn't there to be your "friend". Try to imagine a manager whom the players would address as Mr. That would be a good starting point.
worth noting that Klinsi's obsession with big clubs roughly coincided with his team hollowing out from age, and him being unable to adjust and reformat a new system and roster equivalent to the 2014 team. some of his ageing players started coming back home to MLS with their families (jones, dempsey, bradley, jozy). at present two of them are already retired, another is recovering from injury, and the other is probably nearing retirement. rather than confront the telling and practical reality of "my team is getting old (and coming home to finish their careers)" he acted like he was dealing with unambitious kids, such that a team already fading on the field became more distant from the coach as well. and to me even the "unambitious kids" bit should be a closed session item discussed with players when stock is taken of their standing. the coach shouldn't tell the players where to go or judge them on that basis. his job is coach the players they are when they show up. if being at roma helps that, great. if being in toronto does it, no difference. i don't think it helps to even privately backtalk players who by the time you are having the convo are committed to a contract for a period of years. "now that you have just signed a 4 year deal, let me give you grief, like you can change anything at this juncture." more than a vague "your club playing time situation may have hurt you" or "your level has fallen off since you moved back to MLS" is obnoxious. it's not the coach's job to get into that. it's the coach's job to make out the team and run tactics. he needs to trade in reality and not debate about angels on the head of a pin theory. getting into "would he be better off back at Spurs" is a pointless counterfactual outside of fanboys. that we now do this in public? pfft. that's self aggrandizement. go manage the team. he did a lousy job of it, personnel, tactics, personalities. can't believe people want to hold up the club thing like it was wise and not gas on a bonfire for a team already coming apart at the seams. the reality is that while that whole debate got fired up the team went off a performance cliff and he had no answers for it. we are still in that same basic place of "what does the next good USA team look like." trying to turn this back into the same lame debate sideshow as last time only repeats the pointless distraction. why not focus on finding 11, 23, 30 people who can play right for a change. as opposed to the whole ego thing of "but he plays at...." i mean, shouldn't it also factor in someplace here, "but he plays lousy?" more pointedly, he thought he had a motivation problem, he misdiagnosed that and sure as heck didn't fix the team. at some point coaching is about pushing correct buttons. this button didn't work. why are you imitating that. if anything we have the opposite issue, tons of players abroad, bunch of players under construction, and people wanting to argue that the location of your construction site makes you a better player. we're still missing the practical question of who right now is playing best and should be playing for us. it's still abstracted BS a few steps from the actual question of who looks good.
This talk of "identity" is useless. You don't develop a true identity in three weeks. That has to happen holistically over a long period PROVIDED THE CRITERIA STAY THE SAME.
more to the point x% of this call sheet are just getting a nice resume item like marlon hairston that may never be repeated. i think you can work on implementing a style and expectations and tactics but only some of these guys will be back. this particular camp, while a useful exercise, is likely to indoctrinate a limited set of players we will see again. to get to the pool as a whole, repeat, repeat, repeat. like you're saying. GC is really the long term window to bed in players this year. one reason i get grouchy about the hiring delay last year is that is lost time on your learning curve. and as this summer approaches there will be pressure to play to win when i think realistically we should instead be in a player evaluation and team building phase, basically repeat last year under the "right" coach again. and to explain my focus on talent, based on recent results, we have not identified the right set of people, not for abstracted results, not for a possession system. if we were being real sarachan wasted time with other formations and trying to get draws and you might as well blow up what he gave us and start over. we know about 3-5 players are good. the rest is a confused muddle. back to talent evaluation, please. acting like sarachan had it sorted is only something we will have to tear back down and redo once we figure out the robinsons and trapps of the team were poorly chosen. so redo the talent eval but in his system, particularly the midfield. building on what sarachan laid is a rotten foundation.
Based on the previous comments from Zardes how this system is similar but different than the formation they had in columbus with him seeing time on the ba'' (!) and scuffed previous podcast of him hearing Berhalter will use a 4-3-3 with two 8s underneath a 6. I'd like to see this team tried out --------------Ramirez--------------- Baird--------------------------Arriola -----Lletget-----Mihailovic------- ---------------Canouse------------ Garza--Long--Zimmerman-Lima ---------------Steffen------------------ -Ramirez offers what Zardes offers but with an actual first touch. -GGG rates Lima so lets see how he does in a cap -Canouse is an amazing DM and will be Beckerman 2.0 -Mihailovic is a pseudo 10 so he would fit will combine with another pseudo 10 Lletget -Arriola and Baird will do well as attackers in GGGs system
Speaking of Josh Sargent, this from a recent report: https://www.bundesliga.com/en/bunde...g-florian-kohfeldt-at-werder-bremen-2918-1515 He's a young player, so he's not going to start every week, nobody expects him to play all 17 games" said Kohfeldt. "But we play a deliberately narrow 4-3-3. Since Kruse always comes back into the midfield, there is a lot of space opened up in attack, and we can use Josh for this." Contrast that with Berhalter's "make the pitch big" instructions to his players which means he wants Sarge wide? With Pulisic getting better in defense and Sarge apparently not being so bad, I prefer to use Delgado and Adams to press and have Sarge and Pulisic drop into defense more centrally. That makes more use of Adams on wing, as well. -----------weah ------sarge----pulisic -adams--trapp---delgado and the corresponding players in Jan camp would be ---------------ramirez (ebobisse) -----------zardes------x(?) -----roldan----trapp--Delgado -garza----x-----------x--------lima cannon looks more solid defensively but in this scheme I'd try Lima for attacking width.
If Arena is in the Mourinho Lane....hmmmmm... promising. Ok, then we can have: Bradley was in the Klinsmann is in the Ruud Gullit Lane, Bradley is in the Rafael Benitez Lane, Sarachan is in the Lawrie Sanchez Lane,
Too abstracted. To me it's match a coach to personnel and endgame. What do our personnel need? Some teams, usually veteran outfits drilled in a system already, are fairly self sustaining and a player's coach will work. Is that who I would hire for a bunch of 20 year olds still learning how to play, untrained in a system, etc.? I don't think it's that a player's coach doesn't work, it's more that I don't see the fit for this team. I do think that as the pool becomes hyperprofessionalized a disciplinarian who rips them up and down will be less acceptable. You might be able to badger a bunch of college kids, domestic A-leaguers, and a small sprinkling of expeditionary players. But the current crop is much more professional and dispersed and aren't going to put up with a bunch of crap. How Mourinho bombed at ManU (and CFC after the title before that) should be illustrative of how self motivated players who know they are good will respond to being hectored constantly on the pitch and in the press. When I hear fanboys touting coaches calling their players out, including Klinsi, it's like, did you talk to the team? I had a college coach like that. He didn't last my 4 years. It also may matter if any mouthiness is leavened with fatherly affection. If you like your coach and he cares for you off the field and looks after you, you may put up with the father figure's odd tirade, eg, SAF. If your coach is aloof and a jerk he is on borrowed time no matter how well the team plays for a period. For an example re team fit, the "go play big club" debate. I think Berhalter in an abstracted way speaks to a USSF concern of bridging that "divide." But in reality, that's now really a fanboy argument, not a debate the players seem to be having. The coach who stoked that is gone. The players he was giving grief are on their way out or gone. The dual national Germans with few exceptions disappeared. Like I've said before, that whole rationale was passe before the coach was hired. So, what does this team need, emotionally, motivationally, coaching wise, scouting wise. Some of that is system identity but some of that is what type of people are the players and what do they respond to.
You miss the point. You can't "match" a coach to an amorphous blob of young players who are still learning who they are AND developing their games at the same time. There needs to be an adult in the room. You can't have mastery of a subject without a master. Thank you for the window into the zeitgeist of our modern, entitled world. It's not a new phenomenon. Socrates said, “The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.”