Regardless of what words may be spoken and spun by Jay’s brother, Earnie, the Fed or their loyalists in the media, yesterday’s game was an absolute repudiation of Berhalter and his “System”. Two years wasted since Couva only to return to where we began the day after. A flawed counter attacking team that will struggle to qualify from CONCACRAP. There are a multitude of coaches and prominent assistants available well versed in legitimate pressing systems, who could assuredly make us a more evolved, attractive, effective and competent side. Instead we are effectively handicapping ourselves with a mediocre at best coach, who is an utter misfit for his team. 120 pages of discussion in this thread, only to learn emphatically, the Emperor has no clothes.
Given the preponderance of talent, the team shouldn't struggle to qualify, so long as the coach-- 1. Sticks to the core identity of the team: a. covering more ground than all other teams. b. being efficient in shot conversion c. not trying to dominate possession. 2. Maintains a creative component amongst the cyborgs that US coaches seem to be addicted to. a. the component could include a true '10' b. the component could include creative inside-wide mids. c. the component could include creative fullbacks. 3. Adds elements of "The System", slowly. a. go full system against minnows b. dial it down for teams with MLS-level talent or better.
The US program has always been with its eyes turned to Europe. So far we never come to the reality that we're on the other side of the world and favor anything second-rate & local over superior Latin coaching, or even third-rate so far it comes from Europe, we'll move forward much slower than others with a more practical approach. So, I'll leave you dreaming of your Tuchels, Mourinhos and Klopps.
Clearly, one of the problems is that Berhalter does not pay attention to the important details: 1197879298495012866 is not a valid tweet id
Here's a Warshaw article that I think had an interesting nugget (shout-out to @Pegasus for first linking it) that could be applicable to the current USMNT. https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019...ls-tactical-moves-2019-teams-should-copy-2020 The Hyper-Active Midfield Almost every team in MLS, and certainly the top teams, fields a star attacking midfielder. Nico Lodeiro, Maxi Moralez, Carles Gil, Alejandro Pozuelo (though he eventually got pushed to striker), Diego Valeri, etc. Even the Red Bulls use Kaku. Yet somehow the best regular-season team in league history went without one. Bob Bradley took a different route with his midfield. Eduard Atuesta, Mark-Anthony Kaye, and Latif Blessing. There isn't a "traditional No. 10" in there. There isn't anything close to a "star". Instead, they are all solid passers and extremely mobile, smart and industrious. Even though they couldn't create the moments of magic that someone like Pozuelo could generate, they could still create chances. They just did it in their own way. LAFC completely suffocated the midfield and made it impossible to pass against them. They were more likely to create a chance via defensive pressure and transitions than a slick through ball (though they could do those, too). While Bradley often talks about replicating Pep Guardiola teams, his LAFC group took on a very Liverpool approach to their midfield. All of this was helped by the fact that LAFC had Carlos Vela on the wing. LAFC still had an elite chance creator, they just opted to use him wide (as long as they had a healthy center forward on the roster, at least). This, to me, should be the biggest shift in the coming years in MLS. As the game moves more and more toward transitions, "playmakers" will get shifted wide and mobile vertical players will take over the middle.
Until LAFC can beat the other really good teams and especially in finals or semi-finals I'll take a wait and see with his system. LAFC like Atlanta, Toronto and a few others has a huge payroll and probably talent advantage over most other teams which the US national doesn't so I'm more interested in any advantage an overall system with all the national teams use from U14 to full team or schemes that help lesser talented teams win against the better teams. Doing both an integrated scheme and a scheme that fits the talent would be the best.
hard to argue with that although it appears that LAFC has underspent at the MF position relative to other teams. is highly unclear to me how relying upon a system that requires superior technical excellence is well suited for a team that is lesser talented but I realize that you didn’t say that.
Does the fact that MLS is a salary capped league with each team allowed to spend unlimited on three players lead to the richest teams playing 1990s style with a historical #10? That you can put a player, who maybe is older and slower, at the #10 that is an order of magnitude, maybe two or three, better is not something that can be done in Europe or other non-capped leagues. The amount of players that can play the old, "top of the box, pull the strings" #10 at the Champions League level are maybe two or three, maybe none.Most of the best teams, including the French national team that won the WC, play with the all-action midfielders. That if you can be what Lodeiro is in MLS playing against Real Madrid, you are one of the best players in the world and outside the pay range of 99% of clubs.
Gregg played two games back to back against Mexico and then again with Canada. He played the two games against both opponents completely different. He played completely differently against Ecuador than Chili and then against versus Jamaica. All three of those differently than either of the Mexico or Canada games. Is there really even a philosophy or style to analyze? If so, what games was it employed in? Why not all of them? Some of his last supporters will say this element or that is consistent. But they are general elements found in all soccer games. Players making triangles to pass through opponents is hardly a philosophy unique to Gregg. It is something everyone does. The two things that Gregg seemed to differ on than most was, and I say was because the last two games did not feature them much if at all: 1. defending passively in a mid-block 2. a #6 whose most important attribute was being able to switch the ball to a winger The only other consistent thing is personnel. He called in a group of players repeatedly without consideration of form or performance. Those players were selected before he had held one camp. We don't really know if Gregg doesn't have a game plan, can't install one, can't adapt from one, or can evaluate talent after a year in charge. Maybe it is the horrible talent identification and evaluation that masks all the other great stuff he is doing. Take the case of Lovitz. He started the first game, and the last game 11 months later. He was in every camp, and played regularly. Yet, if MLS had not expanded he would be on the phone with USL teams the second he walked off the pitch for the USMNT.
Egg thinks he is avant garde but he is actually old fashioned. Lampard moved Konte from dmid into the 8 position where he scored 3 goals in his last 4 games in EPL for Chelsea (if I heard the broadcast right in their UCL game today.) Delgado was moved into the 10 for Toronto and Klinsmann made Bradley his 10 for WC 2014 cycle. Bradley at LAFC played with Kaye, Atuesta and Blessing in mid, none of whom are really a 10 and all of whom played defense. Many of us suggested there was an unanswered question as far as Egg was concerned because he had relied on Higuaín so much for Crew. Higuaín covered up a multitude of sins at Crew, as well as jerking Egg's chain a lot. I think what Egg is missing is that Higuaín read the game really well and could play really good defense when the game called for it.
I guess Berhalter could be considered revolutionary with trying players in that role who cant defend or make plays. It is weird to me, but it is as if he is saying "watch me put a huge weak link in the middle of the field in front of the CBs and still succeed".
We have a player succeeding at a far higher club level than any before him. It’s not particularly close. Our coach should be doing everything he can to put him in the best and most comfortable situation so he can be a huge difference maker for the USMNT. that would be a marked change from this year but it’s not too late. happy thanksgiving to all.
His most comfortable situation seems to be surrounded by World Class talent, so it's going to be a little hard to provide.
He was Herculean last Hex while surrounded by Bradley et al. I don’t think he’s dependent upon the players around him.
It's unfortunate that at Couva he was not quite herculean enough to wash out, in that second half, the Augean stables Mikey and his Minions shat all over throughout the game. MB did not deserve a single cap after that brutally worthless and contemptuous performance. If Sarachan got one thing right, it was a big thing right: it was time for the kids, and those few senior players who still gave a genuine damn, to take over.
I'm of the opposite perspective. To my mind, winning a supporters shield across that kind of sample size tells you whose best, the playoffs are small sample size luck generally speaking (you do run into things w/teams like the Patriots, or their opposites in teams like the Rockets where the small sample size ends up kinda being telling (I offer the caveat because there is ZERO argument the Patriots would've had the same run if they'd been housed in any other division over the past 19 years, yes they would've been spectacular regardless, but not at that scale, when you're playing 3 of the worst 10-12 teams in the NFL every year in 1/3 of your schedule, you're nearly guaranteeing yourself at least a bye, and a better chance of a 1 seed than any other team by a country mile). To my mind, that season long performance generally tells us whose the best, period. I'm a Nats fan, and yep, finally, the oppositeofachoke happened, but regardless, I'm still about 80% certain my squad wouldn't have made the World Series let alone won it if it had had to play Atlanta, and replay the playoffs another 100 times and one of the Dodgers, Cardinals or Astros probably wins 90-95 percent of the time. Champions yes, best team? No.
I've never bought into this line of thinking. I think the best team in any league is what the league, coaches and players decide is the most important and if say an NCAA season is used to prepare for March Madness, if college football and the big 5 pro sports leagues make it clear that winning at the end of playoffs is the ultimate goal then that is what matters the most. In MLS lots of teams have players leave during international windows and still the teams play games, many teams see where they're weak and stock up in the summer window, some coaches play young players knowing by the time playoffs roll around those players will be key buy the team takes their lumps early in the season as they make mistakes and learn. Seattle builds their whole team to peak at the playoffs. They could obviously change what they do if the main goal was to get the most points. It's not so they don't.
You do realize the entire "AFC East sux" argument has been debunked numerous times, right? I can provide a number of links (it's very easy, just Google "afc east terrible argument"), but you take out the division winner from every division over the last 20 years and the afc east is in the top half of division records. Additionally, the pats have virtually the same winning percentage against the rest of the league as they do the afc east (which includes all other division winners). The afc east "sucks" solely because the pats are in it. Again, happy to provide a variety of data supporting this, rather than "nobody ever beats the pats! That means the division stinx!" It's such a loser argument it's embarrassing people believe it. That said, it's the world we live in.
Found the Jets fan... The issue comes from the fact that the AFC East rarely has anyone who contends for anything outside of the Patriots. Since the 2002 realignment, the Pats have won the division every time except 2002 (9-7 Jets won because of tiebreakers over Pats/Dolphins) and 2008 (11-5 Dolphins win because of tiebreakers over 11-5 Pats). No other division has such domination by one team. Other divisions have different Super Bowl contenders depending on the year, whereas the East tends to have the Pats, and rarely anyone else, aside from 9-7 or 10-6 Wildcard Jets teams sneaking into a Wildcard every once in a while. Take the NFC West during that span. Every team has made at least one Superbowl, including the trash organization that is the Cardinals. So all of a sudden, watching the Jets, Bills, and Dolphins cycle through tanking and mediocre 9-7 records seems to indicate that the division really never gets any good. Add the fact that the Bills/Jets/Dolphins have each cycled through dozens of awful QB's in the span of Brady's career, and all of a sudden, it's not so far-fetched. When you try to talk meta-stats about cross-divisional records, you've got to be careful. You could have a great record against the AFC North as an AFC South team if you played the Browns and Bengals more often than the Steelers and Ravens...
Actually a pats fan. And listened to this argument so many times I always wondered if it was true. As actual stats prove, the afc east minus the Patriots is basically the same as any other division. The point is, it doesn't matter what division the pats would have been in the last two decades. They would make any division look like the afc east (again, as the afc east, by record, is the same as every other one). Your argument is the other 3 teams stink and the pats benefit. That's not true. The other 3 teams are average, and never had a chance to be better bc the pats were in their way.
Evaluating General Egg's philosophies is like over-analyzing toilet water when the toilet is broken. Until You fix the toilet ( Jay Berhalter and Don Garber), the water is going to stink.
Here's a link with further proof - https://amp.reddit.com/r/Patriots/comments/9vm86h/the_myth_of_the_easy_afc_east/
The problem with this post is that it fundamentally misunderstands both the League as a whole and just how good the Pats have been over the last 20 years. They have had 19 consecutive winning seasons. The next closet team has 6 over the same time period. To say they have been dominant is an understatement. The Pats are a once in a lifetime team. I am positive that I will never see a team in any sport dominate the way the Pats have. What makes it even crazier is that this has been orchestrated by BB probably the greatest coach in any sport ever. And Brady the greatest QB of all time. Those two guys have consistently taken guys like Edelman and turned them into Hall of Famers. on any other team, he would probably be a third option at best. Instead, he is Brady's preferred receiver. I mean think about that... BB and Brady have made Edelman a hall of fame receiver. it's mind-blowing. But what makes it all the more astounding is BBs ability to take cast-off and reclamation projects and turn them into stone-cold winner. BB takes guys and puts them into a position to succeed. Do your job, or GTFO. This is actually in stark contrast to Egg. He does not have the ability to train a guy up. Even though he seems to think he does. He also seems unable to put guys in a position to succeed. There is no Do Your Job mentality. because if you don't it doesn't matter because you are going to get called up anyway. As a thought experiment imagine if BB was the USMNT coach. Do you think we would see these guys lollygagging around on the field? They would be on the plane back to where ever they came from before the half was over. Egg will never have that mentality. And that is the problem. Egg thinks he is Belichick when he is really Rex Ryan
Yeah. We're not going to agree. It doesn't matter what they think or feel, its what happens over the fullness of time. I think this is more applicable in leagues w/longer seasons (NBA, MLB, European soccer, American soccer, Hockey). I guess I can agree to a certain piece w/the quibble that the playoffs mean something about players. This is true, because playoff pressure effects players differently. You have some guys that shine, in my childhood it was Montana, other than '85-'87 dip, and then Brady, who grew up idolizing him. In baseball it was Jeter, who was so good in the playoffs compared to ARod, that people went to the trouble to finally unearth how he was playoff good (if memory serves, it wasn't that he consistently played like a monster in the playoffs, it was that he never dipped in the playoffs, whereas nearly every other hitter did, whether it was because of issues w/pressure, or issues w/facing consistently better pitching than in the regular season). Jordan, Messier, Gretzky, Lemieux, Crosby etc. I don't have a problem ceding that the playoffs do tell us something about players to some degree, but I also think the playoffs are kind of there own thing, especially in shorter season sports, and in sports that leave a lot of room for randomness (The NFL is guilty of this in particular). The only measuring sticks you tend to get that are reasonably reflective of who and what are truly good typically are full length seasons theoretically as close to equal as possible in design (which is where European soccer has us beat). I get that the players may feel differently, and we clearly gain something from the playoff pressure cooker we get to enjoy that I think is totally missing in European soccer (which is one of the reasons The Champions League, feels and seems a lot like basically, they're version of the playoffs): we get to find out some amazing things about teams, and particular players, that in the metronome reality of a full length regular season isn't nearly so evident. However, it's an inherently biased and not remotely even measuring stick, things are radically tilted by home field in some league, by division in others (New England's annual free ticket to the playoffs compared to say, the NFC East of the 80's), by conference even. A regular season is as close to large and relatively fair sample size that you can get. Everything else is just the cherry on top to me. I'm a redskins fan, and I can freely admit, the 1987 niners were the best team in the NFL, not the 1987 redskins, but the Niners ended up randomly playing their worst game of the season in a monsoon in the Bay Area, and the vikes took advantage. My redskins beat the vikes the next week at home for the second time in basically a month. But if we'd have to travel to candlestick? No chance at a super bowl ring. No chance. Doug Williams got that transcendent moment in no small part because of horrific weather in my home town in the Bay Area a few weeks earlier. Sometimes all it takes is whether. Just ask George Washington about the importance of Fog, no chance he will have forgotten (granted the asking would have to be in the afterlife).