So Japan just lost a heartbreaker to Belgium 3-2, after being up 2-0 in the second half. Compared to our loss to Belgium four years ago, we both lost by a goal, though we were able to draw Belgium through 90 min and take them to extra-time. Nonetheless, I still think Japan showed better today against Belgium than we did four years ago against a similar level of quality. Japan played the counter-attack to perfection, scored two beautiful goals, and should have won this match (or at the very least taken it to extra-time). They also showed grit and heart, which is something we've lost. But letting in that last minute goal reminded me of when we let Portugal score in stoppage time to draw us in the 2014 WC, which killed our chances of finishing first in the group. Roberto Martinez lives to see another day - and perhaps improves his chances to become the next USMNT coach, even if Belgium lose a close match to Brazil in the next round. If they get blown out, I think that kills his chance.
Japan also has both skill and organization, which the US didn't. the US only drew because of absurd goal keeping by Howard, but Belgium was completely bossing the U.S. off the pitch. Japan, by contrast played toe to toe with Belgium and looked like they'd be good to win and deserve to do so. Japan isn't just ahead of the U.S, they're FAR ahead of the U.S.
In the last 4 years, Belgium may have found even more star power in attack, but the amount of steel in their defense has dropped off big time. I don't think Kompany is what he once was, and they miss Van Buyten as well. Even in this game, they looked much better when Fellaini was in the game in addition to Witsel. I think Witsel alone in front of a back 3 is something that the 2014 US team could have exploited as much as Japan did. I also feel like the US could have easily won that game, I dont feel like Japan today really outperformed, even if you agree to the starting premise that Belgium 2014=Belgium 2018
Obviously they're a lot better this cycle. But I don't think it would be hugely surprising if we make the knockouts next time and they don't.
You can't just say a country is ahead of us because they put together one good World Cup performance (where they still lost anyways). It's a fair question, but I don't think there's a definitive answer so far. You have to analyze far more than one game or even one tournament when asking "is __________ ahead of us?". In 2010 we had similar showings, in 2014 we had the much better showing, and in 2018 they obviously had the better showing because we weren't even there. But even here in 2018 it took a stroke of luck for them to make the knockouts, Senegal was the more impressive side to me in the group stages. I will say their current squad looks better than what our current A squad would look like. Between Honda, Hasebe, Kagawa and Okazaki they definitely have more top talents than we currently do. However, aside of Kagawa (currently 29) none of those names I listed will probably be going to Qatar in 2022. The rest are all at least 32 and are near the end of their primes. I have no idea what Japan's youth program currently looks like. Not that our youth system is anything great but obviously they don't have any talent of Pulisic's caliber right now. Really not sure who else they have coming through the ranks soon, I don't follow it closely enough. I think this Japan squad was more so a product of maybe their best generation of soccer talent. A few of the best players their country has ever produced made a solid run at it one last time. Yes, their current squad probably beats our current "top" team and it may not be that close. But that doesn't mean they're ahead of us. And that definitely doesn't mean that they'll be the better team in 4 years time.
I think Japan has performed like the US did in 2010 when they had tactics. In 2014 the players seem to make it up as they went along.
And Ritsu Doan on the 100 list of the Golden Boy Award 2018 of Tutto Sport: The Golden Boy award has been handed out annually since 2003, when Rafael van der Vaart claimed the inaugural prize. Winners since have included Messi, Cesc Fabregas, Sergio Aguero, Paul Pogba and Isco. Wayne Rooney and Raheem Sterling are the only Englishmen to receive the gong. The list in full: Trent Alexander-Arnold (Liverpool) Carles Alena (Barcelona) Jose Maria Amo (Sevilla Atletico) Angel Gomes (Manchester United) Mirko Antonucci (Roma) Houssem Aouar (Lyon) Giorgi Arabidze (Shakhtar Donetsk) Joaquin Ardaiz (Royal Antwerp) Ismail Azzaoui (Willem II) Musa Barrow (Atalanta) Fabian Benko (Bayern Munich) Sander Berge (Racing Genk) Justin Bijlow (Feyenoord) Bilal Boutobba (Sevilla) Brahim Diaz (Manchester City) Lorenzo Callegari (Paris Saint-Germain) Lazar Carevic (Barcelona) Daniele Collinge (Stuttgart) Patrick Cutrone (AC Milan) Dani Olmo (Dinamo Zagreb) Tom Davies (Everton) Matthijs De Ligt (Ajax) Abdou Diakhate (Fiorentina) Krepin Diatta (Club Brugge) Javairo Dilrosun (Hertha Berlin) Diogo Dalot (Manchester United) Moussa Djenepo (Standard Liege) Ritsu Doan (Groningen) Mamadou Doucoure (Borussia Monchengladbach) Odsonne Edouard (Celtic) Marcus Edwards (Tottenham) Sergei Eremenko (Spartak Moscow) Zackarias Faour (Osters) Francisco Feuillassier (Real Madrid) Phil Foden (Manchester City) Mamadou Fofana (Alanyaspor) Timothy Fosu-Mensah (Crystal Palace) Juan Foyth (Tottenham) Dennis Geiger (Hoffenheim) Giorgos Giannoutsos (AEK Athens) Ianis Hagi (Viitorul Constanta) Achraf Hakimi (Real Madrid) Amadou Haidara (Red Bull Salzburg) Kai Havertz (Bayer Leverkusen) Callum Hudson-Odoi (Chelsea) Nanitamo Ikone (Montpellier) Alexander Isak (Borussia Dortmund) Arnel Jakupovic (Juventus) Dejan Joveljic (Red Star Belgrade) Herbie Kane (Liverpool) Yann Karamoh (Inter Milan) Teun Koopmeiners (AZ Alkmaar) Han Kwang-Song (Cagliari) Alban Lafont (Toulouse) Leandrinho (Napoli) Dimitris Limnios (PAOK) Justin Kluivert (Roma) Lincoln (Gremio) Jordan Lotomba (Young Boys) Davor Lovren (Fortuna Dusseldorf) Sandi Lovric (Sturm Graz) Mikhail Lysov (Lokomotiv Moscow) Arne Maier (Hertha Berlin) Dennis Man (Steaua Bucharest) Manu Garcia (Manchester City) Faitout Maouassa (Rennes) Mauro Junior (PSV Eindhoven) Stephy Mavididi (Arsenal) Kylian Mbappe (Paris Saint-Germain) Weston McKennie (Schalke) Jan Mlakar (Maribor) Nikola Moro (Dinamo Zagreb) Reiss Nelson (Arsenal) Lukas Nmecha (Manchester City) Martin Odegaard (Heerenveen) Abdulkadir Omur (Trabzonspor) Matej Oravec (Spartak Trnava) Reece Oxford (Borussia Monchengladbach) Pedro Pereira (Genoa) Pietro Pellegri (Monaco) Alejandro Pozo (Sevilla) Christian Pulisic (Borussia Dortmund) Jeff Reine-Adelaide (Arsenal) Panagiotis Retsos (Bayer Leverkusen) Rui Pedro (Boavista) Yusuf Sari (Marseille) Ismaila Sarr (Rennes) Malang Sarr (Nice) Borna Sosa (Dinamo Zagreb) Moussa Sylla (Monaco) Antonio Moya Vega (Atletico Madrid) Idrissa Toure (Werder Bremen) Dayot Upamecano (RB Leipzig) Moussa Wague (KAS Eupen) Chris Willock (Benfica) Ben Woodburn (Liverpool) Rafik Zekhnini (Rosenborg) Andi Zeqiri (Lausanne) Baris Zeren (Galatasaray) Luca Zidane (Real Madrid) Zekhnini (Rosenborg) Andi Zeqiri (Lausanne) Baris Zeren (Galatasaray) Luca Zidane (Real Madrid)
Their youth program is very good, one of the top in the world IMO. If you gave a close look at their talents pool, there are many prospects coming from their system and targeted by European clubs. And they are definitely ahead of us, especially technique and tactics. What limited them is physical strength. Hope US Soccer realize it and push work harder. I saw so many fans claim our generation get better and better ( every time before U17/ U20 WC), but they don't know many other teams in the world improves more, Japan is a typical one.
We'll all be long dead before USSF actually does anything. USSF doesn't care about the MNT. It is an afterthought to our leadership. All they care about is lining their own pockets like the greedy assholes they are.
There is a massive talent difference between Japan and us. Their start list against Belgium GK Kawashima - Metz (Ligue1) RB Sakai - Marseille (Ligue 1) CB Yoshida - Southampton (EPL) CB Shoji - Kashima Antlers (Japan) LB Nagatomo - Galatasary (Turkey) DM Shibasaki - Getafe (La Liga) DM Hasebe - Frankufrt (Bundesliga) RM Haraguchi -Hannover (Bundesliga) AM Kagawa - Dortmund (Bundesliga) LM Inui - Betis (La Liga) CF Osako - Bremen (Bundesliga) Most of them are starters at their clubs. AFC is stronger than CONCACAF too. They have the likes of Japan, Korea, Iran and Australia. Even Saudi Arabia played better than Costa Rica and Panama.
Yesterday at times they were able to keep the ball, something that I don’t think we have ever been able to do.
AFC is a joke. They have the most last place group teams pretty much every Cup. CONCACAF was bad this one time, but we average 2 teams in the group stage since the Cup went to 32 teams. Don’t go all fake news in us.
Japan certainly produces more skilled players with a higher IQ than us. That becomes even more apparent when you consider the dual nationals we have who were developed elsewhere. Furthermore, almost every Japanese NTer has come thru the J League. We're trending towards a large portion of our 2022 NT never having played a min in MLS. The J League is far superior at developing skilled domestic attackers than MLS and having their players use the league as a launching pad. Actually an interesting comparison as the J League and MLS are roughly the same age and their players like ours have to deal with non-EU passport issues.
Frankly, I think the US and Japan look pretty similar. They definitely did this year. That said in 2014 they went 0-2-1 and were bottom of their group (we made it to the second round) In 2010 we won our group and made it to the second round; Japan finished 2nd in their group with a 2-1-0 record; Like us they lost in the second round 2006 we went 0-1-2 and finished bottom of the group; Japan went 0-1-2 and finished bottom of their group 2002; we made it the quarter finals; Japan hosted and lost in the second round.
Yup. Right now we can say Japan is ahead. But this has gone back and forth over the past 20 years. Neither of us have been able to get over the hump to the first tier of national teams capable of winning a World Cup (like Mexico as well). When one does an analysis of youth teams over the past couple of cycles, the US has had better youth results. The US was one of only two nations to qualify for the quarterfinals of the most recent U20 and U17 World Cups. And that was without kids like Pulisic, McKennie, and Parks participating. And when one look at the lineup for japan that was posted above, one notes that they're about to go thru a transition.
By the way, I'd like to remind everybody that the US is ranked significantly higher than Japan in the ELO ratings. We're 24th. They're 45th. They have a low ranking because their past couple of years haven't actually been that good. The USMNT has lost 3 out of their last 24 games, and only one of those was a "bad loss." I'm not saying japan isn't better than the USMNT right now. I just think there's a lot of over-reaction here. I mean, a person wrote Japan's lineup with players at big clubs above................as if they USMNT also doesn't have a whole host of its players at big clubs in big leagues. Our backline could easily have been Premier League, Premier League, Bundesliga, Bundesliga for instance. [Yedlin, Cameron, Brooks, Johnson] We can go around the field that way. I mean.............Pulisic did play more than Kagawa this year at the same club (and by quite a distance), but we're going to pretend like Kagawa is at a bigger club I guess. McKennie did play the same number of games at Schalke that Hasabe played for Frankfurt, and Schalke was a better club than Frankfurt. But let's just obviously give that matchup to them as well? I can keep going. I just don't understand the inferiority complex that American fans have. As if we don't have forwards in the Bundesliga? Where does Bobby Wood play? Where does Aaron Johannsson play? By the way, the Bundesliga just released this starting XI of youngsters to watch out for in 2018-2019. 4 Americans. 4! But lets just continue this inferiority complex.
If players like Sargent, Klinsmann and Weah get enough playing time the US could put out a hell of a U23 team for the Olympic qualifiers.
Good post. Maybe people are saying this because we finished behind Panama and Honduras and lost to T&T? Our friendly results are frankly worthless as an indicator of team capability. Based on real competition over the past year, we aren’t very good.
Are we going to do this for every freaking team that makes it to the QF's? I can't wait for the "Is Sweden better than us?", as the Swedes beat SK, trounce Mexico, and beat Switzerland on a deflected shot 1-0 to advance to the QF's... I know we're not at the World Cup, so it makes comparisons hard, but when so much depends on the draw, and then a single elimination game, it's reeeeeaaaally stupid to use ONE tournament to base your opinion of an entire program... Was the US a perennial Quarterfinalist after being a handball away from the Semi's back in 2002? No? Oh, it's almost like one tournament doesn't matter as much as historical results. Look at Costa Rica. We'll lose to them in CR next cycle, but is anyone scared of that team anymore as their current crop ages out completely?