October 2019: Berhalter suffers embarrassing losses, first at home to Jamaica, and then to Canada. There is no accountability because power and control are consolidated. As long as MLS players feature prominently in the USMNT and the WC is not at-risk, the coach is safe. Does that really surprise anyone? I wonder what the players really think? Are they willing to put in 100% effort knowing that this USMNT roster is always rigged and half best? They got to think why a guy like Roldan and Trapp keep playing in the midfield while Adams got sent to the RB and Morales watches the games from home in Germany? The players can change things. USSF and SUM got to break off, until then; the players need to sit or the USSF can field all MLS roster and try to sell tickets. I don't think people will show up to watch Trapp, Bradley, and Roldan. Pulisic, Adams, Sargent, Weston, Weah, and co. sell tickets.
The worst part about this is I truly believe (although maybe it's just wishful thinking after last night's edition of "Sorry-ball" - yes, that's a double meaning since I think Berhalter does want to play a version of Sarri-ball, but it's just sorry to watch) that the way Tata had Atlanta United playing last season would have been a near perfect fit for this group of USMNT players. Transition quickly and take advantage of athletic ability. Find ways to get a skilled dribbler (Pulisic in the Almiron role) with very good speed into open spaces where he can take defenders on 1 on 1. Run a 3-5-2 with wingbacks, which would have taken advantage of Yedlin's pace. Put Adams in front of the back three. You would have even had a decent complementary two-striker setup with Altidore's hold-up play and Sargent's ability to run off the play more. I really think it would have worked - maybe not quite as well as ATL United made it look last year, but it sure would have been a better system than this stuff. If Stewart wants to play some sort of possession style, OK. Develop it with the U20s and U17s so they are comfortable with it. Don't try to force the system onto a national team with a totally different skill set. Hell, even De Boer has been flexible enough to adapt his preferred tactics to a degree in Atlanta.
I’m sure they always try but I’d def love to know what they think. Not all players but yes they can change things. The top young guys need to speak up and speak their mind the issue is they’ll be putting their national team careers in jeopardy. They need to all do it together. Even then it may still not work.
I suggested all of this months ago and even suggested that the fanbase boycott the program. Everyone laughed at this.
What a bummer read. The only sport that I enjoy being gutted for egos and penis extensions. At least my daughter’s U-6 is pure and fun to watch.
Speaking of Tab Ramos... A future guest who has worked w/ Tab Ramos will tell #TheCoachingAcademy that Ramos should have been the interim #USMNT coach but wasn't because of fear that Ramos would do well & disrupt Jay Berhalter and US Soccer's plan to hire his brother after #Crew96 season @SiriusXMFC— Glenn Crooks (@GlennCrooks) October 16, 2019 If this is true... lol
I’m with Greggg. As he said, Canada is a really good team. The fact they haven’t beaten us in 34 years is proof that it would be hard to avoid a loss this time. Also as he said, stop judging the program based on this result! Look at our performance against Mexico as a benchmark please. Honestly, how can anyone even doubt the program right now? As Greggg said, things are fine.
But Dave S team already looks better than Greg's team. If not too difficult to do that. We almost beat France with DAve S. Fire the berhalters
it would be remiss to ignore all the good berhalter has done... curacao? rising regional power. tata/mexico? genius manager, incredible edition of their team. canada? challengers to mexico as concacaf elite. the truth is curacao is an average-jamaica-level side. tata is a good, not remotely great manager. the only way you could consider him such is in the phil jackson sense of winning when he has clearly superior talent. this is a very average mexico team over the last couple of years, and theyre approaching the end of an era of players theyll need to replace. canada is HUGELY improved on what they historically are...and right now they are roughly a particularly good panama side. or a historically average costa rica. all of them have benefitted greatly due to berhalter, largely in comparison to the embarrassment hes settled us into. i want to be clear: curacao are in the conversation for 8-12th best team in concacaf seemingly out of nowhere. super. im not saying in any way that tata is a bum- im ABSOLUTELY not saying he isnt/wouldnt be better than berhalter...but so would a furby equipped with literally any player rating system filling out a blank 4-4-2 form. costa rica, panama, trinidad- none of them are in a particularly strong era, or generation if you will. how confident are you really that canada is even at that level yet? but its plainly clear- they, and all of concacaf, are absolutely going to town on our ass. theres the saying thats roughly "putting others down doesnt mean youve become taller" but man- theyre all taking turns standing on the dying husk of our once solid, once promising soccer nation of a body, and they sure as hell LOOK a lot taller. of all the schemes concacaf has thrown out- up to and including nations league- to prop up the smaller nations in the region, who would have guessed gregg freaking berhalter would be the most successful one of all? also deserving of credit are sunil gulati jr...er, i mean, carlos cordeiro and earnie stewart. all of chuck blazers cats should lift a diamond-encrusted bowl of cristal to us soccer for finding a way to do it while only bilking their own willing fans.
If this is true, then sponsors should be up in arms. I can’t believe this is how they want the money they are spending to support US Soccer to be utilized. I’d love to hear what Nike’s CEO has to say about this.
If I was king I would call in Tab immediately and say Jay's brother is toast. The job is yours. Do your best at getting as many of your young guns integrated with the core senior team players as quickly as reason would dictate. All bets are off after this cycle but the team is yours through the 2022 WC.
In domestic soccer circles, Tab Ramos is the clear winner of 2019 so far with the 3rd straight successful U-20 World Cup, and I say that as somebody who did not want the U.S. to hire him. The other top 2 domestic candidates either aren't in the U.S. picture (Marsch) or shouldn't be (Bradley, as much as I've always liked him).
Really interesting story on GK coach Des McAleenan by @EoinOCallaghan. Among other things, he's dismayed that Tab Ramos didn't get the USMNT job & says Jay Berhalter was behind the process that led to his brother Gregg being hired. https://t.co/eUzA1ZqLi2— Subscribe to GrantWahl.com (@GrantWahl) October 15, 2019
You forgot Tata Martino. Who knows if he would have taken the job, but he was living in the US and they should have at least at least pursued him. But they didn't. Because he doesn't speak English well enough. And of course Jesse Marsch wasn't considered because he once had an argument with Dan Flynn over how US Soccer treated Bob Bradley...
If it was a legit coaching search, they would have made Tata say no several times before moving on. I will always think he would have at least seriously considered taking the US job. In a career with some high profile assignments, I think he would have found the idea of leading the USMNT to its potential to be an interesting challenge.
Sadly, I don't think Tata Martino can be considered a "domestic" candidate anymore. If Martino is the guy, then USSF blew it. And with Marsch, perhaps Flynn read too much Bigsoccer and did not want a manager who is part of the "Bradley Brigade".
Jay is an honorable Chicago man. When his Brother needed "Respect", he Respectfully made him the Boss of Mikeytown. Jay is an honorably pious man. When he sees that his Brother needs keeping, he never forgets that he is his Brother's Keeper. And both shall prosper to the end of days........ Unfortunately, for we Heathen, what is ending are the days we have a national team worthy of support.
When Gregg was hired, I actually didn't think it was a bad choice. His Columbus teams punched above their weight quite consistently. I still don't have a problem with him as as a club coach. But it became obvious within his first three months in the USMNT job that he was still thinking like a club coach, and it was obvious after six months that he wasn't going to change. Last night, at the AO Sacramento watch party, the general consensus was that Gregg had probably lost the locker room. It's past time to pull the plug. I'd even rather have Sarachan back than continue with Gregg -- at least he put players in their club positions, in a formation everyone was likely to be familiar with. We didn't look as disjointed and confused as we do every single game now.
After the Gold Cup I made the point that Berhalter and Klinsmann are more alike than different. They both think they're visionary geniuses, and they both outsmart themselves by doing things that leave the team completely disorganized and playing like the players met for the first time five minutes before kickoff. In Klinsmann's case, it was making radical tactical changes at the last minute with no explanation of what he expected the players to do, and in Berhalter's case it is an overly complicated system that a national team doesn't have enough time to learn. Berhalter's "trust the system" even has the exact same ring to it as Klinsmann's "trust the process"...
Oh, I thought that might not come through over text, my bad. I just meant I'm laughing because I started the boycott the day after Couva. But I appreciate you joining. I think someone even said stop watching on TV, because that's where the money is at. I encourage that as well.
Breaking News: SUM I mean Jay I mean USSF has been so pleased with 3Gs system their gonna promote him to GM to fill the void vacated by Ernie after his promotion and 3G is going to find a replacement coach who can continue with his system.