Since we (rightly) took down the qualifying thread, I guess we should start a new one to take us home. The finals are in May in Poland. The draw is in February. https://www.fifa.com/news/y=2018/m=10/news=fifa-u-20-world-cup-draw-to-take-place-in-gdynia.html Historically things have happened pretty fast between qualifying and the Finals, mainly due to qualifying usually being later. If you count past cycles' qualifying tournaments as a camp, there were 3 tournament-year gatherings in 2013, 2015 and 2017, all in the low-20s in terms of player count. I wonder if there will be another YNT "jubilee" in early 2019. We also haven't seen the U19s get together since September; three guys who were at that event made the qualifying roster. And here's the qualifying thread, by the way: https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/the-2019-u-20-qualifying-thread.2074848/
Since there is more time between qualifying and the final tournament this time combined with a possible coaching change there might some friendlies to look at more players and make more than usual changes.
By the way, I spaced on the roster thread when posting this -- was thinking that this one might be the sticky, and that one was meant for quick post-qualifying thoughts. https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/2019-u-20-world-cup-roster-discussion.2090223/ But if this isn't useful, mods, feel free to lock/delete/merge/whatever makes sense.
Parchman wrote an article about our U20 success and it pivots to be about why we should combine feds with CONMEBOL, which seems unavoidable at this point. https://theathletic.com/678687/2018/11/27/
The article is titled: "The US U20 men dominated the CONCACAF Championship, and that's not all good news." If I may take a guess... Is the bad news the fact that we need stiff competition in order to sharpen our players?
Thomas Roberts efforting to make this team. http://www.americansoccernow.com/ar...tious-goals-in-2019-for-both-club-and-country But next year he also eyes the lofty goal of making the U.S. U-20 World Cup team – where he would be playing up a cycle. It’s a goal he believes is attainable and U-20 head coach Tab Ramos is familiar with Roberts as he also served as the U-18 coach for the Vaclav Jezek Tournament. “We did really well in the Czech Republic,” Roberts said. “It was my biggest accomplishment so far because I scored the game winning penalty to beat Japan. That was a big step for me, confidence-wise. The U-20 team [next year] is a big goal for me, but I still have work to do to make that roster. I can play in the next one in 2021, but I want to play in this one in 2019.”
Ramos was on the Scuffed podcast an explained that the giant jubilee only works in off years for the U17 and U20 WCs. There will be a combined camp of some sort, but another big one next year.
Worth noting that there is no FIFA date until March. So getting all of these Euro kids away from clubs (even those that don't play for first teams) will be tough for 4-5 months. Just part of the deal.
Ramos will pull a guy in without seeing all that much of him (in U20 camps, anyway) if he wants him. Last cycle, four field players made on the finals roster despite having just one previous U20 callup. And Zelalem was brought in in 2015 despite zero previous camps.