The continued harsh scheduling -- camp cupcake will be Panama and Costa Rica -- reflects our arrogance and failure to acknowledge our present position. Or, we know we've slipped but nonetheless run a schedule like Brazil, which would be even dumber. This is pre-montage Rocky, a continual hospital ball of a schedule. I know the sort of UEFACL obsessive fanboy loves this kind of good vs good schedule but no school team graduating a bunch of seniors and with a new coach would say, oh, let's schedule the final 4 teams from HS state for our preseason. This is when you'd play the JV and the local small catholic school while you sort out did we pick the right players, and try to let them emerge in their own system. Your goal would be improvement over time -- playoffs at the end of the season -- not scheduling a buzzsaw out the gate like you were good last year, kept the same coach, and graduated no one. There is an arrogance to a team that couldn't even qualify and then rebuilt from there pretending it is something it is not and has not reearned since. I want to see us beat Peru before we bother scheduling Brazil. If the idea that playing good teams made you better worked, we would have improved rather than regressed this fall. In reality a variety of teams play the Brazils of the world and it doesn't make them all world beaters. These are final exams for teams that have already done the hard work, not pop quizzes for new students in your class.
Related arrogance: just because you are on a team in Europe or play in UEFA CL doesn't make you hot sh*t. One of my favorite NT players was Dempsey and one of the more interesting things about him is he is a rare player I thought I watched grow before my eyes. He went from a dancing showboat semi productive wing player a la Juan Agudelo, to a serious, sharp finishing, ball holding, legit forward. He did the work at NER, he continued to grow at Fulham, he got his playing time, and he progressed. Too much of this team runs on the "he's a Chelsea asset" and then doesn't acknowledge if that player actually plays any good. It's a fanboyesque concept too centered on where you are playing and setting up some sort of world class schedule. Do we bother to make sure those prospects actually turn out, or that we win any games in the buzzsaw? No. We've kind of assumed from location what we should have to prove. If he is in the B.1 he must be good. If we schedule Brazil we must be that kind of team, 2018 aside. Really? Put differently, if you are on the books at Spurs, you can start playing like it. Otherwise maybe the guy at less fancied NYRB looks better. Ditto bothering with this schedule. Why are we scheduling Brazil and England if we don't even look competitive in these games? Clear sign to drop back down to Canada and Jamaica and Guatemala and earn your way back up. Or is that unfair to Mr. Chelsea and Mr. Spurs and not worthy of our aspirations, regardless how the games are actually routinely turning out. The world is sending us signals, are we listening?
Sounds a lot like the original NASL with "Team America". A good theory but a bit shaky in practice. Would our best 23 be able to compete with the best 23 of the top 10 teams in Europe? . Maybe maybe not...but what happens if 1-4 of our top players are currently on one of the top teams and decide to stay with them (Like Ricky Davis decided to remain with the Cosmos)? What if Pulisc decides to stay with Dortmund or go to Liverpool or whatever...how is that going to affect the US's chances against any of the top four in England, Spain, Italy, Germany? (Remember, the top club teams have MULTIPLE world class players in their team...we don't have one). Ultimately Team America folded, at least in part because they weren't winning and they didn't get full buy in from the top players that put their own careers ahead of the NT. (Can't blame them for that).
To me the thing is if this takes off down this Super League direction do we even have international soccer as we know it. That would be a fairly FIFA/UEFA busting thing if it ever happened. Is Super League going to let its players play international soccer at injury risk if FIFA isn't there to tell it you have to release? I know MLS has the cap and roster constraints etc but the teams are already often 8 of 11 foreign on the field. People keep selling in some EPL way it's to our benefit but short term the league is dominated by foreign scorers and playmakers, I don't see how that's helping USMNT. And then if you unleashed the cap and roster rules I'm not sure that gets better. The EPL is not some unmitigated boon to the EFA. In these cosmo leagues it becomes an exercise in hunting around for domestic players, and weighing small club starters vs some guy who was supposed to be a big club stud but actually sees the field maybe half the time. You lose the benefit of squads of Americans who routinely start for their club and you just pick the best of the lot. Personally I think the high water mark was Bradenton plus a fairly constrained MLS where the focus was on the American player c. 2002. MLS teams never were great with HGP and now their American starters are sometimes good but often marginal. x20-whatever and that's the current domestic backbone of the pool. My Dynamo have more Honduran NT than anything the US might want. The fallacy is that given more money and loosened restrictions it's the American player that benefits. Maybe a few isolated players get better coaching and turn out better -- if the coaching improved with more money -- but what does the overall pool look like.
Maybe I don't understand your point. The team wouldn't be an MLS team but a superstar team owned by a spend-a-fortune billionaire who competes to hire the world's best with a bias towards elite North/South/Central American players competing in the Superleague. Would this team get all of the players from the Americas? Not even close but I'd think a couple would like to live in NYC/closer to home and play top flight soccer against the best teams in the world. For example, we could have Neymar, Messi, CP and Navez all playing together against Barcelonas, Real Madrid, Chelsea, Man U, Man City, PSV, PSG, Juve, etc. The demand and attention this team would get here in the US would be phenomenal IMO and catapult soccer's popularity stateside. Of course, it would be best to have at least one US player who plays for the team.......
I guess I missed your intent. Although you called it the Americas (which should have been my clue), I was thinking in terms of the USMNT and thought you were talking about taking the best Americans (US players), combining them and competing with the worlds best teams. Not sure that would appeal to me any more than having Pulisic playing for a Dortmund, or any other top team in a similar league or in the Champions league. I definitely wouldn't be impressed by an American that I felt was on the team ONLY because it had an American owner. (not saying that is what you are implying)
Unpopular opinion; I am not as worried about the lack of attacking mids that are playing in MLS as some are. I think it is mostly a symptom of two things: 1. the increasing quality of play in MLS, and the resulting increase in competition. (especially in mid and forward positons). I think this is directly analogous to what has been true for much/most of our players that have gone to Europe in the past. Most either played a different position (usually defender) or they sat on teh bench. The exception(s) that I can think of are Dempsey (one of our best players of all time...some feel THE best), Reyna (who also played defense for much of his time in Europe) and Ramos (who played in 2nd division Spain but not in first division...was recovering from skull fracture his one year in first division). 2. The fact is that some of our most promising players right now are very young. Combine that with the fact that our league is better now and it is more difficult to see the feild. Some have pointed to the fact that there were a few notable players that played a great deal at a young age as evidence that MLS is now biased against young Americans. While some coaches may hold that bias (probably true), I suspect that greatest barrier is the player in front of him. That being said, I do believe that there are a few players that demonstrated they EARNED more time that didn't get it. The one player that stands out above the rest is Carlton.
LOL. If we took the best Americans and place them on a single team, I think we would be mid table championship/b2 at best. I do think that the American soccer audience would get strongly behind a world-class team based in the US and I think players from North Central and South America would strongly consider playing for a team closer to home in the greatest city in the world. I mention billionaire only because that is what it would take to build a team like this.
To be fair, people have been saying that FOREVER... At some point, the reality is they don't develop and reach their potential or maybe weren't all that to begin with.
True, that is very fair. And...we will have a better idea about our current prospects in a few years when we get to "some point". For what it is worth, in the past I have been wrongly optimistic about many of our prospects of the past but I don't think that we have had as many of them and they didn't have the same level of skill that many have now....that and they seem to be younger now. How many times in the past have we had so many players under the age of 20 that have been labeled as the next big thing?
To be fair...………………..the issues we're seeing with the USMNT right with regards to a dearth of elite players "in their primes" is a result of development shortfalls a decade ago. The Development Academy was only founded in 2007, and more than half of the clubs in MLS have only been founded since 2011. The professional development programs in the US are still in their infancy. What we are seeing is a wave of development academy kids head to Europe. Weston McKennie and Christian Pulisic are at the front of this wave. JOsh Sargent, who played in the DA for Scott Galllagher in St. Louis is next. These youngsters that are moving to Europe are more "pro ready" than they've ever been before. All of Pulisic, McKennie, and Sargent will have debuted within a calendar year after moving to their German clubs. Bundesliga clubs are providing polish to these kids that were overwhelmingly developed in the US> And there's a lot more where that came from. Chris Richards and Taylor Booth(Bayern Munich), Richie Ledesma (PSV), Sebastian Soto and Chris Gloster (Hannover), Alex Mendez (Freiburg), Brady Scott (Cologne)…………...the list goes on and on. Not all of them are going to "make it," but folks should be very excited about what is STARTING to come out of the development academy. And of course we have our typical batch of Euro-based youngsters like Sergio Dest of Ajax. MLS players "in their prime" aren't moving to these Euro leagues, but these Euro clubs sure want our 18-19 year old (or 16 year old in cases with Euro passports like Pulisic) raw materials. Tyler Adams for instance What I'm trying to say is that there are a lot of reasons to be cynical and negative about the state of the USMNT right now. HOWEVER, there's NO reason to be cynical about what's happening in our youth programs. We keep building and building and building. ITs not going to be overnight, but there's a hell of a lot of growth. And the proof is in the pudding. Euro clubs really covet these young players. They're hoovering them up at an astonishing rate. THe US is back-to-back CONCACAF U20 Champions, and have made the quarterfinals of the U20 World Cup two times in a row. The results are there to see. If the US can actually put together their "best" U20 team with Weah, Adams, Sargent, and company...…………………..I'd suggest that they can even go farther at this U20 World Cup. They're GOOD. No reason to be cynical here. In the end we'll probably include Adams, Weah, and Sargent on our Gold Cup team instead. To go with really young players like Pulisic and McKennie.
is the success of U20 teams indicative of countries relative u-20 talent? I know it seems like a "who's buried in grant's tomb?" question but I'm curious is to whether the most talented players in that age group participate or if a substantial portion of them don't play in this tournament. I'm assuming U17 is fairly indicative of youth potential albeit success at that level doesn't frequently translate to senior success.
Success at U17 level doesn't often translate to success at the senior level. In terms of teams or players. Three of the past 5 U17 World Cups have been won by Nigeria. Isolated U20 cycles don't necessarily indicate future success of the national team. After all, these are only 2 year slivers of the player pool. And its only one coach's selection of these players. [We have a lot of senior USMNT players that simply weren't selected for the U20 national teams.] Dual-ationals like john Brooks, Fabian Johnson, etc. typically haven't made up their minds at this age, either. Worth noting that at the last u20 World Cup we made the quarterfinal without players like Pulisic and McKennie participating. Clubs aren't forced to ever release players for youth events, and sometimes they're not released. And sometimes the U20 players have been "promoted" to the senior team. Adams, Sargent, and Weah are examples from this cycle. While Isolated U20 cycles aren't indicative of future success, consistent and sustained success at that level does tend to translate. If you're getting 5 or so players from EACH U20 cycle that are "international quality" then that quickly adds up to a really good pool of senior national team players. Of the 2015 U20 World Cup and CONCACAF Championship squads we've already had Zack Steffen, Cameron Carter-Vickers, Shaq Moore, Matt Miazga, Kellyn Acosta, Paul Arriola, Emerson Hyndman, Rubio Rubin, Marky Delgado, Romain Gall, Ethan Horvath, and Erik Palmer-Brown get senior national team caps. A callup for Russell Canouse also seems imminent. That's a really good return on only a two year sliver of the player pool. Now not all of those guys will become "elite" international quality. But if you have 2-3 each cycle, that also quickly adds up. Maybe it'll be Steffen, Palmer-Brown, and CCV in that case. Who knows.
Thanks, CE. Looking backwards from recent WC finalists, do you think one can trace success at multiple U- cycles? In other words, did France and Croatia's current squads have success when they were going through their U17 and U20 cycles (probably the past two/three cycles of each)?
Cupcake is largely an exercise in futility and should instead be a strictly U23, perhaps even U21 camp which tours Germany, showcases our top young domestic talent and scrimmages Bund and 2Bund clubs during their winter break. This repeated plan of bringing in MLS mediocres with little upside, practice for 3 weeks and then come out with an incompetent and lifeless performance is a waste of time. And money.
It all sounds good written up like that... but I'll believe when they arrive and deliver at the top tier... You can read similar posts on here from past years on earmarked kids that were going to be next big things... Like prior wave that included Agudelo, Joya and Villareal, among others... Neat and tidy players on their day, but not next big things by any stretch. Perhaps I am being a bit cynical, but the point stands we've all heard this before. I'm not believing any of it until it actually starts happening. Pulisic is a great start and I certainly hope he's not a one-off outlier. I hope you are indeed correct about this wave being different, of course.
"Showcase" buys into the mythmaking where they are better abroad. I also think you would find a la Dominic Cervi that this sort of favor giving approach does not necessarily bear fruit, in terms of getting players well situated, or them being worth a crap. I don't want to distort the call sheet too much trying to find wayward players homes. I want to call my best players and most interesting prospects, or people at need spots. Not do their agent's job. However, I could see the value in it being a camp limited to new caps, youth players, an experimental/upside approach. I think if we are playing some few caps no impression prime age MLS player he better be an all star stud we just overlooked. I think the idea of playing some winter break team friendlies would be a novel approach as well but you'd have to see who they ran out (the Germans) and whether the games were competitive and beneficial. It might or might not be a harder sell for tv, fwiw. But you could try it once and see. It could be an interesting change of pace. One thing I think we need to work on, based on our results history in recent years, is winning away. The contradiction here is perceived anti MLS bias when this is going by definition to be a mostly or entirely MLS traveling party. I chafe a little at the anti MLS stuff because that IS the domestic first division whether people like it or not, and whether we have good periods or bad with the expeditionary players, MLS is supposed to be the "all else fails" fallback. If Hamid or Horvath aren't actually being played in your foreign paradise, and they look like a wreck on the field for us, who do we have playing in MLS? Ironically I think it drifts ever more in the direction of a cosmopolitan money league - and is thus less useful as a domestic player incubator in bulk. Teams can now start 8 foreigners without blinking. I feel like my objection to MLS right now is more current. The level of the league has improved. However the league improving doesn't magically make our players better. The league is not focused on HGP enough and is beginning to tilt towards foreign starters.
One of the worst things Klinsi injected into USMNT is back seat driving on club destinations, to the point where some even want us working on showcasing players abroad. That's not our job. Our job is line up the best players. And if we want to fudge that, maybe give need area players or young prospects of unusual promise an early look. We of course want the players playing and growing, but it's their job with their agent to sort that bit out. The NT coach then judges how they look when they show up. Whether a better, lesser, or same team gets that done is theirs to sort out. The coach's job is just to tell them if they aren't good enough right now. Not only do I feel like Klinsi actually misread some of the choices, and suggested bad ideas, but I think picking players based on where they are is a lazy coach's proxy. I could watch them on tape or I can look at their club affiliations and assume. Hmmmm. Personally I think this team has wandered into a little too concrete of pecking orders and snob factor and lost track of the basic question of who are my best performing players. Cut the crap and play the best people. If B.1 does it for you, fine. If B.2 is best, fine. If MLS makes you good, ok. I'm not a player agent, I'm a coach, and it would be lazy for me to just read the club affiliations and make a lineup off them.
If you look at the historical results of the U20 WC...of the "powers", only Argentina (6) and Brazil (5) have one it more than once. Spain won once (1999), United Germany has not won it (west Germany won once in 1981), Italy hasn't even made the finals (3rd place 2017) etc. To me, that indicates that not all the top countries play their best players. In general, I wouldn't expect many of the world class or almost world class youngsters to play, but I would expect that the overall level of play is relatively consistent. (Teams like Argentina take their 1b level and below quality players for example and teams like Panama take their 1a level and below.) Over time, a rise in success from a team like the US that is developing and has always played their 1a players and is now playing 1b players definitely shows an overall improvement. Furthermore, the overall level might not be 1a, if a player stands out at the 1b or 1c level, that shoulld give a fairly good idea that he has some promise. (not a guarantee or course but a better picture than if it the competition is at a younger level. (a player that stands out at any level can usually be projected to be able to at least fit in at the next higher level)
Some are. Some aren't. And depends on the level. Croatia is typically not good at these youth levels in terms of SHEER results. They've only advanced past the group stage of the U17 World Cup ONCE in their history. And have only advanced past the group stage twice in their U20 World Cup history. The US is routinely better than that type of nation at these youth levels. Qualification is tougher for them than the US, but the fact is that the US almost always qualifies...………………..and we typically do fairly well. Only two nations on planet earth made the quarterfinals of the 2017 U17 and U20 World Cups. That was England and the United States. It has typically been that next stage of development, the 18-22 year old period, where we fall behind. Evidence of that is the total struggle we've had at the U23 level, failing to even qualify for the Olympics 3 of the past 4 cycles. Klinsmann saw that as a huge issue, calling our last U23 group a "lost generation." We have these kids like Luis Gil that look really good at 18 years old, and have fallen off a cliff by the time they're 22. Other nations have that too, but it seems we have had a preponderance of it. This is why the continued development of the 2nd/3rd divisions are so critical in this country. Finding ways to get our elite youngsters minutes in MLS (like Adams and Durkin have) is so important. And the fact that we have this train of elite prospects in that age group moving to Europe instead of remaining in our domestic programs is really important. As I said earlier...……………..McKennie, Pulisic, and Sargent (imminent) debuted within a year after they moved to Germany. These are not Joya and Villarreal level prospects. Although any name mentioned above, Agudelo, has been a surprising disappointment in that age group. And we do need patience. Clubs in this country are investing and investing and investing. Exciting things are happening. Its just going to take time.
https://sports.yahoo.com/usmnt-stoc...halke-teammate-weston-mckennie-004352980.html "Takeaway: It probably says something that out of all his European-based players, Berhalter went to see Brooks play first. The 25-year-old German-American is the most talented and experienced defender, by far, in the player pool. Still, questions about his commitment to the national team continue to linger more than five years into his U.S. career. It makes sense that the new coach would want to establish a relationship early on. Because if Brooks is going to be a key component for Berhalter this cycle, getting him to buy in is essential" The continued hatch-job attacks at the German-Americans because these weakling reporters will never grow some...………...and write an article on how "un-committed" Bradley and Altidore were that day down in T&T. If we cant blame it on Garbers Golden boys, we will just blame it on Klinsmann's German-born players. pay raise and job secure.
Probably unfair to question his commitment but you have to question his recent performances. He's probably just as bewildered as everyone else by what has been happening off the pitch. Compared to the BL the USMNT is amateur night in Dixieland.
I always thought McIntyre was decent reporter but that sounds like something someone who has no idea what they are talking about would say.
Brooks runs hot and cold and when he goes cold he is actually awful. That is not about buy in. If we still think this is a loyalty thing, we are living in the past. He played 3 games last year. And then was not very good. The real issue is quality. I hope that's what Berhalter is there to scout, and not fighting the last war of selling how much he likes the Euro guys to the detriment of the actual lineup on the field. The thing is I can show you in B.1 games things he does that mimic his US failures. This is a flaw in his game -- ie, he is good at clearing balls from zonal space but not staying with a man -- which you can see when he plays in Germany as well. I watched him allow a goal to Dortmund where he was marking space when his man got the header. Just watch how many of his clears and headers are in space not challenged. You might feel superficially impressed he is winning the balls but in doing so he is not usually with the man to negate that risk. This is where I think people need to be shown video of Onyewu dominating his man physically, or Pope and Boca with a mix of athleticism and skill. They truly dominate because they are on their men and then winning the contest for the ball. Brooks is an illusion because he is marking air. I think Berhalter in the abstract could be a bridge -- I just don't practically know whether we need one with the new set of players. The people who were wound up about JK vs Arena are mostly gone, aged off the team.