people need to understand most good teams didn't have their best players in the u20/u17 wc so reading too much into ok performances is not a great idea.
Tell that to Messi and Ronaldo - just to name two who did play in the u20/u17 World cup. As did Pirlo, Robben, Iniesta, Xavi, Hazard, Pulisic, etc., etc., etc.,
The South American teams don't get their best players released by their European clubs for youth competitions. Another disadvantage of depending on foreign systems when your own league is not at the top.
Neymar, Suarez, Alexis, Arturo Vidal, Angel di Maria, Tevez, as well as Messi all played in various U World Cups. Yes, some of these players were still at their South American clubs when they played, but a_new_fan was implying that the U.S. results at youth world cups was/is not impressive because there was/is no talent there from other teams.
Things were different before. The change started in 2010, and by 2015 not even for the OGs they had to release players. Compare: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/ol...ics-Football-clubs-release-players-Games.html "FIFA rules clubs must allow U23 players to play in London Olympics" --2012 to http://olympics.nbcsports.com/2015/...s-clubs-soccer-rio-2016-qatar-2022-world-cup/ "FIFA says soccer clubs don’t have to release players for Rio Olympics" --2016
you just listed a handful of players some like pulisic who didn't play in the u20 so I am not sure you meant to include him. also all of those guys before pulisic were years ago. look at the u17 before england destroyed the us...dortmund called sancho back...so one of their three best players...didn't play.
Nick Lima should've been one of the 7. I really do think that he can challenge Yedlin for the RB spot.
The U17 World Cup, in particular, is a terrible barometer of future success at a national team level. The U20 level is a little better. If the top players aren't at the U20 WC, it does tell you something about depth. The U23 level probably tells us the most about the quality of a program as at that age those players should already be in the mix for the USMNT. Our last two U23 CONCACAF Championships efforts have been a disaster. Take out a couple of unavailable players (like say Pulisic, Brooks, and Yedlin from the most recent team).......................and we were scraping the bottom of the barrel. Our starting lineup for the game against Honduras in the 2015 semifinal that would have led to our qualification.......................included Boyd Okwuono (who as far as we can tell is out of the sport), Luis Gil (who's done an amazing dive out of the pool), Dillon Serna (who unfortunately hasn't been the same since his injury), Jerome Kiesewetter (another disappearing act) among others. Our bench included players Like Charlie Horton, Maki Tall, Will Packwood, Alonso Hernandez, Gboly Ariyibi, amongst others. Its depressing reading. THAT 2015 U23 effort should have been a wake up call for the 2018 WCQing effort. Klinsmann knew that team was a problem. He talked a lot about that U23 "lost generation." These are the types of players that MLS should be producing. U23 players that can step in to U23 qualifying efforts when the Euros aren't available...............and not skip a beat. THAT is what January camp should be doing these days. Identifying and working with those U23 youngsters. By the way, the best player in that game was the Dynamo's Alberth Elis. Scored a brace to knock us out.
That has been true of every team from youth on up to the USMNT and what was so positive about this last u20 side. ...and Klinsmann was criticized heavily for having 10ish u23 players in that January camp. Unfortunately, we only have 4 players in this camp who will be eligible for the playoff (Adams, Acosta, Glad and Lennon).
foden is up their with sancho but brewster isn't on their level. this is the issue with american fans. they can't tell the difference.
yeah...uh no is the best way I can put it. There isn't a barometer from a lower team that guarantees or reflects for the full national team on any level. Sure you can trace the failure to qualify for the olympics twice in a row as a warning of lack of talent for the usmnt that was coming but it doesn't tell nearly the whole story. If that team were missing 4/5 really good players because their club wouldn't release them then it shows a lack of depth but it doesn't mean disaster was certain. The issue is that very few players were missing and they still couldn't find a talented enough troup to qualify. I mean there is great irony in this time was supposed to be the peak freddy adu era lol. the two most dominate countries recently on the full men's team are spain and germany. combined they have exactly zero titles for the olympics, U20 and U17 since 2000. I do agree that they need to do a better job with the pool that is clear and hopefully the newly titled GM will be all over that. I mean one short term goal should be qualifying for the olympics but the u23 team is never going to be the future national team its always going to be about younger and backup national team types. we will see when their is a new president and when the gm is picked if they are going to take the u23/olympics seriously or not.
The 2012 U23 team is the one that Klinsmann called the lost generation. That team was coached by Caleb Porter and massively under performed! Shea Agudelo Adu Mix Jeffrey Corona Villafana Opara Kitchen Sarkodie Hamid Sean Johnson, Boyd, Gyau, and Okugo were on the bench
While Klinsman was the coach, there was no talk about a lack of talent. In fact, Matt Doyle repeatedly said this was the greatest collection of USMNT ever; certainly the deepest. Granted, JK's tactical inconsistency made that an easy target as the problem. But when Arena replaced JK, the story was that Arena will get all this talent to play as a team and qualify. It was only on the eve of the Panama qualifier in October that Sciaretta published his article detailiing the lack of talent. It was only after the failure to qualify with a mostly MLS roster that the MLS paid media really picked up on the idea there was a lack of talent. Not saying Brian's article is wrong or there wasn't a lack of talent in a certain age range, there was. Just pointing out that this as a main reason for the failure is a recent reason that nobody took seriously until Oct. 10th. It is a factor, but is used mostly as a diversion from the failure by Arena and the mostly MLS roster to get a result in Couva. Also, not discussed is whether those kids weren't talented at 19, or something was hurting the development of players 5-10 years ago and whether it is still happening now.
Almost every player on that roster’s career trajectory comes down to lack of talent, playing in a league that didn’t challenge them, injuries, and/or mental toughness/focus/etc. I’d say that front 3 all got in their own way, and not sure collectively if they were better in 2011 than now.
The situation has changed radically in the last 15 months. Back in 2016 we had many guys who looked like they were going to do well in Europe, from Rubin to Johannsson, from Zelalem to Hyndman, from Palmer-Brown to Picault, from Wooten to Wood, etc. Our record of fail has been brutal in that period of time, so the "best generation ever" talk disappeared. Add to that that the Germericans supposed to elevate us to the next level didn't do so (none of the younger ones has come close to what Jones showed for us), and that the "best MLSers" like Nagbe, Nguyen, Dax, Pontius, Acosta, etc. underwhelmed, and you can't say people just changed their tune for nothing.
it just tells you how much of an idiot doyle is. Looking back its not a very talented group at all. I think you are confused by the two different issues. 1)there was a lack of talent to compete at the highest level 2)while there was enough talent to get out of the hex the group was there underperformed but still big picture there was a lack of talent.
I'm not confused and I'm not arguing there was talent. All I said was that nobody in the media was talking about a lack of talent until after the failure. Probably because MLS writers were considering Bradley, Zusi, Bedoya, Gonzales, Besler as top talent. Not only did we have the poor birth years, but several of our best players have really dropped in form (FabJo, Howard, Geoff, JJ) from just the prior summer.. Brooks was hurt and our coach was not talented.
It's the risk with unreasonably hyping up players. People are starting to do it again with Sargent, Parks, and even McKennie who is showing ok but nothing to indicate he's locked the spot. We just don't learn.
I believe those comments were about the '14 player pool that included Dempsey, Donovan, and Jones. Brian's article lines up with what people paying attention to youth players saw at the time. When searching for my list of contemporaneous consensus best prospects I found this section of a fun thread that touches on this topic (read the post I quote and then to about the end of the page). Speaking of that prospect list from 2014:
Many people were talking about how poor the top end talent was in 15 and 16, but we all know everything during that period was Klinsmann’s fault. I’m pretty sure you were writing how horrible our YA crew was. That list you provided isn’t close to half of what people were excited about in 2016 and the majority of the failings of that group were due to injuries and MLS. The best generation talk has been about players born in 1995 or later. The lost generation was the 6+ years before that. It became clear in 2015 Olympic qualifying there wasn’t much in 93/94 group outside of the guys that went to 2014 WC and maybe Morris. There are handful of guys from 95 & 96 that there is still hope for, but it is the next four years after that where the numbers of potential talents starts to grow significantly. Fortunately, the majority of those guys are skipping MLS and giving themselves a better chance to reach their potential. Anyone who thinks one thing is going to elevate the team to the next level is viewing this as way too simple. I thought they would help with depth and increase competition for the team. We would have been significantly better team with Johnson, Brooks, Chandler, Williams, Johansson, etc on the team and healthy in 2017. Not all of them would have started, but we’ll below international standards player like Villafana and Zusi wouldn’t have started and other players would have been pushed. Having these guys, finding a few impact players like wood and maybe Morris, and hoping some more of the younger guys rise to the occasion is what was going to elevate us. Banking in MLSers isn’t a great idea. The league has very poor track record of providing players that can make an impact for the national team. They generally going to be roster fillers or at best role players. I wouldn’t be surprised if very few players from this current camp (which is supposed to be about youth) have much of a career with the USMNT. Steffen would be the only guy I’d put money on who isn’t eligble for the Olympics and then maybe some of the 4 players who are actually pretty young.
Doyle was talking about the games against Mexico and Costa Rica. Find one article from the two Olympic failures that blamed the generational lack of talent. Those failures were blamed on Klinsman. Again,, Klinsman was a problem, but the US soccer media blamed everything on him and never discussed all these problems we are now discovering. Brian published his article 10/5/17, not 10/5/14. Nothing about this has to do with 2014. Brian's article was good because it pointed to something unsaid to that point, not because he was echoing conventional wisdom. Conventional wisdom was that the USMNT was loaded with world class talent. If the fanatics on here saw the problem, that makes sense and great. But nobody outside this small group of fanatics was discussing it. Arena is the king of the statement where he says he is responsible but here are the excuses. He never once said there was a talent problem. Sunil said it was just tough luck.
Can you say that they massively under-performed if time has shown that they really aren't all that good? I'd say they likely played to their ability, especially given the coaching. If those were our best U23's at the time, our 2016-2017 cycle reaped what it sowed.