Pre-match: USA vs Mexico -- Gold Cup Final Sun 7/7

It was always a matter of mentality with them.

 

Right now it does. Transitioning to a prettier style is going to take a while, though, with many growing pains.

We lack the culture to go for it at this point, IMO. After failing to qualify for two World Cups in a row, interest in the sport would start dying.

Of course the World Cup expansion can give us the help we need to start engineering the Big Change.

 

Totally agree, not 'close' to being Brazil or even Mexico.....we are in this weird transition space where we have one player in Pulisic who is talented and literally every other position is up for grabs. We haven't ever been in a cycle like this before.

 

Uploading PBP in a few mins.

 

I’ll always be happy to point out how idiotic it is to aspire to an attractive style.

 

I equate these types of results with the Dallas Cowboys. Since the glory years, they go .500. They never have that 3-13 year...they always do “just enough”, but it gives just enough hope to die hard fans and their owner that they are “still in it” and don’t need to make substantial changes to things...

Same thing with US soccer...every few years we get a decent result in a Gold Cup, or they beat a team they shouldn’t (Spain) and it temporarily makes people think US is about to turn into a big soccer power... and it never happens.

 

We have a lot to be optimistic about though in terms of the next decade.I’m starting to lose track of how many young prospects we currently have in Germany.

 

Here's hoping!

 

I'm pro USA TB just keeping it real. I wudwnot call them scrubbs..thats harsh. a mean this Boyd is being promoted like he's spectacular. Ream has gottong so many looks and not done well vs top region teams. GB picked some guys for ther loyalty. WC team should be made up of top players from your nation, not just because ther loyal and play 2 or 3 tier football in Europe.
I would have liked to have seen some of tab Ramos guys called up. Weah for sure.

 

That's a poor example. The Cowboys, with rules like every other team in the league is also required to follow, can choose any player they want. The whole league has the same player pool. That is not the case with national teams, as I'm quite certain you know.

 

I get the details piece...simply using the “false hope” analogy to all the people who are looking for any kind of win tonight.

 

It’s idiotic to aspire to play attractive soccer? Yeah man, I love watching games where they kick long balls over the defensive line for the forward to chase down and nothing more. Right there with ya on that one.

 

This isn't the World Cup team, it's the 3-years-pre-world-cup team. There are no third tier Europe players on the roster (though, there are a few players that some famous posters on BS think would be big upgrades).

Tab Ramos' guys were busy playing in their own tournament. Weah chose to play in that tournament instead of this one.

 

If your central thesis is that defeat will lead to systemic change, we more or less cratered our program in 2017 and I don’t think anyone could argue we’ve experienced any sort of systemic change. I don’t think we have the management or willingness to change the USSF culture.

Our best bet right now is to restore confidence in the program while waiting for MLS/Euro player development to catch up to our ambitions.

 

I’ll add that what I wrote above is in no way ideal. Ideally, we’d have PROPERLY overhauled USSF after 2017 and not doubled down on the status quo within the organization in terms of how it makes decisions related to national teams.

 

That exactly captures where we are with the national program. Chicago House is to Soccer what Sears is to Retail.

 

Believe me, I get it. But I still think getting a misleading win doesn’t help the cause. The executive situation is what it is, but “winning at all cost” will mask that issue even more...

 

I think that’s where we diverge; if you understand that unmasking the issue doesn’t result in anything constructive, why would you pull for it? Likewise, winning isn’t going to change anyone’s opinion that’s actually paying attention to what the issues are. Sure, the cheerleaders in the “soccer press” will talk about statements and turning the corner but it’ll ring as hollow as Klinsmann writing our formation against Belgium as 4-3-3 “to suggest an attacking mentality” as if that would change the fact we had one attacking player on the field until the 75th minute or whatever

 

I wouldn't argue anything of substance has changed, but there are people out there arguing election, structure, GM, etc. I feel dumb for thinking missing a WC would cause real change when that was the talk 20 years earlier when bombing out of the group stages. I'd say that points to an even bigger problem than most think.

I dont know what will cause it, but I am afraid of the current path. I would to hate to stay on it for another 5 to 10 years and give MLS even that much more power.

if we stay on this track, pomykal and lesser u20s will be integrated before better players due to "first team minutes". Just imagine how much knowledge of the complicated system they will get next january.

 

People getting preemptively mad at the team for hypothetically winning in a way they don’t approve of is amazing.

Live in the moment, people, we’re about to play Mexico for a trophy.

 

I think the rot at USSF is more severe than any of us knew even 5 years ago. That being said, I think that the long term health of our MNT and MLS are irreversibly entwined at this point, for better or worse. That isn’t inherently a bad thing, in my opinion, so long as MLS is developing enough talent where whoever is the NT manager has a non-shallow player pool to draw from.

 

Mexico is quite literally the most popular team in America. They are the at least as much the home team in Chicago. I think it's good practice..

MLS defenders are playing against high priced international attackers. Long has played against full internationals from good teams.