Post-match: USA vs. Peru

For me it has been more his tactical/positional discipline. Marsch actually played him in ways where he could use his running to create havoc without leaving gaps in front of the backline. In the last half of the MLS season I've seen some noticeable improvement in regards to his tactical sense for balancing cover and pressure from the 6 role.

Again with Trapp. There is a stat that shows that his passes, made quickly after receiving the ball in his half, add by far the most xG to his team compared to every other MLS player's passes. Some could argue that means he's the best deep facililtator in the league but what needs to be taken into account is the system he plays in.

What a good Eredivise style system does is provide relatively predictable outlets based on ball position, situation, and respective team shapes. That means that a player does not always need to spend time scanning the field to find long outlets, they know that the opponent has been sucked forward and to one side and that after a turnover their wide attacker will be open in space and they can almost play a blind ball to them in stride and a 3 v 4 break has been created.

With the Crew Trapp knows where his options are in transition and in buildup. He hits tons of productive, long forward or field switching passes. He can make these plays quickly because he knows where his teammates will find space because they are spreading the opponent apart. The likely questions for us going forward is whether 1) the US is best served by adopting that type of system and 2) whether Trapp is the best player in the pool at executing the 6 role in it based on his strengths and weaknesses.

 

I don't see Adams as a dedicated DM, in fact I think him in that role would be a waste for the NT. He's more a defensive CM who can be more box-to-box than just defense coverage.

We need someone to take on the Beckerman/Edu role for this cycle, for those games when we need someone protecting the back line. That allows the other CMs to go forward (McK + Tyler).

 

There are several things to consider regarding Amon , most importantly his young age, very short professional career and for a FCN team that play the exact same highly attacking minded 4-3-3 with lots of short passes, all the way from their small boys to their academy and Superliga team, so tactically Amon has no real experience playing anything but in a highly attacking minded 4-3-3.

Obviously it will take some adjustment for young Amon to get used to play a much different style for the USMNT, so I'm not surprised if he did not really impress in his debut.

 

As you like to point out, this appears to be a real problem given that our best CBs would really benefit from (and perhaps require) a ball-winning midfielder in front of them.

 

This sounds almost word-for-word what some used to write about MB as a 6.

Your assertions that a 6 is someone who "kick every player on the field to win the ball back" or "someone who will go for a big tackle, miss half the time and leave big gaps in front of the defense" is a strawman." We need a ball winner at the 6. Full stop.

ps, do you feel as strongly about WT's USMNT quality as you do about Agudelo and Hamid?

 

I'm not a Trapp fan particularly, but he will serve us better than Bradley in that roll just by not roaming too much and getting pulled out of position so easily. The center has to be solid or you'll always leak goals. Still not opposed to using McKennie and Adams similarly to how we used Bradley and Jones in the past, but I do recall that always ended up being a problem without someone like Beckerman staying home when we played better competition so it's not as easy as just let the athletic guys run all over the place in the middle. Someone has to play positionaly sound defense back there.

And, as long as we're dissecting individual plays and so as not to only talk about Amon, Weah has to get a foot on that ball crossed from Wood. It was hit fast and wasn't easy to do much with, but he didn't look like he was paying attention and let it roll right past him in the 6 yard box. A pass with that pace in front of goal just needs the right toe on it to end up in the net. Gotta do better there. He hits that on goal and his disappearing act in the second half disappears from everyone's mind and he's the star of the show.

 

sorry. Not sure what happened with the cross throughs. Let's try it again.

This sounds almost word-for-word what some used to write about MB as a 6.

Your assertions that a 6 is someone who "kick every player on the field to win the ball back" or "someone who will go for a big tackle, miss half the time and leave big gaps in front of the defense" is a strawman." We need a ball winner at the 6. Full stop.

ps, do you feel as strongly about WT's USMNT quality as you do about Agudelo and Hamid?

 

I would put Weah in as a First 11 guy. Maybe jumping the gun, but whatever. Guzan is only a marginal drop off from Steffan or anyone else. Maybe one of the 3 CMs out there start with Adams and McKennie, or maybe it is Bradley or Williams or Morales.

 

Yedlin and Delgado decided between them who had him. We don't know what they decided. Watching the video, you can think Delgado has him because he is watching him so intently. However, usually the fullback would have him. That is soccer 101. But also, if you are marking a player you have to mark him until you are positive a teammate has him. That is also soccer 101.

Only Yedlin and Delgado know and they were certainly confused and possibly still are.

Just doesn't matter.

 

Anyone remember the great thing Pulisic did on his USMNT debut? All I can remember is him shielding a Guatemalan player.

19, first debut. Amon was excellent grading on the curve. Also, who has looked good on the wing in the 4-1-4-1 Dave runs? Rubin, Agudelo, Arriola, Saief, Acosta, Delgado, have been invisible to destructive of team shape. Only Weah has looked good and usually after a formation change during the game. That Amon had 4-5 good moments is more than Rubin, Agudelo, Saief, Arriola, Green in any of their games. Maybe combined!

 

Passing is only one part of play. It is also easy to pass back. It is almost impossible not to pass back when not under pressure. It is so easy as to be almost a bad play. Trapp passes back when not under pressure. Trapp passes to defenders who are under pressure when he is not under pressure.

All stats in isolation can be misleading. Most CBs have incredibly high pass completion percentage. Should they all be moved to CAM? Most CAMs have much lower pass completion percentage than the CB on their own team.

I would think Trapp is more comfortable playing in MLS than for the USMNT. I think he tries to play ultra safe and that is what Dave wants. But it is comical how unwilling or unable he is to move the ball forward in dangerous areas for the defense.

 

Of course he would. 25 and in MLS tells me that Trapp is near or at his potential. What we see in the game is what he will give us next year and the next until he declines. If it isn't good enough now, what is the point? If Bradley is currently better, you can't argue Trapp could get better than him by the Gold Cup or after.

You can almost say the same about Acosta and Delgado. Certainly Acosta. Delgado only has two starts and has never played with McKennie and looked good playing with Adams. So, I would be comfortable saying Trapp is 3-5 on the #6 depth chart. But there are guys like Haak, Booth, Durkin, etc also coming. Do we continue to give the bulk of the minutes to Trapp?

Minutes as a lone #6 since Couva:

Trapp: 700+ probably
Adams: 10
Bradley: 90
Williams: 90
McKennie: 90

What has Trapp done do be anointed the starter? Because those numbers tell me he has been handed the job and can't play bad enough to lose it.

 

Also in fairness, nobody has been particularly good passing in the Dave S 4-1-4-1. McKennie has not looked good in it and starts for Schalke. Adams has looked the best, but he hasn't been flawless by any stretch. McKennie had his best game (beside a Portugal game where adrenaline was through the roof for the whole team) the one time he didn't play as one of the 8s in that formation.

Dave's 4-1-4-1 makes wingers look bad, starves CFs, and makes it hard to the 8s to complete passes. It is also hard on the FBs. I guess it is ok for the GK and the #6 who is only asked to keep possesion with short back passes.

That Adams and Sargent have looked good in that formation could mean we have two real gems beyond what we think. Weah has looked best out of that formation, McKennie too.

 

That we haven't had one minute of this in the last 900 minutes is Sarachan's #1 failure.

 

If you watched Colombia the sideline reporter said the idea was for Saief to be wide in the attack and then tucked in on defense. Just think through the implications of that if the other team maintains their width on the weak side and gets the ball switched wide fast enough.

The Dynamo have this problem in MLS. They do their 433 with the mids tight inside, but the forwards and backs spread wider. if you evade the limited mid coverage it's like 2-on-1 down the sideline. The DM in theory could try to help but he's been told to be way inside so that's a lot of ground to cover, and particularly as they tire. To me it's an inherent weak spot if the wing stays out on the chalk. You're going to figure out real fast if your wingback is skilled at marking and dealing with odd man rushes. Turned out Robinson isn't, at least yet.

And personally some of the easiest assists and quickest goals I've seen are a team too compact in the initial lines on defense. Here, let me hand you a channel to run or pass down.

I also didn't like it for this type of game because complicated tactics emphasize system over talent when you're trying to tell who the talent is. I don't want to know if a player handles a scheme we never play again. I don't care that much if we can bunker Peru as a team to a result. This isn't going to be the team or the scheme. It just clouds the real purpose. Did player x look bad because he is overrated? Or because he felt awkward trying to execute odd tactics with which he wasn't familiar? Or because the tactics were crocked? This is one reason NFL teams go out in vanilla schemes for preseason. I might get better results with trick plays but I want to know if the rookie can execute our basic run and pass schemes, and how productive they are doing it. Conversely, you have the argument some are making that Trapp is a scheme creature. But what if the next coach isn't Berhalter?

 

Again, we don't have to play as an island. Most teams, international and club, don't. Where is this idea that we have to have a lone #6?

 

Some have forgotten that Yedlin was a winger before his lack of technique relegated him to the back line. He's a typical American "tweener". Has some mobility but lacks ball skills and size. His field intelligence has never impressed me. He doesn't have much of either foot. I don't think Sarachan did him any favors with that late substitution. That said, he showed a lack of serious with his lapse of concentration. The good ones get that job done.

You still can't coach smarts.
.

 

I had said 70' in another post; I agree that is when things changed. Acosta got injured and played with it awhile, that was a factor. But the change to the 4-4-2 with the Green sub killed all forward momentum we had and Peru eventually just came at us in numbers when they figured out it was safe to do so.

I feel Sarachan does this stuff on purpose to try and get the result. But it has the opposite result.

 

Here's my thing, there are players in the pool like Gooch or Arriola who hit that ball into the stands. And we're giving Amon grief for hitting the right ball but a yard behind the runner. He had a few dangerous plays and a couple where if the ball is just slightly sharper they are goals. You get that slightly more dialed and that's quality stuff.

The nice plays keep him around, and the pluses and minuses in context probably project him out as a speed bench guy when games count.

 

The best thing you can say for Trapp is that he looked best and the team looked best in the second 2/3rds of the Mexico game where he played next to Adams. I've thought for awhile that the 4-1-4-1 Dave tries to run makes it hard for players to look good. It is possible that is true for Trapp as well.

We needed a new coach last May. We continue on waiting indefinitely.

 

I don't understand this.

Note: apologies for the weird cross out, not sure how that happened.

 

Born two days apart and have played together on youth teams Weah and Sargent seem to fill that bill. I'm excited to see how they work with Pulisic. Not sure if it would be better to have a 4-4-2 diamond with Pulisic at attacking mid so Weah and Sargent can play off each other at forward or a 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 with Weah and Pulisic at the wings since Pulisic gets almost all of his club time there.

 

I'm leaning toward both in a 4-2-3-1 arrangement against weaker teams as the two defensive mids and both ina 4-3-3 against tougher teams with someone like Canouse behind them.