Chris Richards training with the Bayern first team. https://t.co/X8MKhFhRnp— USMNT Only (@usmntonly) July 28, 2019
From the last translated quote I saw it sounds like Adams is not feeling pain and he could go but he has not fully healed and is at risk for aggravating his injury.
Sounds like definitely not a go for a T/A trip and game v. Mexico in September. Heartened to hear the favorable prognosis.
The internet didn't see him play rb for u20's. b.t.w., good on Ajax playing him a spell at lb to expand his game.
Bad news for Dusseldorf. Good news for Steffen and the USMNT............ In a significant update that involves a key #USMNT player, Fortuna Dusseldorf goalkeeper Michael Rensing is out indefinitely with a shoulder injury - likely making Zack Steffen the team's No. 1 to start the Bundesliga season. https://t.co/yfYfXXioWx— Brian Sciaretta (@BrianSciaretta) July 29, 2019
In life most things come down to timing and while you always hate to see a player injured this couldn’t be better timing for Steffen. He just needs to play well and he should be able to take the position full time.
He may well be a better RB than LB, but he's in competition with Yedlin and Cannon for the RB job and essentially no one at LB.
So I'm going to state an unpopular opinion regarding Dest. I actually went back and watched the game against PSV and he has excellent attacking skills but his defense is more than a bit suspect. It more or less confirmed what I saw from him with the U20's. Honestly, he seems like Antonee Robinson with a bit higher ceiling to me and we all know what Egg thinks about him. Considering the LB is currently asked to sit back and be a defender first, which for the record I wholeheartedly disagree with, I don't see how Dest would solve our LB problem short of changing the entire system. It seems like he would have been perfect for the way Klinsmann was trying to play. All that being said, call him up. Call up Robinson too. No reason those two shouldn't be the callups for the Nations League games. Let's see what we've got. Play a ball-winner at the 6 thus allowing both outside backs to get forward and join the attack. If we're going to bunker, I'm sure Ream will still be around or better yet, we could call Lichaj who is the best pure defender of any of the aforementioned names.
Seeing a fullback do well in attack in a pre-season friendly and promoting him immediately to our starting NT LB is rash, but that is a characteristic of the boards. Let's hope he gets some solid league minutes.
Agreed. I would not play Dest in a meaningful match. I don't consider the Nations League meaningful and therefore I'd like to see how he can do against Canada/Cuba. We've given minutes to players with a lot less pedigree and potential than Dest in meaningless matches. I'm very afraid of falling into another MB90 trap where we don't play any alternate options to Ream and keep telling ourselves as a fan base that there is no one else despite the fact that we literally never got to see anyone else play there. I also think Lichaj and another LB (my other pick would be Garza, he certainly won't be involved in MLS playoffs in November...) should get a call up by the end of 2019.
This one is official. Kyle Scott signs with Newcastle. The kid had some injuries and a tough time break thru at Chelsea. Hopefully he can get back on track. - Exciting new chapter for myself , happy to have signed for @NUFC & can’t wait to get started.🖤 Meet the fans & play for this great club. Special mention to this man Neil for getting everything sorted... Ready to work. 👍🏻 ⚫️⚪️⚫️⚪️ pic.twitter.com/52w6cFA3L4— Kyle_Scott (@kylescott22) July 29, 2019
Robinson been playing left back against adults on the serious level for 3+ years. Dest never played LB before and played three times against adults period. If he is slightly better than Robinson already I'm starting him next game.
I'm not even sure that semiretired former great DMB isn't better than Ream/Lovitz/Lichai/Garza. Or semiretired never been great Bornstein for that matter.
Can we pump the brakes on the Dest hype train? Ajax's STARTING LB is currently out with an injury, Tagliofica will be back soon. Maybe Dest will beat him out, maybe he won't. Have we learned NOTHING from the tragic story that is Freddy Adu?
Dest will likely see rotation time at LB and RB throughout the year and if he plays 1500ish minutes for Ajax at 18 I’d call it a successful year for him. This is nothing like Freddy. Yes people should stop penning him into a best 11. However, they shouldn’t stop demanding to see more than Ream or Lovitz or the nonsense that 3G is pulling. He doesn’t have to bring an entire team of 18 to 20 year olds but he needs to bring at least 1 promising break through player at each level. These games mean little other than experience. Bring them up. Look at them. Play them. The bias towards players he “knows” is problematic.
Adu is one example, others in the USMNT include Pulisic at 17 (?), Donovan at 18 (?), Beasley at 19 (?), Altidore at 19 (?). And Donovan and Beasley as starters at the 2002 World Cup at 20.
Yeah, at least for me, all I'm saying is that if Dest can stick on the first team roster for Ajax, he's likely a better option than Lovitz right now and should be called in. If that's hyping him too much, then I guess I'm guilty of hyping him too much.
I do think he's on the verge of being overhyped but I understand it because I'm also excited to have a potential USMNT player breaking into a major club at such a young age. It's just not something that happens for us very often. I think we need to understand that as a defender, one mistake can make you a goat whereas an attacker can have one moment of brilliance that overshadows an otherwise lackluster performance. One thing young players nearly always lack is consistency which is why so few young defenders break in at big clubs. I'm ready for him to be called up. Same with Robinson who we don't need to put down as a fan base to prop Dest up. Ream and Lovitz are so bad. But the system has to change and we have to be ready for some defensive lapses without going all Yedlin on him and swearing him off when they happen. His game has some holes, largely defensive. He seems like the perfect guy to help us break down a bunkering Panama or El Salvador but I'm not ready to line him up at Azteca just yet. We're really not in a position to turn down consistent performers at LB. Whoever it was that scoffed at me and suggested DMB and Bornstein, go watch Lichaj play against Portugal or Mexico and tell me he can't hang. Ream is a CB, Lovtiz is a joke but that doesn't mean we've totally exhausted our options. I'd also suggest Villafana wasn't as poor as people seem to remember though he's certainly not a sexy pick, he has proven he can at least hold his own in CONCACAF. And yes, Garza was excellent for the best team in MLS so he should also get a look.
Dest on Jong is likely better than Lovitz right now. The issue is the LB/CB role in 3Gs system. That will be fixed real quick once we play Adams and Wes in a double pivot. Tho who knows if 3G will ever actually make that change. As for the hype I get being excited. I am too.
Yup. A ball winning six will lead to a lot of other things falling into place including no stupid LB hybrid position. If we don't see that double pivot at some point this cycle, I will consider that Egg's greatest failure. It is an experiment that must be tried because the upside is so massive if it works.
Stuff that doesn't make an sense around here: Dest at lb. He's not a lb. We need to find a lb, not waste time on somebody who is not a lb. We want Dest at rb. He's twice as dynamic as Yedlin. Another dynamic rb is Tommy Thompson whom I would bring in for the Sep window because we've got a lot of rb's and not enough opportunity to sort them out. Similarly, we need to get Pomykal in at the 8 and leave Wes in Germany to get bedded in with his new manager unless we see him as a back up for Pulisic at the 10 spot and want to give him a tryout for that spot. Frankly I'm chomping at the bit to see high/low combo of Pom/Adams 8/6 with Jozy hold up and Pulisic running thru mid. With dynamic outside backs like tt, dest, lima, it seems like it could make sense to go 352 with Arriola on the left to solve the lb problem. The 3 cb system also gives Brooks the defensive help he needs while giving us his great passing. --------------------jozy----sarge/morris/weah/boyd --arriola------puli-------------pom---dest/tommy/lima ------------------------adams -----------long-------brooks---miazga/zim I'm keeping Lima in the picture because he has a mean shot on goal. that set up allows us to drop a cb and add a forward and make it a 433
Both Pulisic and Adams have new managers and Pulisic also has a new league. Shouldn’t they be left at home too? Or are you leaving Wes cause you just don’t rate him? We all know the answer... just own up.
The thing with Dest is that if he blows up he's likely to get looks from Holland. I'm not a fan of cap tying kids simply for the sake of keeping them away from other teams, especially when their other nationality is anything other than Mexican, but that isn't the case here. He has a legitimate shot to be our starting LB in Qatar. Cap tying him now is equivalent to cap tying Pulisic and Miazga in WCQs last cycle after we'd already advanced to the Hex, with the exception that if we don't cap Dest we're far more likely to lose him than we ever were either of those guys (both of whom were born and raised in the US and just happened to have a Croatian/Polish grandparent). We should call him in for the Nations League games, which are glorified friendlies but with the opportunity for cap tying. I don't think he should be handed the starting LB job--if we had a do or die WCQ tomorrow I'd probably go with Robinson, and I'd also like to see Arriola and Acosta get extended looks (at least 180-225 minutes each for the US against decent opposition) at LB. But Dest is absolutely in the mix.