Castillo, Chandler, Brek, Altidore, Rogers, Edu, Orozco, Agudelo, Torres are all 25 or under, many playing in their first serious action for the national team and for a new coach. That is 9 out of 11 players. If they had won 4 to nil, I would have been worried they were getting too cocky. This was a good wake-up result for everyone, especially, I think the assistant coaches who need to spend more time organizing and defining defensive roles. If people are calling for a change of personnel and style, they will need to just accept these kinds of results. We looked like a team that could do everything but score. At some point it will click and these kids will exert 45% less energy in order to get 65% better results. We were sometimes very, very impatient in our play and this left the back line exposed and over-extended. The Tico's realized after the first minute the US was going to attack with abandon, so they rope-a-doped us with fouls, injuries, ref bashing and in short did everything to throw us off our rhythm and tire us out while patiently waiting for a shot. I am fine with the result as long as someone spends a heck of a lot more time organizing the back 4. Our CB's need to be rock solid for Klinsie to allow the team to attack again.
Well, I didn't sift through 33 pages of thread, I got the flavor in the first couple, typical BS overreaction. The Good: The way we started the game. Torres, Chandler, Shea, Edu, Atlidore, and Donovan interchanging and putting nice passes everywhere. Rogers even involved some. That was nice to see. And I haven't seen it in a while. I thought Torres and Edu were the best players on the pitch. Chandler was also very good. Shea and Altidore started very well and kind of petered out. The Bad Nothing was really bad, but there were a couple of things. I don't think Rogers, Orozco, or Castillo are ready yet. But I don't mind JK taking a look at them. The way people rag on the idea of Bornstein, Pearce, Convey, or Beasley at LB, Castillo is worth a look. We've had a look (and likely will have another in a couple days), and we need to keep looking. No beef up to this point, but if we keep seeing to the exclusion of others, then I have a problem Ditto for Fiscal. Decent against Mexico, and not horrible. But let's see the #1 pairing (Goodson/Boca). And Boca appeared to be the one out of line on the goal. But the likes of Marshall, Gonzalez, Parkhurst, Whitbread, Pearce, etc all need looks before we see more of Orozco and Castillo again. Rogers' first touch and speed of thought aren't quite up to speed. He should be a late game speed option at this point, nothing more. The Ugly Only 2 subs in a friendly. That's ugly. No beef w/ leaving LD in for 90 and the Altidore/Agudelo sub. But I don't understand not giving more people more looks. I know options are limited, but geez.
Subs - I think JK wanted to see more full game action. The subs can play in Belgium and get more minutes that way.
I have a much more relaxed view of this game because it's a new coach, new philosophy, many new players, new roles, etc., so I judge the team's performance less critically than I would if it were further along in this WC cycle. Two random observations: the player who has obviously most benefited immediately from Klinsmann is Torres. You can see that Jurgen believes in Jose, and that's a very important starting point for a young player. He has given him a lot of freedom, and you can see how enthusiastically he worked, both on offense and defense. To be sure, it wasn't an error-free performance, and there is a lot of room for improvement, but I think Torres will increasingly play a bigger role in the USMNT pool. As Cherundolo's role with the USMNT diminishes with age, Chandler's role will continue to grow. Pencil him in as the long-term mainstay at RB. Despite some quibbles about crosses/passes, he put in just the sort of confident stint that you want back there. He's still only 21, so he'll make his share of mistakes as he goes along, but I just feel that we're watching a young star emerge.
Bocanegra is getting worse and worse each time I see him. Edu is not better than Bradley and never will be. Torres was great in the center. Our forwards still suck. Shea is overrated. Castillo is bad at defending and not that great going forward. Orozco was fine, he had to cover for Boca constantly. Howard is the man, the first save before the goal was awesome. Chandler was average at best. Donovan's spot kicks and service are brutal, I feel like he is returning to the frustrating player he was 3 or 4 years ago. Altogether I didn't expect much from this squad, I wish Rogers played as well as last game. We need Dempsey and Bradley, its painfully obvious.
I was at the game and keeping a very close eye on the mids. Shea, LD, Altidore, Torres and Rogers all ran out of gas at minute 40. Costa Rica then started pressing more and that was really the game. The team had one or two practices a day this week and just need had nothig left. If JK would have subbed them all out at the break you would have seen a far different result. From a coaching standpoint I think JK simply over did things this week but he probably felt he had no choice. He is trying to cram a lot into little time. Style wise-the first 40 were very very entertaining. I like what he is trying to do and support it.
The possession game demands a lot of stamina, both mental and physical. Developing that requires time. I think people are being unfair to Orozco. If anything, he had to cover for Boca slow returns. Also this is Chandler's first outing with the team. No one integrates in a week.
I think there is a lot here, problem is we don't have the players to play this game, especially out of the back. Our CBs have no distribution games. Our fullbacks are at best inconsistent (even Chandler was not that great, and Cherundulo is still our best defender, by several miles). Altidore is still trying to learn how to lead the line. Our "best" player floats in and out of games. In the midfield, Torres is a nice player, but he's just that, he's just a nice player. There's nothing eye-opening about his game, and we all knew what we have there. A couple of poundings, and he's done. He wilts. He breaks. He doesn't have the balls. Also, no more Donovan in the center. He's too in and out of hte game. He's been like that his whole career. Dempsey can play in the center, because he gets stuck in. Donovan does not. Against a good team, our center would get obliterated if we started this lineup. Shea will be an interesting option. He's big. Usually his crossing is great, not in this game though. He's dynamic. If everybody is healthy, I line up like this right now: ---------------------Altidore-------------------------- Shea--------------Dempsey-----------------Donovan----- ----------Bradley--------------Holden--------------------- Lichaj-----------Boca----------Cry For Help---------Cherundulo---- ---------------------Howard--------------------------------------- Also I'm sorry, but Michael Bradley > Edu.
Hard to sort through all the doom-saying. Here are the positives that I saw: We looked much better with possession. If you remember, during the Gold Cup, teams like Panama realized if they sat back and let us have possession, we'd knock the ball around aimlessly for awhile, eventually run out of ideas and whip in a lame cross or something equally unimaginative. Last night, we looked much more dangerous with possession. We were lightning quick, composed and created good chances. CRC realized they couldn't sit back like that and that's when things went to hell. Once under pressure we lost composure. Hasty, poor passing, resorting to haphazard long balls etc. We have to learn to keep composure under pressure. We have to improve there. Either you believe we have players that are good enough to individually hold the ball under pressure without turning it over or you don't. I personally think we do. We just need a coach that believes that as well.
Positioning, concentration and patience is what the possession game demands above anything else. A lot of physical stamina you don't need since you don't have to run that much if you got the positioning game right. Let the ball do the work and let the other team chase you. It's your opponent that needs a lot of stamina if you play it right. It takes time, that's right. And the first 30 mins were promising knowing you've just switched styles.
Re: USA vs. Costa Rica 9/3 Post-Mortem [R] He has a position. He is a single DM. Nothing more, nothing less. I agree no one played well with what is essentially 3xDM's vs Mexico. I don't know why Klinsmann thought it would work. Beckerman played well in second half vs. Mexico not because he is so much better than the other 2. Its because of the tactics of being allowed to stay home and have passing options at appropriate angles in front of you, not standing directly behind you or in your space 5 yards away. Bradley has and can easily play that role for the US and if he gets time with Chievo he will secure that role over, Beckerman, Edu, Jones, Clark.
Some of us did. Some folks around here, though, are still caught up in the cult of the best player should be in the middle of the field and have been beating the drum to move him back there. (It's the same mindset that led an inexplicable crusade against B. Bradley for playing Stuart Holden in the Donovan role instead of in the M. Bradley role.)
They scored zero goals against a defense with Roy Miller and Carlos Johnson on it. That is not good. Not concerned yet, but one eyebrow is definitely in the air.
different coach. different problems. same bad team. and bradley was right to sit donovan in the first half in those gold cup games. klinsi is going to have to do the same thing. still early days tho.
Weird game. First 30 minutes I was ecstatic to see the U.S. move the ball around like they did. After that...man, I don't even think they had the internet on computers yet the last time the U.S. won a friendly at home.
Agreed. Papa Bradley moved Donovan outside for a good reason and it unlocked Lando's game. Donovan does not possess the ball with confidence in a crowd. He's at his best when he has some space to attack at speed. As a wing, he can burst into the middle when the space allows, but positioning him in the middle makes him easy to find, and easy for the other team to muscle off the ball. Hopefully for the Belgium game we'll see Dempsey playing behind the striker with Donovan sprayed out wide.
IMO, the big story for the Belgium game is whether Beckerman establishes himself as one of the key guys who can take care of the ball under pressure. He's liable to be up against players like Defour and Fellaini, who play on quality clubs in top leagues.
If you don't learn from history you are doomed to repeat it. Klinsi used his early friendlies with Germany to sort his player pool and install his system of play. The results were poor (by German standards, horrendous). Relax, breathe deeply and remember the euphoria of the first 20 minutes. The US was playing the beautiful game and we were basking in the glory of our certainty that dumping BB was the solution to our growth as a soccer country. Edgar played much more confidently than he did against Mexico. He stepped into the passing lanes well and won a lot of balls. He was quick to move the ball at the beginning of the match but tended to get it stuck at his feet leading to turnovers as the game went on. He's young and, even if he's not the ultimate answer, we need depth at left back. Side Note: My wife asked why a 15 year old was playing with the National Team. The possession game looked phenomenal the first 20 minutes. The problem was our players didn't know when to, as a team, slow down the pace of the attack down without ceding possession. Barca does it two ways. 1) Xavi and Iniesta take the air out of the ball for minutes at a time periodically during a match. Ball does 90% of the work. Attacks are limited to through balls or chips where a single player shoots after just a touch or two (usually Villa). 2) Messi gets to be a luxury player. He can rest as he sees fit and provide offensive punch even when the rest of the team is in recovery mode. We don't have either of those options right now. It going to take a while to learn when to slow the game down so we don't just get too tired to keep the movement going. We may never have a Messi-type. Think back to the Bora Era when we were an "absorb pressure and counter" team. This is a ridiculous shift in style of play. It will take time to learn how to be effective for 90 minutes with only 3 subs. Keep thinking back to that first 20 minutes and imagine when we can boss a match for a full 90 like that. Edu clogged the midde on defense but offensively did not rotate well into space to create passing options. Don't know if this is a tenant of Klinsi's style of play but it worried me a lot. Yup. Rogers really didn't cut it last night. Lack of runs into the box from the weakside wing made us less effective when we hit a cross. Wings in the 4-3-3 also need to be able to cut into the top of the 18 and shoot for that far upper 90. Didn't take a single one of those type of shots last night. QFT Hey Dutchie! Whadda you know about a 4-3-3?!!?
I thought USA played well in the first 35-40 or so, maybe because CR didn't pressure much, somehow USA got a bit tired, after the break CR put lots of more pressure on USA which started to get tired and its passes became errant. But never the less, USA played better, they just didn't win. Roger didn't do much as wide right, Landon ran out of gas in the second half. because of Roger playing wide, it cut in to Chandlers lane. I was hoping to see more subs, but I'm sure there is a reason why we didn't get to see fresh legs.
Re: USA vs. Costa Rica 9/3 Post-Mortem [R] The kid has lived soccer 24/7 virtually his entire life. Take a year off, do other things, get completely away from the only lifestyle he's known. Come back refeshed and ready for the twilight of his career. So say I..