The current state of our youth national teams

It's still part of the fallout from not qualifying for the World Cup. That was a ********ing huge deal.....

Between the shakeups that occurred with two coaching staffs, the USSF president, and the entire player pool, there has been a crazy amount of turnover that has occurred over the last year+.

 

Today members of @SanDiegoOutlaws were invited #USMNT training and met New head coach Gregg Berhalter and GM Earnie Stewart. #HereForTheFuture pic.twitter.com/LY0g7BWSzE

— AO (@AmericanOutlaws) January 20, 2019

Did anyone from AO San Diego ask Earnie why we are missing YNT coaches?

 

In the end, it’s their choice. Just because they are dual nationals, doesn’t mean they should receive anymore special attention than what they already have. But then again, it is kind of strange that Berhalter doesn’t at least give some bit of recognition.

 

Dual nationals are always going to keep their options open. 3-4 years from now, Mendez, Carleton, and whoever else could be ahead of Ledezma on the depth chart. Maybe the US will stop calling him up completely and move on. The only smart thing is for him to keep that door open just in case.

 

Oh God, here we go again. Why are dual nationals, specifically Mexican Americans, going to get special treatment? You can't be calling every single "prospect" just to tell him "we are watching you". I don't know how many of you guys are actually Mexican-Americans and have Mexican family members or parents. It is not as simple as a "call" to keep these kids in the USMNT picture. Have any of you asked yourself why so many Mexican-Americans who were born here, raised here, have never lived in Mexico and just have visited Mexico a couple of times, also will more than likely live their entire lives here along with their kids and to top it off some of them can't even speak Spanish, choose to support Mexico instead of the US? It is not an easy explanation and don't think a simple "we are looking at you" will suddenly change their minds to support and represent US. As some have said already, these kids will keep their options open in case Mexico doesn't come calling or incase they do come calling.

 

I use to be a recruiter. What a top recruiting firm would do in a similar situation is rollout a coordinated attack and approach, where there is a system in place to reach out with status updates ever 60 or 90 days.

Have your list of top 50, 100 or 150 prospects/candidates and proceed as required.

Do it once per quarter and keep the lines of communication open. Offer feedback.

Too much excuse making for a Fed which does a whole lotta nothing.

 

As distasteful as it is, and it is, dual nationals are no different than fighting over a players LOI in college recruiting. Pretending otherwise, especially in our sorry state the last half decade at the senior level, is ridiculous. We have flat out sucked. We can't sit on our hands and pretend that if a players wishy washy, we don't need to fight for him. In the modern game, for whatever reason (probably both for the pleasure and joy of playing in it, and the career opportunities that come with success in things like the World Cup) players don't treat the colors/flag as seriously as they used to in a nationalistic sense. We need to get with the program and fight for these wishy washy guys no matter how unpleasant it may feel to do so.

If you don't want guys representing the flag/badge/etc who are wishy washy, I can understand that point of view, just we need to understand that if we don't want to play that game, we're gonna lose a key battle in the war to win in international soccer. It will impact bottom line results more and more going forward as we move towards basic levels of competency in terms of youth development at the club level, and in terms of the development of our youth clubs from the dumpster fire status we currently appear to be in despite falling rear over teakettle into a potential golden generation. If we surrender in this fight, there will be severe consequences in terms of the long term potential of the national team. We'll be fine, but we will definitely not maximize our potential. I'm just not okay with that, but I've become very cynical over the years, and am really jaded in general in sports and tend to be more bottom line these days, so maybe that explains my perspective on this.

 

I think most people on this board have absolutely zero clue what's going on behind the scenes. I don't. Its just fun saying they're "doing nothing." I mean..............do people actually know that Stewart and Berhalter haven't been in touch with these dual prospects? Or are people taking a post on twitter as the gospel truth? We should know better.....................

Plus, that particular tweet in the original post is about Ledesma, Mendez, and Dest. Three players that are actually in the US program representing the USYNTs in major competitions (Ledesma was hurt for the CONCACAF U20 Championships or he'd have been there too.) We want Earnie Stewart and Greg Berhalter to call up kids on a routine basis to say "we're watching you,"....................when they're already in the US program? Of course we're watching them. It's mindless.

The tweeter concedes that as youth technical director, its Tab's job to do that. And in fact, he is doing that. He was doing that with Jonathan Gonzalez. [Somehow he's blamed for losing Jonathan Gonzalez, when he's the one who called up Jonathan Gonzalez before any of knew who he was.] I don't know what folks expect the USSF to do.

Anybody else think that Dave Sarachan actually got it right when he called in Weston McKennie and Tyler Adams instead of Jonathan Gonzalez to that much-discussed Portugal friendly? Anybody else notice that Mexico seems to have lost interest in Gonzalez recently? He may not even make their Olympic roster. That maybe the STORY of Gonzalez switching has actually gotten bigger than the talent of the player? I mean, maybe just maybe..........the world will continue to revolve without Gonzalez on the USMNT?

And for the bazzillionth time, people need to stop freaking out every time a youngster says he's keeping his options open. That's what they SHOULD say. For Pete's sake, are people this insecure? You think that fans of other national teams praising their play on Instagram and Twitter is enough to get them to switch? God........................

 

When I clicked on the a thread titled "current state of our youth national teams" I was expecting to see people happy and pumped. The U.S. U-20 team has advanced to the last two WC quarterfinals (while missing its two best players in 2017) and has won CONCACAF two straight times. Its prospects for 2019 are strong. The U.S. U-17 is also plugging along and getting decent enough results and churning out prospects.

But hey, all those results mean nothing unless you are texting your dual nationals

 

That's a great point and if the US can keep improving and leave the rest of CONCACAF behind the better players will want to play for the US. Still may have some switch to the Germanys, Frances and Brazils of the world but the youth juggernaut is already starting to trickle to the full team. If it's not a golden generation but a new normal everything will take care of itself.

 

Again, being a dual-national myself and having observed two decades of players 90% of all decisions boil down to this: first come, first served. If you are a non-capped YNT, you will go to the first country to give you a YNT cap. If you are a capped YNT you will switch given the opportunity for a full NT cap. The only times I have seen this not be the case is where the player has a reasonable opportunity with a much larger NT team.

 

I would go a little farther. I have never seen a US U-20 team dominate CONCACAF like they did this cycle.

• Top to bottom domination against all top teams. Only top team they didn't play was Panama.
• Mexico had all their best players except for Jonathan Gonzalez. The US was missing many. It's open to argument how many were missing but assuredly Adams, Sargent, Weah and Amon would have been upgrades.
• In this age group, Mexican-Americans developed in the US are better than their Mexican peers. In particular, they have no player like Mendez except for Jonathan Gonzalez who has been partially developed in the US.

For the first time in memory, I am comfortable in saying that we have developed a group of players that surpasses the same group in Mexico.

 

I am happy and pumped for the reasons you mention! Our YNTs have never been in better shape and this will continue as long as investment continues at the current or higher levels.

This is far too cynical. I've long advocated having someone whose job it is to help the YNT coaches have more positive touchpoints with top talent and their agents/parents, especially dual nationals. Similar to the role te Kloese had with Mexico which seemingly helped with Gonzalez and Alvarez. That's not being unfairly critical, but instead holding an organization accountable for execution to a reasonably high standard.

You're an excellent poster in a lot of ways and I value your opinions and contributions to this board, but for God's sake stop using "we" in posts when you clearly mean the plural "you". Also stop lumping everyone's opinions into black and white buckets (with you conveniently in the reasonable bucket) instead of acknowledging the nuance of individual posts and their specific place on the reasonableness spectrum.

 

This seems much ado about nothing in my opinion.

Just being on the USYNT is courting a player and shows that the federation both values them and stays in contact with them.

I don't really see the value in the USMNT Coach having to send love notes to 18 year olds.

 

Thank you for writing my thoughts so clearly.

Just to add on, the best recruitment tool is winning.

With the U.S. U-20 team flying high for a third straight cycle, that is the best recruitment tool you could ever want. The names I see mentioned here, Ledezma and Mendez, are going to be on a U-20 team that could make a really long run at the World Cup summer.

If they pack up and leave right after the tournament (and I don't think they will), then they didn't really want to play for the United States in the first place.

We're talking about two talented players who haven't even played a professional game. Having them be on a U-20 World Cup team is exactly where they should be as top prospects. It's crazy to think that U.S. Soccer isn't doing their job with these players. Youth national teams exist for just this reason.

 

I would hope our coaches are too busy scouting prospects, running camps, and coaching tournaments to have to send out recruiting texts.

Hell, D1 schools hire professional recruiting coordinators to do that. I'd hope the MNT would at least get someone who's a professional at recruitment if we're going to conduct a charm offensive on all of our dual-nationals.

 

I don't think its the role of Earnie or Greg to call up a player that has never played a professional game. I don't think its their job to call up Andrew Carleton or Paxton Pomykal or George Bello..................much less the dual-nationals we're talking about. Dual-nationals don't get special treatment from me. Its our youth technical director's job to do that. That's Tab Ramos, and he is doing that! Its the appropriate USYNT coach that's scouting them for their squad to do that. So for the U20s that's also Tab. And when we have a U23 coach, I think that person will also be in touch with them. When they're even in the ballpark of the USMNT, then the USMNT coach should call them. I think its likely that our U23 coach will be Josh Wolf, who is a USMNT assistant. So there will be good synergy there.

I don't think its Greg Berhalter's job to say he's "watching them," probably because he isn't watching them. Where are people watching Richie Ledesma? Does somebody have a drone above PSV?

And yes..................I think the STORY of Jonathan Gonzalez has always been bigger than the talent of the player. Do I wish he was still in the USMNT pool? Of course. Why wouldn't I? I want our pool to be as big as possible. Do I pine for him? No. Adios.

 

Spot on. It's silly the US coaches should bend over backwards for these guys. If they want to play for the US and the coach thinks they can play, offer them a spot. If not, then move on. If a kid needs you to cater to his ego and send him sweet little text messages then he may not be the kid you are looking for anyway.

 

I don't care if its dual nationals or just US Citizen kids, I don't think the head coach of the first team or the US Soccer GM needs to send kids text messages. Let them earn the distinction to have a relationship with the first team coach by being called to a first team camp. Until then, sure the U20 and U23 coaches can text them, call them, and send them birthday cards.

If it takes text messages from Berhalter to convince a kid to play for the US, then I don't think we want him.