In Berhalter's defense, I'm not sure McKennie himself knows how to get the most out of his jack of all trades, master of none game. His contribution flatters to deceive only because of the poor quality that surrounds him.
You think this current squad is less athletic on a relative basis than historic squad? Sure - if the center of the field is manned by Trapp and Bradley.
How in the world would we know this? We have Adams, Weston, Pomykal, Morales, Pulisic, Holmes, Boyd, zardes, Arriola, Morris, Wood, Sargent, yedlin, Robinson. They are all capable of being highly disruptive and attacking directly.
It was a friendly, you want to practice to get better. GB wants defenders to learn to play from the back, it is hard to see how well that is going if every time you get in trouble you immediately go back to kick and chase. At least now we know that the players need a lot more practice. But also, we can make the argument that US defenders/GKs may never become good enough for a play from the back passing system, so why even try?
The concept that we need to practice sucking at attractive possession soccer / building out of the back (“aspirational play”) before we get good at it is complete and utter bullshit. Someday (soon!), we will have a full contingent of starting major leaguers players who all have elite passing/line-breaking abilities that they use for their major league club teams on a daily basis. At that point, we won’t have to say “I wonder if they can do” because it’ll already be proven that they can at high speeds. We ain’t there yet and it’s asinine to be aspirational right now.
I didn't watch the game (schedule conflict) and I've only seen the highlights (lowlights), so take my comments for what they're worth. We probably shouldn't have scheduled Mexico for this friendly (#CashGrab), as a 0-3 defeat while we continue to 'experiment' wouldn't have been that bothersome against anyone else. We shouldn't tie Steffen's (or anyone's) hands (feet). A general instruction that 'we want to build out of the back whenever possible' is fine, and good practice against a good team, but you need to go long occasionally to relieve pressure and keep the defense honest. Otherwise you end up strangling yourself and giving the ball away too often in dangerous places.
If we want to change the fundamentals of our soccer style, it has to be done from the ground up. I'd argue up to the U20 class it's been done, but there's a lack of continuity from that level to the U23. At some point around the age of 21-22, our system moves from possession football into strength-and-speed soccer. The game we lost to Ecuador in the U20WC we had the ball 54% and kept close in chances and shots (11/3 vs. 13/5), dominating the midfield for long stretches. You don't see that at the adult level.
Or you know, put him in a role that is clear and isn't demanding that he go bail out Bradley/Trapp all day long and then simultaneously be next to Pulisic so he has someone to actually play with. The stupid regista role being manned by people that cannot do anything worthwhile other than occasionally hit a long diagonal is the base problem, from which many other symptoms follow.
Relative to previous iterations of US Nat sides maybe not. Relative to previous iterations of our hemispheric competition, YES.
Nah. They moved the ball, opened space, made the opponent lose their shape. What Gregg said is the plan. But then did nothing to exploit that space because it was too far from the ball.
The national team isn't a practice squad where the coach can teach everyone how to play soccer. If the problem is that these are all just lesson plans and somehow the hope is that a light comes on and suddenly all our players become polar opposites of what they are now, we're really screwed. I do wonder if this is all really one of those things where the fed has decided the US will play one way and wants all teams to try to do so, whether they get smacked around or not, in the hopes that 20 years from now, all US players will play the same way and eventually catch up to the system. Ernie is Dutch after all.
As stated above, I’ll take me chances with Adams, Weston, Pomykal, Morales, Pulisic, Holmes, Boyd, zardes, Arriola, Morris, Wood, Sargent, yedlin, Robinson. That’s plenty athletic and disruptive and a lot more than our relative technical abilities compared to hemispheric opponents. It’s not particularly close.
Obviously, you didn't see Bora's team. So, no, JK wasn't the most defensive coach. For all his challenges, JK wasn't a crap coach. Besides, this is about GGG, not JK. After an initial positive couple of games, GGG has shown us nothing to this point. Not interested anymore in his approach. I'm done.
The TL-DR version - I'd love to see the USMNT play an attractive, possession-based style of play and favor seeing this at younger ages. We can't do this at the senior level unless or until the talent catches up. I don't get the other poster's assertion that this team has no athletic ability. The reason the team may look slow is because players like Trapp are on the field. Put a team of younger, faster players on the field and let's see what happens. As for the style of play, I'm 100% in favor of trying to develop a possession-based style of play at the younger levels. My son is a U12 player. His club plays a possession-based game. It does get tough when they come up short against teams that play kick and chase, but at that level it's about development. The younger age groups are where you can build this type of play. Even when you get to the senior teams (U23/Olympic and senior national team), you can try to develop a team with players more comfortable with that style of play. Look at USA Basketball - the 2008, 2012, and 2016 Olympic teams weren't necessarily the most talented players or an All-Star NBA team. The program picked the best team based on a number of factors, including the type of play Coach K wanted to play. The issue with the USMNT right now is the talent base isn't deep enough to exercise this luxury. Unless or until the USMNT has a talent pool comparable to the teams we see in the World Cup quarterfinals and later on a consistent basis, you have to adjust to what you have. How do you do that? You put your best players (Pulisic, Adams, McKennie) in their most natural positions, find the best team to place around those players, and then determine the best style of play to maximize this setup. Perhaps in 15 years, we will have a pipeline of players that can play the Dutch style of play. The YNTs can work on this style of play at
Good point about Bora. It's been so long one forgets him and in fairness the talent he had basically demanded being defensive so it may not be fair to put him into any comparisons. JK absolutely was a crap coach though. He lost the team. He left Donovan at home in favor of a teenage player who can't crack the squad today. He played promising #8's (at the time) like Morales and Williams on the wing where they had no business playing and gave Mexican league scrubs repeated chances as part of some odd almost affirmative action move. Worst of all created the hole Arena was unable to dig out of. JK and GGG are similar in that both (so far) have been stubborn to a fault. The difference is GGG seems to have an intelligently thought out plan that doesn't work. JK had no intelligent plan to speak of.
We won’t have to force a possession style on our team, when we have elite players who do it every day at the major league level at every position, it’ll be natural.
Mexico getting their asses handed to them by Argentina without Messi. Scaloni isn't exactly a coach to write home about either.
I don't disagree with any of this...but I'd also add to the end that Klinsy mostly picked the right players, despite being an awful coach and tactician. Egg might have a nice plan, but his player selection is, in my mind, worse than Klinsys poor coaching.