The Official Luchi Gonzalez Thread

I sure hope there are roster upgrades. Otherwise, three months is a long time for me to build up a reservoir of high dudgeon...

 

What happened to kinder, gentler, more dialed back Replikait?

I mean, I said that he sucked, but this is a whole other level.

Go Quakesfans!!

- Mark

 

Ka-boom! Is what happened.

 

Kind of like when people tried to claim that a certain former president would be henceforth adopting a "new (less combative) tone" in his social media posts. Ka-boom!

 

alert! dragging politics into our friendly forum alert!

 

Fixed your post. (Political content deleted to forestall cranial explosions.)

We need a head exploding emoji.
Dang. The Apple head exploding emoji doesn’t display here.

Go Quakesfans!!

 

Interestingly, Matias is doing quite well in Athens, just won again if you can believe that.

And he did really well before he came to San Jose, go figure. And he stood out as an anomaly in San Jose where coaches typically thrive. It’s a total stumper.

 

Hard to win when you’re deliberately tanking.

 

Matías has a big budget at AEK. It’s easier to be good when your team is one of the top spenders in your uncapped league.

He failed here, and his tactics were suspect at best.

Go Quakesfans!!

- Mark

 

What do they say about the company you keep?

#USWNT head coach Vlatko Andonovski says he's off to Qatar to help the #USMNT at the Men's World Cup. He does not specify what that work will be, exactly.

— Jeff Kassouf (@JeffKassouf) November 14, 2022

1591982998203035650 is not a valid tweet id

Fresh off of… the USWNT losing three games in a row for the first time since 1993!

Former USWNT player Heather O’Reilly spoke out after 🇺🇸 lost 3 times in a row for the first time since 1993.

🗣️: “I am tremendously disappointed. Simply not good enough in so many regards”

🗣️: “You are about to lose at home. Get the f***ing ball down the field and fight” pic.twitter.com/LjHzFexDnw

— Women’s Transfer News (@womenstransfer) November 12, 2022

 

They have a very young team in a big time transition…some cranky older players with a lot of heart reluctant to relinquish minutes to young talented players who have yet to step up with the grit necessary. Tough spot for the coach. Hopefully he can identify the young players he can count on fairly soon…
They miss Ertz in the midfield big time.

 

They need to sit Grandma Time Down aka Rapinoe.

The women aren't getting worse, the world of women's soccer is just getting better.

 

True

 

I am too lazy to look this up, but have any of the USMNT coaches played in a WC themselves? I’m just wondering how much we are flying blind in this tournament.

 

Klinsmann was a World Cup player (and coach) before coaching the US in Brazil. How did that work out?

 

Remember when Maradona coached Argentina in the World Cup? Good times.

 

Gregg Berhalter played the full 90 in the only knockout win in USMNT history.

 

I thought the team did well in Brazil. Beat Ghana, tied Portugal and only lost to the eventual tournament winner, Germany, by a score of 1-0. That round of 16 game against Belgium was a battle, could’ve easily gone either way, as we know. Tim Howard’s 16 saves in that one still stands as an all-time WC record I believe.

 

I'll concede that 2014 US World Cup performance was better than we're likely to see for a long time. Not sure that Tim Howard's stellar play against Belgium was a mark of great coaching, though.

By the way, did Kyle Shanahan ever play in the NFL? Because ya know, ya can't coach if ya didn't play.

 

Yeah, I’m not sure on that. I expect there have been plenty of great coaches that weren’t players. Made me wonder about Alex Ferguson though, didn’t know if he was much of a player. Turns out he scored 171 goals over his senior career from ‘57 to ‘74.

 

Thanks for that info! But so no other USMNT coaching staff has played in a WC before?

The only reason I ask is because WC experience is very helpful. Even tho Klinsmann was an ass, he did apply his WC and CL experience to the USMNT, and they would have made it pretty far except for Wondo’s infamous miss.

If the only players/coaches with WC experience are DeAndre Yedlin and Gregg Berhalter, and with such a young team, it means they might lack a steady influence in the locker room. That’s why i wondered how much the team is flying blind right now, in terms of knowing what to expect in a WC

 

I have to say, it looks the MEX-POL game is entirely green jerseys in the stands.

 

That's why they brought Yedlin, Ream, Johnson, Zimmerman and Long for a veteran presence. Even though the majority don't have a wealth of experience. We are basically playing catch up missing the last World Cup. We'd likely have some guys on the team who would have been in the pervious one had we not missed.

You don't need a staff necessarily to succeed in a World Cup who have experience. Saudi Arabia just kicked Argentina's ass. So in the game of soccer anything can happen.

Anyone who expected this team to come in and kick everyone's ass is ignorant as hell, but should take this as a good amount of these guys getting World Cup experience so next cycle in 2026 we will have guys who have played in one.

Also if we won 1-0 over Wales, everyone who's bitching about Zimmerman would be cheering GGG and his choice to play Ream/Zimmerman instead of Long/Zimmerman, but now because of that costly mistake everyone is screaming for Long/Ream and chastening Zimmerman.

But every World Cup the US fans have someone they pick on, bully and beat the shit out of. Wynalda, Agoos, and Wondolowski are the previous whipping boys.

 

And all those whipping boys played for Quakes.

Zimmerman incoming?