Pray for Christian Pulisic's body parts and make sure MMA gets daily ice soak tubs every day til that game. Edit: Just saw Christian was taken to hospital. If Christian cant go.......it needs to be Reyna time. NEEDS to. FURTHERMORE, I want Reyna taking those set pieces. Particularly the corners. Biggest danger man for the Netherlands IMO: Cody Gakpo. Need to keep him uncomfortable.
We need a healthy Pulisic and Sargent next Saturday...Quarterfinal is just one game more? Let's go, USA
I know it won't happen but we need some rotation. I understand needing to keep certain players in the starting lineup because of who they are, but the Netherlands are way too good to leave tired legs out there against. What we got away with against Iran is not going to fly again the Dutch. Of course we played pretty much the same lineup all three games except for striker. So I know these won't happen, but just some thoughts: - Aaronson or Reyna for Weah. I thought Aaronson did good to create some half chances against Iran, even playing next to slop like Haji and Acosta. Weah has played a lot and has been quiet since his goal. Give Aaronson a run out here - Aaronson or Reyna or LDLT for Musah. Poor Musah was out of gas tonight, so I say give him a rest and let him come on in the second half and try to dribble through a more tired Dutch midfield.
Roll em out and run em out. Holland would have much preferred Wales or Iran. Things just got real for them.
if pulisic plays we have a shot. this is the best team we've ever brought to a world cup. this will be a real game.
If Pulisic can't go, I expect Aaronson will start. But by god I wish we could get at least 30 minutes of Reyna! The rest of the starters I anticipate will be the same, but I don't think we can survive bringing on bad subs without ball skills. We've just been turnover machines in the second half as players can't possess the ball. Ferreira > Wright Scally > Moore de la Torre > Acosta Reyna > literally everyone being subbed over him
CHRISTIAN PULISIC IS AN AMERICAN LEGEND LMFAO.(via @AreaSportsNet, @Adimitri24) pic.twitter.com/TzNTVCR5tI— USMNT Only (@usmntonly) November 29, 2022
At the 2002 World Cup, our round of 16 game against Mexico was on two days rest. So Arena switched things up a bit, dropping Agoos - who has been causing the wrong sort of problems - and going to a back 3. One of the players making their World Cup debut in the knockout round? Gregg Berhalter.
The official line was that Agoos was ruled out due to an achilles injury. A lot of people thought that was just a polite way of dropping him for form related reasons though.
One of the big sighs of relief here I forgot to post at the top? I believe there is a card reset after the group stage. So that means Adams, Dest, McKinnie, Acosta, and Ream are clean of the cards.
Yep....it's been hard to tell how good Holland actually are from watching them. It's felt like they've been playing on cruise control knowing that their last group stage match was a certain win against Qatar, but I'm not sure if they actually are capable of turning it up a notch and playing in a higher gear.
I can almost hear Berhalter's internal monologue, how the advantage of sticking to a system rather than implementing a style fitting to the pool is that, if you have a system, it doesn't hurt too much when one of your key players is injured or loses form (like Steffen or Miles). While that is true, the problem with a system is that at some point its rigidity becomes its limitation. I'm 100% sure Gregg has scouted each team that could be in our way well, including the Dutch and even the next ones. So far they play as expected, we should give them a game. Problem is, what if they don't? If I'm van Gaal I come against us rocking a 4-2-3-1 instead of their usual 3-4-1-2, and watch Gregg's head implode.
I actually think we match up fairly well against Holland. Now Gakpo is going insane and he and Memphis can cause our backline issues but I do think we can win the midfield battle
I’m worried about Pulisic and Sargent’s health. We’re going to need both guys to be fit in order to have a chance against Netherlands. And I don’t know what’s going on with Reyna, but it’s getting sort of ridiculous. Anyways, I’ve got the 433/442 hybrid..... Starting XI GK Turner RB Dest CB Zimmerman CB Ream LB Jedi DM Adams CM Musah CM McKennie RW Weah LW Pulisic (Aaronson if not fit) FW Sargent (Ferreira if not fit) Subs: -Reyna must come on. Figure this out, Gregg. -Aaronson if he’s not starting. De la Torre if he is. -Ferreira if he’s not starting. You couldn’t pay me to play Wright again. Heck, I would go with Jordan Morris at CF before Haji Wright again. -I don’t mind the Acosta late sub. I don’t mind the Zimmerman/CCV late sub if we’re up. -Scally or Yedlin over Moore.
Reyna has to start especially if Pulisic isn't 100% I'd really like to see Ferreira start up top. His speed will be quite useful against the Dutch defense although his small frame/size might hinder us.
This should be a super interesting match up to me. I think Netherlands isn't as strong as they have been man for man in many years, but they are still a very good team with some extremely good players. Also interesting that we have a Dutchman in charge of our program who has certainly leaned on some of the Dutch ways in organizing this team. We're going to have to grind a lot in this game. If we get a result in this game, it is not likely to be pretty. In fact, I'd say that if it is a pretty game, we're probably not coming out on top.
I think rotation is a massive question for this game. This is the knockout rounds so even if we hang on, there's always overtime. We've struggled to keep our levels up for 90 minutes. If we have to play 120, we'll really struggle. Unfortunately, our depth is such that if we rotate much from the start we're not likely to get that far to find out. I'll be curious to see how it works out, but I don't anticipate many changes.
UPDATE: #USMNT forward Christian Pulisic has been diagnosed with a pelvic contusion and his status is day-to-day. pic.twitter.com/abZcjU6tco— U.S. Soccer Men's National Team (@USMNT) November 29, 2022