About those September friendlies... what were perceived by some (including me) as being quite winnable... The results in this tournament put a new light on those teams for me. Japan and Saudi Arabia beat Germany and Argentina in this tournament. While our performances were flat in those September games, the competition was legit.
In my mind, I always append "YET" to the end of any criticism of a young player like Adams. He is not a skilled passer ..............YET.
i just dont understand this sentiment and i see it all the time. he is exactly the same as hes always been. nothing has changed. if you separate his tenure into two parts- finding his feet/the pre-covid years and berhalter 2.0 (2021 gold cup-present) hes been as constant as the north star. we find a goal (hopefully early), vaguely keep playing for another until halftime and then we squeeze every ounce of life out of the game. every adjustment, every substitute is made independant of what the opponent does and/or changes to see out the one goal lead. all the wrinkles in the world (a 442 shape to the press, whatever the pattern was last night that had guys popping up in totally random places/switching wes and musah) dont change that overall gameplan at all. love it, hate, grudgingly accept the results that against all logic we continue to get- but the template is the same. you cant lose some "nerve" you never gained- though im not saying it doesnt take immense courage to take such borderline suicidal risks so consistently. but intentionally turning a one goal lead into an open invitation to just unleash an utter barage on us is textbook berhalter.
You cannot forcibly change how deep or high an opponent sets up its defensive line. Nor can you line up your players behind the opponent's last defenders without making them useless. If an opponent is chasing the result, and pulls its defense all the way up to the halfway line, the best you can do is what Argentina (by way of example) failed to do against Saudi Arabia in the 1st half, namely try to beat the offside trap by making well timed passes and runs. The American players, after running so much in the 1st half, weren't as sharp in the 2nd half and the replacements weren't at the level of those taken out.
its always "for our talent" with you people usmnt has never had a coach that would be considered good regardless of which team they are coaching....never had a truly elite coach. never had a klopp, a zidane, a ferguson, a guardiola etc....never even close to that level. its not controversial. its fact. Berhalter still hasnt beaten one top ten team! IN> HIS> LIFE. Beating Mexico doesnt look like such a great accomplishment, either, when you look at how trash theyve been this tourney. does it? Arena, Bradely, and Klinsmann ALL had terrible second cycles/were fired second cycles (Arena had 2 bad re-treads!)......yet, somehow, people think Berhater is going to be the exception??!?! Yes, the US coaches have all had bright moments....I'm not saying they havent.....and? that's not the point!! theyve also all made crucial and terrible errors of judgment at key moments as well....all egregiously so. USMNT has more talent now!!! than any previous US coach had!! of course they are going to be better.... berhalter could coach brazil to 2nd place in their group too....doesnt make him worthy of a second cycle, either. hes not the coach to make this team reach its potential....and I simply cannot believe anyone would think otherwise. He MUST leave his job after the cup. its non-negotiable. thanks for your service. bye.
the team isnt winning. they are tying. theyve beaten Iran. the same team england beat 6-2. Iran sucks lets be honest. berhalter still hasnt beaten anyone good in his entire tenure. this team is punching well below its weight. people just dont realize it yet because of the historical performance of the team.
kerr is overrated....kerr would never take a less talented team anywhere....but he can get out of the way and let his overtalented team win.....which is something.....but he's never going to be on the coaching mount rushmore or even close....and thats not what the usmnt needs.....they need a coach who can make a team better than the sum of its parts.
I hated how the US approached the second half. and how berhalter has maneged this roster and the tourney. youre right. I was watching with an Italian friend from Milan who is an Inter supporter. he watched parts of the US- England match and predicted a 3-1 US win. He was baffled at the second half and thought the tactics were stupid. A lot of other people agree. it's not only me. it triggers me that people watch this and think it is acceptable. this team is capable of so much more. But im not angry that the US won.....
Personally I’d never judge any team based on two nearly empty stadium friendlies played on a neutral site. I maintain those expecting the U.S. to go 0-3 or finish last in the group were mostly doing so out of wishful thinking.
thats so arbitrary, though. aaronson is listed on the roster for the first time as a mid but hasnt played a minute there. im not entirely sure de la torre is ambulatory, hence our "backup 6" has played exclusively as an 8. roldan is always listed as a mid but has only played wide over the last two years. things dont have to make sense. its just as crazy that gregg sees yedlin and moore in training and theyre outperforming scally as it is to say hes only viable as a backup lb. greggs just not gonna play him. it doesnt really matter why, thats just the way it is.
exactly. spot on. people act like we could just bring on new players for the ones that are tired or something! some people are just never satisfied, i guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In support of what you’re saying, I think it’s completely fair to question and critique some of the decisions that got us to advance. I don’t care if we actually win the World Cup, I’m always going to find something to critique. Guaranteed. If you’re not improving, you’re stagnating. That said, we do have to acknowledge that we got across the line even if it was maybe unglamorous in how we did so. Still, I don’t think it was wise to come in and bunker against Iran when we went up. I thought we should have kept our foot on the gas the whole time. We did so against England. But we went into this defensive shell against both Wales and Iran, and it didn’t work out against Wales and it barely worked out against Iran. I’m definitely happy we’re going through. But we can’t play like that last 20 minutes against the Netherlands for a minute.
berhalter never properly vetted the pool!!! he just decided that a lot of MLSers would be on his World Cup team from the very beginning! He had a very hard time finding any that are good enough! but he kept looking......and has taken a raft of inadeqaute players to this cup (that happen to all be from MLS) do you think any of the MLSers on this World Cup team are getting signed by foreign teams after this tourney??? lololololol how can anyone watch this world cup performance and think that the MLSers are good enough for this? that thy arent well below the standard of the rest of the team??? the ONLY game the US has won has been the 1 game that no MLSers started. Its not controversial or coincidence. its facts. he's now giving time to players like ream, ccv, wright who were NOT INTEGRATED prior to the cup and hav barely played with the team....so......he could have done that with other players as well! How can I be expected to be certain of which euro players are 100% definitely the best??? when a lot of them havent had time with the team???? all that said: EPB, Pefok, Sabbi, Mendez, Ledezma, Mihailovic, Brooks, Booth, Fossey, Cannon, Chandler, Dike, (inj), paredes (inj), gooch (inj), balogun, pierie, holmes, hoppe, koleosho (inj), Mckenzie, Sonora, Tillman, Sands, theres at least 23 players that amongst them....would be some upgrades to the squad. there's also some players in MLS that would be better than the nes berhater brought as well. this qatar roster is about 75% as good as it could be imo. which is an abomination.
I think it's because of role - Acosta's best skill is doing Adams things, but if he's out there with Adams, he's probably supposed to be the one doing McKennie things, and he's not as good at that.
Based on what metric? Or just some media bs. Group B has the lowest composite FIFA rankings of any group, by far. Ok so FIFA rankings are suspect? Well then they are suspect across the board so the point stands.
Yep. I think that makes sense. We've seen players who were competent in other situations look comparatively poor when put in an unfamiliar role. If I'm not mistaken, Ale Bedoya was put in a spot like that once.
I don't believe that was ever actually the case in the LOTG. But in practical terms, without VAR, and with the dictate that even is onside, it often wasn't within the ability of human perception to call many of the "the foot is of"--except in static situations where the positions of the feet could actually be discerned with accuracy. (If you go back a few decades, even was off.)
Yes, but unlike Haaland it was our manager's decision that he not be available today, as it was his decision to make no use of Gio Reyna, or de la Torre. That's the point, eh?
berhalter has taken a deep run off the table for the team with the way he has approached this. with rosters, with tactics, with everything basically. most likely with the sole aim of securing himself another cycle.... THATS really my only beef with him. I'm judging him based on performance and nothing else. If he did the right and smart things, I would support him. we really dont know how another, better, actually adequate manager would have this team playing and how theyd be setup. its all conjecture. but it is obvious that this isnt the cieling for the team. all you have to do is compare the first an second halves of his games to make it clear.....lol I havent moved my goal posts at all. where do you get that???!? my bar has never been simply get out of the group for the USA - its a team that does that almost every time they make the WC.....they did in 94, 02, 10, 14, and now 22.....getting out of the group is normal to me...it's expected. 5out of the last 8 WCs the US made it out of the group...do people not remember any of that???!? if we were Canada yeah getting out of the group would be enough...BUT WE ARENT. Can we win some knockout games? can we actually beat anyone better than Iran???
completely agree. its hard (for me, anyways) to not think arriola would be a really useful guy to have in this team. (end direct reply) to the larger "problem" of not having like-for-like replacements in the middle- where both wes and musah need some relief- we have aaronson, whos fresh legs and pressing could replicate the starters effect in the middle, and even ferreira since theres a point scoring isnt even a focus anymore. i dont know why berhalter chooses not to use those options- and sure, results are results so who am i to question him? but i dont think its true that we dont have those options. we just dont use them. we have 4 rbs so i dont know how anyone can claim we dont have enough there, its just a matter of- again- who gregg decides to use or not. same with reyna- could he help with possession-as-defense on a wing rather than keeping aaronson high? it sure seems like it, but we are what we are and we do what we do. no one is unhappy with the position we are in, the idea that there could possibly be small changes that make us even better is treated like god damn treason around here.
True, but our Chicago House confreres seem to prefer a Captain of the Minnow who is quite content to float as high as the available waves of raw talent allow, and no more.