Pulisic's first chance was a good chance, as good as the three they finished. Wright's muffed Wondo moment was a very good chance. There was a strong element of ball-watching in all three Dutch goals, and the culpable guys in two of those were guys who had run their asses off for 270 minutes plus stoppage before this match started.
I don’t like Yedlin’s un-sportsmanship. If I am the referee, I would show him right card by kicking the Dutch player’ head when he was on the groud.
Sometimes. Sometimes they grow out of it. We'll see if Gio can stay healthy this cycle, or if he ends up a Holden or O'Brien. (Twellman was a different issue, and he was a prime age player when he had to retire due to repeated concussions.)
ccv was certainly better than zimmerman. in distribution and defense. ferreira was the worst us attaker in qater...so yeah wright was better than him....point being ferreria played A TON of minutes for greeggg, inexplicably. Ream was poor vs the dutch. bad in distribution and defending...but was great in the group games. its not like any of mckenize, epb, trusty, brooks, miazga couldnt have done as well or better than the CBs that did play for the US....and almost all likely do better than zimmerman. the whole reason ream was even an emergency re-call was berhalters IDIOTIC insistence on playing LOng every game he could over the past year or more. to all the people that believe this roster was simply the best the US could do and even if the other spots 18-26 were different, it wouldnt have mattered.....I say you dont know what you are watching.
I don't know that the first goal was necessarily because Adams was tired/fatigued. He just momentarily lost his mark and completely failed to track back. It was weird because he was so solid defensively the entire group stage. I mean even on fumes the guy would be capable of sprinting for 30 yards to help defend a counter, and it was still early in the game. He ran plenty later in the game
He's never had a consistent shot. He's hammered some, but a lot of times it's "wah wah trombone". He can still improve on it, and really needs to add that to his game (especially as he continues to slow down physically).
Imagine those players being sat the whole tournament. Very insightful - unfortunately you seemed to have trended as an apologist rather than calling it out.
Oh, he's capable, and was physically capable at that point in the match for sure. But fatigue affects judgment as well as effort. That was a mental lapse in concentration.
Disagree. Our system certainly doesn't help our poor striker pool play optimally, but world class strikers absolutely create their own chances, win more balls in the air, create more chances for teammates, are better in possession, make better runs to create space, etc. It's wild for anyone to believe that a world class striker or two would produce the same poor results as the current guys who play up top
Imo, his shot has improved tremendously over the years. And, hitting it hard hasn't been the problem. I think it's reasonable to assume that a guy with a fairly severely bruised pelvis is going to have trouble generating power with his shot. JMO.
I mean Wright was better than Ferreira, but that's not a ringing endorsement or anything. Ferreria just was actually hurting the team, and Wright was just nothing, so by default he was better. Zimmerman was Zimmeran, struggled when Ream was not able to spray passes. Solid in defense. CCV was the opposite, better in possession, worse in defense. So I'd say Zimmerman was better but not by a whole lot since the job of a defender is to defend first. Gregg said he never considered that and wouldn't. So to answer your question, because Gregg said no. As to why? He didn't really answer other than he didn't want to. Today was a great chance to influence some chaos in the game. Weah up top, Aaronson and Pulisic driving on the wings, Musah and Wes crashing late. But instead we got slow and plodding buildup that allowed the Dutch to defend easily. Where they struggled was the in mud. We didn't dirty the game enough, and thats tactics. Oh well. Hopefully that was Gregg's last game and we can find a better in game manager.
Oh jeez, really? Now you're just sniping. If you want to have an intelligent discussion I'm here, but I won't argue with indignant, totally baseless, emotionally-driven sniping. You know what Gio did when he was on the pitch? Squadoosh. Getting booted from a World Cup sucks. It was always going to suck. If we had somehow managed to draw level and beat them on PKs, it would suck to get our asses kicked next week by the Argentines.
One of the most frustrating big item issues with this loss is that I hope that this sticks in the federations skulls that it’s not a formation that gets wins. So much was preached about this beloved 433, and I get it, a 433 is a good formation. But no team should ever only have one method of approach. That just makes you predictable. We have to be better about being dynamic. And that includes the coaching and the tactics.
Well, as we adjusted into a 442 shape this tournament at times I'd say that the manager realized that. It's not about the formation per se. It was never about the formation per se.
Canada proved the drawing on the road by your fingernails was complete and utter bull---- w/their performance in qualifying. They didn't lose a roadie until they basically had qualification rapped up. I will note that they did not have the Panama and Costa Rica roadies until the last window, and those are traditionally 2 of the 4 toughest road trips (honestly, I think playing the US away is not a problem, the refs suck, and our fans intimidate noone, and unless we pull shenanigans like we did this time w/the ice box games, opponents fans are often there in heavy #'s, I'd rank our home field advantage as close to the worst of any top 8 side in the region. We just don't need it, which is why we win, usually) so that does take the edge off, but the fact that they played the US, Mexico, Jamaica, El Salvador, and Honduras away, and were completely and totally fine tells you the roadie difficulty argument, and the "experience" angle so many people argued before we pratfalled in window 1 was complete nonsense. We just sucked and played poorly and were intimidated in Central America like we normally are. We absolutely should crush concacrap on the road. The one piece of good news I'll argue is that we actually played very well at Azteca for the third consecutive time, and we had a fantastic 2nd half in Honduras, and we had our best performance in Costa Rica since 1997. So that was all good, but the overall performance in qualifying was erratic at best. It needs to be better in the future. The good news even on that, is that the xG vs xG allowed stats had us #1 in qualifying, and the sole reason they showed why we finished third was that #1 Steffen sucks (14th ranked goalie in qualifying in terms of expected goals allowed vs goals allowed) and #2 our finishing was crap. #1 objective: we must play in Copa America in 18 months period. Any walking back of that, and ---- this federation. The coaching angle is a concern too. I don't trust these idiots to get coach right (and I was deeply alarmed to hear Wahl say that Earnie has been overruled on youth coaching hires, that's completely bull---- if true, and I would've quit if I was him over that. Why is he the TD/GM if he can't make the hires?) and figure its Berhalter or a ---- MLS coach and I'm not big on either of those options. I also dgaf about Chicago, or the English requirement. Who cares. Also don't want Marsch (why would he use back to back tactically inflexibile coaches?).
Ok, we'll agree to disagree, but if you argue Adams not covering the trailing run, the US not covering BLIND?! in a trailing run with second left in the half and Jedi not covering the far post and the Dutch basically adding a 1 goal cushion at will comes only down to coaching, we'll just have to disagree. Everyone who pays attention knows I'm no Beerholder apologist and never have been, but the idea the Dutch, who have not lost a game in like 15 outings, including 4 WC runs didn't really "play well" today when they scored 3 goals on well executed possession plays and/or set pieces, well, we just have different definitions of soccer and words, is all.
I didnt realise the US team hadn't beaten any european team since 2002 in the WCs. Always thought it was a better record than that.
Even the Dutch didn't bother to use the 433. In 433, unless you have goal-eating monsters on your forward line, the central midfield needs to carry some goal creation threat. Switching to 442 for the England match helped the US deal with the wide attack. But change contributed nothing to goal creation capabilities The US in the U20 Concacaf Championships showed what a dynamic 433 with a goal-creating central midfield could do.
For those interested in a statistical look at this game, here's the link to the full FIFA post-match summary report. You'll have to scroll down a ways until you see the "Round of 16" heading. It's a pdf document and is chock full of data.
Hey c'mon man, to be fair they should've been wearing bright orange vests or something so our defenders could see them