Hopefully, this will be the end of your pushing for Weston to either stay in Germany with his club team or play as a defender.
McKennie started the Venezuela match and 4 out of 5 Gold Cup matches so far. Is this the first time in his entire career that he's started that many matches as a central midfielder in a short period? I think it's a significant fact. Usually with Schalke they push him somewhere else after a few matches, so it's challenging to develop a rhythm.
I think you need a fourth in the list: he is a major disruptor of the opposing defensive flank and creates opportunity.
Historically, we've only beat Mexico twice in the Gold Cup. 1991 and 2007. In two games we had our butts categorically handed to us. I don't think we have the weapons yet to be that competitive against Mexico in a stadium filled with Mexico fans. I would say 30%. What I would like to see is we be competitive for the full 90 minutes.
This team is starting to take shape. As the announcers mentioned, just start thinking about Pulisic, McKennie and then add Adams to the midfield for the foreseeable future. Bradley looked better with more variety of movement in sync with McKennie, but throw Adams in that mix and we'll have the best engine room in our region for a long time. Against Jamaica, more of a pulley system between McKennie and Bradley was much more effective. I'm starting to get on board with McKennie as the new Jermaine Jones. Pulisic may break Donovan records. Our three best players essentially write themselves into the 6, 8 and 10 playing out of this setup. No need to shun the obvious. Speaking of, Jozy was such an obvious upgrade from Zardes. The whole offense works better when the center forward in a system that plays to get the ball to the center forward can actually trap the ball and pass it around. When Zardes came on, the effect on the entire offense was comical. We need Sargent to get real minutes this year for depth and to eventually be an upgrade. I thought Ream was OK. We're not going to get any offense from him but I'd prefer a left back that holds his position reasonably well over a guy bombing forward with little end product leaving you exposed more often. Otherwise, we start thinking about which right back could double on the left. Our options in the center of defense look solid enough if uninspiring, Miazga seemed off the game a bit against Jamaica. For me, Reggie Cannon is a player not out of place in the starting lineup. Looks like a player to me. Steffan is looking in command, if still uncertain with the ball at his feet. Excellent shot stopper in an era where more is being asked of his position. With the current expectations for goalies, the US needs to up the way we look at the position. We struggle with our wingers. Arriola works hard, knows where to be and when to run, but end product is lacking. At least he creates space for Pulisic to work. Morris never got going and seems up and down out there. Boyd likely still one of our better options wide, but that's damning with faint praise. Here's another place we need a big time player to step up; and yes, I'm looking right at Tim Weah. All in all a good performance from this team and some real progress getting to where they need to be. I am looking forward to what another 2-3 players could do to make this top lineup very formidable. We get any of the next crop of teens in Europe making waves close to what McKennie, Pulisic and Adams have done over the first couple years of their pro careers, and we start to become something quite difficult to deal with. It will be a roll of the dice if enough of the pieces are in place in the final right now against Mexico, but we have some guys who can certainly create some danger against Mexico now and with a few more additions we may not be underdogs in these match-ups much longer.
Having expressed skepticism earlier about McKennie, man, he is quality. He'll be a nightmare for opponents for years to come. Zimmerman is one of the winners of the tournament. I think he starts over Miazga, who's fine as backup cb material. Steffen often seems a Ream-like disaster waiting to happen, but he's an athlete. Let's hope he continues to develop in Europe. I can't wait to add Adams and Weah to this mix, not to mention Richards et al. from the u20s.
i think arriola gets entirely too much shit around here. hes always been a very solid winger, great motor, plus plus defensive help on his side and maybe most importantly (what ive always appreciated) is that he pushes the attack. he goes hard to make things happen. as passively as we have (and still do at times) play(ed) its crazy to me he doesnt get more credit for that. and i dont know how much credit berhalter gets- he could have completely stumbled on it by accident- but arriola compliments pulisic incredibly well. yall scoff at "arriola makes pulisic good", i just think thats not worded as well as it could be. pulisic isnt a 10, but he and arriola have great understanding, and that switching/playing off each other has made pulisic a lot more effective for us (then the games he was more strictly central). no, hes not a plus skill player. everybody doesnt have to be. boyd is a far more skilled player but id take arriola over him in a "adams or bradley?"-esque less-than-a-millisecond. if you dont see the value in a really strong complimentary player i dont know what to tell you. and again- it doesnt have to be, and he isnt, a complete scrub to be that compliment.
Weah chose the U-20 world cup. He needed the immediate boost of being a sure starter to get that new contract. Which is the number one thing he needed for his development and eventual inclusion in the full NT.
I genuinely thought they’d lose last night; it was nice to seem them be as direct and aggressive as they were before the weather delay. After the delay, they benefitted from Jamaica having Darren Mattocks and not a real striker at the end of moves; Jamaica still created a bunch of openings that should have come back to bite us. Zardes’s shanked chance looked like a FIFA game where you aim one way but the scripting that says you’re supposed to lose puts it 45 degrees the opposite way. The dropoff in quality from Altidore to him is just staggering. Still, it was their most complete performance so far, and any forward progress is good.
It's tech that allows the coaches to see in real time who is struggling and who is doing good physically.
My major reaction is relief and, to be honest, not a little surprise that we finally pulled it together to play a good game (and a great 15 first minutes) when it counted. For those who would criticize my lack of faith in the team or question whether a rational supporter could worry that we would beat Jamaica, cast your mind back to the pre-GC friendlies, when we lost and were thoroughly outplayed by Jamaica and showed absolutely no reason why anyone should have confidence in a decent GC run. I don't have the energy or time to comb back through the posts from that time frame but people were absolutely questioning whether we'd get to or past the semis, and in some cases out of the group itself. So this outcome, regardless of how the final goes, is a good (if not a great) one. Team also deserves props for grinding out a win under adverse circumstances. To start like that and then have to cool your heels in the locker room for 90min? That is the kind of thing that could totally eviscerate your momentum, and while Jamaica certainly came out better than they had been before, we rolled with it and got the opportunistic goals and the win. That shows a degree of toughness and spirit that I worried was lacking in this team. Bottom line, in context this was a good win. My question before the match was which team would show up and the right one did, thankfully. May they show this form and then some against Mexico.
I'm not betting one way or the other. Let it be a decent competition for time. Just remember that there is the defensive side of the game, too. I doubt very much that Weah would be as strong a defensive player as Arriola at this time.
Arriola doesn’t have the speed of thought, touch, or 1v1 ability needed to compliment Pulisic. Weah at least can take people on and put it in a dangerous ball. Arriola back passes or goes lateral. Pulisic beat that RB all night
Jamaica’s man marking of Bradley was the best thing for the USMNT. Bradley countered by moving 10 yards from the back line and leaving much of the distribution to the CBs. Our spacing and abilities to make runs were much improved and it made Weston more involved as a distributor. While McKennie had some giveaways that he’ll need to clean up, he was also a maestro in breaking lines both with his turns as well as his perfectly placed/weighted through balls. When we replace Bradley with Adams and add Brooks as a highly capable distributor from the back, we’ve got something to build around.
as for this match, im still not crazy about berhalter pulling back from the attack as early as he does. against curacoa we got the goal, and ten minutes later were backed all the way off- token pressure (that never actually presses), 40 yards of nothing, then packed into our defensive third passing around (pretty poorly). only a handful of attacks after that, with any numbers having to advance the entire pitch. very similar last night. obviously the delay was a big factor, but we were going all out, got one, looked to be on the way to more. after the delay jamaica got their heads out of their asses and had a bit of play but once we levelled things out we dropped into that same passive shell for the rest of the half. both second half goals werent built up team goals, they came out of that very passive, "possession" play in the back and we were fortunate pulisic was particularly predatory on the night. i just really wish we didnt fall back so deeply, if we could play some of that psuedo-possession higher up the field. i know its not 100% captain backpass but damn- its some high percentage. and the rest is managing. if we could possess in the middle, when we find our way out or first pass could be to a winger, or pulisic/mckennie 40 yards from goal- not just one of those guys in our own half. i dont even feel like "i told you so"s are necessary with jozy/zardes. literally no one is surprised by jozy can be the attacking hub for this team and zardes just cant. but man, zardes went out of his way to make that clear last night, didnt he? good lord- not being able to take balls 50 yards from goal, his concrete touch leading directly to attacks against us? im finally on board with cannon (not that any of you care). i dont know that hes clearly ahead (or behind) lima but ive seen him enough now at this level to be comfortable with him. id have liked to have seen him push forward more, but that was clearly by design last night. he did well. also, even though it was just putting in a good shift off the bench, a bunch of you buttheads need to recognize roldan had a nice game for us. i was a strong proponent for him getting looks (over the last couple of years) and i absolutely agree he hasnt done as well as he needs to. i think ill be in the majority (not a common place for me) in now wanting those minutes to go to pomykal- but yall throwing him in with mihailovich (whos just full stop not ready) has been bananas. finally, i really wish we had an answer- even an alternative- at left back. i know many want lima, but (since we are playing that position as a cb) i wish we could have seen long there (with zimmerman/miazga). i dont think the final is the time to try something out, i just wonder if he could play that role. this isnt a thought i have often, but man, itd be nice to have bocanegra right now.
A very positive step forward in cohesion and we finally see a complete 90 minute effort from the US. This is also the first game were we step away from the initial starting eleven vs the other eleven. I was most excited to see a quality Altidore start. Not perfect but decent and well integrated. The rest of the changes were interesting but more tailored to Jamaica. Morris and Cannon over Boyd and Lima to provide more verticality and speed vs Jamaica. Miazga over Zimmerman because he also provides more scrambling ability. All understandable. There were still multiple issues but they were over-exposed because Jamaica was gifted a whole hour to figure out how to adjust to the US game plan. If not for that I think a blowout would have been likely. The important thing is that we now see a baseline for how the US can handle a high end CONCACAF team not named Mexico. In the first 15 minutes Jamaica was completely shell-shocked and demoralized. I want more of that.
he doesnt have the speed of thought, touch, or 1v1 ability needed to be a better individual player than weah (or boyd, for that matter)- but we SEE him complimenting pulisic. i think weah is closer to that pulisic/mckennie/adams level than "the rest of the team"s level, and will eventually be a great partner (not "just" a complimentary player) for pulisic but im talking about now. arriola has been far more effective than either boyd or morris because of that chemistry with/supporting role to pulisic.
And he still has some upside to grow....will be interesting to see how he handles the Mexican challenge.
I really like Arriola, but I'd like to see Pulisic and Weah as our starting wingers. Arriola as a defensive sub/depth piece.