Could not agree more. Look, like several of you, I coach. I'm not going to pretend to coach at the same level as Berhalter. It's applesranges. But I know to tell the teams I train that there is no one way to play soccer, each match is individual, and it's a game of problem-solving with 11 players on the pitch. So I qualify a lot of my instruction when I teach a preferred way of doing something with: but there might be times you do it differently, like _______. So I may train on playing out of the back, quick-touch possession, getting lines forward (and to the point of last night -- asking my back 4 to constantly balance its shape by increasing our attacking numbers forward where math is to our advantage) ... but I also know that there are opponents who will really challenge that style of play, and sometimes we have to get more numbers behind the ball and look to a target forward outlet up top with runners off him, or playing more directly. Again -- I do not have a fraction of the education required to be US manager. But it's frustrating for me that I can train teenagers to be multiple in thought and thoughtful about the particulars of any one match we're playing, but the cream of the crop the system that licenses me asks my teams to look up to is 1) so stubborn in its design and 2) so poorly-constructed in its stubborn design. I get that no one just wants to play direct balls over top. I support that. I don't either. I hate when my teams play other teams that only play that way. But it has to be an option, at least at times in a match.
1. The fed never spends money. They aren’t loaded but they are sitting on a VERY nice nest egg. They can take a hit in the short term. So no. 2. Gregg was an very good MLS coach. He turned poop into not poop at Columbus. He would absolutely have been able to secure another job. 3. Wearing the Stars and Stripes is the greatest honor you can have. Turning it down because you don’t like the coach is about the most millennial thing I’ve ever heard. Should we stop cheering for our team as well?
Pretty much agree with all this. I haven't read to the end of the posts, but I am glad there is at least one other poster who recognizes the quality of Bradley's game last night. The number of interceptions and recoveries he made was awesome and he alone was consistently good with his ball management, that one time excepted. I'd really like to place the blame for the US performance on Ian Darke and Twellman. I truly despise Twellman and their combined presentation was totally devoid of decent analysis, while providing unsupported negative opinion about virtually everyone and everything American in the game. For sure, the team could have benefited from Tyler Adams directing the attacking traffic in front of Bradley. I don't know where that leaves McKennie who, IMHO, was a critical missing piece in last night's disaster.
which players perform well next to Bradley? The partnership with McKennie doesn’t work, the partnership with roldan doesn’t work, the interplay with Pulisic clearly doesn’t work. The regista role is somewhat akin to that of a point guard in basketball - an important job is to make the players around him better. We’ve repeatedly heard that he’s on the field in part for leadership and experience. How has his leadership evidenced itself in how the team plays?
1. I have no empirical proof that money isn’t the most important thing to the people in charge. That’s why they have such a nest egg when they should be spending money on hiring. They could start by filling the empty roles and hiring more scouts and making coaching classes more affordable and paying its employees fairly. 2. His results were progressively worse, as the league and coaches around him improved. I’m sure he would have gotten another job, eventually. Hell, even an utter incompetent like Kreis did. He’s going through Kreis 2.0, ie, one-trick pony that new, better managers and players figured out and the guy has/had no response. 3. How else will change come? And probably. Cheering and supporting are two different things. I’ll never stop supporting the team. I’ve consistently found myself cheering for our opponents to win, in the hopes it gets bad enough for real change to occur. But since the fed doesn’t care about supporter opinion or much of anything other than money and ensuring employment for friends and family based on public evidence, having star players reject call-ups is the best path to forcing change. But if you have other ideas, I am completely open to them. Genuinely, I wish there were something I personally could do to contribute to bringing about change. I would love to know if there is something more I can do beyond boycott ticket buying, which I’ve done since the RBA Costa Rica debacle.
Not even close. Kobe still avg 20 a game in his last 2 years combined and was an all star. Also in the debate for greatest ever. Bradley? Think he will be remembered more for failures at this point. He's more like end career Iverson.
I'm about to start my morning podcast circuit so I'll post my thoughts before they are cluttered with other people's opinions. I'll try to just hit the high points: Poor roster selection - We all know that at least 1/3 of these guys have no business being on the roster and many of them started. Even guys like Roldan who look good enough in MLS are atrocious with the NT. Then there are guys like Lovitz who are Toronto FC rejects (that was a hilarious discussion btw) who somehow start at LB. Even with the poor roster selection, a very poor lineup. McKennie scoring a hat trick against Cuba doesn't make him a 10. Lletget is the only guy who is even close to a 10 and he didn't see a minute when we were down a goal. Why not just sub him in for Roldan? Lima actually looked pretty feisty when he came in, wonder if he could have marked Canada's right-winger close enough to not let them get uncontested crosses off repeatedly? Are people really defending Michael Bradley? Our whole team is set up to play through him and it was one of the most disjointed performances I've ever seen. Then, at the end, he reverted to hang out behind the center backs Bradley. Ream actually had a lot more incisive balls than Bradley but no one was moving so most of them were wasted. Bradley had 1 or 2 but his pacing/dictating of tempo is terrible and his defense is worse. Was it his worst performance? No. Does he belong as the first or even second choice 6 at the international level? ABSOLUTELY NOT! We need a ball-winner at the position bad. Or maybe the 4-2-3-1 we all know should have been tried in March... Canada plays better soccer than we do. The pinging the ball around, one-touch stuff that we were told we'd be getting by now is actually happening to the north. Their midfield had numbers up most of the night and they made that clear by skipping through us like a knife through butter. Their system was also very simple and their coach made a brilliant tactical adjustment. Herdman for USMNT manager? Biggest positive was Twellman's honesty. He and Darke gave very legit criticisms even if some posters in this thread didn't like them. I suppose you would prefer Stu Holden stumbling over himself to compliment Bradley, MLS, and Berhalter some more? Morris and Steffen equipped themselves best for me. They're the only two I could give a 5 or better to for a player rating. We all know what needs to happen but it won't. Our best hope is someone from the head of the cabal telling him to take a more pragmatic approach even if they have to hold their nose and call in a few of those Euro guys or non-SUM preferred MLS'ers. The system needs to be flexible. Player pool needs to be expanded. And many of the players should never be heard from again on the national team.
the biggest problem is the coach. He isn’t elevating anyone game (except maybe Morris) and is getting bottom quartile performances from our high upside players. he’s assembled a squad around Bradley and it’s been terrible for our core players. Totally backwards. Even if he was a good player at this point (and he’s not - he wasn’t the worst on the field but wasn’t good last night), we are clearly in Bill Simmon’s Patrick Ewing theory land: What's the Ewing Theory? Where did it come from? The theory was created in the mid-'90s by Dave Cirilli, a friend of mine who was convinced that Patrick Ewing's teams (both at Georgetown and with New York) inexplicably played better when Ewing was either injured or missing extended stretches because of foul trouble.
Klinsmann had it right- these true Americans are a bunch of little kids. Let’s go to Europe and find players that have an ounce of American blood. Soccer internationally (not even counting Canada) is a cut throat sport. Our american players have never even picked up a knife (not brave enough) sad.....
lol, i haven't been on bigsoccer in more than 10 years, but i absolutely HAD to come back on here and see what people are saying about the shitshow that is the usmnt. great to see so many old heads still around, still talking sense!...but so sad to see ussoccer still such a terrible mess, and getting worse every year. honestly, i dgaf about it anymore, and wasting my time and energy on it, and getting all worked-up is beyond pointless, it's stupid. ultimately, this country is falling apart, and the usmnt is but one symptom. the future is bleak indeed. have a great day! :-|
I'm inclined to agree. Our player pool is not technically proficient enough to compete head-to-head with faster and more athletic teams (or more technical teams, ala Mexico). You can see it every time against a CONCACAF opponent, regardless of the coach. We didn't need to "bunker and counter", but we did need to make the field much more compact to make the Canadians play in much tighter spaces and force all of the play down the sides. You risk conceding goals, but you gain possession and goal scoring chances of all types in their 1/3. As it was, Berhalter was so worried about their forward speed and conceding goals that he elected to make the field as large as possible to somehow make it a possession game against their forward speed. Bad idea, which blew up on him within the 1st five minutes of play.
I was unable to watch the game because of soccer practice/wife's birthday preparations. But it pretty much went as I feared. Berhalter again is focusing primarily on the technical instead of the mental. The feeling again was of a group playing a friendly as a training exercise instead of a meaningful game. The big problem is that the last cycle we have had as much a mental lack as a technical lack. Berhalter is not getting across the mental aspect. The solution is quite simple. He is no longer a club coach, he is a NT coach and has many options. There are only four or so untouchables in the group. The rest have plenty of equivalents and should be cycled through until someone shows the requisite passion. Will Berhalter make that change? Not sure. Bruce (of all people) has already pointed an issue with the staff. Everyone from Stewart down have primarily worked in club teams and have that mentality in their approach. That said, Bruce failed in getting his players to have a consistent motivation through the hex. Time is now officially run out. The hex starts in August. Berhalter needs to send a clear message to put fire in to the squad.
1. The fed does NOT have the kind of money to completely change our style of play, the quality of our coaches, scouting, player development, etc. That is an MLS/grassroots/cultural problem. They do have the money to hire a very expensive coach. That wouldn’t set them back at all. So back to my original point...no, the Gregg hire had nothing to do with money or lack thereof. 2. His results were progressively worse because the rest of the league started spending and Cbus didn’t. So back to my original point...no, Gregg is a good club coach. A good national team coach? Doesn’t seem like it. 3. Change will come with investment in MLS. More money in MLS means better scouting and development. For both players and coaches. That doesn’t mean the national team can’t play a little less...naive. 4. A better idea than our best players turning down callups? Attend MLS games. Watch them on TV. Spend money on MLS. Be active on social media. Join the coaching ranks. Work your way up to a position of voting power within the USSF. Contact the USSF directly. All are better options than telling Pulisic not to show up.
Careful there, my constant criticism of Timmy "near post" Howard has gotten me scourged over the years. You have been warned
You think a Canadian team with multiple Toronto FC players on the roster needed a lot of espionage to know exactly how "good" Bradley is at this point? All they did was go to practice and remember what happened there.
Lovitz and Roldan were awful. If Berhalter isn't fired and he continues to call up the same below-average players, I'm done watching the team until he's gone.
This is no big secret! Also the fact that the coach is playing a "system" that is not taking with the squad and he is immovable in his approach. As an opposing coach, this is easy to dissect. Hell, I have done it and I don't coach professional soccer players. I have seen American "coaches" suck the life and creativity out of players for many years. Now we have it happening at the highest level. I feel for players that are trying to play at the highest level and have to come back to their home team and deal with this. Enjoy your holiday and carry on with a clear conscience .
i hope we have gotten all the arrogant bs about being too good for the region, too good for nations league, too good for canada, out of our system. bluntly, losing to mexico twice should have been enough. that alone should have triggered a "not good enough" response except for the first time in our recent history, it's become somehow proper to concede Mexico. well, now we see we're the worst in North America at the moment.