Yes that's 100% a tactic. But your competitors best players. Some City players are not happy. Bernardo Silva is one. He may be going to Atletico Madrid.
The mess surrounding the "departure" of Richie Burke from the Spirit is becoming a dumpster fire of biblical proportions in less than 24 hours. Baldwin is making Snyder look like a novice when it comes to team wide issues of inappropriate behavior. Yeesh.
Not very confidence inspiring. We've now got some of players playing for major European clubs, but the problem is that they're role players or substitutes. I'd almost rather have a few hardmen guys who are playing day in and day out, even if it's only in MLS. Otherwise stated, I think that we need a Kyle Beckerman-type or a Clint Dempsey-type.
I don't think that was the issue, personally. Every guy's playing in a different league - it's kind of crazy, and they haven't played together for 3 months. A lot of the individual play was good, but the connections just weren't there yet, and there's only so much a given American playing in a top 5 league can do against two or three Salvadorans on the dribble. Somewhat related, we defended well, but when you prioritize that, you often lose the numbers game when you try to fast transition. We needed to be more patient with our build up play or drop fewer players in defense (in essence, have the 8/10s stay out of our final third). We shot the gap a lot, trying to break two lines through the center of midfield, which is great, if you've got numbers in support. We often didn't. Credit to ES. They played a level above last night and took full advantage of their home field. Their style is, honestly, kind of irritating. It's like they're playing volleyball through the midfield, which makes me think the pitch must have been intentionally miserable. All in all, impressed with them and their coach, who should be coaching our U-23s, and who I hope we pay a massive amount of money to get.
Watched until the end, sleep inducing so it was easy to nod off shortly thereafter. Quick take: Dest, de la Fuente, Aronson and Sargent were poor. Dest is not a LB and he never was much of a shut down defender. Add the two and you get what you got last night. Robinson, Ream and Turner were solid, as was Yedlin for the most part. Adams was fine and McKennie was fine, but his touch failed him several times. Reyna was the only consistently dangerous forward and had no one to work off of. Too much one on one or one on two or three dribbling and way too much of the standing around with the ball trying to figure out what to do next. Played right into ES's hands. My guess is we see Pefok for Sargent, Pulisic for de la Fuente and either Acosta or Lleget for Aronson on Sunday -- at least I hope so. Maybe Dest goes to RB and Bello takes over on the left or maybe just Robinson replaces Dest. However, given that Canada only got a point and Mexico struggled at home against a depleted Jamaica, I can't quibble too much about getting a road point. Now, if the lads sleep walk through the Canada game at home, we are in big trouble.
Preferably before you dribble into a line of opposing players, ya. This is Concacaf, bitch, not Ligue 1!!!
Yeah. What I meant was that we need the kind of player that I call a "mudder," a tough hombre who may not have impressive European credentials but who plays aggressively to win under adverse weather or "parking the bus" conditions. Beckermann & Dempsey came to my mind as exactly the kind of player we needed in El Salvador. Back in the day, John O'Brien, Cherundolo, Headcase and McBride were those kind of guys. And, another thing, we've finallly got guys playing for World Class teams but only Pulisic (who is not an automatic starter) & Dest are getting quality playing time.
The US might be in trouble. For all their individual talent, the depth is lacking in places, and there's no one who can consistently score.
The midfield cant create chances for strikers. I don't understand why Kellyn Acosta is rated so highly. I also don't get why Lleget started that game. Its like a midfield of 3 guys who can run, but not create, dribble or pass forward.
I was pretty upset last night but this morning, I'm more of the mind that the USA wasn't systemically rotten. They just ran into Canada's golden generation. I'm not ready to give up after game 2 of a 14-game season. A win in San Pedro Sula would, theoretically, put them in perfectly fine shape. Theoretically.
Someone here posted that the NT needs "hard men" in some spots and, while I'm not sure that is "necessary", there is a problem here. The problem is all youth and no experience. Last night, the only "older", with substantial WCQ experience players, were Brooks and Yedlin. Lletget is "older" but injuries have limited his NT experience. None of those 3 guys is an offensive fixture and both Lletget and Yedlin would not be in the starting XI save for squad rotation or injuries. Right now, the only two guys who seem to get it are Adams and Pulisic. McKennie, who could be a leader, appears to be a dipshit (2 covid protocol violations within the past year) and Aronson, de la Fuente, Sargent and Reyna can't buy a drink anywhere in the US. Asking talented, but very young players, to rise to the occasion is a real crap shoot. I actually think this team will be much better in the next qualifying round as all of these guys will have another 4 years of international experience and most still will be in their mid-late 20s. Believe it or not, it actually is a shame that Zardes is injured -- not because he is a great talent, but the guy is a baller and this squad needs more guys like that.
The roster for this window seemed really weird to me too. Wasn't it like 5 midfielders and a million forwards? Obviously those designations aren't written in stone but it felt odd. And I don't understand why Greggggg is afraid of putting Pepi out there when he's in good form.