Thank you, Siddhartha. The other part of this endless FIRE THE COACH refrain--in every sport--is that in 95% of cases the proponent never says who should be hired. Yes, Unnamed Coach X and Unnamed Coach Y are absolutely perfect and 9000 times better than Jill Ellis, Vlatko, or any other coach with an actual real name. But it immediately becomes different if the FIRE THE COACH advocate suggests a named replacement. Then we can critically examine the actual record, strengths, and weaknesses of the proposed alternative.
I have not paid much attention to our youth teams for about a decade (coincidentally during their decline), but it seems like this particular team is doing very well, beating Spain, Germany etc. in friendlies. After a generational decline youth tournaments, are the youth teams now turning it around? Are there some great prospects on this team?
As much as I agree with that it is MUCH too simplistic. What the US needs is an across the board cleanup. We do NOT need or want the US soccer culture making decisions as what the US soccer culture has learned, on the men's side mainly, is how to lose with grace. That "culture" is now creeping into the women's side of the game. Europe, and parts of Asia and South America, has a healthy soccer culture while what we have here is a diseased and rotting soccer culture. What needs to happen is that just about everybody in any position of power for US Soccer should be fired and new people have to be hired. We are in a bad place right now and if we continue down the road we are on we will end up in the lower half of the top 20 teams on the women's side and somewhere in the 30s on the men's side. Our players are plenty good but the quality of our leadership is in the bottom 100 world wide. Off course that is not going to happen and, unless we have a huge amount of luck, we will continue to stagnate and degrade. I just hope the women remain in the top 3 in CONCACAF and the men at least 5th in CONCACAF. This is not a recent occurrence. Ever since about 2005 or so the quality of leadership in US soccer has been dropping and I do not really see a way to save the system.
The youth teams are NOT a good judge of future national team quality. On the women's side I think that North Korea has the most youth wins and we can see where that has gotten them. In some way the quality of the full programs are often inversely related to the quality at the youth level. That is teams that win the youth tournaments are not the ones that win at the senior level. That often seems to me like it is somehow just wrong but it is as it has been quite often. In fact I do not remember any group or country that won at the U17, U20, U23 and senior level in either sex. (Note: results for the women's side prior to about 2004 are skewed by the huge number of programs just getting started or just beginning to take women's soccer seriously.) I think our full men's team will go three and out in Qatar. Our women's team has not fallen that far but, if what has been happening for the last 7 or 8 years continues we could be looking at not getting out of the group on the women's side as well. The good thing is that our talent pool on both sides is plenty deep. We just need some good leadership if we wish to avoid stagnation. Also, I do not know how much is still true, but it would help our soccer development a lot if the "rules" for high school and college soccer was the same as for "regular" soccer. The virtually unlimited subs, the countdown clock and many many other college/HS oddities also hurts overall development.
Agree with most points, but the degradation below a top 5-10 team in the world won’t happen any time soon, IMO. Money is still a huge factor and the US still invests huge amounts on the Women’s side relative to most of the world (especially compared to Concacaf, Africa, and South America). Concacaf teams are still at a huge disadvantage relative to the US in the Women’s side…we aren’t going to fall off that pedestal any time in the next decade.
With all of this, you managed to not answer the simple question - are there good youth prospects on the women's side. I disagre tho, youth programs can be and have been a good judge of future national teams. You can point to the United States, Germany and now Spain as clear examples of this. Morgan was on a youth WC winning team, Dunn and Heath. Spain has rising to the top of the women's game after winning the most recent youth tournaments. I think North Korea is actually the outlier (many thought their youth players not actually being youth) and then of course you have to include the overall environment of those players and it effects their development and professional results. I'd also disagree that the current crop of 20-29 year old women playing for America is deep, as we have seen in recent friendlies. there's a huge drop off of talent. I'm hoping that trend is changing, again.
Past is not a prologue. The evolution of the professional options in Europe and the opportunities for more young women to play at the ages of 18-22 has changed the game. The US no longer has a monopoly on that development demographic with NCAA soccer. Spain has dominated the youth landscape for the last 3 cycles (including Covid). The US hasn’t fared well in the youth WC (however, has done well in friendlies.) Europe as a whole is coming on strong quickly.
I though my general answer was enough but I will answer directly. I think our depth of talent is just fine. In fact it is better than ever. What we do not have is leadership. A good coach can take a poor team and have it over-perform and a bad coach can take a good team and turn it into losers. At all levels and all sexes we have plenty of good players but, virtually nowhere in US soccer are there coaches or managers that are even good. The good ones do not kiss the asses of the upper management so never get a chance. So we have plenty of good or great players at all ages and sexes and no way to get them developed and on the field for the US.
Excuse making and political nonsense are for message boards and such, not for broadcast commentators. Not sure if that was Fowdy, but if it was, holy cow that was pathetic. 17 year old Thompson was one of the few bright spots.
You are wrong about the “drop off in talent.” That infers that the competition has been static and the reason that they have won is because the US is somehow worse (talent or coaching). This is flat out incorrect and uniformed. Anyone paying close attention has seen these days of reconning coming for the last several years. There are plenty of quality young players in the US at the age of 17-22. What they are lacking is NOT talent or desire . What they are lacking is: 1) quality tactics and a cohesive style / system of play 2) chemistry as a team (for example: even though Spain had their “B Team” playing the US today…9 players play for Real Madrid and train together year round). 3) MAYBE…player selection based on more than just pure athleticism and perhaps looking for players with the ability to combine, play one and two touch football, and ability to play within a structure instead of as an individual. The reason I say maybe is that I believe a lot of the current selections have the ability to play that way if it was DEMANDED of them.
Yep, I've been saying this same thing for a while. Especially regarding Spain. Youth championships galore. And, Barcalona the UEFA champs, with lots of Spanish players. It's un dia nuevo. Ya, 1) it is just stupid to press with Pino on the pitch. That's a free pass for the opponent. 2) Against England, we weirdly took our foot off the gas when the ball was passed to their keeper. We pressured intensely, until they passed to the keeper, then someone (usually Smith) would just jog at the keeper, token pressure, giving her plenty of time to pass the ball out. I don't get that at all. Seems like when the ball gets to the keeper, that's when you apply that highest pressure of all. Like, that ball is mine!
Hmm, I guess we'll see how the younger generation of US talent compares this summer and how their "depth" holds up. I don't see the talent (or the tactics) for the younger generation to win anything in the next cycle, maybe 2. The Spanish B- team took us to task, fairly easily. yes, we are missing some starters, but that's my point. We don't have the depth of other top countries.
I have played competitive sports for a very long time and coached youth sports (girls) for many years. Anyone who thinks recent events have not taken a big toll on the US players and affected their play is just plain dumb.
This younger generation of USWNT players could play for most of top teams in the world. Horan and Macario play for Lyon…probably the biggest Women’s club in the world. Rose, Rodman and Smith could probably pick any club in Europe. Pugh and Sanchez…maybe a little more limited, but there would be plenty of top suitors. Mewis was already on a top English WSL team. Talent shouldn’t be an issue.
Do you find that passive aggression usually works? I don't think anyone here has said it hasn't effected them. But I don't think anyone here is looking at only this last week as the sample. We have watched this team for a year now, including the olympic and WC qualifiers where this team only performed well in one game, the finals. There's more subpar performances with this group and that's just the reality. Sure it can change, but it may not.
Which recent events, specifically? Covid? The recent NWSL mental abuse scandal? The reason I ask is….surely you can’t be so naive to think that ONLY the US Women deal with this terrible misogynistic treatment?? Unfortunately, this kind of boorish behavior is NOT unique to the US and I would submit that most likely the US and NWSL is at the forefront of bringing it out into the light and forcing positive change. Don’t have to look much farther than the current drama with Spain and their NT for confirmation that it’s not just the US Women that deal with poor treatment.
Yes…the treatment / scandal is disgusting. However, unfortunately that behavior isn’t limited or confined to US Soccer…not the sport or the country. I’m certain other counties and teams are dealing with similar treatment. Just look at numerous recent headlines around Women’s International Soccer… I’m glad that we are taking positive steps to eliminate the abuse and hopefully all responsible will be held accountable. I suspect, that the US may be leading the way for the rest of the Women’s sports world yet again in this regard. Hopefully, we’ll see similar accountability and transparency in other countries.
This is one of the reasons why I so deeply respect the many courageous U.S. women in various sports who have fought for equality and have challenged harassment and abuse. Surely their activism inspires people in other countries, both inside and outside the sports world. Just as activism elsewhere inspires people in the U.S.
Oh here comes the apologists again! Why do some of you insisting on making excuses for this mediocre man.
For one thing if Jill Ellis was brought back she wouldnt be celebrating a draw or downplaying a loss like " no one will remember this game" nonesense! And she will not tell the players to " slow down" during training. This coach is pathetic and mediocre!
Of course, the abuse happens elsewhere, but I don't think we're actually talking about abuse being the factor here. The players on this roster were, for the most part, not the direct victims of the abuse in the report. But, what I think cpthomas is talking about and what you mention is the emotional labor of dealing with press conferences and activism that the USWNT have uniquely borne this past week. That's not an excuse for their poor performance, and I think the players would be the first to say that. But, it has to have been a factor, both mentally and physically (as we know emotional labor affects us physically as well). Unrelated to that, I would also just point out with all the doomsday sayers here that this roster is pretty far from the WWC roster and to me looks like Vlatko wanted to test some players in a more intense WWC-like environment. I would say some didn't pass that test, but we were missing potential WWC starters in Macario, Pugh, Davidson, Morgan, O'Hara, Sam Mewis (and Kristie Mewis), and Ertz. But, it's up in the air, I know, whether the last 2 come back to the team.
one might say that the Spanish camp had even bigger “mental” problems…..15 of their best players recently quit over an dispute with their soccer federation. Their coach was in the verge of being fired. The hired newbies were being called ‘scabs’ . In fact this might be the first time the international woso community was cheering the US on in solidarity for the rebellion(usually their against us since we’re usually favorites) some of the excuses being now made were ironically answered by Spain, besides both teams were rocked by scandals 1) WE’RE MISSING TOO MANY PLAYERS ……..uh…Spain was missing their top 17(if you include the injured Putellas & Hermoso) 2) WE CAN’T START OVER THIS LATE….well this drawn from scratch Spanish squad just proved you can ….one week ago it didn’t even exist! So I think Vlatko could get redemption if he can beat #2 Germany next month(Germany’s tactics of attacking FB’s & CB’s is usually made to order for our quick countering style, that’s why we haven’t lost to them in over an decade) but if we loose both games, then we seriously got to consider firing the coach & head for an different direction