Welcome to sports. Massaging egos is a big part of being a manager. You don’t have to kiss his backside, but a little hand holding probably goes a long way. Southgate seems to think it’s beneath him though.
SUGGESTION: For those attending the US ES match, at the 9 minute mark start a chant : "FLO COME HOME" or "FLO's COMIN HOME" or "WE WANT FLO" or ? ...just a conversation starter.
The thing is if one is going to downplay Balogun, where does that put Santiago Giménez who never scored more that 7 goals a season in Mexico and has 8 goals this year in the Dutch league (less then Pepi). Same age as Balogun btw. And he’s the primary up and coming prospect that they have.
Agree. At the same time, we have been losing dual nat like Christian flancher, maximo carrizo, cole campbell, luca koleosho, bento estrela, Benja Cremaschi and there are more. Some of them could be good enough for the USMNT in a couple of years.
Of course, I could be wrong. But unless he becomes the second coming of the Messiah, I don’t see England considering him again. This isn’t like a dual national battle with Mexico that’ll sell their soul to cap tie a player just so that we can’t play him. England is probably the number one nation in the world that probably doesn’t give two shits about dual nationals. Heck, they didn’t even make a recruitment effort for Haland. As good as Balogun could be, he’s not ever going to reach that level. And England are probably just going to say, oh shucks, who’s the next player (playing in England)? Thus, if Balogun wants to play international soccer. His future is with us.
I think he’s on a good run at PSV and will be a good player for Mexico. The problem is Mexico doesn’t have a lot of similarly talented guys waiting in the wings.
Musah on decision to play for the #USMNT and on Balogun making his decision: "It makes me smile because I've had a wonderful time playing for the US. We haven't spoken a lot about it but if he wants advice I'm sure he'll come chat to me."— Kyle Bonn (@the_bonnfire) March 26, 2023 That said . . Southgate’s statement about Folarin Balogun brought back Bruce Arena vibes. Arena famously said: “We’re not chasing around 18-year-old players that can’t get games for their club team and tell me they want to play for Italy.”Giuseppe Rossi was that player.— herculez gomez (@herculezg) March 26, 2023
I think part of it is culture. Due to college sports, we are used to "recruiting" and know the steps needed to "recruit" well. For England, playing for your national team is a big deal and seen differently. They donate the money they receive for playing games. They probably view the choice of representing the national team as a binary decision of yes or no.
Exactly, this constant switching and battle for player will get amplified by the media as the years go on. This whole zendejas situation isn't the first nor last. People are getting caught up on a list comparison. Quite frankly I'm not worried about Mexico or their player pool in this conversation I'm simply discussing the ceiling of players and their merits of a call up. I don't my national team to give ransom call ups to people just because the players are threatening to switch. Call ups shouldn't be devalued for a potential flash in the pan player.
Here's the bottom line. Even if you think Flo has a near zero chance to play for you in the future there is just no value to say something that said player may take negatively. Unless you have some future telling ability you don't KNOW what your team or a player may look like down the road.
I was sort of thinking about this as a comparison, but my recollection is that Arena (and Bradley) at least spoke with him, and also tried to call him up, but Rossi was unwavering in their conversations about wanting to play for Italy. Arena probably shouldn't have added a gratuitous swipe at him after that, but that's Bruce for you I guess.
A wide-ranging discussion (in Spanish, but you can turn on auto-generated English captions) about why Mexico lost Zendejas (and might lose future dual nat battles): They bounce around from diet, following ones heart, international baseball, Oscar De La Hoya, doctors being recruited to the US and American universities.
I think they were dribbling morons for not taking him to Qatar, and I think he's a legit special talent. I don't think he's superstar level or anything, but in that Lozano, Tecatito mold of potential? For sure if all things go well and he stays healthy.
Interesting comparison... That said . . Southgate’s statement about Folarin Balogun brought back Bruce Arena vibes. Arena famously said: “We’re not chasing around 18-year-old players that can’t get games for their club team and tell me they want to play for Italy.”Giuseppe Rossi was that player.— herculez gomez (@herculezg) March 26, 2023 As to whether England and Southgate could do a better job handling the Balogun situation, or they really can't because he's around 6th in the depth chart... isn't that around where Brandon Vazquez is in the USMNT forward depth chart? US Soccer has not only been in regular contact with Vazquez, but have now called him up, and certainly their coaches never went around publicly saying things that would make him feel disrespected... You have to get to around 9-10 in the USMNT forward pool before you see a guy who is being treated like how Balogun has been, specifically Jeremy Ebobisse who has said US Soccer have had no communication with him. The difference is, Balogun is 21 and just having his breakout season, whereas Ebobisse is 26.
I mean according to Varas the senior team staff was in touch with Koleosho. A dual nat who the U20 team wants but who isn’t close to the senior team. Similarly Berhalter was very much in touch with Slonina even though he was at best 5th on the depth chart. It’s not all abnormal for a senior team coach to be in contact with a player in Balogun’s situation with England.
I probably should have explained better that while I don't mean superstar, when I say superstar, I'm talking Mbappe/Messi/Haaland/Ronaldo. Could he be one of the best El Tri attackers ever? Absolutely, and that's a next tier down where players are legit big league talents that are damn good players in the league if not world class, and Santi has that potential, so does Pepi (and I think Pepi's accomplishments w/Groningen are more exciting than Santi's, but I think both have the potential to be legit star's for our respective national teams, period). I have full respect for him, he's not a guy I'd get in some bitching fest with El Tri about whose better, I wish we had him too, he's legit.
There are some Mexico fans that think his already better than Chicharito which is mind-blowing. They also say Pepi is trash.
Well you have to sort through delusional homers to the people that can actually evaluate guys, forgetting about their actual national status. Chicharito had 20 and 18 goal seasons for Manchester United at his peak and a 26 goal season with Leverkusen. That's miles better than anyone we've ever had, and I can't recall any of their guys doing that though I could be wrong (chucky approached it, I believe, but never at that kind of league level). Santi's great, and Pepi is looking great too, for us. Both guys are for them and for us, seemingly on trajectory to be amongst our best attacking players ever. Time will tell. If their fans want to trash Pepi, that's an ignore for me. I don't even click it, I just pass the moniker, like people probably do with me when I talk Berhalter or Reyna lol.
I think the thing is the player pool matters as far as the need for dual national recruiting goes. I think England is making a mistake to be so nonchalant about Balogun, but it helps to have Kane, Rashford, Toney and others. Whereas if they didn’t have some of those guys Balogun would be a much bigger potential loss. I don’t think you should give call ups just because someone is threatening to switch, but you also need to be aware of the dual national factor and be in touch with the player. Think of how Berhalter handled Slonina for instance. And I don’t know about writing off a player playing well as flash in the pan. When a player is playing well and is in form you reward guys for that. Especially for instance if they have 17 goals in a top 5 league as a 21 year old (and with plenty of the season left to go). If a dual national were lighting it up in Liga MX for instance, they’d be deserving of a Mexico call up even if they didn’t have a long track record.
Agree. I would not give credit to Berhalter with Slonina because he did it from the heart. You can give credit about Malik Tillman or yunus musah.