Pre-match: 6/12/26 9PM EST USA vs Paraguay: Game 1 of the big show

Jedi is good to go.

I went to the open practice today. Jedi is good.

Late in the practice, Poch did a break out talk session with 10 players, the rest played a small sided game.

The 10 are who you might expect (+ Adams, who was getting treatment, so I've read). And, Jedi was one.

We lucked into front row, midfield seats. Super fun time. Lot's of the players did the full circuit of the stadium afterward. My highlight was when Sergino came by, I said "hey Sergino (didn't have to yell, he was directly in front of me), how many backflips are you going to do?" That cracked him up and he was laughing as he said "I can't do those!" I've always been a huge Serge fan, so that was super fun for this old man.

 

Richards was one of the ten?

 

I'm not going to say anything more. I don't think it was giving too much away to say Jedi looks healthy. And, I've got to believe Paraguay had scouts there. But, that's all I'm going to say.

 

Oh come on.

 

I'm surprised Poch did that. There had to be Paraguay scouts there. But, if that's the lineup, and who's to say it was, then I'm not going to be the one to give it away. If there aren't people talking about this on other social media, I'd be shocked.

 

What's social media? BigSoccer for life.

 

Post by @jeffreycarlisle.bsky.social — Bluesky
Looks like the same group that started Saturday’s game on the right chatting with Poch.

 

Any Paraguay scout here in this forum? Please raise your hand…

 

I can’t take comfort from that without knowing how short-handed the opponents were.

 

Probably. But I think Weah is more of a defensive substitution against the teams that we expect to sit in against us.

 

Weah will spell Dest.

We can’t play Dest 90 minutes 4 games straight.

That RWB position is going to be asked to do a lot of work.

It was a big issue we ran our players into the ground in Qatar.

 

there was a point just before his injury where big pat scored in 3 or 4 straight on set pieces and he was really beasting people in the air (colaship defenders, but still- man amongst boys level)- which isnt really how he got most of his goals to that point. it was all coming together for him it seemed...

and i had the clearest vision of him and seb coming on together, a need-a-goal against a bunker tandem.

alas...

but its an open question. gio and pepi make more sense to start against teams that are going to sit in than any of their counterparts. seb makes sense as a set piece specialist (starting or off the bench) but theyve gone to anyone but seb in the two warmups. and a whole lot of people try to make haji out to be some different profile specialist (in what i honestly cant say), but hes no more likely to get his head on a ball than pepi or anyone else.

depending on whos already in we could bring on any of richards, wes, miles and maybe trusty. haji replacing a small/non-foward i guess is feasible. ream is useless in the box and ive seen mckenzie be both pretty strong and invisible as an aerial presence, to counter potential additions.

and of course zendejas (and seb, for that matter) if we want to just indiscriminately pepper the...well, general direction of the goal. malik and weah are the big plusses there.

...after jedi, of course

 

the work (and area covered) from of our "rwb" has consistently gotten lower and lower to the point that "b" really doesnt belong.

now that could understandably be with an eye towards our first two opponents, with the much more back "5" weve seen pre-march camp not needed until turkey, but im not a big fan of hubris.

 

There is a photo floating around that I saw pointing out that it was Freese and not Turner in that huddle

 

I am Jose Luis Chilavert and now that you've blown my cover if I ever find you in a hotel lobby we will fight.

 

You guys are doing a great job with the disinformation. Keep up the good work!

 

Looking at Paraguay’s away record in Conmebol qualifying, they went 1W-5D-3L. That’s not half bad, and they got stronger as the competition went on. They never scored more than two goals, and never conceded more than two. They never lost by more than one and won by more than one goal only once (2-0 home win vs Uruguay). They got 28 points to qualify direct, same total as the third through fifth placed teams—Brazil, Uruguay, and Colombia—but with a lower goal difference.

The optimistic story is that this is a team that is much better at home than away, and that typically plays for draws (or at least gets them most of the time) away from home. Our strength is in creative offense and ball movement (see, e.g., Senegal) and our weakness is defensive lapses (see, e.g., Senegal and Germany). This seems well matched for a team that is not inclined to put a lot of pressure on goal, hence fewer chances for us to screw up defensively. But for all our offensive skill, can we break down this big, battle-tested defense? We did before though not sure how much to read into last year’s friendly; I just don’t know if it was the same personnel for them plus it was a friendly.

My guess is that Paraguay will be fine with 0-0 and will play like it, though they’re always goal-dangerous on the counter (less so without Enciso though). That’s not a pure bunker like we’d see against some Concacaf mid-level or minnow team. It’s an intentional strategy that’s often been effective against us, such as what Canada did to rope-a-dope us in 2022 WCQ—but with a lot more Conmebol violence. It’ll be intense, and interesting.

 

I saw Adu in the huddle.

 

We need that early goal.

It really is like that Panama game at the Nations League.

The longer it stays 0-0, the more we're going to expect the sucker punch. You feel that pit in your stomach...................

I think the atmosphere is going to be fantastic, our team is going to be super-hyped and motivated. We're going to come out guns blazin' (so to speak). If Paraguay withstands that initial 15 minutes of Pulisic, Balogun, Dest, etc. bombing forward.................then things get interesting. The situation we had against Panama of just passing it around without getting that incisive pass.

We just beat Senegal. A very good team. A good defensive team.
They beat England 3-1 in a friendly in 2025. They did, in theory, shut out Morocco 1-0 in that AFCON final before the madness led to the game being awarded to the Moroccans. They shut out Egypt. They shut out Mali.

The Germans and Portuguese might be able to deal with us, but we have the attack to give Paraguay a ton of problems . Just gotta get that early goal and avoid the dreadful 75% possession with zero shots on goal situation.

 

I hear Amber Dempsey was seen at the Paraguay FA when she went down there for her illegal eyelash extensions.

 

What do people consider a bunker? Bunker teams counterattack. I don't think being effective on the counterattack excludes it being a bunker.

I would consider any team that tends to/regularly counters with four or less in a bunker, if, of course, they are otherwise packing it in in a low block.

 

Given the new knockout advancement scenarios, if it's 1-1 heading into the 80th, do both teams play conservatively? Do we set up shop and say a point is good enough, let's not risk something stupid, let's go try and get a win against Australia or Turkey?

 

I'd say no, but it's an interesting question. No, because 3 points is quite possibly good enough for advancement, so you try to get them.

According to PELE, we advance from the group around 79.5% of the time. Conditional probabilities based on Paraguay result are: win= 97.1%, draw=75.7%, loss=55.5%.

A draw is a negative result for us (-3.8%). But does the upside of the win (+17.6%) outweigh the downside of the loss (-24.0%)? Maybe not.

 

I am not a cable cutter, so I might be missing something for services like YouTube TV or FUBO, but is there anyone that has a service that actually gets Peacock and not big Fox?

 

My 'vote' is still for Morris...