[Bushnell] A ‘broken’ system, nascent culture: Why the U.S. has never had a world-class men’s soccer

Yeah I think it’s not inconceivable that we can develop a world class player in the near term. What’s harder is to have team with the overall talent of France, Spain, England, etc.

We’re at a point where when it comes to the non elite teams our overall talent is near the top of the best of the rest. But we aren’t there yet in jumping to the elite level.

I continue to think the number one thing USSF can do is invest in coaching education. And by that I mean making it more accessible and affordable and also raising standards so it’s competitive with coaching education abroad.

I think our largest issue is we have a large population, we are way less dense compared to our European counterparts, and we just don’t have the same number of professional clubs offering the same level of per capita professional opportunities. The larger issue is that there just isn’t enough grassroots interest in the game. If you look at the states where the most players per capita come from for the NFL and NBA (states like Louisiana) and compare that to where players from the national team are coming from it’s severely underrepresented. Which means there are large regions of the country where we aren’t really taking advantage of our population. This isn’t even the best athletes aren’t playing soccer. It’s that not enough people are period and the ones who aren’t don’t have great access to developmental opportunities.

But none of these are easy problems to solve minus coaching education.

 

That actually was part of the Player Development Initiative that came out around 2017. u12 and below the recommendation was festival style tournaments with a set number of games, no knockouts, and I believe no overnight travel.

The only part of the PDI they put teeth into though was mandating 7v7 (u10) and 9v9 (u12) and going from Aug1 to Jan1 (school year to birth year, which they are undoing this coming fall). Even there I think there were state leagues that still offered an early u12 11v11 option. Or you just had your kids play up in the lowest u13 division.

They knew all the clubs making bank on hosting stay and play tourneys down to u10 would balk and get sanctioning elsewhere if they tried to make the stuff that actually helped stick. I saw some chatter recently that USYS and USClub might have bent the knee or at least made googly eyes at each other, but I'm still not optimistic we'll ever put the competitive u10 genie back in pandora's bottle....

 

They also implemented the build out line and the no heading rule.

 

I think our best bet is to become like Germany. Slowly raising the floor of our talent and system to eventually just power ourselves into world cup consideration.

 

This is true. So are we as a country now comfortable playing out of the back at the u23 and below level?

 

We're probably going to be better.

The build out line is a good thing.

 

Yes, the build out line is a good thing, in the hands of competent coaches. The early years it seemed like it was just guys lining up their fast kids to press, perpetuating panicked bootball with an extra pass as the first step.

I'm hoping it's better used, maybe in the MLSPreNextNext level. Didn't see it at the USYouth levels..

 

And it also made the 10Ungame more playable. It used to be that the other team’s GK was a much better scoring opportunity than your own CK. More playing the game instead of just trying to pounce on the GK. (I was a skeptic when it came out, but I think it much improved the game at that age. Whether it was a major aid to learning to build out, I can’t say, but certainly meant more of game time was playing.)

 

Is anybody else incredibly weary of the "Why aren't we better at soccer" narrative?

Its going to be nonstop over the next month.

I say this every time this topic comes up.

The first time I saw the USMNT live, we lost to Bermuda. Deservedly.
Where we are now was unthinkable.

We're not bad at soccer, and we're making great progress.

When the US makes a semifinal, the "Why aren't we better at soccer" narrative will still be going on................................

 

Still seems to happen but it also givesthe kids a chance to figure it out. Also teaches the off ball kids to defend as a team if there is a turnover. Not perfect, but better.

 

When I saw the thread title, this was my exact feeling along with a "Sigh, here we go again...". The progress will came faster when MLS Development Teams start producing. We are starting to see some of it in the the past five years.

 

Can we make it through the World Cup before we start this conversation again? I’m as big of a proponent for this conversation as anyone, but can we just see how this goes first before we talk about everything we do wrong?

 

Why is the men's team not a world contender?

I don't think is the coaching or the youth clubs setup.

Case in point, the women's team is a top 5 in the world, and they share the same coaching style and club team setup. They are successful because they only have to content with softball leagues for the best athletes.

The men's team doesn't attract the top athletes in this country.
Think about it, if we had top athletes but raw, they would still be snatched by European teams very early. With their training, the sky is the limit.

 

Canada have produced Owen Hargreaves(moved abroad at 16) and Alphonso Davies. 7 Canadians have played in the Top-5 Leagues this past season. Canada are currently 25th on the Elo. They've done all this with 1/10 the population of the US.

And even with the recent explosion in investment in the women's game outside the US, the USWNT still managed to win one of the two major global international trophies available in the women's game.

There's just no getting around the great talent draw that the other team sports have on male talent in the US.

I mean, according to the BBC article the NYTimes story linked to---

and

That ain't 'culture'; that's government investment via the FFF. 24 such academies have been built around France. Is the US govt going to get together with the USSF to do something similar here?

 

I still think we should have leaned into athleticism instead of trying to focus on technical ability. If there's one thing America does better than the rest of the world, it's produce world class athletes. Rather than taking advantage of that and going all-in on athleticism we're trying to beat the world at its own game and ceding one of the few advantages we had over other teams.

 

There are two fundamental problems in the production of world class talent on the men's side in the US.
1. the draw of other team sports
2. there's no source to provide the funding for the needed penetration of elite academies and high quality pitches.

 

(Dumb post alert)

USMNT has been on a funny path since I was a kid.

To my untrained eye it seems like its grown in the following order:
2002-2008 a pool of 35-40 guys who have to be dawgs because there is no other path in the game for an American

2009-2018
The dawgs have earned a place at the table. Captains/leaders in either MLS or clubs that aren't traditional powers (think Dolo at Hanover, Boca, Roma Bradley, Jermaine). Our guys are collectively the best athletes on the field but lack the technical skills.

2019-present
The Floor has risen. Guys are good enough to be squad players and starters anywhere in the world. Weah, Wes, Pulisic all fit this ethos for me. Higher skill level, but not quite the pinnacle yet. Also- the continental game has focused up on size/athleticism to a pre-existing base of skill level. (Think the Netherlands with towers like Weghorst, Virgil, Gakpo, and then a stud like Dumphries).

Its been a long time and some of us that were kids or young in 2002, the 90s, or even the Miro Rys days it is truly an eternity, but the superstar or at least B+/A- level Son/Diego Forlan with a Jabulani level guy comes next and is in the next generation somewhere IMO

***The exception IMO is goalkeeper and I suspect this is more the game evolving and playing goalie being less about springy big dudes blocking shots and punting ball far.

I think you will see a raised floor and the higher that floor gets, the more cracks we get at a world class player. Plenty of countries that aren't powerhouses have created true superstars. Figure 20-33% of our country at a minimum treats soccer at a level that the rest of the country treats NFL or even NBA, and there will be dudes who pop. Heck, Rossi plays for his birth/childhood home, Yann Diomande or Vedad Ibisevic hangs around long enough to get citizenship, or even crazier Alphonso Davies settles in Minneapolis (a ton of my childhood friends in the western inner ring suburbs are Liberian immigrants) and we already have our guy without even trying.

I suspect long term that we start to get closer. Theres a compound interest that has developed with the first generation of players becoming coaches, media, etc. More competent coaches at club level will trickle to youth level, etc. Think about the up and comers in multiple academies people are rightly fired up about? That spigot doesn't shut off.

America produces big, strong, twitchy athletes. The game is moving towards that. (Note: I also think this is why Italy and some other historically solid sides have stagnated. I also think its why Mexico has something of a ceiling that we don't have). American athletes- and I don't mean in the "muh Reggie Bush and Lebron playing soccer (although I created them among others in Fifa 2009)" will only continue to have exposure to an improved level of tactics, training, culture, you name it.

Money isn't everything but its a hell of a measurement.: The 2002 team only had 5-6 full time professionals to look up to when they were kids. Demarcus Beasley or JOB dreaming or being a full time pro (who wasn't making Arena Football money) was a wildly irrational dream for them. Our boys in 2014 grew up with an MLS that was still more or less a seasonal job. What was the league average pre Beckham? 45k a year? At a rough estimate, there are 5 guys on this current team team earning over $5 million a year and I think the low end some of the MLS guys are 400-600k. Probably 15-20 guys in the pool have an 8 figure net worth as of right this second. We are at a point where domestic players will have good solid careers, never sniff an A list call-up or even a senior cap, and will retire as millionaires. In other words, your average national team player (not even a superstar) is making NFL running back, 2nd line NHL, pre arbitration MLB money. Its an exponentially more viable career path now than it was in 2009.


My prediction: Soccer is here to stay regardless of who our team performs (I happen to be bullish). MLS markets have proper fanbases, improving academies, the kids love FIFA, the sport translates exceptionally well to social media, and the level improves with it. I'd love an overhaul of youth sports in this country for a ton of reasons (the travel ball industrial complex in all sports is demonic and specialization too early I bet we will learn leads to all kinds of early injuries for kids and young pros) but even without the changes we want or pro/rel (which will never happen here, you'll see why when some over-leveraged Championship sides go into administration in the next 2-3 years) I think we will get there by osmosis.

I suspect the team strings together some results, plays with some flair, and has some games that get the people going. I think likely to the quarterfinals. From there, maybe we get some PK heroes or Balo steals us a result against the run of play against a blue blood. Who knows?

MLS eventually gets a proper TV deal, and in 10 years the players will be making 2-3 times what their equivalent is making now from the entry level MLS deal up to the now 9 figure net worth guys scoring goals for fun at Liverpool and Bayern Munich who ironically have much less weight on their shoulders every time he gets a call up because of the work our boys are putting in right now.

 

I actually think it is simpler than many make it out to be. Patience grasshopper.

Culture? what actually is it? it seems to be the catch phrase that will solve everything but I think the article mentioned two things that are the real root of our soccer difficulties:

1. kids do not have the basic mastery learned by age 6ish.
2. lack of talent density.

1. why don't kids have a mastery of basic skills developed by age 6? Mostly, I believe, because their parents don't have it. Most parents of children (men) in their 20's and above (mainly the age range of current world class players) have not played significantly above basic AYSO level competition and probably stopped playing at about 14 years of age when they entered high school.

2. For kids that do have parents that have played at a decent level that can give valuable teaching often are not surrounded by other kids with the same advantages. The kids with knowledgeable parents get the advantage of superior teaching and skills but don't have the competition to push and hone their skills in a free environment. (is it possible for parents that never played the game to give their kids a good head start? Yes. Not as easy but possible.)

3. Where do we get those parents with experience in the game? Well, they come from the previous generation when the parents didn't have experience. Each generation has more parents that have more experience at higher levels they they had. The growth becomes exponential. Improvement is gradual...almost unnoticeable at first and then at some point it hits an inflection point. If you look at the different decades over the past 60ish years and compare numbers and quality, an argument could be made that we are entering an inflection point on the curve. I don't think that the young players we are seeing now are an indication of a golden generation but just a much deeper and more talented pool.

 

Indeed. The culture thing is important.

..................but its about money and investment.

So when people say the US should build a Clairefontaine academy system, the correct response is: With what money? Whose money?

We need rich, billionaire sugar daddies to pay the USMNT coach's salary.
We're also using rich, billionaire sugar daddy money to pay for the USSF complex in Georgia.

Barring Elon Musk deciding his life mission isn't to go to space, but to build the US into a World Cup winning team..............where does the money come from?

The money is in MLS. Those are businesses generating profits that are being reinvested into player development, infrastructure, coaching development, scouting networks, etc. That investment and hard work is starting to bear fruit. Its happening. We just have to let it happen.

[And yes, those clubs can't be successful businesses without the sport continuing to weave its way into our culture. The more passion there is, the more tickets are sold, the more jerseys are sold, the more money is made thru broadcasting deals, etc. etc. etc.................the more money can be reinvested. When you go to Spain, you can see that cultural difference.]

Its just weird when all of these people come out of the woodwork saying "We suck at soccer, we should be doing XXX!!!" And you think: Yeah, do you think Cavan Sullivan and Julian Hall and Xavier Gozo sprung up in Philadelphia, New York, and Salt Lake like cabbage patch dolls?

We'll keep getting better at this.............................

 

World Cup squad by state and country of birth:

5 - New York (three within NYC)
3 - California, Pennsylvania, UK (all in England)
2 - New Jersey
1 - Alabama, Germany, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mexico, Missouri, Netherlands, Texas, Washington

The density factor has to be a big reason why the Northeast continues to be over-represented in the US national team. Also notable to me is that most of the US players associated with the South (Pepi, Richards, Zendejas, and McKennie [though born in WA]) were spotted at some point by FC Dallas.