Personally I just will never buy that Tyler was exhausted 10 minutes into that match, unless something else comes out.
Having worked in tech and B2B consulting for too long, give me the visceral, motivational in a rudimentary style, and relational style. Corporate jargon, while often having some common sense application, is generally weaponized by those who are simply in a pursuit of power. I can’t wait for the day when I don’t ever have to see, make, or watch another PowerPoint presentation!
Jargon aside, what I get from that is that they want the Head Coach to play a role in total program technical direction, with the youth teams and with the coaching education programs in addition to all that comes with coaching the senior team (and sponsor obligations). If you listen to Crocker, what he wants is someone to implement a program. I think at one point in an interview I saw he said that he didn't even necessarily want a tactical savant if it wasn't something to repeat. I think that's completely different than the way a lot of fans see it, that's all. And to be honest, I don't really know if this way is the right way, but you can see why they've taken it. For one, Crocker was just part of the group who did exactly this and revived a moribund English program. Two, in order to win a World Cup, our players need to get a lot better. The focus needs to be on overall player development; there isn't a coach that makes us real contenders right now. Three, you'd like some stability for the players long term -- I'm not talking specifically Berhalter; I'm talking about not yoyoing every aspect of the team with a coaching change over time. Being entirely coach centric is not a recipe for long term success. And I get the other side. It's a home World Cup -- an extra game or two in a run can make a huge impact. And how much does the coach need to do versus other people? But we're still on the rebound as well. There's going to be resistance to a foreign coach after our last one quit on us, giving out gameplans twenty minutes before kickoff and abdicating technical director work. And there's going to be resistance to any kind of non-program guy after he left us with a cultural schism that stretched from the players to the Fed to the fanbase that still sits here. US fans act like having a coach on the same page as the Fed just makes them a sycophant or is a bad thing. But the reality is that if the TD and the Coach are on the same page, we might succeed or we might fail if the plan is bad ... but if the TD and Coach aren't ... it always ends in failure.
You mean mutiny’s and internal strife don’t typically result in big wins? I don’t know how any person could advocate for internal conflict in USMNT leadership after seeing the 2018 teams’ slow motion plane crash.
There's actually some very interesting points to talk about here. Is it better to go with a great coach this cycle in the hopes he makes a longer run than an average coach but it may hurt you in the long run? Did Klinsmann burn the opportunity for foreign coaches for a while? Is it better to have a general style of play that goes down to youth teams and lasts over cycles instead of changing every time there's a new coach and that applies to every level? I do find it odd about the sycophant charge since we turned over everything and the new leader is not from the US good old boy crew but a valued TD from England. I think some think the fed forced Berhalter on him but I don't think he would have come here if he didn't have final say power. More like he's copying what England has done for a long term picture. We have Greggg and they have Captain Obvious.
Jargon provides synergies when techies liaise with one another. It catalyzes innovation for excellence.
I honestly have no idea. I can see both sides, and would love to hear from others. What I do know is that you don't hire Matt Crocker to replicate what happened in England and then tell him he can't do that. Is there any debate? Berhalter is literally the anti-Jurgen in a lot of ways. When you hear certain long time American soccer guys say things like "I'm not sure we can trust a foreign coach to care enough / work hard enough" that's a direct reflection. Another great question with arguments that go both ways on it. Here's why I've fallen down on this being a good idea, and it is because of where America is in our soccer journey, so to speak. I think people think about this as developing tiki-taka or something, and I think it is far more about simply trying to move our development system and youth level style of play to requiring more skill and tactical nous. I love our team but we could never do what the Netherlands did to us -- pick us apart with pinpoint passing, every player moving exactly where their teammate expected. We have our moments, but we're never going to be clinical until that's the expectation up and down the ladder. This is less about transition versus possession for me than it is about skill requirements and tactical knowledge. And I think the national teams, including the youth teams, really influence that. Is it worth the potential losses, if there are, along the way? Up to you, but I'd say at the youth team level, of course. When there's a "they" in the conspiracy theories that are unnamed, and sticks around even when those names change, you know it's bullshit. There are many conspiracies out there, and plenty of corruption, but you need names and motivations. I don't know why Cindy Cone or Matt Crocker would benefit from rehiring Berhalter except thinking he was the right hire. My personal bet is this: they know the sustainable plan for performance and the only plan to win a World Cup is to develop better players. It's far more important and more likely to occur than finding a coach that helps a team significantly and consistently outperform talent. So that's the focus. I don't think anyone there thinks Berhalter is a poor tactician or a poor coach in any respect -- I doubt he would have been retained. (And he's not.) But his culture building and recruiting count for a lot for a team looking to improve talent. His willingness to work with the youth teams, work on a style of play, work on coaching education count as well. I also think it's pretty clear from some of the rehire statements that Crocker had some improvement areas for him -- I think halftime adjustments were mentioned. But he liked that Berhalter was willing to work on them. And that's at least the specifically mentioned reason for him not starting right away. I think they probably looked for home runs, and didn't see any. And once you factor in player sentiment, the need to re-adjust to a new coach and system, etc., he probably made a lot of sense. I don't know how Crocker really feels about him, though. There could be a quick trigger on the Copa. Or not.
Let me provide a caveat: Only through stakeholder alignment can you achieve this level of team-based consensus building and focus on big picture KPIs.
It feels like as long as we make it out of the group in the Copa he’s probably ok. I do think a knockout round match against Columbia would be an interesting test given that I think we probably have more talent than they do. They’re a good team but it’s a fair expectation to think we’d beat them at home. But it’s probably not a fireable offense to lose to them.
Losing to Colombia isn't a fireable offense. But I don't think any of us really have a read on Crocker, entirely. But he's said he's a process guy, so I suspect the process will be far more important to him. So even centering this discussion on results is probably not how Crocker is thinking about it. I think it'll matter more, in that situation, about how Crocker feels going forward. I could see a situation where we barely get out of the group but confidence is very much shaken. Not super likely, but possible. US Soccer is stay the course, and Crocker is a process guy, and he comes from an organization that was very much stay the course ... but I wouldn't be all that surprised if Crocker had a much shorter leash than all that. Despite selecting him ... he didn't really select him from scratch. And there were some style of play things that separate Crocker from Earnie and what Berhalter has done as well. And of course, if the players start to lose belief, that's always a death knell.
My impression was that Adams was upset about something - like he'd wanted it one way and Berhalter's way wasnt like that. Game plan? Personnel? Dunno but something was eating him.
Other than not getting out of the group, losing the player pool would be the other thing that would almost certainly do him in. I think the tricky thing is always who else is available. And Crocker should at least have a good sense of the market. If Ancelotti all of a sudden became available I’d be all for going to get him for instance. But I don’t think it’d really change overall expectations for the program.
Well we have massive disagreements on this. As Jerry Fletcher (Mel Gibson) famously told Alice Sutton (Julia Roberts) in Conspiracy Theory when she asked him who they were (after he kept mentioning them ) he told her that if he knew who "they" were he wouldn't have to call them "they". Pure genius.
Looks like they added another assistant Vincent Cavin has joined the #USMNT staff as an assistant coach. He previously was with the Swiss Football Association for 13 years where he worked as an assistant coach and held other roles for Switzerland’s MNT— Brian Sciaretta (@BrianSciaretta) December 22, 2023 By my count the staff is current the new assistant, BJ Callahan, Varas, and Fabian Otte who is also the goalie coach for Monchengladbach. It had been reported they had tried to hire Isaac Oriel Guerrero who is at Venezia and had been a long time Barcelona youth coach but that doesn’t seem like it’s come to fruition yet (though they could be waiting to the end of the European season). Transfermarkt also lists Gianni Viocae technical coach, Darcy Norman as athletic coach, and Rick Cost as performance manager. Also notable because three former Berhalter USMNT assistants are now MLS coaches (Luchi Gonzalez, Wolff, and Nico Estevez) plus Hudson who is coaching in Qatar.
I'm curious how an assistant coach like that comes to our attention. He's not a head coach with an independent body of work that can be directly tied to his decisions and easily analyzed on that basis. He's not already in the US soccer system, where you might expect chatter about a standout assistant's knowledge and skills to spread behind the scenes and reach the people in charge at the highest levels. And he doesn't seem to have any direct connection to the people in charge, such as Gregg or Matt Crocker, at least as far as I can tell. I know those aren't the only ways to get hired, but it seems like they typically have been for us, for understandable reasons.
The biggest thing that shouts out from that hire is "experience playing against European NTs". That's probably the bigger thing.
Crocker worked at the English FA for a long time; I imagine there's a decent network there about talent and the such. On the Swiss side, you've got a decent amount of Swiss connections at the Chicago Fire, with Georg Heitz there and Mansueto owning Lugano in addition to the Fire. I'd imagine with US Soccer there, there's some communication there.
Doesn’t Berhalter have a relationship with the Switzerland coach that came up when we played them? It’s possible that’s where the recommendation came from. Berhalter in particular played in a lot of different countries in Europe and I’m sure has all sorts of contacts that we aren’t fully aware of.