Pre-match: Concacaf Nations League Quarterfinals @ Jamaica (Nov 14) & v Jamaica (Nov 18)

And I don't know who I would start in a complete vacuum, but assuming similar tactics and not really thinking about minutes / fatigue for game 2 ....

------------ Pepi ------------
CP-------------------Musah
---------McKennie----------
--- Tessman - Johnny ---
Jedi -----------------Scally
-----Richards - Miles -----
---------- Turner ------------

I could easily be convinced on several of those. Tessman is more of a curiosity play than any conviction that he's the best, and if we put McKenzie over Miles, I wouldn't scream.

I could also be convinced to flip flop McKennie and Musah. Or Tillman in the middle, McKennie on the right and Musah back, but I struggle with putting Tillman in such a core place in a game like this when there are other options. And while I think Musah can go back, he shouldn't play Scally's role so there will be some cascading adjustment.

 

I never know with this stuff. I feel like so much of it revolves around stuff I don't have a grasp on -- current fitness levels, for example, and also there's so much of damned if you and damned if you don't to it.

Most of our guys can absolutely play 180 and have largely proven it. And we can always sub based on game state, particularly with someone like Pulisic.

But I would struggle with playing anything but my best. I want to win Nations League again, and I don't know that this offense functions right now without Pulisic out there ... I suppose if McKennie is not fully fit you have to choose on him ... but otherwise?

 

I'll think about it.

 

Wiley is just coming back from injury. And it looks like Poch has an assessment of Tolkin similar to mine.

Scally can play left back. If something happens to Jedi I'm happy to roll with Musah at RB and Scally at LB.

 

If Musah breaks down sobbing when asked to play fb, Pulisic will be happy to do it.

 

It seems a bit obvious to state but we will play differently on the road than at home--more of a closed game on the road and more attacking at home. Especially with Weah out the first match. My guess we will play mostly for a moment of brilliance from Pulisic in the away match.

The most interesting choice for the first match will be how to use Aaronson and Tillman. One will be on the wing (opposite Pulisic with Weah out) and one will be our most attacking mid. My preference is Tillman in midfield.

I'd go with a midfield of Tillman, McKennie and Cardoso.

 

It's weird to appeal to authority to a guy who only calls up grandfathered in domestics a month into his tenure. It's entirely possible Poch has never even seen Tolkin play, let alone has a negative opinion on him. Don't know how it'd come from the playoffs on his watch. He's killed it. Why doesn't this appeal to authority apply to Luna?

Tolkin beat out Wiley for the Olympics & was a bright spot. So you were already wrong on this. Don't know why you're doubling down & acting like Tolkin's backup wasn't available so what else was Poch to do. I guess just shift a guy over who doesn't provide enough o his strong foot even.

 

Fair enough.

 

This looks like a good away line up to me. In an ideal world (w/ Weah out) I would be playing Tillman at LW, CP at RW and Musah in the MF for Tessmann.... but Tillman still needs to show the passion for the crest IMO. Musah may not be as successful for his club team but the guy almost always shows up for the USMNT. Tillman remains the biggest wild-card in our pool IMO. Such a huge ceiling and consistently playing well for his club team.... but WTF? Why can't he just come on for this team and play like his hair is on fire? If I were the coach I would tell him I am going to give him 20-30 minutes and that I expect him to not walk the entire time.

I would feel a lot more comfortable if Adams was playing the single 6.... There can be no doubt that this team has dipped ever since he went out with that serious injury. He is the only guy that can cover DM by himself (maybe Musah?) which frees the 8s to act more like 8/10 hybrids. Not sure why Richards is deemed fit enough to play but Adams isn't?... I guess I understand given the length of the layoff for Adams but this is a must-win tie for the USMNT. It would be such a bad look to bow out this early in the defense of our title and Jamaica has a lot of talent. I am certainly worried.

 

first off, wasn't poch's lineup almost identical both games? i thought that was part of his mexico error. i am more indulgent of "work in progress" failures than something that obvious, ie, we'd sent CP home, sent others with injuries home, and then he played a weakened lineup almost identically. like 10/11 or close to that. and they then looked tired and exhibited none of the off-ball running and tempo of play from panama.

so, i would assume no such thing. i'd watch what he does. i would not assume a coach who rotely calls the previous guy's list then plays it twice in a row, is rotating.

now, do i think that violates our "couva" learning? yes. we should know better. but game 2 will be at home.

second, it's like people exist on some alternative planet where our non-adams mids are defensive stalwarts. we got trounced by mexico and both teams were getting at us in transition, though panama made nothing of it.

third, we did musah/mckennie/tillman as the starting lineup for jamaica last time and were down a goal within a minute, and struggled to get anything done until a last minute own goal and a bunch of subs.

this is where i get into DON'T do what we have already tried and failed, please. it's like the fanboys just look at the list and trust in the recent brain trust and literally duplicate what lost them recent games, because they are on auto-pilot in terms of the program's personnel sense and more specifically lineups we've already tried.

to me, go duplicate something from a win. or try new people that shift the paradigm. every fanboy midfield, to me, seems like a bunch of bangers. how about try some skill guys. or pick a different group of bangers if you insist.

 

I'm sure Poch had his reasons for not calling in Cole. There are so many possibilities that one could hardly hazard a guess.

 

I'm looking forward to when I get to see an enraged Tillman destroying other teams. It's within him but don't know if he'll ever unleash it.

 

Last time Tilman played v. Jamaica he destroyed the USA. Yeah, it would be nice to see him destroy the guys in the yellow kits this time. Go to it.

 

his call sheet reads 343. 6 backs, 8 mids, 6 forwards.

so, 3 stay at home marking backs, 3 forwards.

in terms of the mids, 4 of them. one of them i think jedi wide left on the chalk. then 2 central plus a more pinched right side guy, probably musah, who would slide from defending as a mid to attacking sometimes wider right.

the interior guys, based on last time, would be more in the nature of DM in skill. so "according to him" (cause i disagree they are all really worthy of international 6), two guys from morris busio tessmann johnny. my guess? in that order of his seeming preference.

it is also possible based on mexico that he deploys mids as nominal wing forwards in a 1-2 setup, though i think unlikely to start either game with weah and pulisic available.

personally i am fine with jedi as wide wing. i think jedi and dest are vulnerable as defenders without help and would serve us better further upfield with less marking responsibilities. i think we could do better for 6s and think if we push the AM to pinched wing without reyna we have little quality for that.


now, does that actually work? i thought most of the offense was coming from sending jedi down the left flank, sometimes by outright kickball. i think musah was able to get a goal last time, and like mckennie, could be useful crashing the box late. however the general vibe to me was the center was slop and we couldn't possess. there's a reason i listed technical guys or asked for new 6s. is either get this where we can possess. or get it where the people in there to clog, actually accomplish it. for a team giving up a lot of right wing capability with the pinching, we weren't holding panama or mexico very well in transition.

i dunno, i felt like some of the critics i am reading on here, proposing stuff for the next game, couldn't have watched what i did, which was a MF that played with tempo for about 30 of 180', and while refreshingly mobile and making runs for that 30 or so, struggled to find the 9 or do anything positive, and routinely turned it over when they got faced forward. i am not just beefing to beef. you want someone to turn in tight space, face, and find his color, call more skilled options. you want someone to instead bust up attacks, and hit outlet balls, find some DMs with those skillsets.

you want in-between slop, keep starting who you're starting. they will have some attacking ability, though more off deadballs or garbageman duty, and we will turn over a lot of passes. and they will be ok but leaky as defense. to me a team with a clue is getting either more productivity -- and ideally technical -- from attacking, or they maul teams like adams does, where nothing bad is going to happen.

i dunno. US adores "mush" and has seemed to do so since nagbe took over for jones bradley beckerman -- who could beat you silly for 90 and occasionally create something. nagbe is ok defense and might score a goal once a decade. i have no idea how that became the template.

 

i would expect from poch something like

pepi
pulisic weah
jedi morris mckennie/busio musah
ream richards scally
turner

i think either of those wider marking backs will be vulnerable on the counter, and the MF will continue to be sloppy. the benefit will be that by getting weah back we would now have a right outlet option and not just whack jedi over the top wide left. but i also think weah and musah are redundant playing this way and will step on each other's runs.

 

I had the above before I saw who got called in. He didn't call in Maloney and JoMO. I guess you could go

In possession:
-----------------------9-------------
-ARob---brenden--puli--musah
---------------aiden--johnny-
---------ream--mcKzie--scally

If you move AR back to the back line, you have a 4231. We don't need more fb's. Man city plays the above 3241 in possession and fall into 442 in defense. For us Brenden (gundogan for City) falls into defense as L-mid and Puli (KDB for City) stays high and central to play with the 9 if we want the 442. At leeds, Brenden is able to get all over the pitch to help ball side which makes us more flexible if we want a different scheme.

The other 2 cb's are richrds and trusty (left footer). I don't think the issue of back up fb's is very meaningful. On BigSoccer people say USA can't advance the ball without Dest, based on Berhalter-ball. It'll be nice to see an alternative view under a new manager.

 

re wingback numbers, if you watched last game his trick on offense was have scally stay home, musah push wide from MF, but jedi push up high left, even past the MF. almost like 3 backs by kind of twisting the formation. then send jedi back on defense under pressure. scally swings more right. ended up like 4 backs on D but 3 on offense.

so, with that in mind, if he's gonna try 343 this time, my guess is 3 backs, none of which is jedi, but jedi tracks back. RB stays home. maybe a truer wing in weah ahead of scally. and maybe musah or mckennie sometimes swinging out wide as well. again, kind of a twisted formation. but not exposing scally by sending both.

i think in his brain, then, weah/musah/mckennie are the real right wingback or wing. who can at times retreat. jedi is the left wing or wingback. 3 across the back. in his head scally is a marking back. so scally's sub is one of the CB.

i don't think ream is mobile enough for 3 backs if they get exposed. there is a reason he no longer played LB -- he got torched by the swiss and some other teams, dropped, and rebooted as a CB who didn't have to handle wide footspeed.

i think he could push richards wider to spell scally. he has played RB. he might also view weah or musah as emergency options. but they are also his only right side attack options.

and there is literally no sub or cover for jedi that plays the way he does.

very thin wide.

i also think he runs a risk if we need to improvise and he's booked some of the roster shy. like the new formation isn't working and we need 433 or 442 to settle. we have plenty CB/DM/F. we don't have many wide options. i am not a fan of being so bought into one concept you can't adjust, you give up an early goal, your battle plan isn't working. to me cover your bases and then get cute by selecting as opposed to tilt the whole call sheet to the plan.

 

re dest, if we continue to do this assymetrical thing i will be curious if he ever is deployed as a back. i think jedi is encouraged to take risks that can be punished systemically. but i think he can defend when he wants to. i think dest lacks basic defensive grasp and discipline. no amount of scheme could hide that while using his attacking upside.

i have been suggesting convert dest into a RF which he has done sometimes at barca. then he doesn't have to defend and can use his ability to slalom a wing and create. you give him redundant help with a right back or formation that shifts someone back behind him. dest then plays RF or the musah sliding RM in our formation.

i also think if he's pushed way high he can also be used as CP's sub because sidedness might matter less upfield. he was an awful LB so he had to be used RB where he is marginally better. but that was driven by defense. if he doesn't have to defend as much, maybe he can be deployed either wing, as it no longer matters that a u16 could probably fake him out as a LB.

 

I think you've described what Pochettino did in the first window fairly accurately, at least offensively.

It is worth noting that we played defensively in a 4231 most of the time, I think, and a bit in a 442, maybe? Either way, once we were in the defensive phase we didn't play with a 3 or 5 man backline.

As for this window, we could both see a 3 ATB with 3 CBs in those roles (as you mention), but we could easily see the same assymetric situation with Scally as a RB/CB. Or it could flip and Ream could be the LB-as-CB.

As you note, the roster makes a helluva lot more sense if you put it in this framework. Guys like Weah and Musah fit very well in that sort of RWB, and Jedi can play the LWB.

I know you are concerned about lack of defensive support wide, but we were keeping 3 ATB plus two defensive mids plus Jedi is very good at getting back. It's far more important to defend the middle than the edges, so I'm not sure this is all that vulnerable. Especially compared to an aggressive standard 4 ATB.

For versatility to be a concern, it's not just that you'd want to changed drastically, but you'd have to want to change drastically AND have injuries.

 

Yep. He's done it before with Chelsea (and played very well, mostly) and I think a few times in the Bundesliga. But it does seem like a huge waste of talent.

Of course moving him back in the formation will take a LOT of potential goals out of the picture but "We don't need no stinkin' goals."

 

I feel like some folks (not all, thankfully) are hand wringing about who of Weah/Musah/McKennie can back up Scally. And the answer is probably Richards/McKenzie/Trusty.

Same with Jedi, although missing him would lead to a bit more of a shuffle. Likely using the now 4th CB to pinch into the midfield in possession while pushing an AM wide left and a CM further up the field.

I’m way less concerned about the tactics versus the execution. The players need to live up to the hype and the moment. Pulisic, Tillman, Weah, Pepi, Johnny, Tessmann, Morris, Trusty, McKenzie are all coming into camp in their best form. And several others (McKennie, Jedi, Scally) are playing at their normal level, which should be more than good enough versus a not quite peak Jamaica.

Let’s get it done.

 

Aiden isn’t up to it. He’s not an international level player. Frankly I don’t know why he was called in.

 

are you co-signing that it’s a good idea to play Ream as a LB against Jamaica because he’s played some LB for Charlotte?