FIFA 2023 U17 Finals Thread (All Teams, Tournament News)

One of two things I've said:

#1 While the team would crash out, it would get a nice tournament because we were guaranteed to play several of the very best teams in the tourney. As it turns out, probably the best two teams as well.

#2 It carries on a long tradition of our youth teams falling at the hands of champions and runner ups. It's pretty rare that our U20's have lost to anyone other than powerhouses since this run began in '15, the U17's in '17 and '23 lost to powerhouses, and in '19 played very good teams.

 

I don’t take solace in us losing games. We’ve advanced too far where we should be having that mindset IMO.

 

But still this team overachieved playing four strong to very strong opponents. Good for the kids.

 

Did they overachieve? They beat two teams we should be expecting to beat. Lost to two teams you'd expect us to lose to.

They did better than I thought because I was probably stupid to have such low initial expectations. I probably should never have such low expectations for a US team at any level.

I also don't agree with the idea that some put out there that this was always just a weak group. It might've been a weak team at the end, but Segares lowered the bar so much with his coaching this cycle that he made what was a good group into a mediocre one, even if I think the players contributed a little to the gradual decline of the group too throughout the cycle.

 

I never expected them to get out of that group, and they weren't better than the first two teams, just survived first, and then improved to the point of being very competitive with one of the tournament favorites. Whether Segares coached them poorly, and they were better than they looked initially is beyond my competence, although Corcoran did make a huge difference and he was somehow off the team at the quals.

 

Tournaments are about results and not necessarily performances. Germany being in the final shows just that. I just finished seeing the Germany game for the first time, making this tournament very difficult to have clear cut takeaways from both team and individuals.

The US were clearly second best in the games they claimed points, but were arguably better against both France and Germany. I walked away feeling much better about the losses than I did about the victories. Very strange feeling that has me questioning my sanity.

From an individual standpoint, I have a similar feeling. I think some of the goal scorers will get plaudits, which they should, but a few goals seem to overshadow otherwise very poor individual performances.

 

Would have liked to see Corcoran and Soma in a double pivot in a 4-2-3-1. Didn’t happen since Corcoran was brought in so late and team had only trained 4-3-3 this cycle. If Corcoran had been brought in earlier, maybe they could have tried it earlier to see results.

 

Corcoran doesn't need Soma next to him. If Soma can play 8 fine, but I'm not sure about that.

 

I really liked both Corcoran and Soma and was just trying to think of a different way to play both for the betterment of the entire TEAM.

I would like to hear some unbiased, objective, intelligent analysis from someone other than Corcoran’s obvious friend/brother/father/agent regarding Corcoran and Soma playing together in a double pivot.

 

If you mean me, I'm 50 years older than the kid, and never seen him in real life, just not excited about Soma, but you can find plenty of those who are, and discuss his future greatness with them.

 

Now that you have revealed yourself as a true troll, please let the others who enjoy providing speculative analysis answer the question. Thanks.

Would have liked to see Corcoran and Soma in a double pivot in a 4-2-3-1. Didn’t happen since Corcoran was brought in so late and team had only trained 4-3-3 this cycle. If Corcoran had been brought in earlier, maybe they could have tried it earlier to see results. Thoughts?

 

From the standpoint of getting your best players on the field together, most would completely agree. The two paired together simply make a better midfield in possession, ball winning and structure. I don’t think either player required having bunches of games together to figure it out. Both seem smart players that would be able to adjust playing together. They looked good in the first half against Burkina Faso, but that’s all we got to see of them in the same midfield. Again, just a strange overall feeling now that we can look back. Hindsight is always 20/20. Soma being the lone holder this entire cycle, yet played only 90 minutes against Korea in that position. Corcoran comes in at the last moment and plays the lone holder for 3 of the 4 games. Not saying it’s wrong, but just weird how it worked out. I think they partner against Germany if not for the suspensions of Banks and Hall.

 

As it is past now, it will never happen, but was thinking about.

Figueroa

Medina, Habroune, Berchimas

Soma, Corcoran​

Verhoven, Hawkins, Banks, Harangi

Beaudry​

 

Between qualifying and the U17 World Cup Corcoran had a full season playing at the best level short of MLS in the country. Realistically, he's not the same player he was in the Spring. I think he showed a lot of intriguing ability but he also collapsed like a house of cards in key moments. I liked his ability to distribute, and while his defensive game still needs a lot of polish I'm of the opinion that's a lot more teachable than the ball skills.

I think he's got an edge over Soma in terms of passing range and distribution but Soma is more comfortable in tight spaces and further upfield. On the whole, I enjoyed watching this midfield as it was a really interesting blend of talent.

 

Don't forget Corcoran has that FCD fairy dust and while you may scoff they have had a ton of players with lots to little time there get callups with the full national team. Corcoran has taken more of the JoGo route than the Pepi route (which I think is being proven to be the better route) but seems to have pushed through his funk and back to being a big time prospect.

 

Circling back as I didn’t see it mentioned here, but in the Final Germany and France drew 2-2, with Germany prevailing on PKs.

We were once again KO’d by the champion.

 

I get you. But this group was not that. I'm happy how they exceeded my expectations for them in particular. I'm really excited about this 2008 group considering Nimfasha's performance against Germany.

 

I think (hope) Dave was (partly) being facetious, as in the KO rounds when you beat the champions then the the team you beat won’t be champions. You could beat the champions if they started in your group. That does happen sometimes (Spain 2010: Argentina 2022 both lost their first match then won/advanced six straight matches).

If Dave had said, we should expect to be the champions, I would agree if he changed the word expect, or perhaps added ‘one day’ at the end.

No poster here, including the one(s) refusing to take solace or recognize that in some ways this team overachieved, or better, exceeded reasonable expectations, genuinely expected this team to take home the title.

 

Segares was so bad that people have turned a completely average World Cup into a good World Cup.