Fire Pochettino Thread

I got frustrated with Roldan’s one-touch-backpasses to the CBs when he had space to turn, which was often. None of the CBs we had last night could make a line breaking pass so the forward pass to Roldan or Tessman was the only way to progress the ball centrally, and Tessman did some of that. Roldan could have too but didn’t. I suspect that’s why Reyna dropped deep at times.

 

Most our keepers of the recent past would have intercepted that cross

 

Frank Borghi would have gotten that cross.

 

Ream made multiple line breaking passes included a wonderful crossfield ball from the left side of defense to Dest on the right wing. Things dried up a bit in the second half.

 

Yes, there wasn't much room. Paraguay was compact and disciplined defensively. You try to play a pass through the middle and it gets cut out and suddenly the opposition is off to the races.

 

We are doing better now that Poch is using better players.

Weird how that works. Wasted so much time on B/C team caliber players.

 

Good to hear considering he started with 5 MLS players.

 

i still think we should fire him tho - just cause.

Bring back the gargoyle!

 

I’m here for the new narrative where all of you who were dead wrong and unnecessarily freaking out, have now collectively decided that instead of the objectively best manager we’ve ever had by a country mile being competent this whole time and having a plan, he’s instead finally made some colossal change that you would have obviously made earlier.

Is he still just on vacation and mailing it in?

Never change BS.

 

Building quality depth with Arfsten, Freeman, Luna and Roldan was absolutely worth the time. The roster will be 26 (or maybe even 30). You're digging down the depth chart to fill that roster out, in spots where there's not a clearly better player to pick.

 

I do think, unfortunately, regardless of coach we face a keeping issue. Freese has been better than I feared, but he shows no signs of playing above his level and an exception goalkeeping performance can mean a lot in tournament play. But I also have a suspicion that Poch is inching the program forward with very serious but realistic high-level expectations, which has been my argument for bringing in top-tier coaches for a long time.

It will be interesting to see what direction the Fed decides to take post-Poch. Probably depends (unfortunately) on the WC performance, rather than a good, honest analysis of what his tenure will have done for/to the program overall.

 

It's been a bad couple of months for the "sigh... we're just not that good" crowd. 4 good results and performances with an eclectic mixture of available players.

I'm happy to eat crow about anything said before the Japan match, because things were not looking so great.

 

I'm so confused because I was repeatedly told in this thread that the USMNT player pool is crap and that the players not being good enough was the reason the team sucked (at least until the last three games), and certainly that had nothing to do with other factors like say the coach "mailing it in" for much of his first year on the job... never change BS.



Do the players suck and Poch's brilliant coaching is able to overcome that (at least over the last three games) or did the formerly sucky players in "some colossal change" suddenly turn good in the last month??

 

He must be referring to guys like Sarge and Musah lol. Maybe even McKennie.

 

Getting past the point of your post and going to Poch's performance...

I generally love the progression Pochettino has been making on offense (and, if you'd like, you can check the receipts on most of his decisions).

That said, I do think it's valid to point out that whatever metric you want to use -- goals, underlying stats, record -- we have not outperformed the Berhalter years despite a stronger and more mature pool (and both cycles devastated by injury). So while Poch may be a better coach, it's tough to put results on a basis of "by a country mile." Some things are better; some things are trade-offs based on situation. I think the offense will absolutely get better, both because the pool is better and older and because Pochettino is bringing some things.

I do think that there are always trade-offs with these decisions. Pochettino is aggressive in his tactics and play style, and he's big on belief. The result is that even before we get to the overloads and such, the quick moving, more direct, aggressive, always attacking, always pressing forward style has always led to some pretty big defensive breakdowns for Poch. The offense is his trademark and so is defensive looseness at the back.

Poch very much believes in winning with numbers in all parts of the field. That means a lot of guys up in attack, and when the counter comes, he's relying on grit and effort and work rate for those guys to get the ******** back. That's why Roldan has a job.

So, while I think the offense will be in fine form by WC2026 ... we are going to be far more likely to give up a WPOOTBGW - type goal off a bad turnover or get caught on the counter than we were with MMA.

That's fine with me; these are trade-offs. I don't think there's a clear answer, though I will note that defensive teams tend to be a better play for tournaments.

But there's downsides to Poch's tactics.

I do think Poch's mentality is what this pool needs at this point, even if they crash and burn because of it. I like that we are moving the ball very quickly, and that he's asking every player to step up in terms of what they can do. The team was lethargic and too many of the players were static. Poch has drawn out a lot of performances by having faith that Cristian Roldan can pass forrward and play that role -- which I do think people also need to acknowledge that he's been right that there's not nearly the personnel divide they want to think there is.

But if folks like the offensive attitude and tactics, they also can't get mad when someone gets in behind on a counter or there's a deep turnover. It's part and parcel of playing this way. It's just about whether one outweighs the other.

 

The awesome thing about this place - and all sports boards since the dawn of time - is how much we all over-estimate individual - even (especially?) coach's input/impact and how quick we are to universalize small data sets (cause, tbf, that's all we get anyway.

I do think it's pretty clear that there has been a shift in how the team plays over the past half-dozen games, and that it has a stylistic and tactical difference from Beerholder's side. Whether that will result in improved W/L or shows up in the stats is another question - but this team is playing a somewhat different game atm.

One thought I have had the last few games is that we seem much more comfortable playing through the press out of the back - and I wonder how much of that is built on the back of Eggs 6 year (often painful) mission to play that way.

 

When I say objectively our best manager by a mile, it seemed clear to me I’m talking in the macro sense. Like I’m sorry but anyone who ever genuinely believes that Arena, 3G, Bob JK or whomever has ever or will ever, be a better manager than Poch in the literal sense, is a ********ing moron.

More to your point, is he the best manager for this team at this time and whether or not the 3G system is better for that group, or tournaments or whatever is absolutely debatable and even though results at the WC will be used as the objective and conclusive measure, it will still be debatable from either side.

For my money though it seems logical that the Berhalter way, defensively more solid perhaps as it may be, has a steadier floor, but a much lower ceiling. I don’t ever see that methodology delivering a knockout round victory against a superior opponent, under Poch and this methodology I feel totally comfortable saying it’s far, far more likely.

I also think you are comparing the final form under Berhalter to a work in progress with Poch. Even with our glaring weaknesses at CB and keeper, you will see much more consistency and balance defensively with more familiarity in his system and a fuller compliment of our better players.

The method of overloading the opponents box, primarily on the right and pinning them back, and isolating a Danny Rose and Son, or a Jedi/Arfsten and Pulisic on the left high and wide isn’t just about attacking (in a much more consistent and threatening way than any iteration of Berhalter ball), it’s also about dictating the shape of the opponent and predicting and covering for the inevitable turnover and forcing the game to played on your terms.

I disagree that that’s inherently more risky than the nebulous 442 mid block blob against a competent/superior opponent, taking the Netherlands for example, they were always going to carve through the MMA mid block like a hot knife through butter imo, it was beyond risky and was essentially a sure thing in a negative sense in my humble opinion.

Whereas with the supposedly and superficially more risky aggressive press, paired with the attacking shape and spacing of the Pochettino system, the odds of the Oranje murdering you are still astronomically high, but the odds of you keeping the game closer and competing and most importantly advancing, are significantly greater.

To be clear this is all absolutely debatable and I could be wrong and despite my snarkiness, I get why some were down on Poch and higher on 3g than I am/was. Much of this is just how different people see the game and that’s why it’s beautiful.

 

Maybe this is my reading comprehension issue, but I’ve no idea what your point is.

 

I really didn’t expect any pushback from that comment… maybe the confusion is that it seemed clear to me I meant in the macro sense he’s obviously better?

Of course whether or not he’s right for this job at this time is debatable, totally agree.

But no, those who said he’s on vacation and has no plan were wrong then, wrong now and wrong in their new narrative that he finally implemented the changes they would have made 6 months ago.

This is very much the Tottenham type system and it’s what he was working towards early on in my humble opinion.

 

I’m leaning towards not our “best coach by a country mile” but I hope the World Cup tells a different story.

 

Missed that one. I saw a couple of floaters get intercepted and another that he hit out of bounds.

 

We're a bit light on raw talent compared to the top ten.

Thomas Tuchel says he can't start Foden, Bellingham and Kane together. Can you just imagine having the luxury of starting one of those three on the bench?

If everyone is fit, well coached and get a bit of luck the US can go a long way but the depth isn't there, yet.

 

I object to this take. The better play coincided precisely with the change in tactics. And it’s a change he could have made months earlier.

I’ve made this analogy before and I’ll make it again. Bob Bradley was letting us down for a while, holding us back. Then at the Confed Cup he found a tactic that unlocked our midfield and then we had a great 12 months.

Bradley’s adjustment of having his son be an 8 instead of half of a dual 6 (I’m simplifying here, but that was the gist of it) is a lot like how we’ve changed our shape to more of a 3-4-3 look.