Its a value proposition.The millions spent on a top tier coach for a mid tier program would be better spent going for extensive training for coaches in academies.
Given The favorable advantages of playing on our home soil in front of a rabid home crowd, the result would suggest that this is the most devastating loss in United States World Cup history. Poch Admitted that he was unfamiliar with the United States player Pool, when he accepted the position. 73 Different players were called in and given an opportunity. In some ways, appears to be commendable, however, there was no continuity, given the short window he had to operate in. i’ve said this before, I just think it’s time to move on.
For all of you clamoring about how a better coach would do a better job and what not there have been case studies done regarding whether a coach has a positive or negative impact on a team and the resounding answer is ....NO. I no longer have my copy, gave it to a friend who never gave it back, but Soccernomics has an entire chapter where they talk about studies the authors did looking at an entire decade of EPL teams and whether coaches had any impact and they found they didn't. They found teams 90% of the time finished the season ranked within 3 places of their payroll ranking. Meaning talent (the market measures player talent by how much they are willing to pay a player) is the overriding factor in determining where a team finishes the season. ** I'm paraphrasing because it's been a couple years since I read it.
Yeah though the money on Pochettino’s salary wasn’t money we’d have otherwise given it came from donors who may not have wanted to give for other purposes.
I agree it’s time to move on after the Belgium game, that was the worst round of 16 performance I’ve seen from the USMNT. Yes, I had fun watching the group stage but given the opposition and home field I don’t think Poch was the only coach who could’ve achieved that.
I wonder if Poch has any regrets not going more defensive against Belgium? In a perfect world where everyone was healthy, who would you have chosen as the two sixes?
I would agree with your line of thinking. I’d trust Poch to identify some of the diamonds in the rough and rebuild the team. The starting eleven for the World Cup exceeded my expectations. Not sure some of guys I was clamoring for (Morris, Tessman) would have ever seen the field.
I would note, as offered above, they exceeded my expectations for the first half against Paraguay. Other than that, not so much. The match against Belgium was epic fail/shit the bed stuff. A Huge opportunity was lost, given the expectations that had been created in playing in front of our home fans on our own soil. It was like we did not even show up. Do you know what Tim Weah, Matt Turner, Yunas Musah, Brendan Aaronson and Walker Zimmerman have in common? They were all starters, for the most part at WC 2022. The coach at the time, was adjudged to be not good enough, heading forward. Malik Tillman, Flo Balogun, Chris Richards, Ricardo Pepi, Matt Freeze and Alex Freeman. were all added. There appears to have been a massive, upgrade in the quality of our player pool. The previous Coach directed the United States to two Continental championships. Mr. Poch offered excuses and rationalizations following his two failed efforts. His masterpiece would be revealed in the World Cup. And somehow Pochettino appears to be getting a pass. it’s weird, to me.
Maybe they were over-coached as Trossard starting on the left seemed to throw everyone off and maybe our midfield compensated by shuffling across and leaving room on Belgium's right. But your U15 coach is the one who tells you not to let the ball bounce in the box, that has nothing to do with Poch, nor did the brain Frees have anything to do with the coach. The frustrating part was after the hydration break we starting playing better (and this is from memory, as it was 2am) but that was when Dest and Pulisic in particular started playing hero ball. Also, Richards is over-rated.
The entire back four has issues.. Freeman has a chance to be great. We needed defensive support from the midfield to protect them. I can remember looking around on my television screen and wondering why there weren’t more players in the box on the first goal. Our players were bossed and bullied. Rudi Garcia outcoached our $6 million man. I’m still getting over it.
And that has nothing to do with coaching and everything to do with individual responsibility. That's about $26 million a year worth of watching the ball.
It has to with pregame preparation mentally.If one guys off the boil,you look at him.The ENTIRE TEAM looked like muppets.What was said pregame?
But this wasn't an individual error this was 11 guys ball watching.Now,I know Poch shouldn't have to say "Watch ball and man" but he had to have sensed that level of nerves before the game and managed it.For 6 million.
What else is he supposed to remind them, "kick the ball with your foot, not your hand", "run by putting one foot in front of the other". These are things that are burned into their brains from the day they stepped into an academy. They're things they do week in, week out. They did them in the previous four games. You have to give them some respect as professional athletes. This is part of the challenge of being a national team coach. You're dealing with highly paid professionals who do this for a living. It's a completely different relationship to a club coach. You could hire a coach like Marsch who will light a fire under them but some players don't react well.
They needed the complete opposite of a fire,they were already distracted.They needed some calming,some " Lads,its still a game and you earned your place here".Balo has since come forward admitting that his reinstatement was a possible distraction.How was this handled?
Are the players 8 years-old and getting bullied in the playground? Balogun makes $70k. Deal with it! Southgate hired a psychologist to work with England players (Glenn Hoddle hired a clairvoyant). Maybe we need a psychologist to deal with our highly strung prima donnas. A social media ban in camp should be the minimum. Outsiders wonder why Poch likes Seb Berhalter. It's probably because he's easy to coach, does what he's told and isn't distracted by outside influences.
Again, I ask ... why? Three of our four goals were in a passive low block where there were 8 outfield players in the box. Do we think Malik Tillman defended poorly here? He did not. Hell, none of the attacks were even on his side. Neither was any of those three goals even remotely about him or Jedi getting forward. The defensive breakdowns on those three goals we had might have been issues with our low block scheme, but they weren't issues even remotely with playing Tillman at CM, or the aggressive offensive nature of his role (or Jedi's, etc.) or the team's push forward in general. The only goal that can be remotely attributed to playing more aggressively at all is the third goal, where we did have a high line in the back. Of course, if any number of basic things happens there, including Freese simply clearing it, that's not a goal. There's this weird gut reaction that "we gave up four goals. We need to bunker." But ... our defense was bad when we had to play in a low block. The only thing I bet Poch regrets here is that he didn't spend more time working on that type of defense, not that he didn't set his gameplan up to play it more.
I'd love for anyone to get specific on the coaching points. Every time we lose, we're "outcoached." But people can rarely explain these coaching blunders. The fact that our players were bossed and bullied should probably make it pretty hard to tell if we were outcoached at all.
At club level you have a defensive coach to work on things like that. But letting the ball bounce in the box and not ball-watching are fundamentals you expect players to avoid, not something you teach in a short international camp. I was obviously being a bit sarcastic above but an international coach usually doesn't have the time, or need, to teach fundamentals.