Getting ready for the 2024 Olympics

You are the one who is manufacturing the outrage. Your so-called "criticism" to Smith and Rodman are actually bitchings. If you think they are bad, who are better? If nobody are doing better than them, it's incredible to criticize them for being bad.

You believed Dunn and Mal should be the leading attackers, how were they doing today? How was Dunn doing against South Korea? Disatsters. If you could not own your wrongs, you should not open your mouth and ramble your gibberishes.

Calling out your falsehoods is to hold you accountable and is not hystery. Feeling offended because your falsehoodls got called out really revealed your really lack of any ability to reflect.

 

Keep it coming. You make me laugh. At least it seems like we finally agree that Smith and Rodman are no where near as good as people like to pretend. It’s just a question of what to do instead. Progess. I’ll stick with my original idea that Lavelle and Macario would be better. I also think Mal’s better but she was bad yesterday. Too bad Cat is hurt. Can’t believe you still reject that. South Korea? Dunn scored against South Korea, so that isn’t helping you. What about Costa Rica? How did Smith do there? Despite your penetrating analysis, I still wouldn’t play both Smith and Rodman together if I had to play possession or build up. Your love for them does not make my opinion wrong; it just doesn’t work that way.

 

Im sorry but its panic time for me. One goal, in two games, is simply terrible. If Emma isnt worried, she she should be, Smith not a striker. She missed a bunch last night ... too many to be a striker. Rodman tries hard but crossing was poor....also does doesnt score. Mal used to score but she has slipped in this system. Now to Olympics.....probably too late for any hope. We could easily go 0-3 or 1-2 if were lucky. Emma needs to change something and fast or were DOA

 

Thanks for the clarification. It seems like we're people who can look and say "player X is somewhat dominant in their domestic league, yet rides the struggle-bus against international tournament competition. Perhaps there is something to that...maybe they need to go play more regularly in a league where they face international level defenders. Maybe they're being played out of position/different profile for a striker compared to club team."

 

Even when she won NWSL MVP in 2018?

 

Horan is a physical player, plays the American style no doubt, but the American style is outdated, we cant body people around like the Wambach days. I think we need a more modern middie with worldly skills, just my opinion. Albert is light years ahead of Horan at her age.

 

Indeed.

 

Nothing.

 

Last night was evidence of a lack of cohesiveness, hopefully that will come sooner rather than later.

 

Ah, I see where you're going. Post olympics I'd be ok with Coffey Albert Shaw as the midfield 3, while trying to bring in Yohannes and give other players a look, with Horan being a utility player as long as she remains fit/getting minutes with OL.

 

It was announced before the game that she had a "loading injury"-- which can mean almost anything when there's no indication as to where. It can be anything from cervical spine damage to a bruised knee or ankle ligament...

 

The real culprit here having a coach take fully control of the team with less than two months to go. Hayes style is more tight, disciplined, deliberate passing—-and it might just be what the good doctor ordered on our too much freedom lovin players more versed in direct & 1v1 But it’s going to take more than just a few games to enforce her vision on us.
Due to two of the 3rd place group teams still making the playoff rounds, Emma betting she’ll have 3 extra games to get the squad to bent over to her will, but at this point that’s seems more like an gamble

 

Smith was good and Rodman was the best against Costa Rica. They definitely can improve, but they are already world-class player, both top 20 to top 10 level in the world.

Duun scored against South Korea so she was good??? Yeah, no wonder. If who scored a goal is the only thing you can see in a game you definitely don't understand it. Dunn as a starter vs South Korea and the right lane got broken through multiple times during the first half, a scenario did not happened when Rodman started even against better opponent. Dunn starting as the left back vs Costa Rica is even more of a disaster, she does not have elite athleticism anymore and her left foot is much weaker than Nighswonger, her contribution to offense is very dubious as a attacking fullback while her size and strength are of big weakness when she defends.

You are wrong not because of my preferences but due to your very intuitive and superficial evaluation of player performance and total lack of knowledge of this game's tactics and history.

 

Horan cannot body people around because she was never as physically imposing as Lloyd let alone Wambach. This is not American style, players like Bunny Shaw, Ramirez and Popp that still body people around today are not Americans.

One thing important is that USWNT no longer has any physically imposing attackers in their starting line-up since Lloyd, and this type of player is rare in our pipeline.

 

How did you arrive at this conclusion when (1) Smith's shooting efficiency is above 90% of forwards in the world cup; (2) NWSL has fewer goals scored per game than any other mainstream leagues. It's extremely dubious to believe other leagues' defense quality is higher than NWSL.

 

I can't see Dunn as a disaster left back against CR, since CR had absolutely no opportunities to score or even threaten. The attacking part of her role seemed like Dunn was not asked to play as high as Nisghwonger is. That's Hayes's decision. Dunn is not some silver bullet, but if she's going to play left back, she's the backup and I am fine with that. Just like with Smith, scoring doesn't make Dunn good, I just thought it seemed like an odd game to chose to call her out on. But fair enough, I think Smith was a problem against Mexico even though she (finally) scored.

Agasint Costa Rica, Rodman had several good moments. She was better than Smith. But how can you say that she was better than Rose would have been? Trin got stonewalled on dribbles several times and never was able to find targets in the box. And that was an improvement over the last several outings. I still think she would be better in a transition or counter role -- or as a 60 min sub to run at a tired defender.

 

1 - I watched the games. I'm happy that on her 4 shots on target, 2 of them went in, against Vietnam. She didn't have a good world cup for a left attacking forward. See my 2nd point - maybe taking someone who exclusively plays center forward for club
wasn't the best choice to fill more a a "Christen Press" role.

Since then she's been given the CF spot. There has been some progress, the brace in the SheBelieves tournamnent for example.

2. To succeed internationally, the US is going to have to play a style that is more conducive to breaking down organized defenses, and playing on the counter against Spain, and less "jump on errors within 40 yards of the opponents goal and capitalize on the breakaway/2 pass sequence" - the NWSL is almost entirely a transition league, there is little time spent in the attacking/build-up phase, or even the defending phase.

She'd benefit from a move to Europe, in my opinion. And yes, she might be involved in more blowouts at the domestic league level, but would get more exposure against the type of competition we will face in the knockout rounds in the Champions League.

 

You are thinking tactically. Dunn's weak left foot makes her overlapping run in the left lane worthless and she cut inside a lot and curtailed the much-needed width of our attack. Her cross quality espeically from her left foot is poor. She is a bad because she could not fulfill her tactical duty, and she is not as able as she was in defending one-on-one. Smith is good not because she made a difficult shoot, she is not bad because she missed some shoots, she is good because she could (1) ran at the opponent's defense line to push them stay deeper so that Mal, Rose and Horan have space to opertate between opponent's backline and midfielders; (2) she is the only person who could make some back-to-goal plays in the entire roster, and this type of play is especially important if the opponents play low-block.

Rose and Rodman play different positions, fulfill different tactical duties, have different strengths and weaknesses, they're not comparable. You appear to not enough attention to what really happened on the field but base your analysis on vide otherwise you would not say Rodman could find targets in the box. Please watch the replay at 22nd, 40th, 45+1st, 52nd, 90+1st and 90+2nd minute and tell me whether Rodman could find target inside the box.

 

I always found the European is more possesional and NWSL more transitional largely a myth. I don't think there's much evidence to support it. The success rate of pass is comparable in WSL, UWCL, NWSL and LIGA F, around 77% and 76% in the most or current season. The pass success rate is a tad lower in France, Italy and Germany at 73% to 74%. I also see a lot of transitional attacks and goals in European leagues, and I also see a lot of possesional build-up in NWSL as well. I highly doubt the overall style is considerably different across the pond.

 

I'll admit I don't follow US soccer enough to judge, but the notion that Smith and Rodman could be considered part of the top 10 players in the world seems highly exaggerated to me. Do you ever follow European women's football? Off the top of my head, I guess I could name at least a dozen players there that could be considered better than Smith and Rodman combined.

In fact, if you read 2023 Women's Ballon d'Or's chart, you can't find US names in the top 20: Sophia Smith, who's indeed the top US player there, is #25.
The Best FIFA Women's player is similar in having just an US player in their top 16, and it's not one of these two, it's Lindsay Horan at #13 place.
The 100 best female footballers by The Guardian (admittedly Euro-skewed), has Sophia Smith barely making top 20, at #18; Trinity Rodman is #50 (!).

Now, of course these kind of rankings are influenced by a lot of factors (primarily, in a World Cup's year, by the results of the World Cup itself, where the USA were eliminated quite early). But I guess we can anyway agree with the general view they offer, give or take a few names that are slightly overrated or underrated.

Am I right, or is general consensus on this thread, that Sophia Smith and Trinity Rodman can be considered top 20, or even top 10 in the world?

 

Thank you very much, but I watch a lot of league and NT games in both Europe and USA, and I don't need “help" from a couple of journalists who seldom watch women's soccer and players who casted votes for "fraternity" and "sociological" reasons to evaluate player quality.

If you are paying real attention to what actually happened on the field, you will find those rankings not serious analysis based on performance on the field but weird vibe or name recognition. Banda and Temwa Chawinga are doing much better than Oshoala in NWSL but they are omitted by all those rankings while Oshoala was recognized. No sane person will rate Daly better than Bunny Shaw RN but she was ranked higher. Rolfo being better than Hemp, Smith, Diani etc is a huge fantasy. Moreover Ramirez was barely recognized at all despite her very strong performance in the world cup let alone she being one of the best center forwards along Bunny Shaw at the moment.

If you want to have a serious discussion of woso, it's better to avoid all those rankings published by dubious sources, stop basing the judgement on the highlight clips, but starting watch a lot of full-match replay.

 

I'll admit I surely watched less full-matches than you, but I anyway watched my fair share of them. I just wanted to give some other opinions than just my own one, that's why I pointed at those rankings, but my eye-test basically says the same: that the two players you mentioned, ad good as they can be, don't look like "top 20 to top 10 level in the world" as you claim. At max, one of them (Smith) could maybe barely make top 20, in my opinion.

But your point of view is clear: I answered to it, so it doesn't surprise me that you stand by it.

One of the main reasons I posted, though, as I wrote in my reply, is that I was curious to know if your opinion is shared by most of the people posting on this thread: and of course this isn't something you can answer me; it's the other people who have to now share their point of view.

 

For what little my opinion is worth, I don't think Rodman is anywhere near her peak, and I fear Smith may be. And I think "the best player in the world" is not a position that can be maintained for very long in any team sport-- three years at most in most. Sam Mewis was anointed the best player in the world when she was already suffering the injury which ended her career, IIRC.

And I think those sorts of rankings always underrate goal preventers in favor of goal scorers. Lucy Bronze or Joy Fawcett or Wendie Renard has to do far more to get on to the bottom of such a list than Megan Rapinoe needs to get near the top...

It is a team sport-- there is, however briefly, a best team in the world, established in actual direct competition, but "best" players cannot be established by anything but judgement calls, with all their iniquities. Plus there are surely times when the best player plays for a team that did not qualify-- and so wasn't seen to be voted for.