I didn't say you did just that guys need to cool the jets a bit on Pepi. And minutes is about the only comparison you can make between Pepi and Hoppe at this point in their careers. Hoppe is older. Hoppe is bigger and physically more mature. Hoppe played his minutes in B1 (not anything wrong with MLS) I get your point and its not wrong but comparing Hoppe and Pepi today is a stretch.
Also... It's worth noting that of Pepi's 1,300 MLS minutes, 400 have come since the Gold Cup roster was finalized. Hoppe was also at the Nations League camp, and oh, yeah, we've also found time for both Dike and Hoppe. I know, I know, Zardes... but like yes, we can all see the talent. But he'd have also not been established in Dallas, either.
Dike is not even a MLS player. Please refer to @TheHoustonHoyaFan ‘s post where Dike is signified as a Championship player for clarification.
literally no one asks- but you just pop in and say something completely asinine about mls, then you spend half a dozen posts insisting that you dont hate mls or make it about leagues.
It makes more sense that the guys from the USL were just better. Just look at our team. Dike (a championship player) has been one of our worst players so far. Our other championship player (Arriola) hasn’t done much either.
By work on, do you mean rest? Because that’s all he really needs. He’s scored goal for OC in the couple games between the NL and GC (also scored against CR right after NL).
This was the 2019 final US starting eleven. Steffen Cannon Miazga Long Ream Bradley McKennie Pulisic Arriola Morris Altidore
No, I make comments on here and the MLS fanboys dont like it, so they claim i said something else that is easier to argue against or just twist my comments. I dont see anything asinine about what I wrote, and of course, you truncated the sentence you quoted so it might mean something else. That comment was about MLS fans. I guess it struck a chord with you because you were one of the ones with the idiotic idea to discard Sargent and anoint Dike as a starter. It sounded dumb back then and now down right idiotic now. Oh, I do hate MLS on many different levels, but that comment wasn't about them but its naive fans, who I hate even more. They either don't care about the USMNT and just want MLS players on the team and/or horrible at evaluating talent. I personally think it is both. Again, I only talk about leagues in the context of big 5 and all others. For further clarification, the poster that I made this comment that you tried to twist was talking about Pepi.... I am huge fan and hope he gets called up in these next few windows to see how he does.
No, I mean his game has tons of holes in it and is a very predictacle, one dimensional player. I dont care about MLS goals and that CR side was disinterested.
There are a lot of politics in Jamaica, with some local coaches and administrators with pull in the JFF fighting to keep "their" guys in the side. Realistically, Lamar Walker and Tyreek Magee (both 20/21 year old midfielders with limited professional experience who were recent superstars in local high school football, which is the main developmental pathway for Jamaican footballers) shouldn't have been in the side at all. Jamal Lowe (Swansea) and Kasey Palmer (Bristol City) should have been there instead. Local admins forced them into the side to get experience and maybe some exposure for a future transfer fee (the caps they earned might open the UK door too, which is a huge objective for many local clubs and administrators). That did hurt us, because both Palmer and Lowe would have brought a lot more experience off the bench than either of Walker (who is half a dozen games into his USL career) or Magee (who is on the books in the Belgian top tier but has never played in a fully competitive game at the senior club level in a fully professional league). Bailey was hurt, as you noted. Hector sat for Williams for better reasons - Devon Williams is an MLS quality player. He's better than most of the players playing his role in MLS' bottom 10-12 teams, and could easily fit on one of those rosters. He doesn't because he is Jamaican, and MLS isn't as keen on Caribbean talent as it once was (and there are only so many international slots to go around). He's making good money in the USL so we'll see if he will be adventurous at this later stage of his career, but I'm hoping he will find a place in a better league soon. Williams gives us a more technical element in the midfield than Hector with better ball movement, so the tactical change was fine. There's a significant chance he starts at least one qualifying game. Gray sat because he's just not our best striker. Burke is, and Nicholson is next. I had hopes that Gray could equal them, but he disappointed this tournament - I'm rooting for him so hopefully he can seize his chances next time he is called. Right now, he's third in the pecking order. He can work his way up, this hierarchy is quite fluid. ...but that's gonna get tough, because now I have to discuss the other key issue here: guys who missed the squad entirely for reasons related to paperwork. Michail Antonio (West Ham) and Kemar Roofe (Rangers) are probably starters on this team. Both didn't secure their passports until just AFTER the tournament, so couldn't use them. Gray will have to fight his way in over these guys (no easy task). Competition will be fierce, which should help us. Ravel Morrison, meanwhile, is an automatic starter in this team. He completely changes the character of our midfield with his ability to dictate possession in the center. We are, literally, a different team when he's around. And he wasn't around, because the Americans wouldn't give him a visa to enter the country. In a way, this may have been a blessing in disguise - he hasn't had a club since February, and missing this tournament allowed his old teammate Wayne Rooney to give him a shot at Derby County, where he has impressed this preseason. He looks likely to be signed and get some game time, thus keeping him sharper for qualifiers. So maybe this works out for us, idk. Either way, I don't think we'll be able to bring him to Austin on October 7th (visa!), so that right there is probably Devon Williams' best shot to start in qualifiers.
Yes, but Pepi just, FINALLY, started scoring goals like a week before the final roster was due. That he has kept it up since then is nothing that anyone could have predicted based on his prior play.
Not sure there are a lot of guys on this team who have long futures with the full team. But they've done all that's been asked.
It's fantastic in and of itself. I know a lot of fans here are basically like "it's not the A Team and not the World Cup; it doesn't matter." It does to a lot of people. But most importantly, to these dudes, they have a chance to win a tournament for their country. That's pretty awesome.
Frankly, realistic expectations with the group we have have been met. We have put some gritty performances in and have gotten to the freakin final somehow with a C/C+ team. The last remaining goal? Play with toughness and intent, and do NOT 2009 5-0 this thing. If you are going to lose, at least go down swinging and with intent. If we lose 1-0 or even 2-0 in the final with this group, but played with balls, Im not gonna be mad. I would initially predict our chances are not great going into this final, but.........we have a Matt Turner. If we actually win the damn thing? Amazing.
Ill tell you what, though, it does chap my ass quite sincerely about the Olympics and player selections there, though. Bringing Pepi, Cowel, Busio, and guys on that level certainly would have made me wonder "what if" a bit more.
Fwiw, Canada is holding on in this first half. Can't score with Tesho as their only healthy striker but they are compact and countering well. I think Mexico still wins but we should keep it respectable against them. Their team seems older and stuck in second gear. Our team is young so we might recover better, and Gregg should rotate a bit with how the subs played tonight. Resting the NL Euro guys was the right decision no matter what happens on Sunday.
Stock up, Stock down.... using - 5 / 5 + to represent how much growth / regression... Turner + 5 (probably had earned the #1 spot) Moore + 5 (gone from nobody to legit starting candidate) Hoppe + 4 (I would start him at CF with our A team) Miles + 4 (he’s grown into this tournament) Vines + 4 (he’s shown he can be reliable at least as a back up in WCQ) Roldan + 3 (he’s been really impressive this tournament) Zardes + 3 (he shut me up today) Gioacchini + 2 (hope he can find a better club) Acosta + 2 (continuing to make his case as a back up) Williamson + 1 (should get more of a look in the final) Zimmerman + 1 (injury dropped him 3) Busio + 1 (he hasn’t dominated like we wished, but he’s held his own) Lletget + 1 (he’s been Lletget) Sands + 1 (mistakes against Qatar and Jamaica have hurt him but besides his bonehead plays... he’s been outstanding) Bello 0 (neither positive nor negative) Cannon - 1 (Cannon has not been bad. But he needed to put his stamp on RB, and he got hurt... and Moore has been amazing) Arriola - 2 (he’s playing himself off the team) Dike - 2 (injury may have a lot to do with rating but he still receives some credit for good games against Haiti and Martinique... I won’t knock him more because of that potential injury) Pines - 3 (yikes... he’s not a NT player) Lewis - 5 (we should never see again) Yuiell - 5 (nobody has played themselves off this team more than Yuiell... Dike has been terrible in the last few games but that might be injury related and he’s had good games too. Yuiell just doesn’t have what it takes. Johnson - N/R Guzan - N/R Kessler - N/R
Expectations wise, we made the final. That was my expectation so at this point I have to say the team has done the job and Berhalter gets a minimum B for the tournament with a chance to get into A territory if we beat Mexico. This whole tournament has shown that our depth relative to the rest of CONCACAF gives is a significant advantage heading into qualifiers. Now, let's frustrate the heck out of Mexico. One more ugly win, please.