Sorry but the list of possible coaches is NOT the list of currently available coaches. The US isn't some soccer backwater. We have tons of talent, lots more coming through the pipeline, and are HOSTING what will be the biggest World Cup ever in 4 years, with a Gold Cup, Olympics, and probably Copa America (also hosting) in between. We also have at least decent money, especially if we're hosting a Gold Cup (or two?), Copa America, and World Cup this cycle... last time we hosted Copa America didn't we make like $100 million in profit that went straight into our federation?? What's the max outlay for USMNT coach with all the money that will be coming in, why should the absolute max be any lower than say $10M so $40M total? We should be able to get a brilliant tactical genius coach for half that if Gregg is getting $1.3M. We can hire coaches who are good enough to currently be employed. Shoot for the top, ask Pep Guardiola if he has any interest. Woo Marcelo Gallardo, maybe he enjoyed his time in DC. If all that fails there are still like... 300 coaches between national teams from the World Cup, the top 5 leagues, Netherlands/Belgium/Portugal, Argentina/Brazil, MLS/LigaMX... obviously we wouldn't want all of them, but there's plenty of talented coaches out there, it's USSF's job to whittle it down to a dozen who are high quality options. ...which is why USSF should open up their wallet for a top level coach, instead of sticking with a coach we know isn't good enough to win the World Cup, or picking some rando coach off the scrap heap.
The comment you replied to already had walked back the "superclub" thing that was based on my unfamiliarity with Swedish soccer and just said "big club"... #1 in attendance every year, owned by AEG which is huge, doesn't qualify as "big club"?
It is impossible to instill anything in someone else that you don’t believe…and if you don’t believe that somehow, someway we can win it in 2026 then you shouldn’t be the coach. I only say that because the time horizon is so long…which makes it realistic for me.
Where it really shakes out is Berhalter. If your target is ensuring qualification via CONCACAF and producing a coherent, hard-to-beat team that is going to be ready to do the things necessary to get out of the group, a Gregg-type figure is fit for purpose. If it's "we choose to go to the Moon and we choose to win the World Cup", it's a different story, even with total realism about the luck and the fate on the way there. Big names would come out of the woodwork for this cycle's job, I am absolutely 100% convinced of that. Not the same sort of names that are top of mind for the next EPL top six project necessarily (though we probably don't want those guys as that kind of job calls for a very different figure, Pep would not work with the USMNT), but very prominent coaches. We have to look. It's a dereliction of the federation's duty if we don't look.
Pep Guardiola is not coming to coach the USMNT in the next couple years. He's the best coach in the world, but that doesn't mean he'd be the right fit for this particular job. More broadly top tier club coaches are less interested in the international game. Most want to try it at some point in their career, but then our opening has to line up timing wise. I think we could theoretically get a decent coach, but I don't know that the job is as attractive as made out to be. The Copa America is not even actually confirmed yet, and while we made a ton of money off it last time, I don't think that would be the case this time around (as CONMEBOL was not very happy about the amount of money we made and there's probably going to be alot more revenue sharing if it happens again). Just look at the coaches who are in the World Cup this year. The guys with the best pedigrees are Van Gaal whose semi retired and Luis Enrique whose been subject to immense amount of criticism for the job he did. You don't have the same overall caliber as coach available to you. How many coaches at the World Cup in 2022 are in line to get hired for a Champions League team in a top 5 league once this is over? When I say that should be the goal, I mean that's the long term goal, not the goal for the 2026 World Cup.
Berhalter was a USMNT defender who played in the 2002 World Cup and was on the 2006 roster. He also played over 100 BL matches and captained BuLi and 2BL squads in his career. He has high level player credibility which Schmetzer lacks. IMO, the US is entering a next-level problem which we got a glimpse of with the Gio situation. In the 2024 cycle we are going to have to be able to motivate and decide amongst a large group of young, successful top-5 level players. At the international level that is the biggest challenge for a manager. We heard some swirl around the respect issue during the Sarachan caretaker period and Dave did not even attempt to do anything out of the ordinary.
One thing I'm surprised Berhalter advocates haven't pointed out is that 5 of the 8 managers remaining are in their second World Cup cycles with their team, which I am certain is a first. And two of the other three had previously been part of the coaching setup for their country at prior World Cups. The Morocco guy is the only new one. And they're all coaching their home countries, with I believe only Lionel Scaloni not having club management experience in the domestic league.
I think this is the right thread... The Muller Athletic article posted is very good: https://theathletic.com/3974522/2022/12/06/usa-world-cup-tactics-soccer/ It dives into how we changed very prior US teams. The short version: Possession: Minor increase, middle of the pack Long Balls as % of All Passes: Bottom of the pack near elite teams, lower than 2010 and much lower than 2014 Field Tilt: Right below elite teams, higher than 2010, much higher than 2014 Possession reaching Final Third: with Elite teams, higher than 2010 but 2010 was good Crosses: Very high, but 2010 and 2014 were as well; we just were terrible at converting. Mexico and Canada amazingly higher Counterpressing: Top 5, much higher than before xGD: middle of the pack, no comparison to 2010 and 2014 Counter to something like possession, Field Tilt (which is your % possession in final third compared to your opponent) correlates strongly to winning. It's no guarantee (Spain was #1), but it's a strong positive indicator. We did significantly change style from 2010 and 2014, and it was more effective in many ways. We controlled the field, which gives defensive and offensive benefits, mostly through our pressing and counterpressing. That last generated a couple good chances versus the Dutch, actually, as Muller notes. We know we struggled to generate scoring; that's the next step. Hopefully, we can figure that out without taking a step back on other components. But it was interesting to really see how 2014 was in large part a team playing long ball and absord from an underdog positions, 2010 was more in control, and this one had real fundamentals right but needs to solve some things.
Opponents matter: 2010 England, US, Slovenia Algeria. {Ghana} 2014: Germany, Portugal, US, Ghana, {Belgium} 2022: England, US, Wales, Iran, {Dutch} I'll leave the opponent's rankings as an exercise for the reader.
Respect is earned. Starting out with a higher level might be helpful but it’s not the most important consideration for me: Competence over confidence.
Muller notes that. It's just tough to adjust with the sample. I know you are super protective of Jurgen, but a) I don't think anything about this article is any kind of indictment of a coach at any level. It's about the evolution and b) the numbers in some cases are pretty different. For example, on things like field tilt and % of long balls, we basically went from nearly last in 2014 to living it up with the elite teams. Jurgen made the choices he felt were appropriate, and he got to the Round of 16. Seems like those were pretty good calls, results wise. But that team and this team play pretty fundamentally differently. This team isn't an elite team, but stylistically it is starting to play more like one. Good idea as our talent pool improves? Or bad, naive idea? All up to you! But we definitely changed.
Except for Croatia in 2018. But I agree this is something I would ding him on, just like I would on set pieces. One can say that Berhalter did a good job overall, while also pointing out the shortcomings.
I think the second cycle question sort of depends on circumstances and where the player pool is. France and England both had very young player pools in 2018 for instance. Second cycles can go wrong for all sorts of reasons, but to me a big one is you have a player pool that ages and you're too slow to move on from the guys who did the job for you the first cycle. France's coach is actually on his 3rd cycle and I think he wants to continue on (and Zidane very much wants his job).
I don’t think he did good. I think he met minimum expectations in a somewhat weak WC group. So I’d say he did ok. Tactically had some success but repeatedly displayed an inability to connect the dots and complete the picture. The crossing was a byproduct of failing to connect mids to the front three.
We only have 4 American managers who have top 5 league experience as a coach (Marsch, Bradley, Wagner, and Matarazzo) and three American managers who have coached in a World Cup (Bradley, Arena, and Berhalter). I feel like to the extent we are going to hire American managers from MLS it's helpful if they can make up some of that experience by having either played in a top 5 league or a World Cup or both. It's helpful from a having respect standpoint from the team and just having been there before when the time comes to actually coach in the World Cup. Amongst the MLS managers that's Cherundolo, Vanney, Vermes, Wolff, and Mastreoeni. Even though he doesn't coach in MLS I think Hugo Perez also qualifies too. I wouldn't write off someone like Curtin for this reason, but it's definitely a factor worth consideration. I think of the American coaches Cherundolo has the highest ceiling, though I'd like to see how he does in competitions like CCL and the Leagues Cup.
Statement from USSF: From US Soccer: “As we always do after a major tournament, we are taking time to reflect. We will conduct a full review with everyone involved as we determine our next steps. We look forward to building off the performance in Qatar and preparing for the journey towards 2026.”— Subscribe to GrantWahl.com (@GrantWahl) December 7, 2022
The question isn't living in Chicago. This has been overblown, but for youth coaches it's more an issue because they are paid crap, not because coaches don't move for work. Coaches move CONSTANTLY for work. For a HC, it's about level of involvement and level of workload. If a top coach doesn't want to move to Chicago, it's because they want a job where they coach two weeks every few months. You can choose whether that should be a requirement or not.[/QUOTE] Agree to disagree. Yes, coaches move but it's not specific to you must live here. At the club level, I can see it, makes sense live close to where you practice but maybe they want to live in Champagne and commute (which again if the requirement is ve withing 2 hours of here, that's not really a requirement, like you said most managers would do that). But at the NT level, you only meet with players during camps. Being in Chicago for that doesn't make sense since the camps are everywhere. If Pep has kids and wants to raise them in a small city but also coach the national team, that should work fine. Fly in to Chicago for any meetings or whatever. I'm not saying Pep wants the job or should get the job, just an example. As per what Gregg tactically did, I'm not saying he didn't change his system up, he did. But it's still a system. I don't think at the national team level you can implement a system and expect a lot of big time success. That's just my opinion and others may not share it. The US was pretty impotent for large portions of important games when it comes to creating chances, let alone scoring goals. And it wasn't against top shelf competition for most of that. Do I think Gregg was awful and the worst, no. He was below average in game, above average building a culture. So he was about what you'd expect him to be. I just desire more for the team. I dont need to Shaq Moore be subbed on after an absolute crap show only to put on another crap show. I dont need to see waiting 70 minutes before making a tactical switch. The game is just too fast for him to adjust to and maybe that's his perfectionism coming out, maybe it's his bias towards certain attributes, I don't know. But I've seen enough to know I don't like him as a manager for valid reasons. Not saying he hasn't done good things either he has. But to me he just isn't up to snuff on the sidelines as a head coach. Maybe a good number 2 or sporting director or even at a club level. Just doesn't translate well enough to the national team. But again that's just my opinion, others are welcome to disagree. I want a team composed of healthy competitors, good at set pieces, creating 5+ chances a game. This team should do that, and it didn't so that's why I say Gregg's gotta go. We need to be better.
More ironic is if he moves on given how worked up everyone is about the possibility of him staying. Though as the Stewart statement makes clear, no decisions have been made either way yet.
So I don’t think the Chicago thing matters at all, but I wonder in the post pandemic/zoom environment whether they might be more flexible on that front. Stewart clearly has his reasons for wanting everyone under one roof and I don’t think they are bad ones, but the national team coach travels a ton anyways to scout players that with zoom and what not you might be able to make it work (and have them drop into to Chicago twice a month or whatever). As a general rule I think everything is negotiable for the right candidate (even if I don’t think the Chicago requirement is at all problematic). Pep is the pipe dream so he’s the go to example, but I’d let him live in New York if he was insistent (as that’s where he lived previously in the US). As others have said I think it matters more for youth coaches given how much they get paid. A foreign coach is going to have to move to the US anyways so I doubt they have a super strong preference for one city over another. And I doubt any of the MLS candidates are particularly wedded to living in any particular geographic location.
Morocco made the final 8, that could have been US. Too bad, we got a SHITE coach. Even the Dutch coach said so.
All those coaches were/are substantially more experienced than Berhalter. There is no real comparison.
Twellman also confirms Negotiations have NOT started between @ussoccer & Berhalter as Stewart said below. #USMNT https://t.co/XYvYh4OYQc— Taylor Twellman (@TaylorTwellman) December 7, 2022