Next manager after Poch

How can you say it was the gameplanning when the players looked like they'd never played soccer before?

The inability of a player to trap a ball or make an accurate pass should not be dependent on gameplan. Even when not under pressure, they looked scared. They lacked the same aggression and confidence.

The players looked nervous and off. I don't think that's gameplan. Something else was off.

I'm not saying Poch did some masterful job, but when a player can't control a ball, I blame the player.

Furthermore, the complaint with Poch's system seems to be that we played too aggressive and didn't bunker in, but when the first two goals against occurred with 8 defensive guys in the box in a set defense and the fourth was off an idiotic turnover by Richards, I don't know how keeping our players back defensively was going to help.

If I were going to blame Poch for this, it would be that he never got our low block, passive defense into a place where it was effective. The temerity that we exhibited on the first goal to not clear it has been a problem. The holes in the organization that allow for near constant cutbacks on endline runs almost cost us early.

But no, playing aggressively forward didn't cost us. They never really beat the press badly except the Freese play, which should have been cleared.

 

Or Spain would have still found a way to beat them.

 

I urge everyone to read up on Matarazzo, who now coaches Real Sociedad and is the first American to coach in Spain’s La Liga. His leading them from the threat of relegation to winning the Copa del Rey is inspiring and complements his coaching at Hoffenheim and Stuttgart. He was passed over prior to his tenure at Real Sociedad for Pochettino. It would be outstanding to have an American coach with his record in Europe.

 

Hasn't Matarazzo always been cagey about whether he wants to coach the national team though? Not sure it's fair to say he's been passed over if he's not actually interested.

 

Yeah, I hate the phrasing here. "Passed over" as if he were the clear frontrunner or it was his turn in line, and someone else was selected.

US Soccer engaged him in the process, perhaps a bit late, perhaps not. But they talked to him, and he has said that they basically came out in the discussion that then wasn't the right time.

For Matarazzo, he had just gotten a high level job with a team he has a great relationship with -- jumping ship right at the beginning is a good way to kill your contacts.

For the US, they had Poch.

Matarazzo is probably the only American hire I'd be happy with. He's not regressive tactically, he's had success at high levels (and failures, of course).

 

Let' start sending some young talents over to Real Sociedad.

 

I'm sure he'd want to continue carving out a career/legacy in Europe. Perhaps in 4 years he might be interested?

 

Didn't he just sign a contract extension?

 

Who?

 

Lets make sure we are talking about the same thing.

I am talking about the system (flexible and aggressive 4-3-3 variant) and players (ATM as the central trio, Freeman and Jedi pressuring wide, with Pulisic and Dest as aggressive wide attackers and Balo as the tip of the spear) chosen for the WC. That system got our best players on the field playing to their individual and collective strenghts.

It was that system and players that impressed everyone, had US fans and frankly pundits across the globe talking about the USMNT as a dark horse to win the WC.

Now Belgium looked at our system and it scared them so much that they said we are not going to directly challenge ATM in the center of the park we will go wide and/or long. Combine that fact with Dest and Puli not able to generate anything and we were proper screwed.

What we don't yet have that top 10 teams do is a quality bench where if Dest and Pulisic are having a bad day we can bring on subs without significant drop off.

Folks say Poch did not have a plan B what would that look like? Sit back in a low block and let Belgium attack in wave after wave of crosses. That is how they scored their first 2 goals.

 

QFT. Every time we lose people claim we were out-coached. We got outplayed. It happens.

Poch did make some adjustments, and we did take back some of the game, but then Freese shit the bed.

 

Matarazzo.

 

i’m just curious to see if you know what this chart, and it’s not able to format properly, represents?

Coach Tenure Matches Wins Losses Losses %
B.J. Callaghan 2023 7 5 0 0.00%
Gregg Berhalter 2018–2022, 2023–2024 74 44 17 22.97%
Bruce Arena 1998–2006, 2017 148 81 35 23.65%
Bob Bradley 2007–2011 80 43 25 31.25%

 

I don't believe the 4-3-3 necessarily got our best players on the field. I would not count Ream nor Freeman as among our best XI (though Freeman does seem to have a very bright future). That set up certainly worked well against teams that (1) didn't press us and (2) didn't have the technical ability and/or tactics to play through our press. It was a one-trick pony that disintegrated against the first material test. And I don't know what "pundits across the globe" were talking about the USMNT as a dark horse to win it all after beating Paraguay, Australia, and Bosnia. I didn't hear any. I'm sure you can find some example somewhere, but that certainly wasn't a credible perception (unlike, say, Norway or Morocco).

As to the part about "Belgium looked at our system and it scared them so much" -- that is quite laughable. They weren't scared, they were smart. They looked at an opponent's obvious weaknesses and adjusted. And they had the skill to pull it off. It is not a sign of weakness to be flexible. Actually, it is a sign of arrogance (or naivety) on Poch's part to think he had come up with some foolproof plan that works no matter the competition.

I agree that we don't yet have the quality of depth that the top teams do. But folks like Aaronson, Weah, Tessmann, Musah, Pepi, Scally, Reyna et al have proven they can compete against the top levels of competition. Poch either underutilized them, didn't bring them, or didn't put them in spots to contribute. All out of his stubbornness. And there's a huge gulf between (a) naively pressing Belgium hoping our shaky back line and GK can clean up the mess and (b) completely parking the bus. Framing it as this false dichotomy seems disingenuous.

 

Well said. You saw what I saw but summarized it better.

 

I mean, it's a chart of a select group of US coaches with matches, wins, losses and loss %, which I've never seen ever used as a stat.

What is your point with it? I'm not sure I follow.

 

Can’t say I saw anything about the U.S. as a dark horse. At best I’d say there was a sentiment we took care of business but the Belgium game was the first real test.

 

Thanks for your response.

It’s actually the list in order of the coaches who have the best win loss percentage in the history of the US MNT.

 

Okay? Would you like to expound more? I'm not sure why I need to draw things out.

I'm guessing you're trying to say American coaches are better. I don't have a particular bias against American coaches in general. I don't like the particular crop we are given right now at this point in their careers. And I don't think there should be a bias FOR American coaches even though I do think they probably relate better culturally.

I have concerns about both BJ and Mikey Varas being ready. It's a big jump for their level of experience, and Callaghan's record in that time doesn't really impress me. That Gold Cup was not an example of good coaching, and the Nations League is simply not a large enough sample. His time at Nashville has been good, but I'd like to see brilliance there. I will say that both play enough of a progressive game that I am happy with that.

I don't love Cherundolo or Marsch because their style of play would be regressive with the US, I think. Maybe I'm wrong, but I want a plan when we have the ball that is simply not just counterattacking and give up. Cherundolo won a title with LAFC with basically Bob's offense, and then slowly reverted it to a counter attack only team over time despite having some really elite talent. That concerns me.

And the reality is that I saw tactical elements that Pochettino brought that we've never seen our team execute before. Berhalter's a tactics geek; I have no doubt he knows them, but I don't think he ever felt he could get the team there. (Bradley too. Arena sneers at it.

If one of these Americans was head and shoulders above the rest, and was more in line with our tactical evolution, I'd be totally fine. But all of them come with pretty big question marks to my mind.

 

Stop with the Tessmann nonsense, he can't defend my grandmother. The Belgium friendly was the match that finally put the nail in his coffin. When Poch said Gio could play CM many laugh but turns out that Gio played as much defense as Tessmann and was much more press resistant and move the ball along much better.

Could we have v Belgium played another way other than how we played in this WC camp? Maybe but please exactly what would that be and would we have been any more successful? I just don't see it but I am willing to listen.

I am very proud of the way our boys played, dare I say it, it was very proactive. It got the attention of the US soccer community and of global soccer. We have the next group of big, strong, fast, athletic and skilled younglings coming up ...

 

You don't see a lot of things but Zlatan was one of the first major pundits to voice that opinion. There were others:



https://www.facebook.com/stamforddi...te-2026-dark-horseusmnt-soc/1710668553683941/

 

The 1 win and 7 losses under Poch against Canada, Mexico, and the elo top-20 had told the tale before the Belgium match.

 

Sure. Set a low block. Start Trusty and Richards to deal the physicality of De Ketelaere. Don't start Pulisic. Don't start Dest. Don't play sweeper keeper. Start Pepi or Haji up top. Move McKennie and Balogun to wing.

Give yourself chance, like Belgium would do against Spain. Poch had gotten rinsed 5-2 against Belgium, rearranged the chairs on the deck of the Titanic, then came back for more.

 

The Canada happened in that disaster of a week in Nation's League when we lost to Panama. Poch adjusted his whole approach to the team because of that. It was a third-place game. We'd been eliminated from a chance to win the tournament. The one Mexico game we had in a competitive match happened when about half our normal squad wasn't available for one reason or another.

In the current world, managers use friendlies to experiment with lineups. People made the same comments about friendlies under Berhalter, but they're friendlies. Coaches use them to figure things out.