I thought it was to win. At this point, I'd be surprised if we get out of the first round. BB has set the program back a minimum of 4 years and we will have to wait until after the WC to get a new coach and to start hoping ... again
Yes, let's just give up. In fact, we should just not qualify and save us the trouble. Start rebuilding NOW.
usa is not a contender and won't be for quite a few more world cups.. i see the top 8-10 as being viable options for a wc title... getting into such an elite requires depth of talent.. when usa has most of the squad playinf champions league caliber football, then we'll be a contender... 2054...that's when hoists the trophy
If the goal was indeed to win (or seriously contend) for the title in 2010, then no, it is not still attainable. The best we can probably expect for 2010 is a dark horse run. A 2nd-round appearance isn't an unreasonable expectation; with some breaks, perhaps we could see a quarterfinal run like 2002. However, I think it's unrealistic to expect that...and anything more wouldn't really be the result of superior talent as much as it was fortune. However, this doesn't mean that Project 2010 has to be considered a failure. Indeed, I'm inclined to believe that it was a success. I think we have to consider how far the national team has come. When the current crop of players was born, we were in the midst of a 40-year drought. (Less than 20 years ago, we were in that drought!) Less than 15 years ago-- during the Clinton administration-- we had gone 44 years without earning a point in a World Cup. We didn't have a top-flight professional league. There wasn't a true soccer stadium in the U.S., and the 1989 finish in World Cup qualifying was the first time that the U.S. had ever cracked the top four of the confederation. Now, consider the position of the U.S. MLS is fledgling, but it's lasted longer than most thought. Multiple players in the good European leagues. Actually having earned a point in WC play in Europe. Three straight continental championships. And the youth program-- without Project 2010, would Freddy Adu be playing at the U of Maryland? Would Jozy Altidore be floating about the campus at St. John's with Michael Bradley? Maybe Project 2010 won't achieve its stated goal, but I'd say it's still been successful for U.S. soccer.
The rebuilding should have started 2 years ago but BB doesn't have the guts to do it. The US will never go anywhere until we hire a coach that is not just happy to get there but also wants to be competitive once there. Two WC's ago, we got out of the first round because we attacked and got a little lucky. We went on to the field with fire in our eyes and we looked good. Last WC we played not to lose and lose is exactly what we did. We sucked and it cost Arena his job. Now we have BB and he's scared to attack in games in our own region, what do you think he'll do in the WC? He will play his friggin bucket and we will go three and out and he'll be fired. My biggest disappointment is that it didn't have to be this way and that four more years of my life have gone by without seeing any significant improvement in the USA's game when playing outside our region. A coach that is committed to not only qualifying but to developing a contender could have been found. A coach that knows that he has to identify and start many talented YOUNGER players if he wants to have them ready in four years and that he has to say goodby to older players to do this. BB is not the right guy for the USA. He will not take chances and while he's run a large number of players through his system, few younger players are used in games that matter. He would rather run Pablo or Frankie out then give an Edu or Wynne a start. He has Torres, who is the best prospect I've seen for the US since a young Reyna, and he can only get 10 minutes in a game we had won? Why? Even Altadore has struggled to get starts though his last two outings should have fixed that. Meanwhile he sticks with a living fossel, Beasley who clearly isn't cutting it and I'm guessing he'll be called in for the next game too I'm sure many won't agree with this analysis but when we do zip at the next WC, start asking yourself why this is? It comes back to the coach, his team concept and the team he's putting together to execute his concept. It will get us nowhere and BB will be labeled a mistake
I'll agree to a point. An inclusive soccer system that offers soccer to anyone who wants to play will to a degree net us a few more Torreses and such, which would be a major boost to our system. Our current team benefits from guys like he and Altidore who might not have gotten into the system had this been 1998 or 2002. We're still nowhere near that goal, however. But the 2014 and 2018 teams with players like Gyau and Lleget and Renken most likely having a chance to make the senior squad, and guys like Torres, Altidore, and Adu likely becoming key members will tell the tale of just how successful we were. The biggest boost to the team, of course, was in having the entire senior program, plus the U23 program and the vast majority of the U20s made up of full-time professional soccer players, plus the Bradenton Academy to offer something like a Euro-style academy system for a few elite-level players as esteemed by their 16th birthday. Of course, a lot of players fall through those cracks and not every player that looks like a world-beater at that age is indeed a world-beater at age 26. But, having that system in place has given us guys like Donovan, Beasley, Dempsey, etc. I still say, however, that in order to cross the final hump, we do need to become a soccer nation. We do not need soccer to displace the big 3 (football, baseball, basketball), but soccer does need to be a "big 5" sport I think, for a number of reasons. I have no idea just how far off the stated goal of a WC championship caliber team we really are in terms of years, but looking ahead at the amount of talent we're likely to have in 2014 and then just using recent history and a gut feel for the trends as a guide, I do believe that if we're named the host in 2022, we have a strong likelihood of going deep in that tournament. I'm not going to predict at this time that we'll be one of the favorites, but making the quarters or semis in a tournament we host in 3 more cycles looks like a very realistic goal at this time. Overall, Project 2010 is probably about 12 years behind schedule, IMO.
My memory sucks much of the time, but I'm pretty sure Dempsey was completely outside 'the system'. Checking wiki on him, he went to Furman. While I do think the things we have in place have helped, I'm completely there with Appoo, though I haven't watched the teams myself yet. Having an entire set of dozens of teams developing talent and playing against each other -- top-level teams -- will produce a lot more depth and it's a lot more likely to give us a full team of top-level talent. I think we could be surprised how quickly this produces another boost. Think about what we got with Bradenton. Along with a lucky draw, it gave us 2002. Less than 10 years. So it's really easy to imagine us having a very good team, potentially Cup-winning (if we get a lucky draw), in 2018. And definitely if we host in 2022. And the way Mexico's youth system is sucking, even if Mexico hosts in 2022.
National teams don't rebuild. It is neither the mission of the national team(any national team, not just the USA) to do player development nor Bradley's job to do so. The clubs are responsible for that.
I did a review of college, Bradenton, and the national team last summer. Bradenton helps, but a U-20 World Cup appearance was a better indicator (Dempsey made the U-20 team.) We're a huge country, so it's not surprising that we continually have guys appear from outside the a narrow system. Who could even describe Torres a year ago? As mentioned above, we'll abet the youth movement with more training and a wider net.
not attainable, definitely not. usmnt can win in the qualifiers, but too many holes in the starting line up to beat wc teams. dmb has not been playing on a regular basis, yet bb will start him even if that continues into next year. he should not be even considered for a spot unless he is playing week in and week out. mb is a youngster still, with potential, but loads to learn. young age to have such a prominent role. gooch/boca, though experienced, are not playing in the best leagues. i could give more examples, but prefer to say success would be getting through first round.
Project 2010 was unattainable when it was first conceived, and it still is today. We can throw as much money at the problems as we want. The issue is the infrastructure at the youth levels isn't there yet...........at all. It's going to take generations until we've got the coaching across this country that's up to the levels in Europe and South America. And not the 15-17 year old level that the Bradenton/Academy program targets. Most European and South American talent scouts agree that the 12-13 age group is the most pivotal in player development. We're so far behind that it's laughable to suggest we'd come close to the 2018 world cup. And it's nobody's fault..........you can't just snap your fingers and all of a sudden have a world-class soccer culture throughout the country. The USSF has made strides that seemed impossible when I started following US soccer around 1990. We're just not close to being there yet. Our next best chance to win the world cup will be when we host it. Possibly 2022.
Well the K League was founded in 1994 and South Korea made the semifinals of the World Cup in 2002. I don't know much about South Korean soccer, but I think they only have 15 teams and no academy structure (verification anyone?). Thus, I think that the next World Cup that the U.S. hosts will give them a very legit shot at the semifinals...but the finals are almost ALWAYS the big soccer nations.
If the officiating is as bad as it was in 2002, maybe...it really worked out in S Korea's favor. Then again, if the handball would have been called out on Torsten Frings in 2002, there might have been a good chance that the US made the semi instead of being elimiinated by Germany.
We are definitely not viable options, and really 8 to 10 teams is a stretch. Throw in the Big 4 of Italy/Germany/Argentina/Brazil, who have collectively won all of the World Cups not won by hosts, save one. Then throw in Spain, which is a definite contender, and perhaps the other past winners of England and France (leaving out Uruguay), but even Spain/England/France are bad choices, as European sides have never won it outside of Europe. In most years you would consider the host side, but South Africa is terrible. Maybe you'd substitute in a big African side in their place like Ghana or Ivory Coast or Cameroon (though the latter might not even qualify since they lost their opener - Africa's process is so brutal that a loss in your opener makes it really hard to make it back in, as sad as that sounds). But to get to even 8 let alone 10 is a real stretch.
1. Our team is quite young. 2. Look at the average age of past champions. I think you'll find a good blend of youth and experience is a pretty solid way to go. Chill.
I agree. IMO all the African nations taking part in the next World Cup will have HUGE support. I think the absolute ceiling for this current U.S. team is the quarterfinals in 2010.
i think we agree, there are about 8-10 nations who can win a world cup right now... brasil argentina italy spain holland germany portugal france england after that, it gets problematic... what african side would you put there... croatia, serbia types... on a good day they can beat a top etam, but beating 4 of them.. as to south korea, the pro south korea reffing was either a complete fix, OR terrible reffing in the elimination phase... suspect the koreans only attending their matches kept them getting the "good" calls
I think you can scratch Portugal of that list....and France for that matter. If we are talking about "right now", these two teams would need a ton of luck to go along with all their talent due to their horrible tactics and management currently being implimented if they want to win anything today. I would say the same thing about Loew and Germany but they usually are able to step up to the plate when it actually counts - not always, but usually.