I was not aware of that. Thank you for the clarification. Regardless, my point is thus: Do MLS clubs have to develop their players the way that a national team coach tells them to? Doesn't logic follow that they would develop their players and play a style at the full team level that they think is in their best business interests?
Ok then you guys win. It is stupid to think that we should try and play a more ball to feet technical type of game with the senior team because the youth program does not emulate the senior team. We should continue to play hoof ball with the occasional counter or set piece and expect that the next gen will develop so we can play technical footy. He is leading the team and the program the problem is you do not agree with his methods. I just happen to believe his hardware out weighs your opinions. His results so far are fair to good and the trend is up so you have three choices , find another team, live with our current reality, or continue to tilt at windmills. Have a nice day.
The future (and some of the present actually) core of U.S. players came through MLS clubs and/or academies at some point. In the future they will mostly be coming through MLS academies. Bradenton and the youth national teams will be made up of MLS academy kids. Not the other way around. And MLS clubs don't have to do what the national team coach says. That's my point.
The senior national team should play whatever style/tactics gains maximum results. That's all. And IMO we didn't play hoofball to being with. We got outclassed in a few games against the world's best, but our style wasn't "hoofball".
Won our WCQ group. Currently tied for 2nd in the Hex on points. The 1st place team has played 2 home match we have only played 1.
My point had nothing to do with style of play, methods or results. The point was change only at the senior nats will not make a change in soccer culture. USSF's thought process was not "change the senior nats and all will follow." Klinsmann will be asked to contribute to program at all levels to affect change. Klinsmann has said himself it is necessary to change not only the youth NT's, but youth soccer in general in order to change the soccer culture.
And an objective analysis of his methodology leads to the conclusion that JK has decided the best way to facilitate that change is force that change at the senior level. While at thee same time advocating for it throughout all the youth levels, and putting his guys in place to facilitate that change. He aappears to have made a conscious decision to endure some short term herky jerky sputtering to help the process along.
By that metric, is he not successful? We just came off our best results year ever, and followed that up with only our second ever point in Azteca. Obviously that is not all, or there would not be nearly 300 pages of whining .
Fine if you want to say its the best way (I disagree, and that's not to say I have a problem with him forcing some change), but you said it's the only way. That's what I took issue with.
Oh, I'm not arguing current results at all. I'm just fine and dandy with our current point total. And if we continue to get the points I'm totally fine with that. However, I was hoping to have a clearer picture of where we were going after the past 2 games. I don't have that. But we have the points. So I'll have to wait longer to see more games.
I thought about that same thing yesterday when this discussion really got going. We were all denied any kind of analysis with the near blizzard and the rash of injuries. now we have to wait for two months for another peak and we are all already ready to jump through the computer and choke somebody. I was thinking the whole damned USMNT forum might end up on lockdown before the end of May.
They will still be part of the USSF Development Academy and follow the Technical Director's (Claudio Reyna) developed program. Why is any on this relevant? All the NTs are still going to pick players that fit the NT vision regardless of what style(s) their club teams play, just as it as always been.
I'm EXTREMELY happy to take the points. However, I also wish we could have better conditions in Denver, and a handful of those injured players available. Then we would have had a better idea of where the team is. Or rather, what JK's real master plan is. On the other hand, without those circumstances do we find out what we have potentially in guys like Besler and, to a lesser degree, Beasley? Maybe we don't. However, I didn't see us getting those 4 points through some new style of play that JK was trying to implement. Those points came through work ethic and defensive strength...which I'm totally fine with. IMO it's not what he was selling coming in, but I don't really care what he says anymore. I just want us to play in a way that gets maximum points.
Cool then and I misspoke if I said it was the only way. I meant to say that appears to JKs thinking on the matter. I personally would not have taken the crutches away. I would have tried to add to what we do best, counter and set pieces. I think that is a large part of why so many are frustrated. He has effectively sent those weapons on an extended leave. Leaving us to produce shots and goals through run of play and thus far it has not produced any consistent threat. Phonebooks and nutrition seminars notwithstanding, if it is going to work the players have to whole heartedly buy in and accept responsibility to make it happen.
Youth players will be following the training program implemented by MLS teams. Whatever time they get with the youth national teams will be a reward for their hard work at their clubs. Which was in place well before JK took over. The YOUTH teams should do that. Absolutely. The national team should pick the players that gain them maximum results. If that's 23 guys who play ugly football so be it. I'd rather win the world cup ugly then not qualify by playing joga bonito.
It is nearly impossible to play proactive (high-press, high-line, high-tempo) and absorb and counter at the same time. The 2 systems are almost 180 degrees apart. More important we are not very effective at absorb and counter without at minimum a full strength Landon Donovan. That was the real scary lesson that the GC2011 matches taught us. We needed to move away from absorb and counter anyway. CONCACAF has caught up to that tactical scheme and in some cases may even do it better than us due to faster effective wide players.
2010 cycle (complete): Hexagonal: 6W-2D-2L 20 pts 19 goals / 13 allowed 1st Place. Prior Round: 5W-0D-1L 15 pts 14 goals / 3 allowed 1st Place. Combined: 11W-2D-3L 35 pts 33 goals / 16 allowed. Per Game: 2.2 pts 2.06 goals / 1.0 allowed. 1st Place twice. 2014 cycle (incomplete): Hexagonal: 1W-1D-1L 4 pts 2 goals / 2 allowed 2nd Place. Prior Round: 4W-1D-1L 13 pts 11 goals / 6 allowed 1st Place. Combined: 5W-2D-2L 17 pts 13 goals / 8 allowed. Per Game: 1.9 pts 1.44 goals / 0.88 allowed. 1st Place once and currently 2nd. The US is nearly matching last cycle's production. Fewer goals allowed per game (down 0.12), but also fewer goals scored per game (down 0.62). Also, fewer match points per game (down 0.3) and slightly lagging in the standings. JK is statistically a fraction behind last cycle, but you can make a fair discount for the tougher early Hex matches and call it a rough tie at the moment. One can either look at the pure results of the meaningful matches and say JK is doing fine, almost identical to the last qualification cycle, which was very successful. Or one can say that for $2.5 million per year JK hasn't really done much of anything that hasn't been done before at a much lower cost. My view: Nothing in the results say fire the guy. But nothing in the results offer much praise, either. Just more of the same at a much higher cost. Pretty unremarkable all in all. Average.
One could argue either point depending on one's benchmark. They are certainly both reasonable points of view. I am certainly in the camp that say the USMNT need a scheme change/prep for a post LD world. BB realized that fact and started to make moves in that direction. I wish more gave him credit for that fact. As the old saying goes 'only Nixon could go to China', well BB would not have been allowed to do what JK can get away with. The fact that we are changing the scheme while getting similar results towards WC2014 is fine in my book
This. The style of play that the US national team employs will naturally evolve over time. And as you pointed out MLS academies are changing youth development in this country, and it WILL reflect in the senior national team eventually. There is absolutely no need (or logic) in trying to force the current player pool to play a style of play that they just flat out aren't suited to do. It benefits absolutely nobody.
Timeout. I thought that Denver game was a masterclass of dominant soccer. At least that is what quite a few around these parts want to believe. Oh, and it wasn't a "near" blizzard. It was a blizzard blizzard.
I think various persons (including you and I) have tried to assign domination to one team or the other. I think, we should all just be honest and say that there is very little that can be taken away.
I never said anyone dominated that game. Simply said that as soon as Costa Rica decided it needed to score, they controlled the game and were the more dangerous team. That really isn't a subject for much debate. That the US controlled possession early had more to do with Costa Rica sitting back and hoping to get a draw in farcical conditions than it had to do with US "dominating" as you tried to claim. As far as being honest, I believe that one of my first comments after the game was that the result really didn't change anything with regards to Klinsmanns tactical acumen because of the playing conditions.
For all the hate Klinsi/love Low fanboys, an interesting take from Stefan Bienkowski at the NYT soccer blog http://goal.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/...cess-might-be-bad-for-joachim-low/?ref=soccer
I have never understood the comparison between national teams and club sides. Aside from the rare occasion when a national team has a preponderance of players from a single club (Barca/Spain), nats and clubs are two different beasts that require a different coaching philosophy/strategy. To say that Low should be getting better results because Bayern and Dortmund are, is naive. Give him the players he wants for 5 steady months to train like a club and then make your comparisons.
This is such a retarded premise for an article. Of the 14 players who saw action against Juventus, 5 were German. The rest were foreign born. So about 33% of the team is even eligible to play for the German national team, yet somehow because a bunch of non-German players are dominating the Bundesliga, Jogi Lowe is in some sort of trouble?