Welcome a new USWNT era, our coach for this next cycle will be Vlatko Andonovski!! https://www.espn.com/soccer/united-...donovski-to-replace-jill-ellis-as-uswnt-coach
So, as we had supposed earlier, they were just waiting for him to finish his season with Seattle Reign FC to announce the news: as soon as the Reign were beaten in the NWSL semifinal, the name has been officially disclosed.
Graham Hays wrote an excellent profile on Vlatko Andonovski for ESPN. I enjoyed, too, reading about his background, growing up in North Macedonia - and that's the first time I've ever typed that because it's from a part of the former Yugoslavia which was just called Macedonia then, as long as you knew to distinguish that from the part of Greece called Macedonia. And if I confused you, believe me, I'm still a little confused and I also couldn't tell you which Macedonia Alexander the Great was from...
I believe I will reserve all judgement until he does something national team related. Club coaching and national team "coaching": have very very little relationship. Club coaching is about coaching and teaching a "system" to selected players while on the national team side it is about selecting players and figuring out a system that will allow them to shine. Trying to fit players into a preconceived system is doomed to failure, see Berhalter for an obvious example. To say it another way: Club coaching is coaching while national team "coaching" is managing. With the women's side there is a bit more "coaching" that there is on the men's due to having, often, a bit more time. But there is still very little coaching that can really been done. We will just have to wait and see how the new "coach" "manages."
Yes, but he's shown a lot of ability to adapt, for instance to all the injuries the Reign suffered this year. Also, see what Megan Rapinoe had to say about his tactical acumen in Graham Hays article on ESPN.
The whole argument revolves mainly around the origins of Alexander the Great. The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (aka FYROM) is known as Skopje in Greece. In fact, many Greeks, even with the name change to Northern Macedonia, still don't use that name but refer to FYROM as Skopje. The people who live in Skopje are actually of slavic descent, whereas Alexander the Great was of Greek descent when Greece was just city-states. The Greeks feel that Skopje has been trying to usurp their traditions, by claiming that they (the Skopjans) are descendants of Alexander the Great. The Greeks also believe that there was a lot of politics involved with the creation of FYROM and the naming to Macedonia. History clearly shows that Alexander was of Greek descent. He is known to have united the Greek city-states and led the Corinthian league and eventually conquered the then known world. Just a few tidbits to chew on.
Adapting at the club level and showing "tactical acumen" at the club level has almost no relationship to the national team. While it is the same game it is not the same in most other ways. There are plenty of examples where great club coaches proved to be pretty horrible with national teams and there have even been average club coaches the moved to a national team and did quite well. I just am trying to say that until he actually handles some matches and player selections we will know nothing about his real abilities. In fact we will know almost nothing until he manages national team matches in meaningful matches and that will not happen until the Olympics. The qualifiers are not going to be a real test due to the awful nature of the competition. I doubt that anyone will get within four goals regardless of coaching except maybe Canada and by the time we play them we, and they, will, probably, already be qualified.
But the Sweden match is just a friendly and therefor really meaningless. Again, in spite of they being somewhat meaningful the qualifiers are only slightly more meaningful due to the teams, except maybe Canada, being so horrible. It is only in the Olympics where we will face a real test. Any matches before then do not matter except the qualifiers and, if we fail there, then he will have proven to be a failure as a national team manager.
To be honest, though, Ellis was still "proving" herself to a lot of fans up through the 2019 WWC championship.
Of course Ellis never really explained, in a convincing manner, her process so many "fans" did not understand what she was really trying to do in friendlies and other less than meaningful matches. Also the poor performance in the Olympics against Sweden and the subsequent necessary drooping of Hope Solo did not help anyone to believe in her abilities. It should be noted that I believe she should have been MUCH firmer in her handling of Solo and publicly denounced and banned her well before the USSF took action. In retrospect she clearly always had a vision and stuck to it and that resulted in the USWNT performing better than any women's national team ever has. We will be making a mistake if we try to judge the new coach by the standards Ellis set. We just need to see how he does and judge based on that.
It seems to me that he took himself out of consideration. I agree with the overall gist of this. I think Vlatko is a great coach, and I'm happy to see him as the next WNT coach. My only real reservation about him is that he has no international coaching experience, and NT coaching is a different kettle of fish, especially when we're talking the USWNT.
Interesting hire. Is he an outsider to the cabal at us soccer? Last time they did this, Sermanni didn't last long. I am excited, though reserved thanks to the skepticism surrounding us soccer as a whole.
He is an outsider, and imo that's a good thing. He'll have to last at least as long as Sermanni, I think, due to the timing of the Olympics. However, if the team crashes out early in the Olympics, I don't think he'll be able to stick around for the whole cycle.
Well he has to win some matches, even the friendlies. The early months are usually the hardest for a new coach, they have to show that they are progressing, otherwise things go south real quick. Apparently USWNT coaches are fired as quickly as a brushfire starting in California so they have that pressure to deal with.
That maybe true on the women's side but the men do not seem to get fired until they REALLY fail. If turnover was quick and based on incompetence shown then Berhalter would have been gone months ago. I guess it could be that the women are expected to succeed while the men are expected to fail so under performance on the women's side is not expected and therefore that manager's fault.
It's not true on the women's side either. The only early fire was Sermanni. That's hardly enough to say there's a pattern. Every other USWNT coach has had at least a few years in the job and at least 1 major tournament (unless we count Mike Ryan, the very first coach, but that would be ridiculous; Greg Ryan would be the only USWNT coach who only had 1 major tournament and not 2 or 3, but his notorious fail was enough to see him out.) The job does come with high expectations though. But a new coach knows that coming in. No one would accept the job without realizing what the expectation is and believing that you can handle the pressure. EDIT: Whoops, Dorrance also only had one major tournament, but he also obviously wasn't fired because he failed.
Interesting comments on Twitter from Anthony Dicicco (Tony Dicicco's son): "...Learn from Tom, the staff hirings are going to be CRITICAL! If Vlatko surrounds himself with GREAT people who compliment [sic] his weaknesses, he’ll be successful. Jill did this! If he hires people he’s “comfortable” with or bc they worked with him in KC or with Reign, he’s setting himself up. Won’t be good enough." I've never seen that take on staff being one of the reasons Sermanni failed. However, I would agree that staff hirings are crucial. Hopefully, Vlatko knows his weaknesses, and can hire staff that complement him. I also am still hoping that Dawn Scott sticks around.
Jill Ellis has an elite staff, I think that's honestly what saved her in some moments. Vlatko should already know this.
That would be completely unfair, considering the date of his hire and the fact that Ellis crashed out of the Olympics and retained her spot (yeah, I get that she had already won the previous WWC, but still the way she crashed out was ugly). Gotta give the man at least one cycle.