U20s vs. Italy, Oct. 9, 2025 (Pre-/PBP/Post-Match Thread)

Noel Buck looked really good 2 years ago and since then has played less than 900 total minutes in the last two seasons. He's one I thought had the talent to hack it in MLS, and I know there have been some fitness issues, but he's also at San Jose now. Arena will not play a kid unless they're absolutely better than their competition, and the midfield there is actually decent.

 

I doubt Habrone will ever be as good as Tsakiris is today. In a year Tsakiris will play in either Italy or BL. Maybe in 4 months.

 

The only thing I could think of is if you lose a challenge, you lose a sub. If you're out of subs, one of your players must be sent off. I think that's a sufficient penalty to ensure that only "clear and obvious" errors are corrected while also providing a harsh enough penalty for missing a challenge that teams won't just use it as a de-facto timeout.

 

He still might, but Arena was the one who was playing Buck in NE, and it seems that he likes him way less now. I, personally, always thought that he scored some fluky goals back then and also got some unbelievable hype as 5 goals 1 assist in 2600 minutes is nothing to write home about whether a player is 28 or 18.

 

In Buck's first run in NE, it wasn't really about goals or assists. He was absolutely bossing the midfield. Defending well, generating turnovers, distributing, just controlling. I watched 3-4 matches and he was the best midfielder on the field most of those games. He was also playing as an 8 for a decent portion and not really contributing directly in goals and assists.

He got moved forward as other guys got hurt and others came back and ended up playing some winger almost towards the end of the run -- I think that's where some of that goal production came from.

Then he got hurt, came back ... and wasn't the same level of dominant. Just looked like he was holding his own versus controlling. That's not something I expected to be a small sample size.

When Paxton Pomykal went down, you could see how the constant injuries basically obliterated his ability to perform. A big strength of his was his constant motor, and basically having to pace himself killed his game.

Buck never looked as confident or as active when he came back. But one minor injury shouldn't do that.

 

I was wondering what the hell was causing them to repeatedly say Delaware and Oklahoma about the game.

 

It shouldn't. I suspect if not his goals he wouldn't be even noticed, just another young deep playing midfielder doing well for half a season. Vargas, Edelman, Morris, Berhalter, Atencio, Leyva, etc. Some progressing, some not.
Pomykal was destroyed by presistent injuries. There is something wrong with poor kid's body. JOB like. Not Buck's case.

 

Pomykal, the best American player in a U20 WC with Dest, Weah, McKenzie and Richards. That just shows you how much development there is left to do at 20.

 

To be fair, Pomykal suffered an ACL injury that basically just derailed his career.

 

If it was just one ACL injury, he'd be okay. He's had one serious injury after another.

I've actually lost count of all his surgeries

 

Stuttgart, IIRC.

 

Meh.

He's not ready, but he starts in MLS, so he kind of earned it.

Also not playing his best position, to be fair.

 

2004 is actually looking pretty good: Freeman, Brady, Sullivan, Wolff, Wiley, Downs, Slonina, Yapi, Craig. There's talent there for sure.

2003 I think is doing alright. As well as we hoped? Not yet, but I'm not complaining about a year that has produced Pepi, McGlynn, Gutierrez, Luna, Paredes, Neal, etc. There's some players there.

Funny enough, 2005 and 2006 are the years that are looking quite weak, despite this team having a good World Cup so far. 2001 too, although we kind of rallied in 2001 by recruiting Balogun and Johnny (to go along with Tessmann, Morris, Arfsten).

 

Not to take away from your overall point, but Oregel wasn't a release issue. He wasn't selected. Mitrovic simply preferred Corcoran.

 

I disagree with this.

I think this viewpoint is how players like Campbell get overrated. They assume that because he dominates against a bunch of future bankers and plumbers that what he's doing is extremely impressive. No, that's just what you gotta do if you're an eventual pro playing against 95+% of the competition who aren't going to be that. The players who play in the USA did that too. It happens everywhere. It's not to say the U-19 level in Germany isn't higher. It definitely is higher, but it's not like the gap between Bundesliga A and MLS.

Why? Because the way they acquire talent is different. Bundesliga acquires some of the best players in the world because it's a top 4 league in the world and clubs quite literally just buy good players from other leagues with money. It doesn't really work that way at youth level. There's only a certain amount of quality talent in Munich or Berlin or Hamburg you can pull from. That's more than in LA or New York or Chicago, but all club youth teams everywhere are generally bad and generally have a bunch of bad players that get regular minutes who will not amount to pros. You can't just spend 20M because Luca Schmidt, some fictitious and hypothetical 2008-born RB for Leverkusen's U-18's, is having a bad season and struggling defensively.

 

Berhalter is the first coach that fielded a full euro team for a WC game. Hence, he was very active going after dual-nats players.
With Poch this trend is being reverted somewhat.
In the past, our senior teams had very few promotions from the prior U20 WC team, except for the 2022 team because we cleaned house after the 2018 debacle.
I expect no more than 3 of this U20 class to become regular participants for the senior team after the WC.
My guess is Kochen, Banks, Wynder, Raines, Cremaschi and Gozo, have the best chances.

 

There have been multiple players showing well in this tournament but I am very impressed with Cremaschi. Imagine what he'll be in the next cycle and the following. I'm getting MB vibes with better attacking.

 

Agreed.

 

I think this Nat. team is beyond the MB prototypical player.
Cremaschi is ok. He tried out for Argentina, and they told him to continue to work in the US. The kid has average speed, but he is a hustler. He has a chance to be contributor for the senior team, but he needs to improve a bit more.

 

Vargas, Buck and the other guy chose which countries to represent because of "the political climate"?

 

I'm waiting a bit based on the fact that scuffed mentioned him as being a prospect they were excited about before the qualifying tournament, and who was horrid in that, before looking much better since, so I just want to see more sample size if he sucked in the qualifiers. I don't know anything about him, so I'm not judging yay or nay, just waiting.

 

I've seen enough flashes with Habroune to be interested, I just don't know anything beyond some nice flash plays and goals here and there, so I can't really speak to him, but I'm definitely more on the exited than "out" side of things w/him.

 

Vargas could choose Alaskan NT. Are there any talented kids in Alberta that would play for us?

 

It's a bit of a weird team, because the number of high-end prospects isn't huge, but the MLS experience (with so many guys with 20-70 first team games under their belts) has come through.