Dammit, I really wanted to win this one. I really felt that we were good enough to get a result today. Dammit. We're ready to make a real run at this, folks. We have some weaknesses, yes (and those guys actually held up their end of the bargain for the most part today), but we have the talent to win games. Multiple games. With some fortune, maybe a lot of games. They've bought in to what Mauricio has sold them.
Umm…they went toe to toe with Germany. Heard of them? They’re pretty deep. And so are we. That’s the praise. Our massive drop off from 7-8 plus hiding 2-3 has gone to “this is our 11…we’re bringing it..and there’s more where we come from”. If you’re not excited about that…I don’t know what to tell you
The problem is Conmebol refs (this was one), and Concacrap refs let fouls go uncalled, and do not punish violence with appropriate cards until it's too late and a game is out of control. That's what happened here. He didn't set the tone early on fouls, and as a result, players got more and more reckless, and agitated and prone to dangerous fouls.... It's one of the reasons I've been waiting to find out ref assignments because in general, Conmebol and Concacrap refs are inherently bad for us now that the vast bulk of our team is used to UEFA refs who punish this sort of insanity unlike refs form our and the South American continent.
Might be better in some ways to fight, but make a few too many mistakes and lose, than fight, make a few too many mistakes and win. Makes the players more thoughtful and probably hungrier going in. I liked the performance, and the "one to grow on," lol quality of it. Players will learn from this, hopefully like they learned from the 0-2 loss to the Dutch 24 years ago.
We have scored some great goals vs Germany. Dempsey had one, Pulisic a year or two ago, and Jedi today. Just a shame that Robinson worldie was in a loss.
Just glad we didn't get shelled in either friendly like the previous window. Yeah it doesn't count but it's not great going in with completely bad mojo. They should feel good enough about themselves that they can just focus on the games ahead of them now instead of having massive doubts.
You may be right. The team definitely knows that they can handle a team like Germany. I bet they'd love a re-match.
Remember that the final window before 2022 was absolute garbage, as well, and that tournament went ok.
Sounds a lot like a moral victory. I’m not sure what you were expecting. I didn’t see the intensity to get another goal, and other than Aaronson’s individual effort, I didn’t see much to get excited about offensively.
Decent enough have to get them ready. I still have reservations about Matt Freese, I would go with Matt Turner personally. We need to beat Paraguay period.
That's the game I saw. The reality is that we got a bit lucky with Robinson's shot -- great skill, but we know the %s on that suck. In another game where we don't get that, we're lamenting that their (backup?) keeper is better than ours and that they had that moment of brilliance we couldn't replicate with Havertz's perfect one touch entry pass. (And we'll ignore that Miles' block of the ball is probably why Freese doesn't get to it.) It's close ... but it's also the gap between Germany and us. We can make those plays, but not at the rate that Germany pounces on them.
Is it? Chicago didn't want to pay tens of millions to get FIFA rich? Oh know, what a miss by the city!
In a very rational way, what I hope to see is a team that really owns the game at least against Paraguay and Australia and wins both. We lock down these dumb defensive errors and overwhelm on offense. I want to see us outplay Turkiye even though you can argue they are the better team. I think we can. Once we make the knockouts, it's all team specific. But if we face a Germany-type ... I know it's going to come down to if we can be plus on the conversion and if our players can make the plays. I just want to see the team play well. If we just miss, I hate it in the moment, but I will be okay. Just don't lay any eggs because you are good enough now to get through the group if you do that.
We will never really know, but I am curious which approach actually is better leading up to the tournament. Playing tough teams like Senegal and Germany (4 goals scored, 4 conceded) or doing the South Korea approach and playing Trinidad & Tobago and El Salvador (6 goals scored, 0 conceded) I sure enjoyed watching the US play those tougher teams as a fan, so that is probably the right way to do it but who knows! Doesn’t feel like we learned too much in terms of how to beat Paraguay in a week but that is probably not a big deal considering they figured that out a few months ago.
This game felt similar to the final friendly in 2002, where we lost on the scoreboard but looked in no way inferior to the Netherlands.
Yeah, after the tournament is over, I’d be VERY interested learning if all host cities feel it was worth it, considering: FIFA keeps all the money from ticket sales FIFA keeps all the money from In stadium concession sales FIFA keeps all the money from In stadium parking Host cities keep all the money from fan spending in hotels and restaurants. But, host cities are completely responsible for transportation, security and Fan Fest costs. However, given the many reports about how there are FAR fewer hotel reservations than expected, I wonder how much money host cities will actually make?
Just watched a replay. That first Ger goal was such a simple pick play. We have to do better on that.
youre crazy if you think playing more concacaf crap teams would do anything for this team its actually the biggest difference between a germany and a usmnt you can just tell that the USMNT is simply not used to playing a team like Germany...so they try passes, dribbles and shots that have zero chance of being completed or successful......its simply a calibration problem. the stuff they get away with vs pot 2 and worse teams doesnt work.....they NEED more games against pot 1 teams!! germany gets them all the time in europe its an extremely unfair disadvantage to the USMNT that it came so late in the cycle that they finnaly got these tests...it should be a regular thing and what the hell was up with these refs this window??? biased for germany.....i watched the games in a bar with a fw germans and they agreed the ref was trash and didnt give the usa a fair shot...so weird that they would get such crap referring in a sendoff match at home for a wc