I would have called him up to be the alternative to McGuire, if no premium over-age like Sargent were going to be released. But Cowell was a pretty controversial suggestion beforehand. You had a lot of people incredulous he shouldn't be selected because of his club play the last couple yrs & the lack of technical ability.
Thank you. One of my opinions that gets constant pushback from everyone is that the US' fanbase's expectations are wildly out of whack due to what is a toxic combination of American exceptionalism and a fundamental lack of understanding of really anything to do with international soccer. Every loss is the same. People screaming they are embarrassed. Someone literally wrote that US Soccer "doesn't care about them" because we lost, which is such a ridiculous statement on so many levels I don't know where to start. Someone else is calling for Cone to resign because we lost in the quarterfinals of a U23 tournament with a B team to a pretty good team. All across reddit and others, people are calling to "burn everything down" because of, again, a quarterfinal U23 loss in a tournament no one previously cared about. There's like seven pay to play threads on reddit. There's about 500 comments immediately falling back on population calculations. I don't understand how this loss changes the perspective on any of these? Aren't some of you exhausted? Brazil once lost 7-1 to Germany in a HOME World Cup. Losses happen to every nation, and nations far more accomplished at this than ours. As you note, this wasn't our best team. Even with our best team, we might not beat a very good Morocco team, but the game would look different. More importantly ... it doesn't change anything. It's a single game, and no the desperate attempts to find parallels that don't make sense don't do much for me. (I saw a post claiming the player selection and game was very much like the Netherlands match -- I mean, no. A McGlynn, DM, Tessman midfield doesn't resemble MMA at all, in any way. The defensive play was beyond different. The way the game played out as well.) But we have to make everything a crisis. The most embarrassing thing in this thread is a bunch of 40 and 50 year olds getting wildly upset over a U23 loss. * Please note that none of this applies to game analysis or things like criticizing Marko's choices or gameplan. That's just talking sports. But it's one game with a B U23 team. In a tourney where we made the quarters after missing the tourney for decades. I don't know what trend people are talking about with development.
I actually agree w/you, I think anyone who isn't incensed would agree, and I am incensed and I agree. This team played Spain and Paraguay, regional winners, and a Finalist (in Conmebol qualifying and UEFA qualifying: Spain lost their final to England) in tune ups and beat both. They played France fairly well in a friendly and even the opener before the finishing differences and goal keeping made it look uglier. All true. There is either a problem with mentality to some extent, or we just have small sample size examples of mentality in '89, '90, '94, '95, '02, '06 vs Italy, '09, '10, '14, which make these guys seem weaker. Its small sample size but prior generations did claw out results in games that mattered and usually played above their talent level. Again, maybe that's just randomness, and noise, that would have evened out with more games rather than tournament vividness bias moments, who knows, but it did actually happen those 9 times, and in the aughts and nineties when Mexico was actually better but we either owned them (aughts mostly) or drew even w/them despite being inferior (much of the 90s). I also need to note a good chunk of this is draw. Yeah we got France, but we also got easily the worst team out of Pot 2 (comically overseeded New Zealand), and easily one of the worst Pot 4 teams (Guinea, who finished 4th in CAF qualifiers, and beat a crap AFC team 1-0 to qualify in a playoff). That's why we advanced. Do we advance in an actual tough group? Maybe. But just as easily, maybe not. We got the best options possible out of the Pot 3 and Pot 4 draws in a near duplicate of the Copa America draw from last December. When that happens you absolutely should advance, and probably handily (New Zealand sucks, Guinea is totally erratic, and were missing their captain and #1 overage player). So, yeah, agreed, I think what we're seeing is the rising tide lifting the floor of the program with more and more talented B/C teams, and youth teams, but we're not seeing the ceiling rise AT ALL. The senior team is losing to the same old teams it always did (and sometimes actually beat) and occasionally vomiting against crap (T&T in November, Jamaica in March, Panama in June), and the youth teams are doing the same, running into brick walls at the QF level of the U20's and earlier with the U17's. The good news is they are consistently raising the floor, no more missed tourney's like a decade ago, but the bad news is, the against the great tough as nails wins aren't happenng in big moments anymore, and the ceiling hasn't moved an inch despite the pool seemingly getting so much deeper and at least somewhat seriously better (certainly than the '06-'16 era if not the '94-'04 era). I think that's probably the source of some frustration, 6 straight QF losses at the U20 WC, no deep runs at the U17 level since '99 other than '17, U23 level we're either a total embarrassment ('12, '16, '21) or lose to any good team we play ('24 version). And on top of that, plenty of evidence that the only reason we made the QF's, is because we didn't have to play anyone of consequence in the group stage other than France. We had no chance of advancing if we'd been draw in Group B, and probably would have really struggled to qualify out of Group D. We couldn't have been drawn in C with Dominican Republic (who acquitted themselves quite well, not being the punching bag expected).
And where does the idea that any team is past getting blown out? Especially a U23 B team? Brazil lost in a HOME WORLD CUP 7-1. And they are the most successful program of all time. That team was not a bad team. No program is ever past getting stomped on once in a while.
because those of us in that age range haven't seen a big non Mexico win in going on twenty years. You can't just argue this defeat in isolation. In addition, not only have we not had any big non Mexico wins, we've had several humiliating, non competitive defeats whenever we dip our toes into the deep end of world football. So yea, there's more to it than you're saying. Nobody is saying this is a huge set back. I think a lot of people are saying it's typical of the product we've put on the field at any level the last 20 years.
I agree but we are also struggling mightily to get releases for players even at the U20 level (Guti being so consistently blocked he may end up going with Mexico eventually having missed most U20 and U23 camps and both tournaments). It's a huge problem. We are flooding the zone with enough talent to get by at the U20 level but I'm not sold we would at the U23 because at that point in qualifying the guys will be at a level that neither European or Domestic clubs will release them and we end up with a frankenstein team like March '21 for the Japan Olympics).
Right, it also indicates just a general lack of depth which people dislike. It's not like this is a big setback or even a setback at all, overall it was a mildly positive tourney imo, but it's just disappointing. Like forever coming home and seeing half the beer drank by your roomate. Eventually you'd like to just have a full fridge.
Totally agreed. I raised my eyebrows nearly off my skull when I saw that lineup waking up bleary eyed (I'm on pacific time). That was an invitation to be overrun, but, to me, McGlynn didn't compromise the roster build the way Mihailovic did. Mihailovic's inclusion ripped an overage slot, ripped the possibility of a competent overage RB, and ripped off a potential Luna (though I believe Luna was never making it after he decided to rest rather than go to the France/Guinea friendlies camp in March).
I don't think Tolkin is "it" unless his poor game today was more fatigue than anything. He was horrific today and his great games in this were against total garbage opposition.
I know all this, but sports casuals watching this, aren't necessarily going to be picking up on those nuances. If the women do well, like in '99 after the '98 debacle, it will provide a touch of cover, otoh, it could also provide a lot of opportunities to people who hate soccer to crap on the "pathetic mens team," we'll see. But I do think the women doing well and playing beautifully will help to some extent to push aside arguments that we simply "can't do soccer".
What are you expecting exactly? A lot of USMNT fans expectations for the program seem out of whack with reality to me.
He’s also been not great in terms of club play (though went on a tear right after missing the roster).
This coach has his biases, and Cowell was not good in MLS, or in Mexico until the past month in his club seasons. Personally I would have taken Cowell, and Luna, and not taken Mihailovic to begin with (or Booth or McGuire).
I think that we're simply in the early stages of a transition, and part of the keep on keeping on is continuing to drive a cohesive identity. I don't think that identity needs to be as specific as some of the things we've had, but the lack of a real identity is part of the reason why we struggle to be cohesive. The whole reason Crocker was hired was because the England DNA project he headed results in multiple Youth WC wins and a senior team that suddenly is making finals. While certainly much of that has to do with individual player development at clubs, there certainly seems to be a strong possibility that driving to certain expectations and consistent style of play allows for stronger cohesion and plug and play in national teams. I think there's two key structural things that are going on: The standards we are attempting to set are high enough that we simply don't have a full pool across age groups that can do it all. This leads to coaches making harder choices than England's coaches need to make -- and we consistently see our youth coaching making the choice for skill over athleticism and that's even occurred now post-Qatar at the senior level in many cases. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing. You want to set a certain standard of skill set for players to work towards. Continuing to select and play with only athleticism, grit and defense does not ever move the needle or influence how kids and youth coaches play and coach. I think the other thing that is going to be really curious is that the current US teams do NOT reflect the comments that Crocker made about style of play right now. I don't know if the US DNA is done, but according to what he said at hiring, we're supposed to be aggressive, proactive, able to defend in space, and able to control the game with possession but move decisively when an opportunity opens up. Nothing from Berhalter's Copa America CB selection to this team screams that. So is that not implemented or done? Is there such a big gap in the pool? Will there be more of an overhaul? Lastly, with this team ... Marko made his bed with some questionable roster choices that everyone saw and disagreed with. The Mihailovic and the only-one-RB clearly came back to bite us. Some of this is simply on that. Those don't seem like systematic things so much as simply bad choices.
I think the ceiling is rising but it’s taking longer than what we all have patience for. We have players in some of the best leagues at bigger clubs than previous generations would have dreamed of and it’s not by accident because our players are talented The issue in the usmnt currently is that most of the team are all still in the talent stages of their career. They’re still rising players who have not peaked and are not in their primes. In order to be a top performing national team, we need numerous players who are not just a player on a big club’s roster, but a focal point for the team. Landon Donovan may not have hit the highs in Europe that we wanted him to, but if he wasn’t in the team there was a notable drop off in that teams performance. How many of our current player pool can we say that about? Pulisic and maybe Antonee Robinson? As more players start to reach their prime aged years we will start to see key pieces of the usmnt take on larger responsibilities within their clubs which will make a major impact for the usmnt. Right now the usmnt still plays and looks like a young team and we need a good number of players to take the next steps in their careers and really become high performers within their clubs which will translate to the usmnt
Okay but why are you focused on the opinions of a few crazy people? Yes some people have unreasonable expectations, and yes the best teams lose and even get blown out sometimes, but the US men haven't really punched above their weight at any level since the U-20s vs France in 2019... that was half a decade ago. There is a trend in this US program right now and it is that we have not been able to beat better teams in tournament games. It hasn't happened since our U20s beat France at the U20 World Cup in 2019. We have to find a way to start punching above our weight every now and then There is a trend in this 🇺🇸 program right now and it is that we have not been able to beat better teams in tournament games. It hasn't happened since our U20s beat France at the U20 World Cup in 2019.We have to find a way to start punching above our weight every now and then— Marcus Chairez (@chai_asc) August 2, 2024 We know the player pool's talent level is improving. Also you can't really change that (aside from winning even more recruiting battles eg Amir Richardson, Obed Vargas, Esmir, Buck, etc. etc. and doing a better job with talent evaluation, player selection, roster construction)... but the one thing that you can improve is the coaching, by hiring better coaches. And that ties back into the other stuff mentioned above as well. If anything the "beating better teams" thing seems to be happening even less over the last half decade than it had before? See above.
People underestimate the value of professionals in their prime age 26-32 or so. Which the usmnt has had very few of since 2018. People have been placing ridiculous expectations on teams made up almost entirely of 18-23 year olds. Just now guys like Pulisic are at the cusp of that more middle aged professional range.
Yeah a first choice Olympic team looks something like this 1. Slonina 2. Schulte 3. Lund 4. Scally 5. Reynolds 6. Ream 7. Richards 8. Neal 9. Tessmann 10. Cardoso 11. Musah 12. Busio 13. Tillman 14. Reyna 15. Parades 16. Pulisic 17. Pepi 18. Balogun Not counting the centerbacks who are fairly interchangeable and Lund who I don’t think there’s a huge gap with between him and Tolkin, we have about five players who were on our Olympic team who would have made a best choice team (Tessmann, Busio, Parades, Slonina, and Schulte). Neal probably also doesn’t count as I think he’s one of our best 18 but was a coach pick not to take him.
Good points all. My only quibble is that when I refer to ceilings, I'm referring to the tournaments. There's really nothing about WC '22 that was better than any previous WC. People pointed to an athletic article talking about possession and field tilt and what not and how things had changed radically but noone seemed to mention that all of that control and possession still contributed next to nothing in the attack, we were absolute garbage at generating chances and xG in the tournament. Despite revolutionizing the game in terms of possession at WC '22 which did happen, we weren't anymore dangerous than previously (which also happened), the team was outshot by vastly inferior in talent, and generally out SOG'd by vastly inferior talent in I believe 3 of 3 and 2 of 3 previous WC's if memory serves. That is beyond absurd when you realize the attacking talent available in '22, versus the detritus we rolled out in '14 and '10 (take a look at the strikers alone in '10 and '14 after Altidore and after Altidore went down respectively and THEY outshot us). When you look at tournament play, we were the usual or worse (the usual in the group stage, worse in the knockouts in '22). and at the youth level, while I love that the U20's have turned into a quarterfinal qualifying machine, they've still run into brick walls against Uruguay, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Serbia the past 4 tournaments just like they did against Austria and Argentina in '03 and '07. They aren't knocking down doors, other than that fantastic performance against France at the U20 WC the summer of '19. They're still hitting brick walls in the Quarters at the U20 level, and in the group stage or early in knockouts at the U17 level. That's what I mean in ceiling. No major noticeable movement. Just like '09 at Confed Cup was a one offer, so was beating Brazil and a mega Uruguay team in '07 behind Altidore, Bradley, Szetela and Adu (the Austria loss was basically the product of an injured goalie and bad playing surface weather as much as anything, the losses to Venezuela and Ecuador in '17, '19 and then Uruguay last summer were games like today where we were clearly and vastly inferior).
Of course, the last win we had in the Olympics was over Kuwait in Sydney. In 2000. I know we're the big bad US, but there's probably something to be acknowledged that we haven't made the Olympics since 2008, and haven't made it out of the group in a quarter century. It's a youth tourney, and the most erratic, weird one, because U23 is, let's face it, not really youth players. It's a slightly young B squad tourney to start ... and we send a B squad version of that. It's fun. I like watching the US play soccer. But youth results are at best long term indicators in mass aggregate. Individual results are completely irrelevant to bigger process discussions. And U23 results are just ... eh. If we miss a bunch of U20 tourneys with an A team, then I think it can be a red flag.
But if the coaches make bad decisions that is a pretty big deal. We're not some soccer superpower where we can go deep in tournaments despite making crappy coaching decisions at every step of the process from talent evaluation to dual nat recruiting to player selection to roster construction to lineups formations tactics substitutions etc.
Ya, that Ghana team, and their fans btw, permanently took a slice off the top of my soccer enjoyment that will never be restored.
it wasn't our A U23 either, key players were not released by their club. 3 usual starters and some good subs.