News: USA draws Panama, Bolivia, and Uruguay at The Copa America

Why do people (including our own dumbass coach) keep speaking like this? Brazil is down right now. Colombia is up right now. Sure, Brazil may win its group. But they very well may not. At this point, it is a 50/50 decision on which team the US would rather play. This defeatist attitude about Brazil is perplexing to me ... or is it just disrespect of the current Colombian team? There is no reason for Berhalter or the fans to talk like this. Let's play the game/team in front of us, and stop making built-in excuses for failure. I always find it weird that our fanbase complains that we don't play enough good competition -- then, when we find ourselves in a situation to play good competition, we are begging to avoid any of it until the finals. It makes no sense.

 

Will Brazil have an actual coach in place by the time this tournament takes place?

 

Ancelotti might be available by then.

 

Worse team in SA

 

I’m looking forward to all the complaining about how physical CONMEBOL teams are and how lenient SA refs are from the bunch who have suggested we leave CONCACAF because of poor reffing. If people think T&T are physical, they’ve got something coming when they watch Bolivia and Uruguay play for their Copa lives. The only saving grace is that we are the home side and might get the usual home cooking from the refs.

 

Normally Bolivia is at least a little challenging to play in La Paz. This time they are really bad even at home.

 

There’s an argument that they’re the worst team in the tournament, unless T&T stuns Canada. I don’t think they’d be favored against Honduras on a neutral field.

 

success: win group, beat Colombia

anything else is gravy

 

Some were soft selling Uruguay a month ago, I mentioned back then that going into WC qualifying, I viewed Uruguay as every bit as good as Brazil and Argentina right now. They then backed me up by beating Argentina in Argentina a week later in a WC qualifier. I said similar things about Venezuela's chances for finally qualifying, they then backed me up with a draw at Brazil, and only 1 loss in their opening third of their qualification campaign. As for Brazil, it depends on how you measure it? Do you determined their form based on the present? Probably wise too. And they've sucked, there's no questioning that. On the other hand from '20-'22 they played an entire WC campaign without a loss? What should we take more seriously? They're superb form in '20-'22 qualifying, excellent form at the WC for the most part other than some brain dead defending in their group stage finale and quarterfinal matchup with Croatia? Or the recent run of crappy form, with the home draw vs Venezuela, home loss to Argentina, and road loss to Colombia? I can't tell you I know the answer. I just know our team, a squad that struggled to beat the worst T&T in eons at home, and then managed to lose on the road (due to a card), the squad that is back to struggling to turn possession into anything meaningful yet again under Berhalter, is not a match for Uruguay or Brazil, period, probably not Colombia too. I mentioned before the draw we needed to avoid Uruguay most of all, and Colombia too if we could be so lucky. We were not.

If we're going to do anything at all with this opportunity Berhalter is going to have to accomplish something he rarely has with these players (Weah being a nice exception): have them play as well and better than they typically do with their clubs. But I've largely never seen that happen, other than a touch in the spring of '22, and for a couple of halves at the world cup, and that England match. It's possible he manages it. The talent is there to make it happen, but I'm skeptical.

More than anything I wanted to avoid Uruguay. We didn't. It's all well and good that we drew heaven sent options from Pot 3 and Pot 4, that will make it largely inexcusable to struggle to advance to the knockouts. But Colombia or Brazil in the knockouts? I just don't see it, at all. I've seen the players show the talent to make that happen w/their clubs, and last summer with the linebackers coach, but under Berhalter? Not really, maybe the England match? But that's about it. It's a HUGE ask. I do believe they're capable of it, on a player basis, but I don't see it with Berhalter, at all. If nothing else, at least we get baby steps in the group stage to try and work through those issues. But that also might be a problem, if we get overconfident pounding Panama, or a terrible Bolivian side. We'll see, I want to be surprised, I yearn to be wrong about this, I hope desperately I am. If nothing else, its a legit challenge.

 

The scuttlebutt pre-draw was that we were going to play Uruguay in that second friendly… if we weren’t drawn together.

 

Elo rankings:
7 Uruguay
28 USA
29 Panama
59 Bolivia

 

Gonna be a preview of the quarters matchup in the likely scenario where we finish 2nd and Brazil 1st.

 

Let’s goooooo…….

Bold prediction…The crux of the tournament: Panama vs. Uruguay. Panama could win and get through. Or…Uruguay wins and subsequently goes on to win the tournament.

 

Of the two Uruguay has a lot more in the way of high end talent. They have a number of guys who play key roles for some of the best teams in the world. But we probably have more depth than they do.

With Columbia I think we arguably have a talent advantage compared to them.

And it’s true Brazil playing with an interim coach has not been at their best this far in qualifying. But the talent level on their team is obviously vastly superior to ours.

 

Could be. Probably will be but that's what everyone said when he played teams coached by Tata Martino and he did quite well. He actually has more trouble against lesser teams who play very defensive. the US has been on a decades long attempt to transition from a hard working defensive team that scores on counters and set pieces to a much more rounded team. That has led to the problem even the best teams have which is breaking down a team like we used to be while not giving up goals on .... counters and set pieces. We would have a hard time breaking down our old self. Against teams that are trying to boss the game we have much more room to operate and if MMA is healthy (a big if) the Uruguay type games are what it is made for. Destroy, hunt and let a few players try and score.

 

Are some people seriously saying if we lose to Urugay the coach should be fired? Who the hell would want to work for the USSF if they do that? Any reputable coach would see the USSF as delusional if they do that. Which, uhm, they won't.
We of course have a good chance to beat Urugay, but they are a damn good team and have more top end talent than us. They just beat Argentina in Argentina. WTH people.

 

Why are we so confident this team is going to beat Panama?

 

There is a segment of the soccer pop that reveres the ELO rankings. But, this right here is an example of why even these rankings are not necessarily trustworthy.

 

Panama will be a hard out, and I wouldn't be shocked by a draw in a tournament like this. Weird things also happen in soccer in any given match. However, I believe the thinking is that the US won't be sending a Gold Cup B/C team to this tournament, and the US will be playing Panama on home soil. That combination has proved routinely fruitful for the US. I tend to side with those who are a bit more confident and optimistic about this match.

 

In 2016 our most likely draw was Brazil in the quarterfinal.
We thought we'd finish 2nd in our group to Colombia and Brazil would win their group.

Then we won our group and Brazil failed to even advance. So all of the hand-wringing about facing Brazil was a waste of time.

Our quarterfinal opponent was Ecuador.

A) Shenanigans always happen at Copa America.

B) We're the 12th ranked team in the world. Enough with the inferiority complex. I totally agree.

Every single competition we've had under Berhalter, the haters come on here predicting imminent disaster. Berhalter will be fired if he doesn't win X or the team performs poorly in Y!!!! None of it actually happened. We won the 2021 Gold Cup. We won the 2021 Nations League. We qualified for the World Cup. We advanced to the round of 16 at the World Cup.

Psychologists would say that US soccer fans collectively have a "calamity thinking" mentality.
In other words, spending a lot of time wondering what the consequences of potential impending disaster will be............before anything actually happens. And of course, what happens in the real world is completely different, rendering all of the months of hand-wringing a complete waste of emotional energy.

 

Panama is a difficult opponent and has the potential to beat us.
The same can be said about virtually every team at this Copa America.

On home soil, against our "A" team in a game that matters........................The result has typically been a USMNT win.

Such as the 2022 WCQer that REALLY mattered. We had to win that game, and smoked 'em pretty good. 5-1. Pulisic hat-trick.

Yes, our "B" team just took their "A" team to penalites at the Gold Cup.

That game is completely irrelevant when analyzing this upcoming game. Cuz one expects only one player on the field that day for the USMNT may play in this one. Miles Robinson.

 

I like it when people agree with me.

 

No ranking system is going to perfectly represent the quality of every single team at every possible snapshot in time, but in terms of their general predictive capability, Elo has significantly outperformed FIFA's rankings in every study or analysis I've ever seen. (For that reason, FIFA seems to be constantly changing their methodology to increasingly resemble the Elo system.)

If you are trying to use the rankings less for general predictive purposes across a wide range of teams and matches, and more to accurately gauge the absolute quality of two or more teams at a specific point in time, then you do need to pay closer attention to the context behind those rankings. For instance, the USMNT's rankings have taken two big hits this year -- first when we sent a B team to the Gold Cup, and second in a game where our primary goal was simply not to lose by 4 or more goals. Without those results, we're probably closer to 20th in the world right now. Conversely, Panama's biggest point gains have come from multiple wins against a Costa Rica side that was good enough in 2022 for wins against them this year to still count for a lot, but poor enough throughout 2023 to call into question how meaningful results against them right now really are.

 

We don't even know if Ancelotti will be their coach. Canada might try to get Ancelotti.

 

The data agrees with you.

US and Panama have played 26 times. Panama has won 4 of those contests [of which 2 were in penalties]. We seem to play them A LOT. Gold Cup draws tend to pit us together.

Panama has beaten us outright in regulation one time on US soil.
2011 Gold Cup. That was an incredibly strong US lineup, and Panama deserved that win.
That was the big, capital "A" USMNT, and Panama won 2-1. It was basically the 2010 World Cup squad.

So it can happen. Anything can happen.
But that game in 2011 was the aberration, not the routine.

Can Panama beat the USMNT? Clearly yes.

If people want to put money on it, go ahead.