Pre-match: USA v Australia Game 2 6/19 3 pm ET

I watched the first 30 minutes of the Australia/Turkey game, and I stand by what I said a few pages back: If we play close to how we did against Paraguay, we'll win.

I thought Turkey looked sort of like the USMNT in the bad years of the Berhalter era. They had plenty of possession, but they were pretty static and just swung the ball around the midfield from side to side until Yildiz decided to take someone on and try to put in a cross. But the crosses either got blocked right away or cleared by the Australians in the box, because they had plenty of defenders back, and the Turkish players were, again, very static. Even with that, Turkey generated a few decent chances that either went straight at the keeper or over the net.

The way we played against Paraguay was just way more dynamic. Though, of course, it's always a question if we can repeat that sort of performance.

 

I just don't see Australia shutting our attack down enough to where they can score a counter and beat us.

Can they score on a counter? Yes. But also they scored 2 goals against Turkiye with an xG of .7 so they were overly effiecietn and I don't see that happening again.

Can they hold us to 0 goals like they did with Turkiye even with all the shots the Turks got? I think not and I also think we will get more quality shots than just flinging long range bombs at them.

The Australians had a terrific game plan and they played it to perfection. The little attacking they did also went to perfection. Every ball that bounced in the area went their way, Can that happen 2 games in a row AND against what appears to be a much more dynamic attack than what Turkiye had. Possible but I wouldn't bet on it especially with the home crowd we are going to have in Seattle.

USA USA USA

 

I would think them beating Turkey would eliminate any chance that anybody connected with the team would underestimate them.

 

I've got a ticket to the group D winner game in the Bay Area, so I'd say the advantage of winning the group is much greater

 

Two more thoughts:

We don't want to give up set pieces near our box - the Aussies have some size: 6'6" and 6'4" defenders. Our tallest starter is 6'2", not so bad against 6'4", but not great against 6'6" competent guy with his head.

In terms of resting players, I don't think that's much of an issue in the group stage or even between the group and knockout stage. 6 full days of rest between matches 1 and 2, 5 full days between 2 and 3. 6 days before knockout game 1 if you win the group, 8 days(!) if you come in second. What is likely more important is giving the guys you expect to use in the latter knockout games as substitute starters some experience before you actually really need them to rest players. That would mean more like subs in the 60th-70th minute in these early games rather than starting them now.

 

The knock out game is six days later; that's a pretty good rest. I think there might be selective resting but I'm not even sure not playing for nearly two weeks is better than playing at that point.

 

in my attempt to will time forward, ill jump right to this laid out in units/roles...

__________freese__________
__freeman__richards__ream__

this is our backline, and i dont see a compelling reason to change it here. i get all the "i dont want irankunda running at ream" talk, but against us last fall and against turkey he played on the other side of the pitch (and doesnt seem to be an especially horizontal player). off the bench in our match he beat freeman and richards a few times; i dont want him running at anyone. the way that happens is addressing it further up the pitch...

______adams___________jedi

while weve seen adams as the left-sided cm most frequently under poch, he was more frequently on the right against paraguay (in the second half in particular) and it makes sense that will be the case here as well. when australia pushes forward he can act as the roadbumps between alex and chris, pushing him wider with the rw tracking back. his club career/experience as a rb, hybrid rm, etc far outweighs that as a central/left sitting d-mid.

i have jedi on this "line" because while i know he will be higher (more than im completely comfortable with) hes isnt in our first line of our confrontation, and he has to give us that presence in the mid/def third when they are in possession/attack. i dont think his fitness is really an issue, and we see him building from deeper helping back generally...but that recovery from the high attacking third to defensive third that makes him really special hasnt been evident since hes been back in the team. i dont know if thats at all related to fitness vs tactics but we are gonna need that, cause we dont want australias rw (and second goalscorer against turkey) "running at ream", either.

_______wes_____tillman__
weah___________________

this is a little tricker to lay out, because malik is responsible for a whole lot of ground vertically. hes still the cm partner to adams "behind" our attacking mids, but for all the talk about australias counter we are still going to have a lot more of the ball and his pressing/counterpressing is going to be more of a focus than his helping back/mirroring adams in slowing down and forcing any attacks wide (in that area diagonally between ream and jedi).

one of the biggest reasons wes was so outstanding against paraguay was his ability to (bear with me) "overlap horizontally" with dest. while a bit withdrawn from our first line of engagement, pressing-wise thats where he moves more central. i go with weah wide/ahead of him here because im me and id go weah over dest in any position/role/scenario- but in this particular case he brings both better service from wide and a more dangerous threat from testing the keeper with shots (which are two of the primary ways to attack a bunker). while his edge in pace isnt a huge one i think he can provide the same thing he did against doku (dont get dumb with that comparison) in being there is the most important thing. thats what made beas such a solid fb later in his career- the biggest thing is not letting "that guy" directly beat you. we cant defend as ream or as weah, we have to defend as a team.

__________pepi______puli_

if we dont see pepi here- and we should, imo- we arent going to see him period (starting). his pressing work rate, willingness/ability to work cbs physically and at the very least provide a passable ability to win balls in the air make him an obviously valid alternative to balo here. i feel like im banging my head against the wall with this, but pepi banging for an hour with balo coming on to run at backlines makes so much more sense than balo making runs (usually wide of the cbs) and having no targets in the box from the run of play.

i mean, poch is gonna do what hes going to do. australia may be more cracks than cover and/or decide to open up against us like paraguay did...but i dont think thats especially predictable. the reasoning for starting pepi isnt based on his scoring, but increasing and maximizing the possibilities/ways to attack a packed in defense. his substantially higher pressing ability only adds to the argument (along with better passing/combining, though thats a little more arguable).

but again, poch is gonna do what poch is gonna do and its going to go how it goes. we beat this (roughly) same australia team a few months ago without either (if youre one of those dummies who think friendlies and world cup matches are remotely the same). in fairness, that goes both ways. its not reactionary or overconfident to say we can be/are a better team than this aussie team...but weve also shown we can be far less than the team we saw saturday.

this just feels a little weird right now, being a very pragmatic guy in an extremely reactionary crowd.

at this point, i should say. it may (hopefully) settle down some as the week goes on, but man- it sure seems like everyones expecting another dominant performance like we saw against paraguay and either a nearly-as-dominant showing from the aussies in the turkey match...or a bunch of bunkering also-rans. that seems to be the only expected variable in this match. which just feels weird.

 

considering our injury-prone, constant target best player/attacker, crucial, major-injury prone d-mid with no backup and a 38 yo captain i beg to differ. at the very least i think liberal substitutions are called for.

but poch seems to think differently, and he gets paid for what he thinks. he got puli exactly right in the opener. all i can say beyond that is i f'ing hope youre both right.

 

So I can’t tell if this a joke or not, so apologies if I’m missing the humor, but FYI:

If we finish 2nd in the group, we will play in Dallas, which would be hot…except it’s a climate-controlled stadium. Announcers from the Netherlands - Japan game described themselves as feeling cool inside the stadium.

Meanwhile, Levi’s Stadium is effectively in San Jose, not San Francisco. Bay Area locals will know what a difference that is in temperature, particularly in the summer. The highs for the next three days, for example, are 83, 85, and 84.

So, ironically, the game at Levi’s for the group winner would almost certainly be hotter than the one in Dallas for second place.

Not saying we should aim for second, but wanted to clarify that.

 

Australia plays a very defensive 5-4-1 even if it is sometimes listed as a 5-3-2.

It is almost impossible to successfully attack their set 5-4-1 wide even with world class wide attackers as we saw from the Türkiye match. They are very compact and structured so central 1v1 attackers are also not very effective.

Aussie are also very content to continually hoof the ball long in a manner that would make 2004 Greece proud. We may not be the same counter-pressing opportunities since building out the back is not something Australia will often attempt.

The very quick one twos starting with Malik and Weston combining with Dest|Pulisic|Balogun is going to be very key to unbalancing Australia. I would expect Jedi and Freeman to be a bit more conservative in the match spending much of their time level with Tyler.

 

Turkey was slow, selfish, desperately plodding and arrogant. Let’s not do that.

 

Some general thoughts on how to attack Australia:

• The best thing to do will be to move in transition when we get the chance. Pressing them will be valuable, and even if they break us a bit, that will encourage them to loosen up. There needs to be no hesitation on the counter.
• Vertical movement is going to be key. Australia won't likely be very susceptible to horizontal switches unless they are perfect because they really don't care if you cross into the box. In non-set piece situations, McKennie might be a threat and Tillman as well, and I think if we are going to put something in the air, we should be running them late into the box to avoid direct marking by CBs.
• Something Turkey didn't do at all was attack the endline for the cutback. I don't think cutting inside from the wings is going to do much, but any attack on the endline can create vertical movement and allow for spaces. We have good trailing shooters, and between runs and dribblers, we can get around some of the corners.
• Give and go all day. Runs into the box combined with one touch is going to be hard with nearly no space, but it's still probably the best bet AND if we can keep it up despite lack of it working, they will start to mentally and physically tire reaction wise.
• Shoot. We're likely to have a lot of shots, but if you have something on target, do it. Deflections are your friend. We had an own goal and Balo's first goal both basically give us a goal off fortuitous deflections. Don't wait for perfection, it's probably not coming.

 

Very easy for us to say sitting on our asses at home.

 

I know playing aerial balls in will be tough. But, I think that part of the problem facing Aus is not playing Aerial balls at all. I would like to see some of our better (albeit, not great) aerial threats play. Get Pepi and/or Gio and/or Weah on the pitch. If the keeper has to actively account for a target-role guy that can change his positioning. And, if their essentially 4 CB's have to mark a guy so that he's not open for crosses, that changes angles. You put Pepi in there and the keeper always has to think "do I come out for this ball?"

 

I dunno, "slow, selfish, plodding, and arrogant" pretty much describes me when I'm at home. Especially when I'm on the couch.

 

The match last fall featured their B team against our B team. Australia played a very different squad and a very different scheme v Turkiye.

 

Mistreatment doesn't really capture it. It was every bit the genocide that occurred in North America. A crazy thing about it, was they didn't even talk about it until the 90's when researchers (yes, researchers) started looking into Australia's past. That resulted in what they call the History Wars - The truth vs. their fictionalized past. In the 90's.

 

An addendum watching Spain. Shoot lower, and try to keep shots outside the box to a much lower %/ Yes, there's more people in the way, but the number of hopeful long shots skying over everything is ridiculous. We shouldn't shy from longer shots, but the ratio of outside the box to inside here is the sign of a team that is just hoping, not trying things.

 

Someone posted the number of off days between matches. Seems crazy to me. I think a big thing that Poch is going to have to manage is boredom. Especially for people that aren't in the rotation. They can become a cancer, like Lalas was in '98. Lalas said that when he wasn't named a starter, he started actively trying to subvert the team so that they would look bad without him. All this time off would give plenty of opportunity for a malcontent to do their work.

I don't think Poch chose any cancers like Lalas. And, I'm sure he has non-soccer stuff, diversions, planned. But, there is going to be a whoooooole lot of sitting around.

 

I don’t know man, these dudes are chilling at the Ritz in Laguna Niguel with their families. I think they’re ok.

They’re resting, if that’s what you meant.

 

I said upthread that they will be looking for any reason to be butthurt.

 

I didn't know their families are there. But, even then, a month long vacation, even at the Ritz-Carlton, a world class hotel, can lead to restlessness.