Post-match: USA v. South Korea - September 6, 2025 - International Friendly

Go back and read the post. The question was what to do if Berhalter outperformed those guys.

 

Roldan was fine. Adams was not. Based on their history I am hesitant to say that Roldan is simply better going forward. Not sure that’s making excuses.

 

Yes, and it took CHRISTIAN ROLDAN who was new to this coach to show these guys what needed to be done.

That’s why you need guys like him in camps.

 

Back in England unless we want to have overworked injured Adams by May.

 

See, that’s fair, because now I get to say I’m not so sure he’s better than the Celtic players.

I think it was this thread where I said I think it’s more nuanced than, Poch overrates MLS. I think he overrates MLSers from the clubs that have succeeded in continental play, like Vancouver, Columbus, and Inter Miami (an odd club in that they have about a half dozen players literally from the area, but committed to Haiti, Greece, etc. Cremaschi is their only interesting Yank.)

 

It is going to be difficult to put up a midfield against Japan. I might go with Adams, Roldan and Zendejas and cross fingers. Would be nice to have some size in midfield but here we are.

 

Bad comparison.Regis was nothing like Timmy or Fab Johnson attitude wise.

 

If we’re going to press, need to get Brendan Aaronsen on the field?

 

Fab Johnson played well for us until he decided he doesn't want to anymore. Regis range was from poor to mediocre. He just wasn't trash talking, but putting no efforts was happening.

 

Id take Zimmerman or Miazga over Blackmon.

 

As being agnostic on Roldan I'd put it like that. In form Roldan is better than out of form Adams. Roldan is obviously in form, Adams isn't.

 

I think it’s fair to take Zimmerman over Blackmon. We’re just trying out someone new at a position where we lack players. Trying out new players by its very nature doesn’t always work out.

 

Fab Johnson made a business decision.
We'll disagree on Regis.We can agree that Bruce putting Sanneh in the back made it a moot point.

 

Is Adams out of form? He’s started the season well in the EPL.

 

I haven't seen his EPL games. I think he is hiding some injury. If that's his new good we have a problem.

 

Dude you’re like the mirror image of Adam Tash…irrational in your assessment of our European players, but in a negative way, and also irrationally positive about MLSers.

 

I think Sanneh was on the other side (instead of injured Dolo?), I believe Bruce put Hejduke on the left.

 

Poch had all summer to try out new players. If he didn’t call Blackmon then, these friendlies are too late to integrate.

 

Apparently its too late to integrate Pulisic, Weah, and Adams as well, who were our worst players on the day.

 

1. Yes.
2. No. Pulisic started earlier and his trajectory isn't good.

 

They all switched sides a lot,which is pretty rare these days.

 

Some people tried to warn the fanbase that a random great Euro hope was not likely to be the team's panacea. We were called USSF shills for saying so. Yeah, ok. The team's players were never as good as the rabid fanbase thought, but it was easier to blame coaches. In sports, it's mostly the players, stupid (not speaking to you directly -- just a part of the adopted saying).

 

You have a womens team player as president, a British guy under her with the Mens team, and an Argentinian Euro-centric coach. You dont get to a USMNT-centric person in leadership until you get to Onyewu.

What we have here is US Soccer that is disconnected from the actual USMNT.

 

Maybe, I don't recall Sanneh on the left at that WC at all, but I'm getting old.

 

Pulisic didn't play all that well.

I'd also add he played better under previous NT coaches than he has under Poch.

Further, most of our better players have not excelled under Poch. Have people chosen to ignore this. The weirdest aspect which some continue to push and have for years is observing players who are literally playing well and showing good form with their clubs, in the weeks surrounding NT camps, arriving for the NT and then looking worse. As if they continuously just show up, forget their quality and decide hey, I'm not gonna try and I don't care.

It's a very convenient and elementary line of thinking.

This way they don't need to assess the collective setup, instruction, tactics, spacing/movement, environment. Watching a game in just about any sport and after a poor performance concluding hey, the player(s) just don't care is one of the more absurd arguments I've ever seen and for some reason I've only ever seen it made in relation to the men's NT. A far more reasonable conclusion was the players/team wasn't prepared well. What to people think coaches do? If an NCAA, or NFL or NBA team consistently isn't performing up to their potential the latter is almost always the issue, not that the players suddenly stopped caring or left their talent at home.

We've had numerous coaches with all kinds of fluctuating talent get the collective unit to perform much better than we're recently seeing.