PBP: USA vs Jamaica; 07/25; 10pm

I thought he was Mexican.

 

That’s the most physical Jamaica team I have seen in a long time. They were good.

 

Jamaica is a tactical mess. They have decent players, but I cannot see structure to their team. Heart alone is not going to get them the ticket.

 

No Busio hasn't been better than Lletget.

Lletget hasn't added much but he hasn't subtracted from the team either. Busio was a liability last night. Also as bad as Lletget's free kicks and corners were, Busio's were worse the game he took them.

Maybe the Qatar game will be a better fit for his skillset. To me it really looks like we're watching a kid who's not ready to play with the big boys.

 

Exactly!

 

I did not. That slow lofted delivery is a very poor attempt at a cross that 99.9% of the time the GK handles. Blake was poor on claiming that play and appeared to call off the defender who backed out at the last moment leaving Hoppe free. Blake misjudged a poor lofted cross.

Roldan came on for the last 27 minutes and played very hard, but Acosta, Robinson, Hoppe, and Turner kept us in the match for the duration.

 

Sorry, which play are you talking about. I do not think it was the goal. Hoppe's defender wasn't called off and didnt back out. He fell down going for the ball.

 

Zardes' marker was Lowe #17 CB, who fell down. Hoppe's defender was Fisher #8, the RB. You can see he initially had a body on Hoppe and then pulled out. He claimed that he heard Blake claim it. You can see them having words after the play.

 

Glad we won.

Qatar is going to be tricky if we do not start putting better shots on Goal.

IF we score early like we did against Canada then that should help out big time.

 

Do you are stating the goalie called off the farthest defender, who he never looked at and was outside of his field of vision? Ok. If you think Blake was focused on FIsher to call him off the goal makes total sense because the ball was in the air in front of the goal at that point...but that doesnt seem likely from the video.

Id wager that the cross placement was good enough that Blake could not reach it and Fisher thought it was going closer to near post. Fisher doesnt look called off, he looks like he is playing the ball longer than it was.

Watching the goal mouth slow mo Blake was focused on the ball prior to Fisher's cut to the left. I'd wager there was a bit of a curl that was to our benefit.

 

So we agree that Hoppe's man did not fall down?

If you watch the replay you can see that Fisher had a body on Hoppe and actually pulled away when Blake started coming for the ball. Fisher never even attempted to jump for the ball and said on Jamaican media that he heard Blake call for it.

Now Fisher could be covering his ass but ...

HOPPE GIVES THE @USMNT THE LEAD IN THE 83RD MINUTE! 😱🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/RTdinsbzGZ

— FOX Soccer (@FOXSoccer) July 26, 2021

 

I know you didn't forget. You will talk down on anything Roldan whenever you get the chance.

Like you just did, saying it was a poor cross.
When it was a good cross to the back post right where it needed to be for our far post runners.

Andre Blake is a good and very athletic keeper. If he couldn't get to it than 99% of other keeps wouldn't either.

 

A slow lofted cross is not a good cross. Almost all the knowledgeable pundits put Blake at fault for that goal and yes he is a fantastic keeper but crosses/box command is a weakness of his.

I have seen Roldan for 23 USMNT matches. He is what he is and right now he has moved up from dreadful to useful is a high energy, hard working sub on a B team and only because GB made poor choices as far as player selection.

Roldan should be nowhere near the USMNT first 23 or extended 36. With the full team, Hoppe will be way more valuable as an attacking midfielder sub than Roldan or even Lletget. Hoppe has shown the ability to take on and beat opponents off the dribble and actually create danger for the US, something neither Roldan or Lletget have shown any ability to execute.

 

Roldan looked up, saw his target and the only way to get it from how close he was to chip past far post. A driven cross would have never got to Hoppe. Zardes and defenders helped create some of the chaos that resulted in Hoppe getting what was almost a free header. I’m not big on Roldan but he delivered a good ball there.

 

Persuasive defense of Roldan chip. Unpersuasive description of the level of effort/difficulty of Hoppe’s header (at least to those of us with eyes).

 

Good grief. Obviously Hoppe did everything he had to do including being at a good spot and staying focussed as the ball narrowly missed Zardes’s head and there were defenders in the area. But, for whatever reason, the guy marking him bailed. He claimed that Blake called him off. Blake was at near post when ball was chipped and couldn’t get over. It was a good play all around coupled which created a mistake or two by Jamaica. That’s how goals are typically scored.

 

Why are people arguing? It was a great play by both of them. Roldan played a nice touch ball far post where either Zardes or Hoppe had a chance to get to it and Hoppe did. Moore had been trying to force low driven crosses in all game and it wasn't working. Roldan made the proper play. Hoppe is a poacher and did what he does.

If I had to bet, I'd say there will be many more USMNT team goals for Hoppe before he is done. Roldan, not so much, but give the guy credit for a clutch assist. I'd start him over Arriola tomorrow, or at least be quick on the trigger to bring him in if Paul looks like he did against Jamaica. Roldan does not have the athletic ability to even sniff the A team IMO but he made a nice contribution on Sunday, and we may not have won without him.

 

It's the Internet!

 

I am kind of shocked by all the negativity about this match with Jamaica. Not just here, but the guys over at ESPN FC (or whatever it is called now).

Shaka Hislop picked Jamaica to win the match and said they were at their best, with their best players while the US was using a "C" squad that hadn't impressed yet. After we won, Herc Gomez said the US won 'ugly' and that there were still many concerns.

THIS IS OUR FRIGGIN' "C TEAM"! What do you expect? I thought that they did a good job shaking off the early blunders in the match and a pitch that had way too much traction and bite (slowed down every ball), and adapted well. We then went on to establish possession. Dike didn't impress but others stepped up.

What do expect from a "C Team" when they are playing other countries' "A Teams"?

 

We won. We had some good moments. We had more bad moments. But victory is victory, and we should not deny ourselves the pleasure of it. We also should not let victory put a mask over our eyes as to what badly needs improvement. I do believe that some of the American players on that field cannot be improved... for good or ill they are at their plateau. I believe others are still a work in progress, and need honest assessment if they have a hope of significant improvement.
As for team cohesion, and all that is ultimately on the shoulders of the manager, we have to work on the assumption that also can be improved, and that honest assessment is the only ground for the possibility of improvement.
It is not negativity to seek the betterment of our side, in any tournament. It would be negativity to just cynically shrug our shoulders with vast indifference and mutter something about "you can't make a horse out of a donkey".

 

Show me a goal scored in the history of football where you cannot point to a defender or the goalie making a mistake.


I'll wait!

 

Paul Mariner RIP with the assist.

 

I think it is not uncommon. Being beaten does not necessarily imply a mistake, especially at the top levels of team sports.

 

To be clear, Hislop is wrong here. Jamaica wasn't at their best.

Ravel Morrison is an automatic starter on this team and the Americans wouldn't give him the visa he needed to come through.
Ethan Pinnock should probably be a starter in the back but preferred club duties, Jamal Lowe and Kasey Palmer would likely be first off the bench but had family things, Michail Antonio and Kemar Roofe probably start but couldn't get passports in time.

That's at least 3, maybe 4 starters right there who just aren't around. We play 15 guys a game, pretty much all of these guys are getting on the field.

Despite this, I was on the record before on this forum saying in the days before the game that we had basically an "A-" team, missing some top players noted above but with enough talent to avoid using their absence as an excuse. But with Bobby Reid coming off of Covid and Leon Bailey (the teams best player) sitting out last minute with an injury in addition to all the absences above, I don't know that I can stick to that. We can't be short our best player and 2/3 others in our best XI and expect to beat the Americans on their turf (or anywhere, really, but especially on their turf), be it an American A team, B team, or C team. We're just not good enough to do that.

I'll be honest, I don't see us qualifying for Qatar.

I don't want to be overly pessimistic. I know there's a chance. But between the clear tactical foibles, the organizational misses that compromise the quality of the team, and guys being in and out (so we never seem to QUITE get to our best 23 in any given game and, as I implied above, we aren't beating quality teams if we can't consistently put our best foot forward), I just can't feel good about it.

Realistically, I think we're the 6th best team in the octagonal, maybe 5th on a good day. On paper we are better than this, but what I'm seeing on the field is not a top 3 team in this region.

I hope I'm wrong. And if we can somehow step things up a notch (actually finish clear chances, build more cohesion on-field and off, remove the organizational foolery, etc), on paper we will be hard to keep out of the region's top three. But that's a big if, and games aren't played on paper.

I'm pretty optimistic for 2026 though. Looking at our GC roster, most of the current core of players is young enough to still be playing at a high level then (although they'll all be old - 31-33 mostly, and 35 at the high end for guys like Blake) and with 6 CONCACAF teams going to the 2026 World Cup (plus 2 more to the intercontinental playoff), we should be where we need to be in the regional ranks. We'd have a highly experienced group of players likely still playing at a high level, and should have some young talent arising between now and then to provide some fresh legs to match that experience.

Idk about us being a top 3 team, but I feel pretty good about us as a top 5 or top 6 team (we've actually kind of been in that range as a team for most of the last decade). For now, that's my expectation until proven otherwise.