USMNT Gold Cup Discussion

Well we can now stop all the talk that Tessmann is missing because he just had a child

Pochettino insisted he was making his judgements on a case-by-case basis. Also left off the roster were Norwich City's Josh Sargent, and Lyon's Tanner Tessmann, although the manager said those were for "footballing reasons."

https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_...sences-worst-case-scenario-us-world-cup-hopes

 

Trusty has a newborn too. 2 months I think.

 

Was listening to a business podcast the other day, and there was a brief off topic (for the pod / on topic for us) Q&A at the end with Scott Goodwin, who sits on the board at US Soccer. Below was Scott's answer to the question...

"When is the USA Men's team going to get any good?"
(at the very end)

"So JT [Batson] hired for the women's program, Emma Hayes, probably the top women's coach in the world. And the women's program has elite talent. Historically, they've had, you know, between 5 and 15 of the top 50 players in the world and maybe 20 of the top 100. Although Spain and others are catching up. The men's team typically has maybe one of the top a hundred players in the world if that. So women's team has a, has a bigger talent base. Title IX really put the US ahead of everyone else when it came to women's sports. And we now we have the top coach in the world, and it was a women's team that maybe needed a culture change. They go and win the Olympics.

So in trying to do the same thing on the men's side where you had a need for a culture change, a need for a new voice, JT and his team brought in Mauricio Pochettino, who's a top 10 global coach.

And now he, you know, Mauricio has some, has something called [grinta], which is an Argentine word for grit. And I think part of what the US men's team's been lacking is that grit, that intensity. And one thing he said to me, it was an interesting conversation, you know, he said, "when I played for Argentina, if I was playing in a friendly game, so let's say Argentina was playing a, there was a, there was a national team camp, they were playing a friendly game against one of the club teams in Argentina, or I was playing in the World Cup final, same, same attitude for Messi, we play the same, same intensity.

And that's not necessarily been true. I don't think about the American men's team on the men's side. So instilling that mentality of belief, grit, hustle, heart is important. And hopefully that will lead to better results next summer. The Gold Cup's coming up in a, in a, in a month. So let's see."

Wondering if this new focus on "grinta" may be explaining some of the callups we're seeing.

 

I don't necessarily disagree -- that may very well be the most likely outcome. I'm not super optimistic for White.

But here's the thing: Sargent hasn't performed for the US, and it's not just ball go in bad luck. He's not been great at getting into good spots and he hasn't executed well when given chances to make a shot or pass. It's not a good save by the keeper; it's a muffed shot off target.

Brian White is killing it in a league comparable to Sargent's. The Championship is probably a little better, but the competition overlaps is very large. Plus add in CCC where Vancouver is playing a half step up as well. Dude has 13 goals in 14 games!

Sure, I watch him and wonder if his smarts and good runs can overcome the lack of physical tools like anyone sane.

But I think you have to have enough doubt about that assessment -- there's enough of a chance given his performance to have earned a real shot (and he passed his minor test in January camp). If he fails it, he fails it.

And since Sargent hasn't passed his test -- and granted, small sample size, of course -- what message are you sending if White doesn't get his shot? If you keep calling in Sargent?

It's one thing for Christian Pulisic to have an assured spot -- the dude has earned that at this point.

But after a year of complaining our players are entitled, not working hard enough for the crest, not caring, feeling like their spot is assured ... our fanbase seems weirdly eager to hand guaranteed spots to guys like Sargent and Tillman who have not performed because they are killing it in second tier leagues.

If there's really a culture issue here -- and Poch definitely seems to think so, and most of the fanbase and commentators -- then you need to make these calls.

 

If this is Pochettinho casting a wide net and having players murder each other in training to get on the pitch I’m all for it.

If donkeys are getting time to shine against minnows and pad their stats, then we are going to pretend they are better options than clearly superior soccer ball players, then that’s just business as usual.

 

I've seen that he just had a kid, so perhaps he was called and stayed home to be a good dad and husband.

I would have called in Tanner personally because I think we really lack his line breaking pass ability except Jack McGlynn and maybe Tim Ream. Neither is a good idea defensively right now and Tanner is ... passable there? I think he's shown enough in a small amount of time to deserve more time to bed in. He's another guy that probably should be a better defender but he's not as assertive or physical as he could be given his tools.

Even with the positives ... he is pretty mediocre for a CM in our pool. Part of that is that it's the deepest part of our pool. I think when we throw him out there he holds his own, makes a few good plays and also makes a few mistakes. I'm not sure what else to call that, to be honest.

Being 23 is irrelevant to a call up discussion for this Gold Cup -- his future potential should be a minimal consideration a year out from the World Cup. It's also of zero consideration for how good a player is today aside from contributing to a lack of experience.

He likely doesn't make a remotely healthy 23 or 26 man roster -- I'm one of the bigger Tessman fans in that I'd honestly consider starting him with this roster because we desperately need ball progression, but also ... I've seen him play. He's going to hit some nice passes, look okay, have a few questionable turnovers and be mid on defense against a decent international team.

Getting 1,000 minutes for Lyon isn't really an argument that holds much weight by itself. Scally's getting thousands of minutes in the Bundesliga and mediocre might be the best assessment he'll get.

 

This roster has a ton of guys who will almost certainly be on the World Cup roster. It's got our #1 striker, our #1 RB, our #1 CB, our #1 DM, likely our #2 DM and so on. I'd say our #2 and #3 CAM are here (or #3 and #4, depending on your Reyna POV) as well as a definite striker / winger backup, another likely winger backup, at least another CB that will make the roster and so on.

Yes, we are missing five keys guys plus Reyna and Musah, depending on your feelings about them. And that absolutely sucks. But this is not a C team or something.

Even when it has been, the 2021 Gold Cup found our GK and our central defense for WCQ and the WC (excepting Miles' injury).

There are plenty of players on this roster that are top 3 on the depth chart, as noted above.

I don't know if Alex Freeman is going to be ready by next summer, but I think this is going to age really poorly if not next year, fairly soon. Dude has Yedlin/Beasley potential in terms of using his athleticism to make a WC roster young.

 

Several with those contracts left clubs to join US Soccer, including Dooley and Stewart.

Those guys were pros who were literally leaving club contracts to play with the national team because of the hopes of playing in a World Cup and creating a pro soccer league in the US.

They were not a bunch of scrubs. That is a myth. Watching the games from that World Cup, it’s easy to see a bunch of pros who were capable of playing with Colombia, Switzerland, and Brazil.

 

Why did you pick guys who were not on the World Cup team to describe the World Cup team?

 

Balogun is a different player, one who is capable of creating ridiculous goals from nothing.

 

Tessman is a golfer.

“I have found some good golf courses around Lyon,” he says. “Lyon has nice hills and woodland and you can design a course with a lot of different elements, but now I have a son, so I won’t be playing as much unless he wants to caddy for me. We’ll see.”

Says he wants to play in the Gold Cup.

 

People are saying it's over for Paxten which is what they said about Brenden when he wasn't called for NL. Poch said "we know Brenden, we need to see others" which meant he needed to see the alternatives he hasn't seen. Basically he got to see McKennie at the 10 instead, partnering with our best striker, Pulisic, at NL. Check that one off the list.

imo, the work that needs to be done now with Paxten is to see how he does with Frankfurt who will be in UCL when Paxten returns there on completion of his loan in Eredivisie. Paxten improved a lot at Utrecht; does he stay at Frankfurt and risk losing pt. to a starlet brought in for UCL type money or does he continue with Utrecht for the p.t.?

I like that Poch is especially sensitive to players' contract situations (which I believe to be the case). A player's club situation could have more to say with how much he can contribute to USA come 2026 than playing in a friendly in the summer 2025.

 

I don't really disagree, but I'd have a contrarian response too:

The only reason Argentinian grit really moves the needle, is that Argentinian players are also, collectively, consistently a top 2-8 side in the world in terms of talent. Talent+Grit=results.

In the 1989-2014 era we had grit and little talent

In the 2019-2025 era, we have little grit and middling to above average talent.

Some of this is randomness: Pepi is gritty, and Adams is gritty for instance, McKennie is probably the weirdest of all of them in that he switches back and forth between gritty and totally not gritty at all.

I also think the women's team stuff is easy as hell to understand. They had two era's of dominance: 1991-2004, where they won multiple World Cups and Olympic Golds. They did this because there were less than a half dozen great women's teams in the world: Sweden, Norway, China, Germany, Brazil etc. That was about it. They went into decline in part because of mean girls bull----, and in part because of a dip in generational talent along with the advantages of Title IX slowly bleeding away, and in part because Brazil and Germany reached high points in the aughts (2003-2011 or so), they had a run with more generational talent from '11-'19, and then all the investments that went into the game in Europe caught up with us by really, I think at the youth level, a decade or more ago, and the senior level, by around '16-'19, and it showed dramatically with the horrendous back to back performances at the Olympics in '21 and World Cup in '24. We've clearly slipped more into a role inbetween say Spain and the Netherlands in the Men's game, where we are consistently a top 8 side in the world, but we need peak performance and generational talent going forward to win titles like Spain has in the men and the women, and to not slip to that Netherlands/Brazil level where we are contending, but never winning on the women's side.

But there's other stuff too not mentioned with the men:

A ton of key players have either gotten hurt, or hit their floor instead of their ceiling projections or both: we had a hot exciting start with the '97's through '03's at the youth level and in Europe from 2016-2021, but since then, most of them have either tailed off, or flattened out into solid league players but not top end ceiling results from projections, when you combine that, with injury, and meh coaching, and potential grit issues, you get crap results.

Looking forward to some of these guys getting moves, getting healthier and guys like Albert and Cavan breaking through hopefully and pushing guys out (or forcing them out of complacency).

 

Effort moves the needle. Talent moves the needle.

You can't win without both.

This group has been super injured, for sure. But the lack of development of some, especially relative to the fanbase's expectations, should be expected.

 

Don't know what approach you are speaking to? The Poch quote just clarifies that Tessmann was not selected for footballing reasons, not the personal reason that some here have been pushing. Musah was personal reason by the player.

“For Musah he communicated to us a personal reason, so he needed to withdraw from involvement,” Pochettino said. “He was originally set to be in the roster, but we had to change things around.”

Presumably Busio and Aidan Morris were also footballing reasons. If Poch wanted to send a message to Tillman he should have just not selected him.

 

Bet my mortgage payment on Pulisic winning the golden boot so I'm sweating over here tbh

 

sure, if only everyone had the same intensity and fighting spirit of messi...

what i find interesting is that they give the credit for the coaching hires to batson, when media points to crocker as the guy that make it happen.

 

I'm actually fascinated that you specified 2-8 as opposed to 1-8... this is the country that has produced the best player in the history of the sport and arguably two of the top 2-4. Even if they're not 1 are they not closer to 1 than to 7 or 8? What country is so securely ensconced in the 1 spot that they're keeping Argentina from ever reaching it, Brazil, France, Germany?

 

Crocker works for Batson.

 

I said that more than anything because they aren't really that close to Brazil and Germany when it comes to a dominant run of finals appearances and wins. They've got some, '78, '86, '90, '14, '22, lol, more than I remembered, but Germany and Brazil are in another tier, I put them more with Italy, than Germany and Brazil.

As for the 8? I think I went that deep because they had a pretty huge dip from '94-'10, five straight WC's, and I don't think they made the semifinals of any of them.

Germany's got 13 Final Fours, 8 Finals, 4 wins.
Brazil's got 11 Final Fours, 7 finals, 4 wins.
Argentina is 4th with 6 final fours (interestingly, they've won all 6, and split the finals)

Argentina basically sits 4th on the Medal Count board and its all since 1978, Italy and Brazil and Germany can point to 3, and 2 more decades apiece more relevance long term. Both also were consistently contenders across nearly all the decades. Italy's had the 1 dip since '06, Germany had a small sputter '98-'04, and since '14. Argentina is more 1978-Present, but I'm just rambling as I think.

It's interesting to debate, Argentina sits either 4th or 5th depending upon whether you prioritize Final Four appearances or Titles), but it seems like at the world scale, they've been all over the place, I totally forgot they made the final of the kind of faux-goofy 1930 edition, than vanished for 48 years, then have been a consistent top side for two chunks of the ensuing 47 years (1978-1990, and 2014-2024).

If you tier them out, it kinda looks like:

Tier 1:
1.Germany
2.Brazil

Tier 2:
3. Italy

Tier 3:
4. France
5. Argentina
6. Uruguay

Tier 4:
7. Netherlands
8. England
9. Sweden
10. Croatia

Kinda seems like that, and Argentina is probably in that 4-5 zone, rather than 2-8 like I said.

 

Brazil, Argentina, Italy and (W) Germany are the top 4 for me, in no particular order.

Spain and France are up there for those with shorter memories.

Then it's England, Holland, Uruguay, Belgium and Portugal.

 

Gold Cup Discussion

 

Whatever Poch needs to do to get the program confident and firing on all cylinders is what needs to happen. We are running out of time to have a settled vision and strategy for WC2026.

I am one of Malik's biggest supporters but if Poch really believes that Malik does not have the right attributes that are needed to create a successful USMNT at WC2026 then he should stop calling Malik to camps.