3 matches in 6 days, 18 man roster, 0 changes to the starting 11. wtf is wrong with us soccer? LET'S. GO. FELLAS. #OlyMNT x @Visa pic.twitter.com/2A2bZaCYGN— U.S. Soccer YNT (@USYNT) July 27, 2024
Hoping there are a number of subs at halftime. Not rotating for this game didn't seem like an ideal decision, but getting some guys off the field would limit some of the impact heading into a really important game.
Depending on how hard france beats down guinea, we might be in good shape to give the bench a shot next game.
To be honest, I felt like this was the game to rotate pretty heavily. General consensus was that this would be the "easiest" of the three group games, and the game against Guinea would be the most important of the three group games. But the US is in a spot where they can manage today's game like the women's team did against Zambia on Thursday.
Yeah don’t think we got enough goals to rotate bodies unfortunately now . That goal we gave up made the difference
Doesn't matter anyway, we had to beat or tie Guinea, we still have to beat or tie Guinea, and considering Guinea was the better side against NZ in a loss, and played France WAY tougher than we did, there was never going to be rotation beyond the sane one (actually start the right lineup for the third game, after not doing it on matchday 1 or 2?). Like, a natural rotation involving us actually starting our best attacking lineup (Yow, McGlynn and probably Booth need to be starting, maybe switch McGuire out for Paxten as a false 9 like he played in the U20 qualifying that actually sent us to this tournament). Only thing I'm fairly certain of is that McGuire and Djordje need to sit, and Paredes isn't helping the attack any beyond set pieces from the constant fouls he draws.
So the US can’t lose by more than 1 goal and/or allow Guinea to catch up on goals scored, is that correct? Tiebreakers get confusing.
Any one goal loss and the US still finishes above Guinea because the goals scored would still favor the US. If France beats NZ that would mean advancement. The US could beat Guinea and still not advance if NZ wins by 4 or something, but that seems unlikely. Of course play not to concede and lose 2-0 for sure.
I'm so frustrated that I had to suffer through that France defeat, only to miss out on our having some fun with the Kiwis yesterday...
France isn't great. They were fortunate against us with officiating, goalkeeping, and long-range strikes that found the back of the net.
FWIW the replays come up on Peacock later the same day, and so far their arrangement is good about getting the replay going in the app without any spoilers.
If Busio is injured with the new alternate rule we can replace him temporarily for the next game (with Atencio I assume), and he can come back for the quarterfinal if healthy.
Statsperform/Opta had it: .43 - France 1.20 - USA Elsewhere someone posted Laca’s shot map and he hadn’t scored an outside the box goal all season. I think we defended very well as a team limiting France to those kinds of looks and a set piece where they found the only legal way to trip a defender. Individually there were a lot of disappointing moments on the ball.
I have to admit that I thought that France's 3rd goal was probably the highest-percentage chance of the match, a free header right at the top of the middle of the box, but overall, that one chance aside, we almost certainly had the better chances. I mean we had TWO chances from six yards that should've been scored, certainly at least one of them. Yeah, overall, we played a decent game against France, and the 0-3 loss is extremely unflattering for the sort of game we played, but... that's football. If you don't finish, bad things happen, and their two goals from outside the box were both very well-taken.
We won't play a team better than France at this event. They have a couple of difference makers. Yes, Lacazette can do that to you. As hosts, they were able to get him released when he didn't make the Euros squad. If we get by Guinea (and we beat them 4-0 in a friendly in the last U23 camp), then it's still totally up in the air who we'd play in the quarterfinal. After 2 games, all of the teams in the opposing group have 3 points (Argentina, Morocco, Ukraine, and Iraq.) After beating Argentina, Morocco lost to Ukraine 3-0. Yikes. Guinea, like us, could have gotten some real difference makers for their overage slots. Couldn't get them. They got Naby Keita, but he's more of a name people know than a really great player at this point. None of the teams at this event look particularly good. Mostly because there's no such thing as U23 national teams. These aren't really teams, but hastily thrown together batches of players that have played few games together. Spain and Japan are the two that have already advanced, and both are kinda "just fine." Everyone is beatable, as well as us. We played Japan in a camp, and beat them, but its probably not relevant at this point. Japan could be one of our opponents in the medal round should we get there.