And Mexico is just irrelevant now. Canada is everything that was our best traits: toughness, grit, physicality, closing down space vertical threat, finishing when it counts meanwhile, we get pushed off the ball like delicate flowers, are prone to the counter attack, mediocre at best goalkeeping, apocalyptic in the final third, but hey…….. we possess the ball goodly and make it look pretty, and that’s what counts, right? does …….Canada….. “play like our grandmother”? Basically, they are all of our traits from past years we admire the most, and we are everything we used to make fun of Mexico about. Questions need to be asked if this is who we want to be. This isn’t us. It shouldn’t be us. We’ve become what we used to laugh at
Not really. 2000s Mexico's problem was they advanced the ball far too slowly. The US advanced the ball well enough. But once around the area, problem was the lack of the patterns of play needed to create the open shot, especially against a low block like Canada's. There were too many bad decisions being made around the area. It takes time to create effective patterns of play when you're not using specialist attacking midfielders. Most notably, it took Liverpool and Klopp time to do this. But the US don't have a lot of time. And 433, nevermind a Klopp-style 433, is not GGG's background. Imo, GGG should switch to a 4231. We now have a number of a-mids who can handle the creation.
I was thinking exactly the same during this game. Now I know how all those El Tri teams felt like when they ran into a determined bunker and counter team in the USMNT who played direct while El Tri passed the ball back and forth.
Their top players are better than ours ever were. Their MLS role players are not as good as ours were. But generally I agree with your point.
Canada had 11 players committed to doggedly defend for 90+ minutes today. Truth be told, and the majority of the BS USMNT Fans are going to disagree with this. The US was one Matt Turner horror sequence from a 0-0 draw. The US has a goalkeeper problem. Steffen can't stay healthy. Really not sure that Turner is at the elite level the US demands from its keepers. His poor distribution directly led to the first goal, and nearly lead to a another in the second half. He also didn't cover himself in glory on the first goal, as that was a savable shot from Larin. It might not be fair to Turner, but we've seen his predecessors (and his main competition) make that save in that moment. Yes the defenders didn't cover themselves in glory, however the poor distribution allowed them to be caught out of position. Yes, Canada played with more grit. For all of the praise about the improvement of MLS, it might actually be hurting the national team program. Sure players have more competition nowadays at earlier ages. They also have multi-million dollar facilities to practice in. They're not practicing at a different local park, college, or public school field each week like teams (MLS, Amateur Club) in the past did. Or maybe they just lack an out and out striker? Soccer is one of the only sports where a manager/coach is pretty helpless once the game starts. The coach/manager can't score goals, or make key passes. Sure they put tactics in place. At the end of the day, it's on the players to make plays. Today, Canada's players made the one play they had to. The US didn't make/crate enough plays in the final third to get a result.
Unfortunately, there's been a pattern of mediocrity extending beyond possible goalkeeper performance. The Canadians come up in environments similar to those the US players do. The Mounties are not from the favelas.
The fan sets are also mimicking your comparison. "We out possessed them!". "They are dirty as hell!" "Our players are better!" "We played way better soccer!" "The ref bailed them out!" "We beat ourselves!" This is what I used to see the Mexican fans type about the USMNT matches in the 2000s.
Dude I hate that this rings true. I said on another thread that more than disappointed today I felt jealous of Canada because they reminded me of the US when I started watching the team in 2001, for all the reasons in the second paragraph. Add to the analogy that the coach seems arrogant and clueless about the games--e.g., Gregg's post game presser where he seemed to be having a dissociative episode when describing the game--and the analogy is complete. Ugh.
Remember when we used to laugh at Mexico talking about how the they dominated the US with impotent possession when we actually attacked and scored goals? Yup, that's what happened to us yesterday and Berhalter shows up in the press conference talking about how Canada couldn't handle us and we dominated the game. Very much deja vu for me.
They're basically mid-late 90s US as a baseline but augmented by a golden generation of a small number of legitimately world class players. Larin is probably roughly the caliber of Donovan/Dempsey in their prime and is their 3rd or 4th best player, Davies is better than anyone we've ever produced and David is probably better than any non GK we've ever produced.
I mean this was also because they scored early and it allowed them to sit back. I think they would have had to open things up more if it had remained 0-0. I mean I also think there's nothing wrong with sitting back and playing that way. It's the same thing the USMNT did to great success. You can't win a World Cup that way, but neither of these teams is winning a World Cup anyways. Yup. We have two ok but not great goalies. Turner is a very very good shot stopper, but his distribution is not good. Hopefully this is something he can work on Arsenal. Either way not a good situation where neither of our top 2 goalies are playing regularly. I'm hopeful on Slonina, but that is more of a 2026 thing then a 2022 one. I do think our guys who are with top clubs seems to especially struggle with both the field and referee quality in CONCACAF. On the other hand Canada does have guys with top clubs too, and they don't seem to have that issue. Except for Kaye all of Canada's MLS guys also all played pretty well, especially considering they had neither a December camp nor a January. Meanwhile Miles Robinson looked very much like a player out of season and not at his best. For all the discussion about our talent advantage, striker is one position where Canada has a massive edge.
Canada is also having a major societal unification movement right now that is causing a lot of national pride while the US flounders in a bitterly divided culture. The grit you see from Canada is what the US had prior to the current movement to deconstruct American culture and replace it. Grit comes from desire. The US players simply are not familiar enough with desire to channel it to grit. We look like a bunch of mercenaries without a homeland. This is a much bigger problem than soccer.
Yeah, Turner didn’t come up with the save when he was needed. If that’s what he’s there for he needs to do that.
Instead of looking at granular detail of the game itself (which is fine, don't get me wrong) this statement is far more true of the USNT vs CANNT as an entity since 2020. While Canada has rallied around a manager and culture that defines their identity, the US flounders with far too many "ideas" and far too little in terms of execution. And confidence is an exponential thing - both directions. The more success Canada experiences, the more they gain (think USA late 90s and then especially 02) whereas USA doesn't know how to solve the problem of being favored (Mexico in those exact same timeframes). You're seeing a Canada team that is reveling in being the under appreciated yet talented team without a history to lean on. That is the US in the late 90s. You're also seeing a ridiculously talented USA team struggle with being told they are good and should dominate. Thats a sports thing far from unique to soccer but, with how hard it is to score in this game, can become completely suffocating. Prime examples of this are Canada most recently against Honduras and USNT at Jamaica. Watching the game in Honduras - Canada should have drawn if not lost that game. Honduras had multiple clear cut chances that somehow sweatpants kept out. The more that happened, the more they believed in themselves. Think back to our history of GK's making saves they absolutely shouldn't keeping us in games we shouldn't be in. Whereas the US goes to Jamaica and looks scared of the pressure of being favorites to win a game they absolutely should win. But then as the game plays out, they are lucky to just draw. I also think that, looking at Mexico, it's naive to say that there is a silver bullet to fix this; the go-to being firing Berhalter. I wouldn't lose a second of sleep if Berhalter was fired, don't get me wrong, but looking at Mexico rotate through managers with the level of talent they've had should be a warning sign to those that think this all gets better with a change of the coach. I mean Tata freaking Martino - a coach many that loathe Berhalter wanted for the role - is doing everything the same with Mexico that Berhalter is doing with the US.
I would say that it was the most dominant midfield performance I have ever seen from a US team. Absolute dominance. The same goes for defensively…the early mistake was obviously an issue, but otherwise they cleaned up. It was clear that Canada was not equal on a talent level. Canada essentially scored both of their chances.
Canada's line of confrontation visibly dropped after the first goal. Instead of pressing in the middle, they dropped to the final third and challenged the US to break their block. I agree we looked really good in that space - as we should expect - but the game situation was a huge factor as to why. The midfield trio wasn't beating multiple players on turns and passes. Typically it was one, maybe two, with the block of 5+ Canadian players sitting back around the wings and forward waiting for us to pass laterally. Buchanan and Laryea became outside backs more than outside mids, especially in the second half. They illustrated best, for me, the shift in tactical approach from Canada.
And how many chances did we get with this domination? Two chances worth anything and xG less than 1? Just playing keep away in your own half isn't dominating. It's being played for a sucker.
US older cats come from the generation where we expected to overachieve because we put ourselves aside for a greater cause. This was manifest in our soccer culture as we competed with the worlds best despite not having a true domestic pro league. I’m not sure that this generation will ever get to see that, and that’s sad. You all missed a great experience.
We dominated first and second balls in the midfield. Adams and McKennie really cleaned up. Canada didn’t have much opportunity to bring their line up.
Fair I'd argue they didn't have much reason to bring their line up, either. Preserving the energy and waiting to spring once the US overextended itself (which came once or twice before the goal in stoppage time) was incredibly effective. The only thing the US could really do to create chances was hoof in crosses or attempt the most perfect pass through a 5 or 6 man defensive line on a narrow field.
I’m sure they got comfortable in letting Pulisic and Aaronson dribble into nowhere. I’d be interested in seeing the turnovers by those two. They were both completely ineffective. Aaronson was really bad…he got owned by the awkward clod #4 continually.
Apologies Mods, I thought this was post game thread. This discussion belongs there, not in this thread. Feel free to move
Say what? Canada had more shots on target and more dangerous shots on target. Canada also had a higher xG than the U.S. A dominant performance isn't passing the ball around impotently and then kicking it out of bounds. Did the U.S. even have a shot on net that wasn't from a set-piece? The U.S. was allowed to have possession of the ball because off the early goal, and because it's pretty clear that there isn't a lot of creativity in the attacking third.