Photo by John Todd/ISIphotos.com
U.S. national team head coach Bob Bradley was in New York on Thursday for the unveiling of the U.S. national team home jersey, and also to speak with media about preparations for the upcoming World Cup.
Bradley touched on a wide variety of topics, from the progress of specific players, to process of selecting the team, to the recent success of players such as Herculez Gomez and Edson Buddle. He also discussed Jermaine Jones, altitude preparation and even his observations of Algerian and Slovenian players.
Here are just some of the things Bradley said:
On how many of the 23 World Cup roster spots are secured
"We’re somewhere between 16 and 18, some days a little higher."
On Jermaine Jones, who the U.S. team is still monitoring and who U.S. national team trainer Ivan Pierra will be visiting soon:
"Jermaine has tried to hold off as long as he could to give this thing time, but I think we’ll know in next week for sure whether that one has any hope, or whether or not for his future the best decision to get the surgery."
On Charlie Davies
"I think the fact that Charlie is this far along is great, but certainly even within the framework of being back, let's face it, there are different levels there. Our ability to assess where he is factors into making that decision.
"There’s going to be a decision on our end that is simply about the World Cup. I know that’s been one of his motivating forces in this whole thing. Regardless of how that particular decision goes, if at the end if he's at step 80 (in his recovery), and we think in order for him to start that camp he needs to be at 85, that can’t get in the way of him getting to step 100.
t’s a tricky part because I know what’s on the table right away. I know that a lot of his drive has been with that goal. That means something to all of us, but at the end of the day we still have to assess completely where he is as we make decisions, even for the camp.
On the possibility of not selecting Davies, or cutting him in camp
"At the end of the day decisions get made that you feel are best for the team. There's tough decisions that get made all the time. This one has a lot tied to it, that's exactly right.
Oftentimes, wtihin the team, decisions are clearer than people on the outside would understand. There's an old expression that the team picks the team. That's pretty true because usually things establish themselves pretty well. Players know who are the ones that should be there, and that kind of thing.
There's always going to be strong feelings, not only about Charlie, there's strong feelings about all sorts of guys in this process."
On putting together the starting lineup
Your best eleven guys don’t always make (up) your best team.
On Jozy Altidore
"His experience this year at Hull, I think, has helped him. There’s been some good days. I remember for sure the game against Chelsea, where you could tell he was motivated that day. It was an extra edge in everything he did. I think that seeing that makes you feel good, tells you that some of the things that we've talked to Jozy about, things that he needs to do to keep growing, are happening. There are moments when it goes the other way.
Part of it is our experience as a staff helps Jozy because we know him. We’ve had him in enough. I think the experiences along the way will ensure that he'll be ready to go."
On the upcoming national team camp
In a perfect world we’d have picked our 23 and that’s who we’d come into camp with. At this point, we’re probably thinking more along the lines of 26 to 28 guys in, and knowing that within that we’ll have to assess and, at the end of the day, make some decisions.
On Edson Buddle
"The easy thing to see so far this year is he’s scored some incredible goals. That actually fits if you look over Edson’s career. As a young striker in the league, his talent came through based upon his ability at times to score some great goals, a variety of goals. Goals where he dribbled, goals with his head.
That part is not new, but it’s been there of late. There’s been a lot of maturing that has taken place in less obvious ways. He seems to be doing a lot of little things that make a difference for his team."
On Herculez Gomez
"Herculez we had in in Copa America in 2007 following the Gold Cup when we had almost an entirely different team. We all know, if you go back to his beginnings in MLS, his first year was a year where he came into the scene in LA and what you would say is everything that he touched went into the net. His pure ability to strike a ball was pretty obvious.
That’s kind of come back a little bit at Puebla.
Even in the games where he was, a lot of these games he was just a sub, but he came on the field and now a certain ball would pop loose and the next thing you know he’d latch on to it and score a great goal.
You try to assess those things and project, or factor, or ask yourself what it’s like when the games get better, are enough other pieces of the equation that fit, and see."
TIDBITS
Bradley said he hadn't settled on a specific number of players at defender, midfielder and forward, but that the versatility of the players chosen will help him make that decision. In other words, if has a midfielder who can play in central defense (like Maurice Edu), that might make it easier for him to bring one more midfielder and one fewer defender.
Bradley mentioned Edu's experience as a centerback in the 2008 Olympics as the type of experience that could make him an option in the centerback pecking order.
Discussing the left back position, Bradley mentioned Carlos Bocanegra, Jonathan Bornstein, Jonathan Spector and Heath Pearce as options.
He has not settled on a No. 2 goalkeeper, with Marcus Hahnemann and Brad Guzan the obvious choices battling to back up Tim Howard.
The team is still looking into possible solutions to handle the high altitude of South Africa, including potentially using oxygen tents. That is still being discussed.
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That's all for now. What did you think of Bradley's comments?
Share your thoughts below.
That’s really romantic Thor but it doesn’t square up with reality.
Football isn’t like most American sports where you can come in for a limited amount of time, then get a blow for a while and then come back and do your old school Willis Reed imitation.
You have to be there for the whole 90 (otherwise, you are automatically handicapping the team from the start) and, in the World Cup, go at least 3 games in a row over a very short period of time.
And remember that the US and Charlie in particular, excel when they are more fit than the other guy, have more commitment and desire that anyone else and that requires fitness and strength. And Charlie may very well not have that. It may not be pretty but to paraphrase Tim Howard, they are what they are.
This percentage crap is just that..crap. He’s either ready to go 90 or he doesn’t go. Besides, the Davies you all know and love took off as a starter not as a sub. You guys want a feel good ESPN outside the lines, RUDY, story. Me, I just want to win.
This ain’t Charlie’s World Cup. It belongs to the team and if he can’t hold his own where it matters, on the field, then he does not belong there.
“not one regular national team player.”
Really? What was Kasey Keller? Keller, EJ and Olsen had just gone to the World Cup.
Here’s the Copa America 2007 roster:
Marvell Wynne, Jay DeMerit, Bobby Boswell, Benny Feilhaber, Heath Pearce, Danny Califf, Herculez Gomez, Eddie Johnson, Charlie Davies, Eddie Gaven, Jimmy Conrad, Jonathan Bornstein, Ben Olsen, Drew Moor, Sacha Kljestan, Kyle Beckerman, Kasey Keller, Ricardo Clark, Taylor Twellman, Justin Mapp, Brad Guzan, Lee Nguyen
They didn’t do well but Demerit, Benny, Pearce, Gomez,EJ,CD, JB, Rico, and Guzan all have legitimate shots at going to the 2010 World Cup and 9-10 of them have either been regulars or have a shot to be one soon. As a developmental exercise I would say it was pretty succesful,all things considered.
Look, Goche, it’s not like the US had a million players available in 2007. And the best of them had club committments.
Bob brought his best to the Gold Cup to guarantee we would get to the Confederations Cup. Once that was done, Bob most likely had to send the best of his squad back to their clubs as two tournaments back to back like that in the summer is frowned on by most clubs. Whether you like it or not Bradley has to play ball with the clubs like all national team managers.
Especially when you consider the travel involved in that Tournament.
And if you don’t think that most top clubs don’t do exactly the same thing Bradley did, then you haven’t been watching the FA and Carling Cup competitons in England, for one example. All the big clubs use it to try out experimental teams and the like. Why? Because those tournaments mean nothing to them just like the Copa America meant to the US. I bet you can’t name the last three Copa America winners without looking them up.
No one really cares about it. The USMNT is on a 4 year cycle and only the World Cup matters. The Copa America tournamnet was useful inthat regard.
Besides the US did get something special out of the tournament. They got to see Bornstein do a pretty good job on Messi which perhaps has helped fuel his USMNT career.
these were the dumbest answer someone could give in an interview, for every question he tried to answere he created two more
I will 2nd that motion ! Can I have an Amen ??!!
No doubt! Long-live the “Bease” from WC 2000 and 2001-2003 Champions League play.
Gooooo back to the Dutch league!!
Agreed; I am sure he will be. Buuut, even if he is…maybe Bradley couching his words and not promising to do so tells us something about posible reservations about Davies.
We all may love the guy for his play, but there should have been and still be some question about his maturity and decision making now that all of the facts of the accident have come out. Out after curfew, involved w/drinking and driving …before a game???
To some extent yes. He is certainly a very measured man when he speaks. He’s said that he like to keep things close, so its no surprise he speaks in generalities and cliches. He’s been like a recent college grad train hopping through europe to see most of, if not all, the players in the pool so I’m confident he has a pulse on everyone, gooch davies and holden included. The camp is certainly going to be interesting and there are 3 or 4 questions left back, forward pool, 2v3 GK, etc.
Bradley:
“There’s an old expression that the team picks the team.”
Me:
“Sh*t coach, I thought that was your job!? You don’t inspire me…”
Anyone else read this transcript and think of Bill Belichick? The platitudes, the assurances everything will be revealed in due time, the sense that he knows everything going on but won’t reveal any bit of what he thinks about it? Just a thought.
While there is no disputing the importance of match fitness there has to be some consideration to the ” mental” aspect of selecting players. Sasha for example is a player who is very fragile mentaly his confidence goes up it goes down. Not the type of player you want to see on the pitch in the WC. Davies on the other hand mentally speaking is all aboout abusing defenders, scoring goals doing what ever it takes. This guy will not back down against anybody. Call me OL School but I would take an 80% CD over ever forward but Jozy
“over-paid”
How much does he make then? or are you going to use multiple accounts to answer that question by not answering it because im sure u dont know.
Patrick ,
Great points.
This will get me labeled a heretic at the Church of CD9 but Gooch is a long established veteran center back for the USMNT and if he shows signs of not being up to it there are viable options. Frankly, mobility was never one of Gooch’s strong points anyway. So there isn’t much of a story there.
Charlie’s story is far more dramatic.
Charlie basically had a run of about 10 games starting with the Egypt game at the Confederations Cup. Along with his never say die attiude and his speed he was also powerful and relentless.
It’s asking a great deal of him to expect that he will have the strength and power that made him stand out. And without those things, he doesn’t belong on the team.
So him getting on the team is a much greater long shot than Gooch.
There is no reason we couldn’t send a legitimate team to the Copa America.
I realize it was two days after the Gold Cup ended, and it probably would not be possible to send a full squad, but we sent not one regular national team player.
You make it sound like he was saving our players for the Confederations Cup or something, but that was 2 years later and qualifiers didn’t start for a year after the Copa.
It makes no sense to not send a legitimate team to a major international competition, particularly one that is a better competition than any CONCACAF competition.
If he is only taking 26 to 28 in the camp, anu fringe players are gone.
This is the World Cup, a very serious, big money affair. Players here get showcased and maybe win a move that can get them into the big or bigger money.
So Charlie went thru hell to get to the World Cup? Well it’s not good enough to just get there; you have to do something once you are there. If Davies can’t do something beyond being a cheerleader, I guarantee you the players would rather have someone there who can actually help. Otherwise, he is taking their money.
“The last striker on a 23 sees virtually no action. ”
So you think you can just throw away one slot? In 2006 England took Rooney, Owen, Crouch and Theo Walcott as strikers. Rooney was half fit and played poorly (inspirational player,sound familiar?). Owen blew out his knee in the third group game. Peter Crouch scored one goal against TNT, the only England striker to score.
Walcott did not play a minute, which would seem to validate your comment, except it doesn’t. He did not play because he wasn’t up to it; therefore England was down to Crouch, a half fit stuggling Rooney and a Michael Owen with a blown out knee.
You think England might have done better if they had taken Jermaine Defoe instead of having to play Crouch? There sure are a lot of people who think Sven should have.
The USMNT is not so good that it can afford to give anything away; why people like you want to send them to the Cup with one hand tied behind their back from the get go is beyond me.
“Your best eleven guys don’t always make (up) your best team.”
That, combined with
“There’s an old expression that the team picks the team. That’s pretty true because usually things establish themselves pretty well.”
To me that is saying that players who are not getting regular games like Onyewu and Davies will make it to the camp regardless because they’ve begun to form something of an establishment in the “A Roster”. The team knows who should be playing for the good of the USA style of playing. Maybe I’m being hopeful, but I think that Bradley is actually doing a -bad job- at hiding the fact that Davies and Onyewu will be in the camp.
Bradley is a master.
Looks at all these posts; many of you have come to completely opposite conclusions on topics that Bradley has commented on.
Genius!
Bradley’s comments on Davies were fairly shrewd as he is in a no win situation. If Charlie is fit he makes the squad. The worst thing for Bradley is to have CD good enough for the camp but not ready for the World Cup. If he leaves him off the team and they tank in SA he leaves himself open to a huge amount of second guessing. It’s much safer from Bradley’s standpoint for there to be plausable doubts about Davies’ fitness. Same for Gooch. Let’s hope its a moot point and they are both fit.
Marcello Lippi, manager of World Cup Champs Italy, is famous for always saying that.
dwitty, according to Fox Soccer Bradley did talk of Beasley,
“Bradley said Glasgow Rangers midfielder DaMarcus Beasley, a veteran of the 2002 and 2006 World Cups, was “on the radar screen” for the training camp, but “there are still clearly some questions.”
“DaMarcus has been tricky in this last year,” Bradley added. “He had some very good games in December, got back into the team and I think did well. And since then it’s been up and down, more down certainly of late.”
DMB did look good in Holland but he has barely played since. Makes it tough to take him.
You are reading way too much into that comment.
That is a cliche often applied to teams where the majority of the positions are clearly decided because those players are clearly better.
Another way to say the same thing is “we have no depth”. And that, of course , is absolutely true.
Well the USA had already qualified for the Confederations Cup by doing very well in the Gold Cup. Lo and behold, Bob manages to do the USA proud in the Confederations Cup. Wasn’t much point in risking injury by taking his players down to a tournament that didn’t even matter.
I remember all of DMB’s career.
Horrible first touch, lots of aimless dribbling and runnning around, but when he is on the US can really use him.
But if he’s not, he’s a disaster. Unfortunately he hasn’t done much since the Holland game so it’s hard to see him making a case.
The players are just like anyone else.
If they see CD clearly not ready to go in camp and then see Gomez looking sharp, they’ll be fine with that.
It would be cool to go with your buddies but it’s even cooler and more lucrative if you win. This ain’t some spring break trip the Padre Island, it’s the World Cup and there is an awful lot of fame and fortune to be had; if you win.
The players will leave Charlie behind without a backward glance if he can’t help them win.
Yes, but I don’t think it’s anything that will end up costing the USA any kind of matches. It’s also not like nobody tried to call in Hoyos; he simply declined and Bradley had no room on his roster to be trying for a young player who wasn’t even guarenteed to accept the invitation.
All the sites I’ve seen have him listed as an attacking midfielder so I’m gonna go with that, but either way, it’s no huge deal and no proof that Bradley has done a poor job.
a lot better against Euro teams like Denmark and Croatia? I wouldn’t say so. Rest of team looked better against dutch, except for BB pet LB Bornstein, who…didn’t. Assuming we all agree being responsible for the other team’s 3 goals counts as having a bad day.
That’s certainly great news, but I personally wasn’t worried about him getting called into camp, it’s been about him convincing bob, or whomever else, that he’s fit and in form enough (or close enough) to give him a spot.
If you were as viciously attacked as he is for every single thing he says and does, you’d be very careful with your words too.
Care to explain that?
We are in agreement that pool has deepened and Sacha has sunk.
Giving Sacha – and Bornstein if I recall correctly -looks in Confed Cup finals as the second half subs – what do you call that? Yes USMNT lacks depth, but if it were me they would be last 2 off bench.
BB’s learning, but I agree with those hoping he is one and done after the Cup.
He did downplay Gomez’ accomplishments. Don’t know why?
I agree. I can’t think of any athlete in any sport who plays only 10 games a year (three straight years) and is in professional form.
I was a huge Beasley supporter, but the reality is, he doesn’t play, for reasons. If in the 23 it would be a wasted sentimental pick, like Lewis, and Wegerle were.
I think it sounds like Charlie is at least going to the camp…Bradley was on ESPN First Take this morning, and here was his quotation on Charlie:
“We’re still assessing it, but Charlie has had an amazing mentality…we’re hoping he’ll continue to progress…WE’LL GET A GOOD LOOK AT HIM IN OUR CAMP…we’re hoping it will still work for him”
That sounds good.
I also think Bradley saw a guy who can come off the bench (and who won’t MIND coming off the bench) and do a great job.
Bradley wouldn’t say “a great goal” lightly and he wouldn’t have set up Herc to train at Chivas USA for a few weeks if he wasn’t somewhat interested.
well, its a good thing our games are going to be played later in the day then, huh?
Landon has already publicly backed both Gomez and Buddle for a look-see, so he’ll certainly be OK with it.
Everything was good until he mentioned Bornstein!!!! Yes Bradley has done well, but he still has his favorites despite them making numerous mistakes that has given away goals like Bornstein. Just last game he caused a penalty AGAIN for Chivas. I would rather try out some of the young guys in the MLS who have shown better composure on the ball(ex. Chris Tierney,Kevin Alston, Rodney Wallace & Mike Chabala). Pearce has speed to run the flank and crosses much better than Trashstein
I remember that factoid about Holden from last year. He stated in a recent interview that he prides himself on his fitness, and hopes that it will speed his return to first team action at Bolton. I wonder how US players stack up against other nationalities in an objective test like that.
If they are both cleared to resume full training they should both be at the same level of recovery, which is recoverd. They are now searching to regain match fitness. If I’m not mistaken a great deal of speed and hustle go into defending as well as attacking. My point is, that there are too many articles about CD and whether he will/won’t make the trip to South Africa. I don’t understand the sigh of relief because Gooch (as well as Holden) are back training fully. I feel we still aren’t out of the clear just yet. Hopefully everything works out for the USMNT, thats what we all want.
I was under the impression that he was a defensive midfielder that can pass. I have watched some of his games as a starter and as a sub, I’m not saying that he is the answer to our prayers, but we won’t know until we try him in a friendly, which is my point, we won’t know now since he was also invited to the argentine U20 NT.
It’s funny you mention this, at times during the Inter-Barca game I felt I was watching a USA-Spain replay.
I agree with this. The last striker on a 23 sees virtually no action. Selecting Davies is an intangible that might over balance having a Buddle who gets zero minutes.
I know if I was on the team (and reading between the lines of Altidores motivation) I know I’d look at the sideline, see Charlie and say wtf.. I can’t track back right, look what that guy did just to be here and I’d get on my horse.
I don’t know about you, but I kind of think the ridiculous amount of injuries he suffered is lesson enough.
That was a joke of a team. That was a perfect opportunity to raise our level of play against good opponents. I understand taking some young guys, but taking a side with almost no international experience and no chance whatsoever of succeeding was a terrible decision and I put that on Bob.
I think Bradley makes a mistake not bringing in the full 30.
There are enough health and form question marks that he needs to see everyone pitted against each other and let the cream rise.
Say or love or hate what you want, but until that camp we cant really tell how back or in form these guys are:
Gomez, Buddle, Gooch, Beasely, Holden, Adu, EJ.. Clark.. Sascha (who you know he will bring)
I’m glad you like the lineup, but don’t be shocked if Bornstein IS in the lineup. Even though Bocanegra is an all around great defender and has the positional sense to deal with pace, he has been known to get blown by like a stack of leaves at times. At the moment, I go with Bocanegra, but I can understand Bradley’s sentiments if Bornstein is played out there.
of course Jones is being monitored coach Bob has a big hard-on for Jerman Jones. i’m surprised they didn’t get him to rehab with Charlie and Gooch 6 months ago, then he might be playing now…
from Bob’s words on Herculez and Buddle it seems he’s a little higher on Edson i think???
I like Bob Bradley, but he does rely to alarming degree on the phrase, At the end of the day. One fears that he gives almost no thought whatsoever to sunup and midday.
I like this….especially because Bornstein is not in either lineup!!!!