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Christian Pulisic’s latest display leaves Lothar Matthaeus believing Bayern should buy him

Saturday may not have been a good afternoon for Borussia Dortmund, but Christian Pulisic was a lone bright spot for Peter Bosz’s side.

Dortmund, which has only won one match out of its last seven across all competitions, fell 3-1 on Saturday against Bayern Munich in Bundesliga play.

Pulisic helped set up the lone goal for the hosts, dancing past Arjen Robben on the left-wing before passing off to Gonzalo Castro.

Pulisic’s performance was so impressive it left German legend Lothar Matthaeus believing Bayern Munich should look to buy the 19-year-old American.

“If Bayern Munich someday looks for a replacement for Robben and [Franck] Ribery, then they have to put out their feelers for Pulisic,” Matthaus told Sky Sports, according to Goal. “He is 19 years old and has high quality.” Matthaus continued. “With his confidence and his speed, he is called to higher [things].”

Dortmund was held to four shots on goal, and has dropped to third in the Bundesliga table. Pulisic also received praise from Dortmund coach Peter Bosz after the game.

“Pulisic was clearly the best player in our team,” Bosz told Sky after the match. “He had an incredible game.” The U.S. international has two goals and one assist in 11 league appearances so far this season.

Comments

  1. Think it is good to give him a break. Would love to see him playing for the US but Dortmund has a busy schedule between now and the end of December.

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  2. Would it be nice as a fan to see him play? Certainly. But not a big deal if he doesn’t. This is a meaningless friendly played in a hellish limbo heading into…. nothing for quite some time. A match led by a stop-gap interim manger who is a relic assistant of the failed, departing regime who slunk away in failure, tail between legs. Nothing about the line-ups, tactics etc. will have much bearing on anything, little learned by fans or players. A strange pointless run-out with us perhaps seeing new blood get capped.

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  3. I watched that game specifically to see Pulisic play. He was great! My biggest observation was as follows.

    Somebody is keeping him very wide to the left for much of the day. That being said, he team went to the right maybe 80% of the time. The few times he did get the ball, he was magic. Why do they go right so much and isolate a player as explosive as Pulisic. I would love to see him in the middle with more touches

    It would be good for Pulisic to go to a better team IF they intended to play him. In my estimation, he is on track to be the best ever US Player. Lets hope he doesnt get hurt

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    • Agreed, that the team seems to go up the opposite side to CP more often than not. On the other hand, CP had 14 one-on-one dribbles, the most in the Top-5 leagues outside of Messi and Neymar. If they went up CP’s side more, he’d have to attack more than he already does, which is alot. Don’t want to burn him out. He’s already shown some fatigue, which led to him dropping his form, earlier this season. In some ways, it may help CP to get a little break from all the pressure, without the weight of a WC on his shoulders.

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    • yeah, whichever side he plays on, he seems to hug the line so tightly as to be totally out of the play, not even providing a decoy to create more space for others, since the opposition no longer has to cover dembele on the other side. i’m assuming it’s the coach’s instruction, since pulisic seems very tactically aware (and also *always* wants to be in the middle of play); but it’s maddening, especially since it’s not working at all.

      and one more comment about the last game: the last 15 minutes or so, bayern were doubling him (easy, because no one else on dortmund was interested in playing), and pulisic was *still* getting by everyone. it was simply amazing to watch.

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    • it comes down to Kimmich was at RB. so naturally you go down the other side and stick a super talented guy like Pulisic on his side. what’s weird is once they saw Pulisic having his way, there wasn’t a full tactical shift to his side.

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  4. pulisic was the best player on either team yesterday; don’t think i’ve ever seen him that good before.

    lost track of how many easy chances dortmund missed; they should’ve scored 4-5. auba is in just terrible form, and the rest of the team doesn’t know how to play together. can’t imagine bosz will be around much longer.

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  5. Yup. Time to really, really, REALLY dedicate ourselves to the 4-3-3 that the USSF always preaches…which means playing Pulisic as a true winger/outside forward, and finding a legit #8 who can connect front to back so Pulisic doesn’t have to fill both roles and be our Mr. Everything.

    Argentina/Barca did much the same with Messi, and of course Robben filled that role for Bayern and the Netherlands.

    Or we can dither around and keep messing with formations, and waste him, and keep doing nothing particularly well.

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    • a team shouldn’t decide tactics based on one player. Pulisic is good enough he should be effective in multiple type of formations. We need to be solid in the back before we worry about anything else.

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      • Agree, but the USSF has been preaching the high-press 4-3-3 for years now. The fact that it also suits our best game-changer (and the guy we’ve seen closest yet to having the ceiling of an American Messi) is just an added bonus.

        Whatever, we need to pick a system and stick to it…and it might as well be the system the USSF has been preaching and aspiring to for years. When I first got nationally certified back in 2011 they were ALREADY preaching the implementation of that 4-3-3 and here in almost 2018 we STILL haven’t settled on a system with the senior team? Really? And we wonder why we’re out?

    • the problem with adhering to one formation, or even one system (like high-pressing) is that they invariably lose effectiveness as other teams change and adapt, and then you’re faced with re-vamping your whole structure every few years, creating a disconnect between your youth and senior teams.

      when klinsmann came on board and gulati started crowing about the new system we would adapt, they were already behind the curve (teams had started moving to a more flexible system, using a 3/5 hybrid backline with flying wingers).

      i’m not saying there aren’t benefits to having a set formation/system—there certainly are. but a prime example of this is holland: they have a culture almost entirely dedicated to excellence in soccer, and they produce a massive amount of top players, but they’re perennial underachievers (and getting worse) because they’re tightly tied down to a ‘total football’ 4-3-3 that was revolutionary, oh, about 40 years ago.

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