The newly-created U.S. Under-19 Men’s National Team’s start to 2016 has not gone as well as envisioned.
The U.S. ended its Copa de Atlantico campaign on Friday with a 1-0 loss to lowly Canary Islands, which were playing with 10 men. Brad Friedel’s side held the man-advantage since the first half, but was unable to capitalize and finished the tournament scoreless.
The Americans also suffered defeats to Spain and France in this competition. Spain edged the U.S., 1-0, on Tuesday, and France handed the Americans a 5-0 blowout loss.
Here is the U.S.’s starting lineup (4-2-3-1) from Friday’s defeat:
Goalkeeper: Benjamin Hale
Defenders: Reginald Cannon, Hector Montalvo, Tanner Dieterich, John Nelson
Midfielders: Weston McKinnie, Eric Calvillo (c); Simon Lekressner, Paxton Pomykal, Djordje Mihailovic
Forward: Brian Saramago
Here are the highlights vs. Spain, France and the Canary Islands, respectively:
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What do you think of the U.S. U-19s performance? What are you expecting from this group in 2016 and beyond?
Share your thoughts below.
Meh, we definitely have genuine issues with identifying and training the best talent. However, a country the size of the US will never efficiently pick the best underage teams. Just look at our U-17 women’s team. They have yet to win a World Cup (and have failed to even qualify for half of them). Meanwhile South Korea and North Korea, countries with at most a couple hundred serious female youth soccer players have each won a U-17 WWC. I seriously doubt that Mexico, which has only missed one U-17 WWC has actually surpassed us in talent.
If we want the best performance from our youth national teams (particularly the men’s program), then we need to pick more than just kids from LA, New York and a token handful from DC, San Francisco etc. If we really want to maximize the value added by our youth teams and increase the future success of the USMNT, then we need to stop picking MLS academy products. As in not pick any of them. In stead pick only kids outside of major markets. The academy players are already training at a high level and if they are any good they’ll make it no matter what. It’s the players in El Paso and Detroit that are falling through the cracks and not getting the necessary chances to improve.
Brad was desperate to get clean sheets, the side didn’t matter.
Looks like Wall St off-shore accounts are are paying off huge dividends…
I believe you’re thinking of the Cayman Islands.
Zero goals against a 10 man team (and zero in the 2 previous games as well). Not sure everyone got JK’s memo about attacking soccer. Friedel was a great keeper, perhaps his approach to the game is not so attack-minded. Or perhaps the selection of the players was weighted towards those who played defensively first and took too few risks. Or perhaps there are no 18 year-olds available who can score. Whatever, it is not good.
Pretty funny to lose to Canary Islands and not score a single goal. Not funny for the players of course, but funny for us
Oh brother – Friedel has UEFA badges. His academy in Cleveland produced players like Romain Gall and…Wil Trapp. plmedici – you are clearly the answer.
So many chicken littles following US Soccer now. The sky is not falling. If you want to be a coach, you understand that losing is part of the process of learning too.
Never said Friedel was a bad coach. And never said losing wasn’t part of life. And, again, never said I was the answer.
While I admit on the negative side, my comment was meant to be more of a rallying cry to see all the passion I see on these message boards channeled into youth coaching (where we could use the help).
Maybe Friedel isn’t ready to be a manager or maybe someone did a very poor job when selecting the players. Don’t make it about the status of US Soccer because we’ve had some incredibly successful youth teams.
To be fair to Friedel, I follow the US youth prospects list at least somewhat closely and I haven’t ever heard of even one of these guys. That doesn’t mean some of them aren’t good, but I follow closely enough that I’d at least thought I’d have heard of a handful of them. This could be a US C team or something for all I know.
Still kinda sad to get shut out by the Canary Islands.
If this is an experimental team, ala’ a January camp, then it would be nice for SBI to state the same. I appreciate Mark’s comments that he does not recognize the names of most of the players attending this tournament for our US19s.
Not sure why you don’t recognize the players. Ten of these players were at the recent U17 world up and all the other ones play for major academy programs. All well know.
Still, not the best talent of the 98 class was there, that for sure.
Loosing to Canary Islands and canary was playing s man down is unjustified!
Pretty embarrassing. I made a sarcastic comment on the post regarding the thrashing by France that I hoped they could finish up with a big win over the Canary Islands. I was surprised to learn there are 2 million people in the Canary Islands but it’s still pretty ridiculous to lose to a ten-man Canary Islands team.
Also surprised by the opening comment on this article which basically says we can never hope to bridge the huge gap between us and the Canary Islands. Even with results like this, I’d say that’s unduly pessimistic.
So this U19 team lost to a country, the Canary Islands, with a population similar to that of the state of New Mexico. Youth or not, this is not good.
Things aren’t always what they seem- this ain’t like Moldova or something. . Canary Islands- it’s football are closely tied to/a part of Spanish football. The majority/all of its players on their team are a product of Spanish develoment. I don’t think they even compete separately in International soccer aside from friendlies.
The Canary Islands produces players like David Silva and Pedro. They produce more world class talent out of their 2Million people than the US ever has.
New team. takes time to gel. Canary islands, though?
“It’s all Klinsmann’s fault!” –USMNT fanidiots
A taste of the gulf in talent, coaching, and professional development infrastructure between us and the rest of the world.
Stop looking for “saviors” and quick fixes and blaming people when they don’t (and realistically never can) come off.
It’ll take years for us to close this gap. That’s why I’m working on my coaching license.
Not sure how the u20s can finish 4 and that not be the exhibit of the narrowing of the “gulf” but a meaningless tournament against France and Spain (and the Canary Islands and I have no clue which portion of Spain’s youth players they have) and suddenly the gulf is huge again. Moreover I am not sure how you can mock people who want to blame Klinsman the sentence before you point out the huge gulf in coaching. You realize Klinsman leads the way as our coach/TD right? It’s not like he *just* got here.
Yes, clearly YOU are the answer.
Never said I was the answer. I’m just going to try to do something about it, and I hope you decide to as well.
The game won’t improve in this country if we sit at our laptops or on our couches, will it?
Also, Jurgen doesn’t “lead the way” in coaching. The youth coaches in this country are mostly volunteers with little to no formal training. Jurgen can instill best practices in the top parts of the pyramid, but then it’s up to us at the bottom to stop being fans and start participating.
But thanks for proving my “savior” point.
Keep up the great work with your coaching. We definitely need as many capable coaches as we can get.
In reference to the people who are critical to Klinnsmann–I’m sure that you remember that both the gentleman and Mr. Gulati marketed him as a bit of a “savior” who was supposed to help get us to the next level, right?
So, when you get paid/bring in a guy that gets paid more than anyone in the history or the programs and give him the keys to the entire mens’ side of the kingdom–you can expect some pushback when we don’t look any better several years later. That comes with the job and those types of decisions.
Hopefully, you might be one of those guys to help us get to where we need to get to. If you get marketed and paid the way that Mr. Klinnsmann has been–you’ll be catching shade if the anticipated results aren’t there.
That’s just part of the experience; it comes with the territory.
I agree with a lot of what you’re saying.
It’s frustrating. That’s where my first post came from.
I also get frustrated seeing all the blame fall on Klinsmann when things like the following happen:
1) EJ and Stuart Holden retire due to health conditions
2) Josh Gatt, Terrence Boyd and Joe Gyau (players who should be taking up the attacking mantle) are out on extended injuries
3) Players like Lee Nguyen (prior to this camp) can contribute to the national team but aren’t upping their games — from what I read Lee had taken previous call-ups for granted and wasn’t fit (who knows what Feilhaber did)
How’s he realistically supposed to make up for some of those losses in talent/professionalism?
Because that’s something he has to deal with right now with the full MNT.