The U.S. men’s national team achieved two of its key goals during the November international window, clinching a berth into the 2024 Copa America tournament and sealing a return to the 2023-24 CONCACAF Nations League Final Four.
Gregg Berhalter’s squad defeated Trinidad & Tobago 4-2 on aggregate over two legs, continuing their quest for a Nations League three-peat. Antonee Robinson scored twice for the USMNT while Gio Reyna and Ricardo Pepi also celebrated goals of their own.
Several players did not live up to expectations during the two quarterfinal ties, failing to boost their stocks over the window. Sergino Dest was the biggest disappointment following his ejection in Monday’s 2-1 second leg defeat in Port of Spain.
Here is a closer look at the winners and losers from the USMNT’s November Nations League matches:
Winners
Antonee Robinson
The USMNT left back job looks to set for many years to come.
Antonee Robinson shined brightest for the USMNT this window, scoring in back-to-back matches for the first time in his career. The 26-year-old also assisted once in last week’s 3-0 first leg victory in Texas, creating a match-high five chances against Trinidad & Tobago.
Robinson’s absence from the October schedule was clearly visible on both sides of the field. However, his return to action in November concluded with a pair of confidence-building performances to take back to his Premier League schedule with Fulham.
Gio Reyna
Gio Reyna was also among the goalscorers for the USMNT, logging 132 combined minutes over two matches.
The 20-year-old Reyna delivered a clinical finish in the first leg win at Q2 Stadium, going 90 minutes for the first time since a December 2022 friendly with Borussia Dortmund. Reyna looked confident and lively in possession, setting up his teammates on several occasions.
Reyna was substituted off before halftime in Monday’s match following Sergino Dest’s ejection. USMNT head coach Gregg Berhalter confirmed to reporters that Reyna was expected to be replaced at halftime, which is key for the midfielder’s long-term availability for club and country.
Yunus Musah
Yunus Musah continued to show why he will be a key player for the USMNT long-term.
Musah started in both matches this month, totaling 180 combined minutes against the Soca Warriors. The 20-year-old registered a 91% passing rate or higher in both matches, winning six of 13 duels and covering ample ground on both ends of the field.
Weston McKennie’s absence from the second leg due to injury forced Musah to provide even more range from his position. Now Musah will aim to carry that confidence over to AC Milan’s busy fall schedule.
Losers
Sergino Dest
Sergino Dest delivered a positive performance in the USMNT’s first leg vs. T&T, but concluded his window on a disappointing note.
Dest’s tantrum in the first half of Monday’s eventual second leg loss led to his ejection after a pair of yellow card offenses. After punting the ball into the stands after a decision did not go the USMNT’s way, Dest argued with lead referee Walter Gomez before receiving a second yellow in quick fashion.
Tim Ream, Gio Reyna, and Matt Turner were all visibly frustrated with Dest’s actions on the field, actions that led the USMNT to play the final 50+ minutes with only 10 men.
Dest’s talent remains sky high, but his attitude will need to change if he wants to remain the USMNT’s starting right back.
Folarin Balogun
Ricardo Pepi concluded his November window with another international goal under his belt, while Folarin Balogun failed to score in both of his starts.
Balogun did assist once in last week’s first leg win, but struggled to offer anything outside of that. The Monaco forward was held in check by the T&T backline in Monday’s second leg loss albeit the USMNT were down to 10 men from the 39th minute onward.
Pepi has continued to make the most of his chances, but Balogun has been up-and-down since his USMNT debut.
Malik Tillman
Malik Tillman entered USMNT camp off the back of four goals and two assists over the past two months with PSV, but struggled to replicate that production in Nations League play.
Tillman struggled last week in his 66-minute start against the Soca Warriors, offering just one shot and creating just one offensive opportunity. The 21-year-old struggled to bring the same intensity that he had done with PSV at club level.
Tillman’s 25-minute cameo on Monday was improvement from last week’s performance, which is a slight positive heading back to Eredivisie and UEFA Champions League play. However, Tillman remains one of many midfielders/attackers fighting for a long-term role in this squad.
Who impressed you vs. Trinidad & Tobago? Who disappointed? Who are you hoping to see more of in 2024?
Share your thoughts below.
The biggest loser is the US Soccer Federation. Our talent base keeps on improving yet our performance in games that matter does not. Losing 2-1 against T&T? Sound familiar. Sneaking into the World Cup via a tiebreaker last cycle? Getting spanked in the first knockout round? We haven’t improved since 1994 and our best ever world cup finish is now 20 years past. People like to dump on Gregg, and despite the fact that he is a lousy coach, he is just a symptom of the problem. Attending soccer, playing soccer as a kid, and even accessing the TV packages has made being a soccer fan ever more burdensome on regular people, and if soccer’s marquee attraction in the USA keep up the lackluster performances we are going to lose our fan base very quickly, because there is no level of soccer at which the USA now excels.
Chill about DEST! HE’S A fantastic player. Been undervalued at Barca, playing great now in Netherlands and playing on a bals field getting fouled left And right. He helps the team having a chip on his shoulder let ot go he’s so good
I really like Jedi Robinson, and his speed and energy were a big help. He is a solid defender and he has no problem getting forward. But the problems arise once he tries to deliver the end product. His crosses are subpar and that’s being kind. It’s a shame because he absolutely can do all the buildup work, and still get back to defend. I’m holding out hope he can improve, the goal he scored in the first t&t game was a great strike. Even if he could consistently play the cutback ball on ground to the penalty spot after getting to the corner, it would be an improvement. I think it’s worthwhile to give Lund a shot against a better team to see if his defending holds up because he looks far more polished offensively. Reyna is quickly becoming indispensable, the offense just isn’t the same without him. I hope you guys are right that Tillman can grow into that role, but imho I just haven’t seen it yet. We just don’t have anyone else who can play that perfectly placed and weighted final pass. Right now if Reyna went down, I would probably go with Pulisic in that spot before Tillman. Not really CPs best spot but I think he comes closest, and we have other wing options.
In addition to his crosses, A. Robinson also has a heavy first touch and struggles with his passing out of the back when the opposition high presses him.
Agreed, with regards to Reyna. If Reyna cannot go, and all other options are healthy, Weston is our next best 10, followed by B. Aaronson, and then Tillman. To this point, Tillman has not shown that he can do it, but to be fair to him, he has not been given that opportunity.
Brenden is not playing well enough to get called up anymore.
Unless he gets dramatically better he is going back to Leeds and they don’t want him.
my deal is if you look at his NT game logs he’ll produce like this then go quiet for months. this was a soft opponent. i don’t think it matters as our evaluation process lacks context ie you produced but who against. we have a tendency to try and rehabilitate players like this. last cycle he tried to bring back steffen at turner’s expense. lund had played well in jedi’s absence and i guess the narrative is going to flip to jedi was out so none of that matters.
for the team to evolve and improve the coach can’t fight it when turner comes in and takes the job, so to speak.
OK, I know he’s old and not fast, but Ream made, so far as I could see, only one, perhaps two, mistakes; one easily cleaned up by CCV and on the other hre bumped the attacker enough to force a bd touch (true a better attacker might have scorfed, but this resulted not even in a shot.
True TnT did not offer a great deal going forward, but despite my fears, their attempts to get Ream into foot races he would lose did not bear fruit barring that one time; CCV may bear some fault for that.
With the ball at his feet Ream was the most composed player on the field and his passes were crisp and accurate.
I dunno if that moves Ream up or not (GB seems to already have a high opinion of him), but it was a couple very good games for Ream.
I have yet to be impressed with Tillman. He does well with his club team, but I don’t see that much with the national team. I thought he did not do well against T&T, but since I didn’t expect much, I wasn’t surprised. At the international level in a competition in a two game playoff to advance, the keeper cannot afford to make mistakes. Turner screwed up and although it didn’t change the ultimate outcome, I certainly wouldn’t automatically start him vs. Jamaica. Although he didn’t screw up and held his own, I though Scally was a disappointment. He wasn’t bad, but he wasn’t as good as I thought he should be. Starting regularly with a decent team in the Bundesliga, I expected more from him. I thought he could have done better and should have done better with ball control and deciding when to pass and when to dribble. I think too often he hesitated to pass and allowed himself to be pressured and put himself in tight spots when he didn’t need to. I agree with the article’s analysis regarding Robinson, Dest, et. a. and definitely agree with the mistakes by Berhalter, which continues a pattern we see too often. His substitution decisions were head scratching, at best.
I know I definitely felt like a loser.
Now that was pretty funny!!
CCV didn’t do the best job on goal 1, but richards didn’t play all weekend.
it’s telling to me that a lot of the responses are kind of reading the tea leaves of what GB thinks more so than really evaluating who played well or bad. the two aren’t all that aligned. eg i was underwhelmed by tillman’s play but some are saying well but the coach subbed him right into the game down a man.
that’s not what I’m saying easports 🙂
I said he was a winner because it looks like coach favors him, and when given a 2nd bite, he came thru
it’s easy to evaluate what we saw…like Tillman being subbed on in that situation instead of other options available, and then how he played. it’s been covered by others very well here
we all await your wall of words reply , and then reply to yourself, and then counter reply to your own reply
I’m just messing with you IV, but good grief dude, many here demonstrate they understand at least as well as you…as in, in the least, they demonstrate it, repeatedly. you could come down from your high horse self anointed one and commiserate with the plebs, or continue to wear no clothes emperor 😉
bb: to me you used to earn a spot on the team by playing well for it and not because hype surrounded you based on your club resume. club resume used to get you in the door is all.
tillman definitely has some raw goods and i’d say try him again every so often. i just don’t see it other than the tautology of he’s already one of the regulars, which begs the question. if you want to win in a world cup every player needs to be a performer in the shirt.
funny, but I’d say Tillman was a winner, not because of his play first game, but because GB showed belief in him by subbing him in 2nd game over other options, and he responded
still do not understand GBs lack of other sub usage in that situation, but I guess GB is saying he doesn’t believe in those players, at least in that situation. Maybe it begs the question of why they are there? idk
the positioning of Tillman defensively after the Dest sendoff still ??? imho
he came across like of two minds. like the initial response sitting on the 1-0 lead he subs in an AM and scally like he would just patch dest’s spot and keep trying to score. he didn’t really try and retrench the defense until very very late with maloney.
i thought turner had a lousy road game but he has zero competition and the crazed coach has set up the pecking order where his second choice is the 3rd string keeper at turner’s team behind even him.
the defense also looked at sea game 2 and was shaky last window but he didn’t seem to notice last window’s issues with this window’s choices, and the coach’s analysis seemed stuck at the emotional “blame dest” level rather than how did the rest play.
to me we seem so obsessed with chasing individual friendly results with conservative old shoe personnel choice that we don’t seem to care/grasp that what didn’t work for germany or TNT game 2 may also prove a problem in copa america and the world cup. there is a loss of big picture and the idea that i might trade away experimenting today for winning tomorrow. roughly since klinsi it’s been the reverse, the stubborn belief the coach knows his choices and that’s our best chance at winning. even when we don’t.
IV
“the crazed coach has set up the pecking order where his second choice is the 3rd string keeper at turner’s team behind even him.”
Bullshit.
Gregg had little to with Ethan’s rather bizarre offseason.
Gregg also had little to do with Zack’s slow fade into obscurity, Slonina being 19 and not particularly ready, and Matt losing his job at Forest. Gregg is playing our best available keeper, at this time. The fact that our best is shaky right now isn’t on Gregg.
“the defense also looked at sea game 2 and was shaky last window but he didn’t seem to notice last window’s issues with this window’s choices, and the coach’s analysis seemed stuck at the emotional “blame dest” level rather than how did the rest play.”
More bullshit. Germany is not TNT. TNT present a different problem .
Using a Germany solution to solve a TNT problem is like fighting today’s war with the last war’s weapons.
You have no idea what Gregg’s analysis of anything is. The fans and media are focused Dest’s rather spectacular implosion because it was the most entertaining aspect of the two games. The two games? They were pretty boilerplate boring other than the red card and Flo and Malik’s interesting work holding possession and wasting time in the second half of the last game. Perhaps those kinds of tactical wrinkles are not taught in high school, college or your select teams? They tend to be cynical concepts so I can see protecting your young ones from those dark arts.
In the meantime Gregg has 4 months to figure out what to do with his team and with Dest. And, while it may not matter, you have no idea what he’s thinking.
“to me we seem so obsessed with chasing individual friendly results with conservative old shoe personnel choice that we don’t seem to care/grasp that what didn’t work for germany or TNT game 2 may also prove a problem in copa america and the world cup. there is a loss of big picture and the idea that i might trade away experimenting today for winning tomorrow. roughly since klinsi it’s been the reverse, the stubborn belief the coach knows his choices and that’s our best chance at winning. even when we don’t.’
That’s a load of crap. Again , you have no idea what Gregg and his staff took away from those games.
The bottom line here is the games just before TNT were used to help the team qualify Copa America. They did qualify. So whatever Gregg did or did not learn from those games, the objective was achieved.
They aren’t paying Gregg to please your alleged high school, college and select team sensibilities about how a soccer team should be managed. They pay him to get results and make the USSF look not so much like the c==ksuckers that they are.
Results mean you advance.
Advance means you get to play more competitive games.
And that is the ONLY way you build a team and get better. Play more of those tough games in competitive circumstances.
Everything else is just noise.
V: dude, i didn’t say GB “made” horvath 3rd string for his team. he does not control that. what i got at was it’s crap planning to have your first contingency for a seemingly rusty turner be his even more rusty teammate. this is fact whether you like it or not.
he responded to the germany debacle with almost the same call sheet. i don’t care what his thought process is, it’s wrong and sets us up for the next big game debacle. if you want to win the next big games you have to be attentive to why the last one happened.
a team that wants to improve later has to be willing to take risks now. to me the problem with the US is it treats every game like the super bowl which impedes winning the actual super bowls. this has been a running issue since roughly 2015 when the desire to win summer tournaments derailed the 2018 cycle by encouraging us to bet on older players who either dropped out or faltered before qualifying ended.
you need one eye down the road and you also need to be attentive to what actually works. i don’t think we have questioned this system or lineup since roughly 2020 when the coach got musah in for the wales game. how many ups and downs before we mix it up?
“what i got at was it’s crap planning to have your first contingency for a seemingly rusty turner be his even more rusty teammate. this is fact whether you like it or not.”
“crap planning? “fact”? bullshit.
Right now the entire USMNT goal keeper pool is underwhelming, Turner, Horvath, Zack(recovering from knee surgery, Josh Cohen( w/o a club), a 19 year old unimpressive Slonina, broken hand Sean Johnson who just got back to playing with TFC.”
“he responded to the germany debacle with almost the same call sheet. i don’t care what his thought process is, it’s wrong and sets us up for the next big game debacle. if you want to win the next big games you have to be attentive to why the last one happened.”
Then you should pay attention.
The last time I checked Germany and TNT were two very different teams and the Germany game was a friendly.
Vs. TNT, Dest was the left back and Scally the right back, Richards played as did Weah and Pulisic. No Jedi.
Weah, Pulisic and Richards did not play vs. TNT. Jedi was the left back.
Those 4 changes, alone, make for a significantly different team.
There is also a huge difference from playing a friendly and playing for a shot at the Nations League semis and thereby qualifying for Copa America. Plus you had an away leg with TNT while they met Germany in luxurious East Hartford, CT.
Your contention that the USMNT went into the TNT w/o some significant changes from the Germany game is the kind of lazy made up out of context fakeness that you have refined to an art form.
“a team that wants to improve later has to be willing to take risks now. to me the problem with the US is it treats every game like the super bowl which impedes winning the actual super bowls. this has been a running issue since roughly 2015 when the desire to win summer tournaments derailed the 2018 cycle by encouraging us to bet on older players who either dropped out or faltered before qualifying ended.
you need one eye down the road and you also need to be attentive to what actually works. i don’t think we have questioned this system or lineup since roughly 2020 when the coach got musah in for the wales game. how many ups and downs before we mix it up?”
“willing to take risks now…you need one eye down the road and you also need to be attentive to what actually works.”
You’re the one who came up with this highly original observation?
You are a hypocrite.
Gregg just tried something a little risky, assuming he didn’t do it by accident(who knows?). And it actually worked. And you blasted him for doing it.
Down to 10 men he brought in Scally to replace Gio and Tillman to replace Pepi. Scally was obvious but Tillman was interesting in that he gave you both Gio’s ability to hold possession and set tempo and had some of the offensive threat that Pepi had (to keep TNT honest).
He did that instead of bringing on Maloney which was the obvious battening down the hatches 101 move.
A bit risky but it worked. It kept the ball away from TNT , wasted time , meant the USMNT did not have to spend 30 minutes kicking every ball out of bounds( a risky strategy on it’s own), reduced the likelihood of the USMNT defense possibly conceding free kicks in dangerous areas or conceding penalties ( always a risk when you have 19 guys in the box).
It was a gamble made viable because:
1. TNT weren’t that good
2. A three goal lead with 30 minutes to go, regardless of anything, is hard to make up and gets harder as the clock winds down
3. With the away goal rule and that 3 goal deficit, it was TNT who could not afford to concede one more goal. TNT had to respect the threat posed by Tillman and Flo. It made the game harder for them.
“Vs. TNT, Dest was the left back and Scally the right back, Richards played as did Weah and Pulisic. No Jedi.”
Correction . That should read “Vs. Germany”
dest’s blowup and the weak frontline effort mean the real winners were weah, pulisic, anyone else who plays wing, and people who can offer RB services. reyna continued to solidify his 10 role. jedi looked good but i feel like we go in silly circles on that one — i know how that movie ends defensively against better opponents.
Problem is most of the next in line wingers were ineffective against Iraq and Morocco U23s.
i thought zendejas lost by his usage, and i feel bad for lund. lund can play both sides and should be tried as a RB even under GB’s theories. i argue below get lund on the field by moving jedi and puli around.
IV,
It is better to not play and have people think you are better than who is out there than to actually play and PROVE that you’re not better.
V: 100% the biggest winners every winner every window are the guys that don’t play. From Julian Green to Duane Holmes, Alex Mendez to Paxton Pomykal. Holy cow this window people were calling for Jesus Ferreira. Everytime he is called posters lineup with MLS quota conspiracy theories.
JR,
To be clear, what I’m talking about is not original. It is also known as “Backup QB syndrome” as in your backup QB is the greatest thing on toast…until he plays.
Lund is just the latest of IV’s faves. He’s done well with is PT but he hasn’t been asked to do much. Jedi is a victim of high school, college, and select team theorists who love to pound the old cliche that fullbacks have to be defensively sound first, which ignores the fact that many “modern” teams use fullbacks to generate a lot of their offense.
The reason for this is simple and has been true since at least 1970 when Carlos Alberto scored vs Italy in the WC final. In a game that also featured an attacking fullback for Italy in the immortal Fachetti.
Fullbacks tend to be less heavily marked than wingers or midfielders so if you have an aggressive, creative guy. Jedi has his flaws but he is aggressive and direct and his runs cause problems for the other team .
What many, especially high school, college and select team people like IV forget is that the percentages when attacking are different from when you are defending.
Jedi could make 20 runs a game and suck on 19 of them. But on the 20th one, he might score or he might make a great pass that results in an assist. You may only need one of those to win. And if you are defending Jedi, you have to respect every single one of his runs , even if the first 19 are garbage, because the 20th one might be the one that kills you.
An attacker need only be successful 5% of the time to have a good day.
A defender needs to be successful 100% of the time to have a good day.
Jedi’s aggressiveness wears out the other defense and softens them up even if he winds up doing nothing on every single one of his runs.
As for Jesus, he seems to be, or was , Gregg’s idee fixe. I don’t think MLS had a lot to do with it other than make him easier to call up.
There is very little conspiracy around Gregg. The reason he’s here is pretty straight forward.
1. Right price
2. Decent alternatives are likely to be very leery of working for the Great Clown Car in the Sky
3. Success with the USMNT uncertain and even if it is achieved is unlikely to land you the great club gig that you’d want.
4. He’s one of the “boys”. The USSF is still a very clique-oriented cool kids club. A lot of these old time ex players seem to wince when they are forced to criticize him publicly.
If Gregg really wets the bed at Copa America, I expect the USSF will take a long look at Julian Nagelsmann who will likely have been fired by Germany by then.
Then they will go back to Gregg because they will figure why pay Julian all that money to screw up the USMNT when Gregg can do the same thing for much less?
Vacqui,
Fullbacks do need to be good defenders first. Your examples of Carlos Alberto and Giacinto Fachetti exemplify that. You happened to pick two of the best defenders of all time that also were technically top tier players and could attack, as well…but, they were great defenders, first.
V: come on, be honest. i agree that not playing, nominally, says nothing. you weren’t good. you weren’t bad. you just were. but maybe with some other coach. to me to get called then not used with this guy is a statement. GB doesn’t really have players compete for slots in games. he picks someone beforehand. if you aren’t picked you are falling off in his esteem.
re lund, he has played in 3 games, all Ws. i thought he played well. you can pretend i am imagining things all you want.
re green or holmes, this team OBVIOUSLY needs some center mids who can go straight to goal and accurately place a shot. green and holmes have that skill set. i get people adore weston, musah, and tillman but they aren’t the sort who receive a ball top of D and hammer it into a corner of the net. WE NEED CHEAPER GOALS. weston, msuah, and tillman tend to just play it wide and let the wide players do the creation. we know how that ends. we also need a reyna backup with some of his character. LDLT is not a baby reyna.
clown on me all you want we looked like heck for 160′ of TNT and most of germany. this is not optimized and optimization will involve some other system/formation and a few different faces. if this still looks like this in 26 this is a round of 16 team, period. whether you think i am grasping at straws or not.
Papi Grande,
“Fullbacks do need to be good defenders first.”
That depends on how you want to set up your team. Wan Bissaka is an excellent one-on one defender and maybe the best pure defender Manchester United has but he’s too one-dimensional and thus does not play as much as you would think such a solid defender would warrant. Modern teams are compromises. Players are asked to focus on certain tasks. Sometimes those tasks are not as defensive as some would like. Managers trade some defensive prowess in exchange for attacking skills.
Trent Alexander-Arnold was Liverpool’s ever present right back when they were good. While he was hardly a complete waste as a defender everyone knew why he was on the field and it was not to shut people down. And obviously, Klopp was okay with what Trent was doing and how he was playing. VVD on that same team was a dominant center back but what really set him apart was that he would step into midfield occasionally and made Liverpool that much more dangerous. Stones and Rodri now do that for Pep at City.
” Your examples of Carlos Alberto and Giacinto Fachetti exemplify that. You happened to pick two of the best defenders of all time that also were technically top tier players and could attack, as well…but, they were great defenders, first.”
I never said those two weren’t good defenders but that’s not why you know who they are.
IV,
“V: come on, be honest. i agree that not playing, nominally, says nothing. you weren’t good. you weren’t bad. you just were. but maybe with some other coach.”
?? We’re talking about Gregg here not some other coach
“to me to get called then not used with this guy is a statement. GB doesn’t really have players compete for slots in games. he picks someone beforehand. if you aren’t picked you are falling off in his esteem.”
?? I can’t read Gregg’s mind but I would think that, unless Gregg is experimenting, he’s going to play the guy who he thinks gives the team the best shot at winning the game. So if Lund , for example, doesn’t start over Jedi , it means that when they had practice and training before the game, Lund did nothing to show Gregg that ” Wait! he looks so much better than Jedi! And Jedi looks like he’s hung over! I should start Lund over him!”. That might also be influenced by whatever is happening before they come in. For example, let’s say Jedi was dropped by Fulham for sucking and Lund was on a tear for Palermo.
These are what they call manager’s decisions and sometimes they aren’t, to people like you and me , logical, because sometimes managers go with their “gut” and there is no explaining that logically.
All things being equal, regardless of what you and I think, I believe all managers go with the guy they believe gives them the best chance to win.
Nothing else makes sense.
“re lund, he has played in 3 games, all Ws. i thought he played well. you can pretend i am imagining things all you want.”
I said he played well and that he was promising. So what? The competition he faced was milquetoast, a fancy word for garbage. There are any number of other guys who might have done just as well. I saw nothing exceptional about Lund. Now if Gregg had started Lund in both of the TNT games I would not have had a problem with that either. It would have meant that he wants to see how Lund does with some real pressure on him. If Gregg believes in Lund, like he apparently does in Tillman, then throw Lund in the deep end and see if he swims. I guess we will have to wait a little longer on Lund.
“re green or holmes, this team OBVIOUSLY needs some center mids who can go straight to goal and accurately place a shot. green and holmes have that skill set. i get people adore weston, musah, and tillman but they aren’t the sort who receive a ball top of D and hammer it into a corner of the net. WE NEED CHEAPER GOALS. weston, msuah, and tillman tend to just play it wide and let the wide players do the creation. we know how that ends. we also need a reyna backup with some of his character. LDLT is not a baby reyna.”
Has it occurred to you that maybe the reason that “weston, msuah, and tillman tend to just play it wide and let the wide players do the creation.” is because Gregg tells them to do that?
And that if Holmes or Julian were playing for him Gregg would also tell them to do that ?
Okay, maybe Green or Holmes have the gravitas to convince Gregg to do as you say but I don’t really see that.
I’m a big fan of Julian and I know nothing about Holmes. But it is clear to me that Holmes and Julian have not done enough to convince Gregg that they are worth his time.
Both guys have been on the UISMNT radar for years. It’s up to them to sell Gregg on them. If they were consistently “worthy” I have to believe that Gregg would have looked into it. Why wouldn’t he?
My conclusion is he has looked into them and is not convinced. He clearly doesn’t believe that either guy makes this team better. Maybe he’s wrong but if so, then what is anyone else going to be able to do about it?
In other words IV, you are their agent and Gregg isn’t buying what you are selling.
“But clown on me all you want we looked like heck for 160′ of TNT and most of germany. this is not optimized and optimization will involve some other system/formation and a few different faces. if this still looks like this in 26 this is a round of 16 team, period. whether you think i am grasping at straws or not.”
You’re getting boring IV. Tell me something we don’t all already know.
This team has a ton of issues, a mediocre player pool, a manager of questionable competence and an organization in the USSF who inspire nothing but hatred and ridicule.
But they are though to Copa America and have a chance to work on their issues. So there is always hope. Hopefully they won’t be thoroughly embarrassed and humiliated.
push jedi to LF, shift puli in the middle with reyna, put lund back on the field. anyone remember lund? we already know what happens to jedi and dest when we play a good offensive opponent. the DM overload at MF is overkill and the offense is clunky, basically knock it wide and cross it in. this needs more finesse. reyna and puli will do some chasing but what we need is some more direct attack capability straight to net, and the end of pretending that “tillman” or “LDLT” should be starting or IMO even on the team. get rid of the 2-way rubbish. you either are dangerous or you break legs. very good at one or the other. at some point c. nagbe this oddly detoured into jack of all trades. you need a true 6 or two, which is musah (and he needs a backup or two) plus adams. you need some actual productive AMs who can create going straight to goal. this needs to be either a lot more aggressive to goal or it needs to become a different formation if the idea is pitch shutouts and grind out 1-0. i will repeat myself. right now this is very 1-1. not amped enough on offense. not tight enough on defense. this to me is a symptom of a bunch of hybrid types picked for being multitalented as opposed to very good at their particular job. we need more specialists.
Loser: Gregg
Another window of stupefying decisions, including leaving on two forwards when down to 10 players, calling in AND starting players who are out of form, and substituting off players 20-25 minutes too late.
You can call Reyna a midfielder, but he’s not defending any more than Balogan or Pepi. So, from a defensive perspective, it didn’t matter much that Berhalter took Reyna off instead of one of the two forwards. The issue is that he replaced Reyna with another offense first guy in Tillman, instead of Maloney or some other more defensive player.
Johnny 99, Gio was replaced by scally. And when you are the one helping to control possession, yes, you are more important defensively.
Tillman didn’t look good at all that first game. He definitely improved his second. He came in with something I haven’t seen from him before – a nasty edge to his game. He was physical, almost to the line of drawing a card, he was pressing, and he was doing a bunch of dirty work I haven’t seen from him before. And he definitely looked more…settled, I guess would be the word. The level doesn’t seem to intimidate him anymore; it assuredly appeared to his first couple callups.
Nobody’s ever doubted his athleticism or skill on the ball. My questions around him revolved around his confidence, competitive fire, and willingness to put in an honest shift and battle for the team. I’ve always thought his ceiling was one of the top 2-3 on the team and I still think that…certainly it’s in the Top-5. He’s a ways off reaching that yet but I do think he can get there and I’d been 50/50 on that for awhile.
PSV is going to get some large offers for him, and probably as early as January. I think he’d benefit from a full year in the Eredivisie but I definitely think he’s in one of the top five leagues next year.
here’s the deal. he’s playing AM or wing. 0G 0A in 8 caps. i argued for both the tillmans to be brought in but if we’re trying to make this a good team of people who perform in the shirt, as opposed to an allstar team of people on cool european teams, he should be marginal and being challenged for his spot. he definitely shouldn’t be starting. to be fair, that’s not permanent. but good teams reward NT performers rather than get stuck at the pedigree “but this should work” wish fulfillment level or fanboy “but look at his resume” level. so what. we have lots of resumes. next.
ditto zendejas and a list. do something — and i mean for us — or go back to your club.
IV,
“but good teams reward NT performers rather than get stuck at the pedigree “but this should work” wish fulfillment level or fanboy “but look at his resume” level. so what. we have lots of resumes. next.”
That’s what they call a theory looking for evidence. Or if you want to be trendy and hipsterish, as is your wont, you can call it confirmation bias.
Here’s an example :
“Based on a theory that brain size would have some correlation with personality, Paul Broca predicted that criminals would have smaller average brain size than non-criminals. Weighing of brains failed to support this hypothesis, but Broca noted that the criminals in his study had died quickly of violent deaths, while the non-criminals had died of long illnesses, during which their brains had probably diminished in size.”
V: all due respect but tillman is theory in search of evidence. and if he and the regulars hog all the playing time then, yes, anyone else is speculative, but the present is also pretty mediocre. so they have to do something.
to me it’s vapid to say but your ideas are theory when half the problem is the coach rarely tries anything new despite just kind of puttering along mediocrely.
IV,
“V: all due respect but tillman is theory in search of evidence. and if he and the regulars hog all the playing time then, yes, anyone else is speculative, but the present is also pretty mediocre. so they have to do something. …to me it’s vapid to say but your ideas are theory when half the problem is the coach rarely tries anything new despite just kind of puttering along mediocrely.”
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Here’s the thing IV. You talking about a need for experimentation is kind of amusing.
The bigger picture?
Things are about to get forced on Gregg. We’re in the Copa America, a competition that could be rougher and tougher than the World Cup. And we have a team that Gregg is rebuilding.
And I honestly have no idea but my guess is that if he wets his pants at Copa America it could get really unpleasant for him in very short order.
You and others seem to be under the notion that this is a settled team, Qatar WC 2022 only it’s 2023.
But:
We have Flo and Pepi. That makes for a significantly different front line than what we had in Qatar.
We have Reyna and now apparently, Tillman playing centrally in midfield. Didn’t have that option in Qatar. We have LDLT playing which he didn’t do in Qatar.
We have no Tyler. He may not come back as good or maybe he doesn’t even come back at all. Brenden has regressed terribly for a long time now and shouldn’t be called in anymore.
Timmy and Jedi ( and I know how you hate those two) have solidified their spots but the rest of the defense is in flux.
The entire goalkeeper section has become an embarrassment and is trending downward.
You are looking at a very different USMNT than the one that went to Qatar. This is not the same team.
“the coach rarely tries anything new”
True or not, it isn’t likely to stay that way for long.
Whether he wants to or not, he’s going to have to fix or alter almost the entire team from Qatar. And he has to do that before Copa America if he doesn’t want to be humiliated.
Time is running out.
He is only on loan with PSV, so Bayern will receive offers in summer. I believe PSV has a buy option at the end as well.