The U.S. men’s national team’s poor showing at the 2024 Copa America dropped it to its lowest international ranking since October 2022.
The Americans dropped five places to No. 16 in Thursday’s FIFA Rankings, the federation announced. A group stage elimination at the Copa America featured a pair of losses to Panama and Uruguay, ending the Americans hopes of making a deep run in the tournament.
Despite a 2-0 opening night victory over Bolivia, Gregg Berhalter’s squad was one of several CONCACAF nations to suffer an early exit.
Overall, the USMNT only won one of their five matches this summer, also losing 5-1 to Colombia and tying Brazil 1-1 in friendly action. U.S. Soccer proceeded to part ways with Berhalter as head coach, opening the door for a new manager to step in.
Mexico dropped to No. 17 following their group stage exit while Panama, Canada, and Costa Rica all moved up in their individual rankings. Both Panama and Canada jumped up eight places apiece while Costa Rica moved up three spots.
2024 Copa America winners Argentina remained in the No. 1 spot while 2022 World Cup runners-up France stayed in the No. 2 place. Recent EURO winners Spain leapfrogged several nations into the No. 3 spot while England and Brazil rounded out the top-five.
Belgium, Netherlands, Portugal, Colombia, and Italy rounded out the Top 10 overall.
The USMNT’s 2024 schedule continues this September with a pair of home friendlies against Canada and New Zealand respectively.
We were way overrated before, now we are a little over rated. I’d put us in the low 20’s, but we should be much higher than that since this team has really under performed.
dude we were top 16 last world cup by definition. this wanders into have we actually regressed.
first off, we’re hosts, so who cares. get it fixed before the tournament starts. matters more if we’re one of the qualifying squads, both in terms of getting in and then where we stack for seeding.
second, as q said, was to be expected. we literally won 1 game all summer. and i think we could’ve taken at least 4/5. and argentina showed colombia could be gotten to as well.
third, you’d think at some point this fed and its fans would figure out that showing up with 95% of the same guys who struggled for a year and could barely beat jamaica on an own goal was not actually your best chance to win or not embarrass yourself at copa. klinsi did the same exact thing at copa 16. he got further but lost a lot of games (3 — half what we played).
this is like larry david and seinfeld — “no hugging, no learning.” that being said, since the fans finally got upset and the coach finally got fired, there is some point where we go to school, and to be clear, we shouldn’t have the same students in class next time if we’re trying to do better. every time this men’s team has any success the tactics and personnel ossify. for a team with elite aspirations we don’t get that even how far canada advanced should not be enough, and should trigger at least targeted reconsideration. that is part of how one gets to top dog.
Just to No.16? lol, I’ll take it.
We deserved the drop. Truthfully I don’t even know that we’ve been Top-20 or Top-25 the last few months. The team had really stopped progressing under Berhalter after he came back – actually, it seemed to regress – and I never really saw a cohesive team that knew how its bread was buttered or one that had that killer instinct and knew they could win.
Gregg was casting about, a lot of times, and it often seemed like the team was too.
The computer doesn’t care about any of that. It doesn’t care that it took 90+ minutes to beat Jamaica it just says oh you won by 2. It doesn’t care that Mexico is bad as it’s been in 30 yrs just that you beat #15 2-0. It doesn’t care that Brazil is a mess just that you tied Brazil. It also doesn’t care that you went down a man to Panama just that you lost.
Johnnyrazor,
Exactly!…and that is why the FIFA rankings are farcical. Some of us rely on the eye test. The FIFA rankings are based on an algorithm that doesn’t mean shit. The real rankings get sorted out on the field. As someone already say, we are in the ’20, but probably closer to 30 than 20.
Papi: yes but imagine if there were voters like in college sports. They’d all have beach front vacation mansions and Ferraris in every color.
we act like a team content to make the MLS playoffs and lose, or like a NCAA team content to finish mid-conference and maybe upset a ranked team once in a while, but not be ranked ourselves or make the tournament often. or like some select team with no aspirations to win league or state. “but they were a good team.” “but we won even though jamaica gave us a rough game.” you cannot view it that way if you want bigger things. we act like a round of 16 team content to stay there. every time we get that level we circle wagons on tactics and personnel instead of keep asking if there is anything else we can do to get better.
the fundamental flaw in your computer argument is that near miss or bad loss is telling you that setup isn’t working. even if you get that specific result (and the ranking bump) you should be tinkering, or you will lose some later tougher game and suffer a corresponding rankings hit.
at some point the US needs to get that the conservatism fetish where the lineup locks in at the round of 16 is not how the elite operate. to me it ends up with the current mentality where you throw your cleats on the field at something like copa america and just expect/assume results no matter how you play. if you round up the wrong names and play the wrong way this sort of tournament exposes you.
listen to your lesson. change stuff when you lose games. when we get that attitude the ranking will follow.
IV,
“listen to your lesson. change stuff when you lose games. when we get that attitude the ranking will follow.”
Who are you addressing?
Watch the USMNT for the last 5.5 years.
If a person does that and knows anything about the game , or even if they don’t, as long as they have half a brain and are moderately intellectually curious and it’s clear that the USSF, whatever they have learned from Gregg’s journey to the toilet, is not going to follow your advice.
Or at least not in any way that suits you.
The USSF is not particularly interested in doing what it takes to field a serious World Cup contender. They are not even trying to do what it takes to field the best, most competitive USMNT possible. Too much work, or too much money ( they’d be happy to as long as they can do it on the cheap). Either that or they just don’t know how to.
They are a high school, college or select team operation trying to run a so called world class professional team. And I’ll bet your college, high school and select teams were better run.
I don’t see how anyone can argue that. Maybe I’m giving the USSF too much credit.
So what’s your point?
Gregg said something like he wanted to change how Americans look at the USMNT. Mission accomplished. I used to take them a lot more seriously. Now I know that when they had a chance to put the AMERICA into Copa America they reacted like that drunk anthem singer at the MLB homerun derby game the other night. They need to go into rehab too.
distilled down, my point is that the coach is not getting fired in a vaccuum, but rather because his faith in particular tactics and players was misplaced. if you fire the coach then run out the same players in a similar scheme for the fall friendlies — you have learned nothing.
secondary point is at some juncture the US with its strong standing, tough schedule, and occasional late wins, comes to view those lineups as optimized. in reality, if you get brained by colombia and germany, lose to TnT away (discipline issues), can’t beat a struggling brazil team, diesel through bolivia game, etc………..you actually need some fixes.
at some point this became risk averse. a team that wants to continue improving cannot be risk averse. it needs to be open to scheme and personnel tweaks or changes. i personally believe personnel is primary and scheme secondary, hence my calls to try different people.
if you aren’t getting all the results, you aren’t yet on the perfect lineup. if you lose some key game, be attentive to did the scheme fail and/or which players caved. i keep naming guys like dest, scally, or jedi who do not show up for big games and maybe even get abused — then they are back out there next time.
we do way too much based on how players do on weaker opponents. we should be making decisions based on who blows colombia or germany. you notice that you will start fixing why we lose.
IV,
“distilled down, my point is that the coach is not getting fired in a vaccuum, but rather because his faith in particular tactics and players was misplaced. if you fire the coach then run out the same players in a similar scheme for the fall friendlies — you have learned nothing.”
I don’t buy it.
What do you mean “not getting fired in a vacuum”? Matt Crocker is reported to thought that firing Gregg was an over reaction. but apparently was given no choice in the matter.
We may never know the exact reason why Gregg was axed but it is irrelevant. He’s gone now.
“we do way too much based on how players do on weaker opponents.”
What do you expect??? We mostly play weaker opponents. Lie down with stray dogs and you come up with ticks.
If there is a new person hired by the fall friendlies and they do run out the same players in a similar scheme I don’t see a problem with that. A coach can tell a lot about players by seeing them up close and personal in a formation they are comfortable with. For a new person, it’s pretty hard to get all judgmental after one or two friendlies.
And for another thing, it is possible that the new person may use the exact same formations with the exact same players as Gregg did and succeed with them.
These players are people not programs. Players react differently to different managers. Sometimes it makes for a big change and sometimes it doesn’t.
“you have learned nothing”
Maybe you didn’t but it is possible the new person will have learned a lot.
Definitely regressed under GB, but the regression started with many of our players inability to play consistently with their clubs, or at all for that matter. We should have made it out of the group no doubt, but not having players in consistent playing rhythm and self sabotaging the team, that is what we get