The first U.S. men’s national team roster of the Mauricio Pochettino-era has officially been released.
Christian Pulisic, Zack Steffen, and Tim Weah headline Pochettino’s 25-player roster for October’s pair of friendlies. Weston McKennie, Brenden Aaronson, and Folarin Balogun were also included.
Midfielder Gio Reyna and defender Cameron Carter-Vickers missed out through respective injuries. Steffen earned his first senior call up since 2023, as did midfielder Gianluca Busio, who featured at the 2024 Paris Olympics for Team USA.
Marlon Fossey, who made his USMNT debut in September, is also back in the squad as a right back option. He will be joined by Joe Scally, who excelled for the USMNT last summer at the Copa America tournament.
The No. 9 race continues with Balogun, Ricardo Pepi, Haji Wright, and Josh Sargent all named to the squad. All four players have scored at club level in the past week, with Pepi netting twice in Eredivisie play.
The USMNT will host CONCACAF rivals Panama on October 12 in Austin, Texas before concluding their two-match window in Guadalajara against Mexico on Oct. 15.
Panama last defeated the USMNT 2-1 last summer in the 2024 Copa America group stage. However, the USMNT have won 17 of the 26 all-time meetings between the two teams.
October will also mark the Americans’ first friendly trip to Mexico since earning a famed 1-0 victory over El Tri on Aug. 15, 2012. The result remains the USMNT’s only win on Mexican soil in all competitions.
Both matches will serve as preparation for the CONCACAF Nations League quarterfinal round this November.
“We want to start from the first day working and helping them to perform and to feel confidence, because I think the talent is there,” said Pochettino. “It’s our responsibility to create a very nice environment. They need to be happy. We are going to enjoy playing football. I need them to play with freedom.”
Here is the full USMNT roster for October’s friendlies:
GOALKEEPERS: Ethan Horvath (Cardiff City/WAL; 9/0), Patrick Schulte (Columbus Crew; 2/0), Zack Steffen (Colorado Rapids; 29/0), Matt Turner (Crystal Palace/ENG; 45/0).
DEFENDERS: Marlon Fossey (Standard Liege; 1/0), Kristoffer Lund (Palermo/ITA; 5/0), Mark McKenzie (Toulouse/FRA; 14/0), Tim Ream (Charlotte FC; 62/1), Antonee Robinson (Fulham/ENG; 46/4), Miles Robinson (FC Cincinnati; 29/3), Joe Scally (Borussia Monchengladbach/GER; 12/0), Auston Trusty (Celtic/SCO; 2/0).
MIDFIELDERS: Brenden Aaronson (Leeds United/ENG; 44/8), Gianluca Busio (Venezia/ITA; 13/1), Johnny Cardoso (Real Betis/ESP; 17/0), Weston McKennie (Juventus/ITA; 56/11), Aidan Morris (Middlesbrough/ENG; 7/0), Yunus Musah (AC Milan/ITA; 41/0), Malik Tillman (PSV Eindhoven/NED; 14/0).
FORWARDS: Folarin Balogun (Monaco/FRA; 17/5), Ricardo Pepi (PSV Eindhoven; 30/10), Christian Pulisic (AC Milan/ITA; 73/31), Josh Sargent (Norwich City/ENG; 25/5), Timothy Weah (Juventus/ITA; 41/6), Haji Wright (Coventry City/ENG; 13/4).
beachbum,
Are you telling me that one win over El Tri is so important that we should lighten up on Gregg?
I’ll lighten up on Gregg if you lighten up on JK.
“Jurgen Klinsmann was the first US coach to win a game at the Estadio Azteca in Mexico City when he led the US to a 1–0 victory over Mexico on August 15, 2012. This was the US’s first win in Mexico. In 10 games as player and manager, Jurgen Klinsmann has never lost to Mexico.”
to the folks who are so sure the lineup is fine or at least harmless:
dude, you realize we haven’t won a friendly since October 2023? as in, have not won a friendly IN A YEAR?
have won 1 game all summer?
this team has been bad since roughly the pre-qatar friendlies and was absolute crap this summer, like we aren’t beating much of anyone.
i hope this guy can by coaching alone make some change but if you aren’t lobbing rotten fruit you’re not paying attention.
Omg 0-2-2! Wow! Cut everyone! 4-3 in competitive games. Everyone knows that’s not great that’s why everyone was in agreement Berhalter should be out. But playing a bunch of journeyman and teenagers leads to two more losses in friendlies and now you’ve got no baseline, is it 17 yr old can’t defend an EPL striker Jimenez or is it Poch’s tactics? Play the guys that routinely play in European competitions and if they still look lost under the new coach move the lost ones. Even this summer we were only out of our depth once, against Colombia.
“this team has been bad since roughly the pre-qatar friendlies and was absolute crap this summer, like we aren’t beating much of anyone.”
That is the sort of thing that gets the coach fired.
Going to be u19 and U20 camps this window. U19 roster already out Cruz Medina, Berchimas, Figueroa, Rudisil, and D. Vazquez headlining.
U20: Cremanschi, Wydner, Banks, Eyestone, Beavers, Harbroune, Tsakiris, Raines, Zambrano highlight the roster. They’ll play Chile in Santiago next week. The U19s play Japan and Sweden in Spain.
I wouldn’t be so fast to criticize these selections, he’s gotta get eyes on and 1 on 1 time with this cast of characters at least once, and since I’m guessing every person on SBI knows more about most of these players than Poch right now, he just began.
Next window will be time for us to get on here and go to town…
dude if you showed up for a serious interview and knew nothing about the company you wouldn’t get the gig. to me it would be HR 101 to not just vaguely ask him what soccer does he like and does he think he can help, but literally get down to brass tacks/talk turkey. our pool. which guys do you like. which would you dump. what direction would you take this. i should be hiring him because his answer was more informed about this particular team and more convincing than the next guy’s. he should already have opinions. if he has no opinions yet, then what did we hire, his CV?
i mean i would want to be picking the candidates’ brains not just for hiring but for our own edification. maybe more than one coach is down on a set of players, or suggests a new formation. that then is a pretty strong hint, even if you don’t hire them.
last, this isn’t september. september the excuse for not having him sideline was he’s just putting pen to paper and we need him up to speed. he’s had a few weeks of being the boss and on the clock for a paycheck. surely he has more thoughts than, send me the usual list and i’ll run them through practice and have some answers.
due to our copa failure, we have played just 10 games this year. ~20 hours of soccer. that’s 2-1/2 work days to watch if he just does 9-5. 3-4 days watched more closely. he can then spend some days watching new options or previous years. we can then spend this window on evaluating what we don’t know as opposed to re-establishing where the known messes are.
last last, we have been talking for months? years? about how we need more competition and accountability. some have suggested tougher discipline, dealing with emotional issues, eg, reyna, dest, weah. injuries have taken the edge off that list but as i was saying around when he was hired, the man radiates new-agey as opposed to hardcore. whether done nicely or not part of what this needs is come broken china. different selections, different approach, and players under emotional control at a basic professional level, can calm self down without a red, can walk away from a confrontation, can play the game without picking up reds, basic practice effort even when not entirely happy.
we will see what happens when he coaches and if the selections change over time. but this is the least aggressive coaching change lineup i have ever seen. it’s not sarachan from arena. or arena from klinsi. or bradley from arena. immediate stamp on the thing. new faces. conveying change. conveying familiarity with the team they are coaching.
Sure, but even if I’ve studied the company up down and sideways I haven’t gotten 1 on 1 time with my future employees, I think you’re overreacting a bit here IV, alls I’m saying is if after his first camp we don’t see anything different then go hells bells, ill be right there with you
IV,
More BS.
You’re the guy who doesn’t believe in the job interview process for the manager.
to be fair, yeah, i would just chase a big name or two at a time, offer them a salary number, but we would have a quick chat first and/or i’d know what system they would likely bring and do my own thinking whether that makes sense.
you can pretend to call bs all you want but if you do run interviews you should be paying attention during them. a losing candidate might have useful nuggets about your team.
and my point is that your winner, from an interview process, should display some pretty good level of mastery of the the pool and be offering some change items, in the interview.
calling the same people to put them through their paces does not feel like he’s on top of the pool. calling steffen in particular feels like he’s operating off who he knows or a dated sense of who to pick or a list from USSF’s analytics vendor.
Pochettino is going to play his way. It’s not just USSF who has rated these players to be our best their clubs are the best too. He needs to see are these players overrated or was Berhalter out of his depth as a tactician. If he changes tactics and players in the same window you have no baseline for what worked or what didn’t.
What will be really really interesting to see is if the players ARE overrated but are still the best to offer. Then are the players be out of their depth with Poch’s (GBs) tactics – which, will be from all the tactical breakdowns of his style I’ve read, are not that different from GBs but require more hustle to turn the ball over and get forward quicker with quicker decisions and incisive passing. Sounds a lot like the “vericality” GB once upon a time was hammering us with but gave up on due to the guys not delivering it. This is going to be really interesting to watch. Can the players deliver Poch-ball? If not how does Poch respond? How do fans respond – especially the vitriolic Berhalter Out crowd? Are there players in the pool who fit a Bielsa ball style better than this group? Also one of the things being said against GB was his tactics were too complicated to implement at the national level. I haven’t heard any concern for this being possible for Poch but it seems a very fair concern if it was before. Maybe he is that much of a superior coach that he can succeed where GB failed. Well, we know he’s a better coach but can he get his system in place at the international level with THIS group of players?
MotO,
“What will be really really interesting to see is if the players ARE overrated but are still the best to offer.”
Name 25 better USMNT eligible players than the 25 Pochettino picked.
Vaqui, why does the players possibly being overrated have to mean there are better players in the pool? It just means the players wouldn’t be as good as most fans believe them to be.
FYI…….A lot of these players on the CanMNT would not make the USMNT final roster let alone our starting 11 but they bullied and beat us up ……. convincingly, I might add with Ali Ahmed, Nathan Saliba, Stephen Afrifa, Joel Waterman, Tani Oluwaseyi, Mathieu Choinière, Jonathan Osorio and Jacob Shaffelburg, and that’s after reaching the Semi-Finals in COPA.
CANDA NATIONAL TEAM
GOALKEEPERS (3)
Maxime Crépeau – Portland Timbers
Jonathan Sirois – CF Montréal
Dayne St. Clair – Minnesota United FC
DEFENDERS (7)
Moïse Bombito – OGC Nice
Derek Cornelius – Olympique de Marseille
Alphonso Davies – Bayern Munich
Alistair Johnston – Celtic FC
Richie Laryea – Toronto FC
Kamal Miller – Portland Timbers
Joel Waterman – CF Montréal
MIDFIELDERS (6)
Ali Ahmed – Vancouver Whitecaps FC
Mathieu Choinière – Grasshopper Club Zurich
Stephen Eustáquio – FC Porto
Jonathan Osorio – Toronto FC
Nathan Saliba – CF Montréal
Niko Sigur – Hajduk Split
FORWARDS (7)
Stephen Afrifa – Sporting Kansas City
Jonathan David – LOSC Lille
Cyle Larin – RCD Mallorca
Liam Millar – Hull City
Tani Oluwaseyi – Minnesota United FC
Jacen Russell-Rowe – Columbus Crew
Jacob Shaffelburg – Nashville SC
Food for thought
MotO,
“why does the players possibly being overrated have to mean there are better players in the pool?”
It doesn’t but if you tell me a group of 25 guys are overrated, it usually means you are implying that people expect more out of them than maybe they are capable of.
So I challenge those people who think that there MUST be something better out there to go find them and bring them in.
Times a-wasting.
I happen to think that by and large the cast of characters that we are all familiar with are probably , more or less, the best USMNT eligible players currently available.
A dual or two or three may pop up in the next year or two. Some younger player(s) who are not so well known right now might also have a break through. But I’m just talking about what is on hand this second in October of 2024.
I think Pulisic is the only consistently legit player ( healthy or otherwise) in the USMNT pool at this time.
“Also one of the things being said against GB was his tactics were too complicated to implement at the national level.”
I don’t really believe that. Soccer is basically a simple game. There are only so many tactical variations of the basic themes that you can implement. And they have to be “simple” because once the game starts the only real impact a manager can consistently have is through the subs. Compared to many other sports we all know and love, once the game starts the players are mostly on their own.
For whatever reason, if Gregg. really had a system, it either did not work or he couldn’t find a way to get the guys to make it work.
Whatever the reason, he failed to do his job
I’m sure this happens to many coaches. Usually they change the players until they find some who can play it the way it is supposed to be played.
The supply of alternatives is limited with any national team, so if you don’t find your guys in a timely fashion, you either either have to modify the “system” or you have to improve how you teach your players until you find a way to get through to them. In other words , you have to become a better coach.
Whatever Gregg wound up actually doing, it didn’t work.
,So what about the players, aren’t they to blame as well? Yeah but that doesn’t help. We’re not big boy ( France, Argentina) talented. Those players can make up for a lot of managerial deficiencies.
England should appoint Gregg as permanent manager. Then maybe we could see what his “system” looks like.
In all the articles I ‘ve read, Pochettino talks about the great potential in our player pool. I take that as meaning maybe he agrees with me that only Pulisic is currently at the top level. However, that also means there must be others that he hopes to are on the verge. So for Pochettino the key will be identifying them and then figuring out how to (I hate the cliche) set them up for success. I see a lot of discovery going on and that should be a great watch.
Pochettino has a set of basic principles and a way to do things but he’s very pragmatic and I don’t see him wedded to a particular formation or tactic. He places a great importance on fitness based on the idea that the fitter a player is, the better his he will be able to express his talent, when it matters. I think he wants to explore this player pool and see what is the best way to make a winning unit out of them . And that should be fascinating to watch.
What Pochettino is trying to do is not unique but it will be rare. As a fan I religiously watched every single Gregg game I could, even though the whole thing had become quite tedious. I figured out that Gregg was a slow motion train wreck, more or less, after his 2019 Gold Cup final loss I called for his firing then. He improved a bit after that but not enough to change my mind.
There is reason to think that Pochettino is a better coach than Gregg. Yet you have IV ripping him because he’s not doing it in the IV approved way.
So who knows more about building a high level pro soccer team? IV or Pochettino? We’ll see.
Vaqui, “if you tell me a group of 25 guys are overrated, it usually means you are implying that people expect more out of them than maybe they are capable of.” Agreed, but then immediately following you write:
“So I challenge those people who think that there MUST be something better out there to go find them and bring them in.” None who says something is overrated MUST think there is something better out there. One does not relate to the other. Something being overrated is a pure opinion that can stand alone. If there was literally ONE of something with no other options existing in the universe I could say that singular thing was overrated. Saying the show Friends is overrated doesn’t speak to my opinion of other sitcoms. It means I believe many people think it’s more funny than it actually is. If there are better sitcoms out there is a completely different conversation. For the record I enjoyed Friends, found it funny but not nearly as much as so many other people. It was entirely overrated in my opinion. Getting back to the USMNT and the original post…it will be interesting IF this team IS actually overrated and then to see what follows now that Pochettino is coach. It was a response to the scenarios JR had posted about. I was proposing another possible scenario.
MotO,
FRIENDS was like McDonalds.
It was familiar, comfortable and ,when traveling a long way, usually had clean restrooms. It was a comfort to know exactly what you were getting.
Gregg was more like Waffle House or White Castle. You know it was crap but it was good enough, being the only places open in a hurricane or at 2:30 AM.
And actually there are some things I love about both places. But ultimately you knew that if you really wanted a decent non toxic meal, you could do better
It remains to be seen what kind of restaurant Pochettino winds up managing . Maybe Pulisic will get him to open a SHEETZ.
dude, come off it with “IV approved.” the media all seems to agree the selection is “default.” social media comments abound saying “you didn’t change enough players.” i kept harping on this about the WNT but over a few months they swapped out 4/11 of the lineup that lost in the WWC a year ago. they didn’t just change the coach. their whole MF got redone.
i do not have some unusual take on what just happened. the roster speaks for itself.
i agree wholeheartedly with bizzy. on paper talent this should be the runaway dominant team in the region. we should be in another one of those golden ages. canada and mexico have some guys but you mark them out of the game and 11v11 we just have more talent and depth.
i see coaching as a marginal thing, a little + or – at the edges, do we optimize the lineups and rosters, does the system make us better than the sum of the parts. i think the coaching has literally brought us back to the pack in recent years.
i am not saying poch can’t coach but i am just concerned that personnel is not immediately evolving.
IV,
“i see coaching as a marginal thing, a little + or – at the edges, do we optimize the lineups and rosters, does the system make us better than the sum of the parts. i think the coaching has literally brought us back to the pack in recent years.”
If the coaching has “brought us back to the pack in recent years” then how is “coaching as a marginal thing” possible?
Sliding back to the pack? That’s a big deal. People get fired for that.
“i am not saying poch can’t coach but i am just concerned that personnel is not immediately evolving.”
You can’t coach a team before you meet the players. Pochettino hasn’t met any of the players. All the remote analysis, is fine for shooting the shit on SBI like what we all do, but when you are getting paid 6 million per and are supposedly an elite manager, it really helps to actually meet the players before deciding to rip the crest off of their jerseys and casting them to outer darkness.
You’re being ridiculous.
“lagging indicator.” the clubs you are touting tend to sign players who are already doing well or highly sought as prospects. but the thing is they are not a perfect sorting machine and thus pulisic comes flying out of the CFC machine as reject. or fulham thought EJ was good. or steffen washing out. or, other end of the scale, we are waiting to see how campbell goes. or which MLS or prospect turns out. if adored, they take their place on these same elite clubs.
few years ago steffen was going to be the next big thing. now some might squeal “MLS!”
i do believe they have financial ability to collect the best prospects but i also think that’s lagging and imperfect. they will toss x% of these kids right back out. they will even be wrong on y% of the ones they reject. but the machine comes down to humans who make mistakes.
and then last point, but, sorry, i think picking people off rep clubs can also be the laziest, least soccer-oriented analysis possible. i could have one of my non-soccer college buddies who vaguely knows what the name brand teams are by association, pick guys off those teams. that wouldn’t mean they were the best. likewise, some slide rule guy who ran stats could pick me names but has he watched their soccer?
i keep making fun of precisely what you’re advocating, a team of snob all stars picked more for where they play than for scheme fit or do they play together well. we even toss around the word “profile” but then don’t seem to think through, what players do i need on the field to play a certain way, say, we’re gonna whack crosses in, or play transition ball. or to ruthlessly consider whether the name brand players actually have the skillsets to fit the scheme. and the will to either bench them or change the scheme to fit the actual skillsets.
This isn’t a group of Caden Clark’s or George Bellos who came from MLS to Europe and then were quickly dropped. Pulisic has played at BvB, Chelsea, and Milan he’s obviously a top player. Musah played for Valencia and now Milan. Aaronson didn’t come crawling back to MLS he’s had a Bundesliga club pick him up and is a regular starter in Championship. Multiple teams with different managers are rating these guys. Compare that to Julian Green. Couldn’t get time at Bayern no shame, then couldn’t play at Hamburg, couldn’t play at Stuttgart, found time at Furth, benched when promoted. He also started as a striker, then moved to AM, then an 8, now a dual 6. He continues to go down in level and move farther from goal. McKennie has played for 3 different top league clubs. Weah has been successful at Celtic, Lille, and Juve. They are not one guy saw me and bought me then I dropped significant levels. We aren’t going Indiana Vassilev gets 30 caps because he once had a couple appearances for Villa when they were racked with injury.
———————-
Eddie Johnson has 19 US goals seems like he was one of the better strikers in his time period but competed with Dempsey, Altidore, and Donovan for minutes. He probably would be in the Brandon Vazquez zone if he played today but competition then was Brandon Ching, Juan Agudelo, Edson Buddle and Robbie Findley.
ok, you continue to not get it and cherry pick your examples. my point is pulisic has been dumped by 2 big clubs before finding a good ACM home. weston was nearly dropped this summer. musah isn’t playing much. on and on.
conversely, what you will see sitting where i am is 5 seconds ago pepi was dismissed as FCD, but now lauded for having been in germany or holland. aaronson went from union to various european places. CCV got loaned out of a bunch of english teams before finding a celtic home.
you diss green, i get that you care more about TnT goals than france or belgium, that’s your prerogative. my point, however, would be that he was once a bayern kid.
and on and on back to mcbride, donovan, twellman, etc. all shipped back to MLS. before mcbride eventually returned to be sanctified at fulham. before donovan became a loan bada$$ at a higher level than the teams who cut him before.
you can do your usual nitpicking and personal attacks. it’s an imperfect sorting machine. as with the supposed economics invisible hand, it only seems apparent AFTER all is said and done, and on some abstracted, generic level. in terms of specific players, something like what pulisic or mcbride or donovan endured tells me the decisionmakers are quite human. at which point i am not just replicating their guesses.
last US coaches to have their own brains were sarachan, who had a clean slate, and klinsi, who had a big enough name he could do whatever he wanted. but what i see is a team in terms of tactics or personnel or whatever that wants to xerox european fashions or decisions because it feels inferior. which seems like a poor way to fix being less than.
you wanna beat europe you have to have your own ideas and be smarter than them. and you have to get off the inferiority complex and urge to mimic.
last thing — TO BE SUPER BLUNT — you and a bunch of others took CFC’s lame critiques of pulisic to heart. you have been proven wrong. lampard has barely kept a job since then. is there a reason you give him higher godlike status than english clubs do? he’s a man and based on his history and employment, a fallible one.
like i said, a lot of y’all are so status quo biased and xeroxing whatever the herd does you would basically recreate whatever the current coach does even if you didn’t realize it. you absorb so much of the fashionable mindset you are basically that coach replicated. think for yourself.
I am underwhelmed by the choices for defense, especially the CBs and I don’t think there is an adequate defensive midfielder in the bunch.;
The USMNT’a greatest fault is it leaks goals. Until the defense is fixed, it does not matter who is in the attack.
Defenders can be evaluated by their success against strong competition. The US has only a few playing defense against strong competition. Poch has his work cut out.
Dennis, I typically agree with you, but not this time. While what you say about the D is accurate, we need to finish the chances we create at a higher clip. our finishing % sucks. Balogun needs to either start pooping or get off the pot. if he can’t, get another player in there who does more. We need to score more of our created chances
USMNT VS Mexico roster:
Jimenez returns, Ex-U.S. youth star Vargas called up to face USMNT
Goalkeepers:
Luis Malagón (América), Raúl Rangel (Chivas), Guillermo Ochoa (AVS)
Defenders:
César Montes (Lokomotiv Moscow), Johan Vásquez (Genoa), Rodrigo Huescas (FC Copenhagen), Jorge Sánchez (Cruz Azul), Jesús Orozco (Chivas), Bryan González (Pachuca), Jesús Angulo (Tigres).
Midfielders:
Obed Vargas (Seattle Sounders), Luis Romo (Cruz Azul), Marcel Ruíz (Toluca), Carlos Rodríguez (Cruz Azul), Andrés Guardado (León), Sebastián Córdova (Tigres), Orbelin Pineda (AEK Athens)
Forwards:
Diego Lainez (Tigres), Roberto Alvarado (Chivas), Ozziel Herrera (Tigres), Germán Berterame (Monterrey), Cesar Huerta (Pumas), Alexis Vega (Toluca), Guillermo Martinez (Pumas), Raúl Jiménez (Fulham), Henry Martin (America)
No Julian Araujo? No Edson Alvarez? I guess Alvarez was hurt so give him some rest but Araujo has had a couple EPL starts for Bournemouth.
Reading between the lines of Poch’s comments about the roster, it appears he wants to see the players in person and spend a little time with them this window before cutting some of the mainstays loose. He noted that the call ups were driven primarily by info from US Soccer.
My guess is that he is being politically astute here and, after seeing the old guard in camp this window, he’ll move on from some of them next window. A perfectly rational approach to avoid burning bridges, pissing people off w/in US Soccer, and being “fair” to the guys who’ve anchored the NT for years.
yeah my first instinct when i read this was something like, did dude even pick this? eg he calls the same weird 4 striker set i have been beefing about for months. are the analytics/GM people just churning these out themselves and to what degree is that now the problem beneath it all. i mean, i took the caretaker xeroxes as stability driven or identical mindset. then poch calls them like a caretaker too.
roster conservatism is unjustified by results, and unlike the women we’re not just losing on kicks to top teams, we’re getting drubbed. and also to me some of the coaching personality is usually evident in the choices, some quirks, some fresh faces, a different direction. the only real surprise here is steffen which is actually regressive, dude’s been off the team since winter ’22 before the NL games or preqatar friendlies. and even that kind of came across like “i remember the name” more than “i watched him and he’s back.”
he’s getting a lot of money and i expected some shift.
and also the deal is this is friendlies, last time was friendlies, next time it’ll be NL again. if either he’s being lazy or the fed is insisting on the names analytics decide, NL is always another conservativism excuse. this needs more work than the women did.
based on forever, mexico is not easy. based on recently, panama will be a contest. man’s gonna hav to earn his paycheck.
IV
“yeah my first instinct when i read this was something like, did dude even pick this?”
No, Pochettino did not pick this roster. It says so in writing.
In the article it said that he picked this roster based on information from the USSF. Because the poor silly boy trusts them. Oh well, live and learn.
He was given it by his bosses, the people who paid him a ton of money.
IV, I don’t know how you operate when you first start a job but if my new bosses , who are paying me 6 million a year, hand me a list of who they say are the best players and I’ve never seen any of them recently, I do them the courtesy of at least giving them an in person look.
Did you think he was going to tell them ” fuck you guys, IV says I should pick Holmes, Campbell, Green, Cohen, and CJ Sapong, etc. “?
“he’s getting a lot of money and i expected some shift.”
You don’t pay him shit. You haven’t paid him one centavo. He owes you bupkus.
And don’t give us that crap that, ultimately, we pay his salary because in that case, I have as much input on this as you do and I agree with what he’s doing at this time. So we cancel each other out.
After a game or two, when he finds out how terrible these guys really are, then, maybe you’ll see your boys called in.
But right off the bat? No way. He’s not stupid.
Think of the bright side. When it all goes wrong you can claim that he should have listened to you and it proves how much more you know about soccer than even Pochettino.
Besides, name me an alternative 25 player roster, one that does not include anyone on that list, who is not injured?
I had predicted we would see pretty much the same players. I’m only disappointed he included Tim Ream. Even if he is a contributor now, I can’t imagine he will be one in 2 years. Cut the cord on Ream already. I also would like to see Luna but otherwise the roster is about what I expected and hoped for. Now the question is how and how well they play. Will there be a change in formation and/or tactics? The main problem under Berhalter is that he was not able to maximize the talent he had to work with.
he said to another publication he anticipates a 4321 or 433 formation. same ol same ol. from what i read, he likes to transition a little quicker forward and is into attacking wingbacks still. on some of his teams eg PSG with all that talent, he has encouraged the forwards to interchange. conversely he has been willing to drop the 6 into the center backs for 5 defenders.
there’s a reason i’ve been talking midfield and whether the incumbents can accurately feed the frontline a nice 30 yard pass not sent to the flag, but instead between the backs.
Richards and CCV injured (EPB still injured). That puts you down to Dietz or Neal so probably stretching to first team those two. What are your thoughts on Neal, Gary since you follow LAG? Not a lot of time to lobby dual nats like Anrie Chase.
Pochettino has to turn these guys into a winning group. ASAP
And he has never met any of them.
So those of you who hate how conservative this roster is just answer me this, can you name 25 healthy and fit alternatives to the 25 named in this list?
Pochettino has said he wants to establish a winning culture. That means they need to play well and win these two games. Ream is not what he was in Qatar but there is no other defender better than Ream at doing what he does best.
And his presence makes winning those two games more likely than not.
They don’t need to find a successor for him today. But Pochettino needs to win NOW and Ream might be able to help him with that.
Those of us who have survived the reign of Berhalter the GGG all feel we know those players better than anyone. Many of you are offended that he doesn’t use SBI as his guidebook and manual on USMNT eligible players ( see Holmes, Duane) .
But the beauty of Pochettino he is pure. He has no real familiarity with these players. Given his undoubted credentials, and the incentives in front of him, his take on these guys and how he chooses to utilize them, to me, will be fascinating.
my select team growing up was a physical defensive team who fought for each other. and it was coached for, and enforced by lineups and subbing, but also each new year, after tryouts, some choir boy would get cut and we’d sign someone who would play the desired way.
you’re treating the lineup as in stone and culture as something they get taught. no. my experience you do teach who’s around, but you are also meanwhile selecting for the desired characteristics. cutting people who just can’t play that way. favoring the ones who can. and nudging the ones on the borderline.
kind of like, the select team’s approach to offense was often to simply sign the best scoring kid from some other team, not do a culture thing with existing tools.
talk is cheap. anyone can say, play harder. the faster and more active way is start cutting the ones who don’t play as wanted. and bringing in scouted players who you see on tape or live play the desired way that is a far faster way to the desired culture than trying to teach it.
that and i see true sporting confidence as earned. you don’t will yourself to become something, in isolation. you get taught, here is how you position on defense, here is how you slide tackle. you get taught, you can make this risky slide tackle here to stop a play. if you have the tools, you can then make those plays. you will eventually be confident in your ability to do so, from teaching and from doing. but you don’t make a better defender just by saying, be confident you can be better at the job. that’s how dest happens. dude barely has the first clue how to defend. dude lately seems like a loose emotional cannon. he lacks most of the basics to work with as a defender other than people want him on the field for offense. he shouldn’t be very confident in his defense. and teaching him culture wouldn’t be very useful. he needs the basics. or he needs to move.
more soccer soccer. less talky talky.
IV,
“you’re treating the lineup as in stone and culture as something they get taught. no. my experience you do teach who’s around, but you are also meanwhile selecting for the desired characteristics. cutting people who just can’t play that way. favoring the ones who can. and nudging the ones on the borderline.”
Those people who were “around” ?
How long did it take you guys to bring them up to speed?
Did they become starters or were they just subs?
biggest shortfall for GB was no respect from the MAN
our region is full of Sh__
Hopefully Poch gets respect from the corrupt and spineless powers
We bringing back Zack Butterfingers Steffan back, what a waste spend it on Beaudry, Kochen, or Calentano. Calentano I can see going to Serie A soon.
Steffen’s back to being the best keeper in the pool and IMHO it really isn’t that close right now. People forget how good he was before he went off to Man City, but then he got hurt and his career derailed.
He looks healthy now, for the first time in probably four years. And he’s back to looking like the guy Man City paid almost $10 million for.
My guess would be, if they truly get a clean sheet of paper with Poch, Steffen wins his job back. And I absolutely would not have bet that way after he crashed out with Middlesbrough and even after his first couple months back at Colorado. He looked like a blown player to me.
He certainly doesn’t now.
We will see if he will see quozzel arise from the flames or becomes a payaso clown🤡, Steffan needs to prove me wrong.
Q: his goals allowed to xGot is pretty bad. He’s making some big stops but the analytics are showing he’s given up 7 more goals than he should this season. Guys like Schulte (maybe not after Inter Miami tonight) and Celantano are giving up less goals than the xG says they should. A quick glance since Leagues Cup is he’s giving up about the same goals vs xG, but that’s just meeting the minimum in terms of analytics and a small sample.
I’m not sure what this camp will tell us about Poch. The cast is pretty much the same. The games would dictate a much higher intensity no matter who the coach was going to be – a revenge game and Mexico.
My guess is we get a couple of intense but disjointed performances this window. It will be people (pundits/fans) overreacting about how Poch brought back heart to the team but with understanding that a new system takes time to gel. People wi want to spin it positively. 1-0 v Panama and 2-2 at Mexico.
“I’m not sure what this camp will tell us about Poch. The cast is pretty much the same. The games would dictate a much higher intensity no matter who the coach was going to be – a revenge game and Mexico.”
Coaching is one thing.
Results are another.
There are three parts to a national team
1. The FA, our USSF
2. The manager and their staff
3. The players.
The USSF sucks. Years and years of blatant mediocrity can’t be erased by Emma and Pochettino . But at least they are improving.
Pochettino is unquestionably the most accomplished coach we have had and could have reasonably be expected to hire.
That leaves the players.
Some of you loved Gregg, and blamed our softy players for taking advantage of poor baby Gregg who had such a hard, hard job. Others hate him for being a cretin.
The main thing Pochettino does is give everyone a much better idea of what kind of player pool we have. That’s about the only guarantee you have.
The USMNT might be twice as good under Pochettino but if they get a bad draw in the World Cup and a little bad luck , they might not get out of their group.
I don’t understand your point. You quoted me about this upcoming camp and then went on a tangential patronizing rant concluding with what sounds like a preemptive excuse for if/when Pochettino doesn’t get anything more out the the USMNT than any other lessor coach they’ve ever had.
“I don’t understand your point. ”
That results ( wins and draws) are not necessarily reflective of how well coached a team is.
There’s no doubt, none at all, that Pochettino is a better coach than Gregg. That does not mean that the results, the amount of points produced, will be better than if Gregg had coached.. Not over the course of two friendlies.
“concluding with what sounds like a preemptive excuse for if/when Pochettino doesn’t get anything more out the the USMNT than any other lessor coach they’ve ever had.”
He may not.
All that superior coaching means is that the team is very probably going to be better organized and more coherent. And this means they have a better chance of winning than they did under Gregg. But money does not guarantee it. There is a very strong possibility that Pochettino’s team won’t get further in the World Cup than Gregg did at Qatar. Regardless of how well they play. It depends on two things Pochettino cannot control. The draw and injuries.
The 6 million per year just means that the person coaching the team is one less thing USMNT fans have to worry about.
Vaq, This camp, I could care less about results. It’s about familiarizing. Coach with players, players with coach. For better or worse it sounds like Pochettino hasn’t had contact with anyone on the team yet. So yeah, it’s a nice to meet you camp. Another reason for my original comment about not being able to learn much from this camp. But sure, agree, about results? Not really caring much. Play hard are my expectations. We should be able to expect that no matter who the coach is vs these two opponents.
MotO,
“For better or worse it sounds like Pochettino hasn’t had contact with anyone on the team yet. So yeah, it’s a nice to meet you camp. Another reason for my original comment about not being able to learn much from this camp. But sure, agree, about results?”
I expect him to go hard for two wins because he has spoken a lot about the importance of establishing the expectation to win. Besides, on paper we are better than both teams. The sooner you start winning, the better. We have no WC qualifying ; friendlies will have to suffice.
We on SBI might not learn much from this camp and the two games.
But I bet Pochettino surely will.
And I’m pretty sure those 25 players will as well. Unless none of those 25 will be around in 2026, don’t you think that matters?
This is one of the things I like best about Pochettino.
Comparatively speaking, he knows next to nothing about the USMNT ,the USSF and US soccer media.
He’s about as close as you can get to being “unbiased” on the topic of whether they can be molded into a dangerous unit in the time remaining.
What we have here is a guy with the best soccer credentials we could buy evaluating in person for the first time the core of the group that he is being paid to turn into a serious contender for the 2026 World Cup. When he was interviewed by Crocker, he pulled out his own evaluation of the team I would love to have that eval and see how it holds up after these two games.
Will he come out of these two games and resign knowing he made a terrible mistake ? The Man U. job might be open by then if it isn’t already open as I write this. So is the England job.
You would learn a lot if he resigns.
If he doesn’t resign, then you would learn that there is some reason to hope.
“We on SBI might not learn much from this camp and the two games. But I bet Pochettino surely will.”
Well, if that ain’t the truth. However it’s a huge bummer all these injuries are popping up.
I love it……most of the players called up are IN CLUB FORM, getting regular minutes and/or making an impact with their respective teams in one way shape or form.
Positive start to the “player selection”…..next stop “formation and tactics”!!!! lol
Hmmm, out of curiosity…….I now wonder if Giovanni Reyna and Luca De la Torre would have made this roster or would they still have been cut for lack of playing time.
Haji 1g month of September moved to the bench several times. Musah 43 minutes since last window. Horvath hasn’t played since Aug 31 2.5 GAA, Turner hasn’t played for a club since February. Cardoso 1 start in month of September 0g 0a. 100% if healthy Gio would be there. Luca I’m iffy on just because he hasn’t had the NT success other than the Canada goal so maybe he would have on recency bias.
Nice try
Our goalkeeper pool is not “up to par: so scratch that off the list lol
Top Scorers for Coventry
1. Haji Wright: 3 goals in 8 appearances
2. Milan van Ewijk 1 goal
3. Ellis Simms 1 goal
4. Brandon Thomas-Asante 1 goal
Top Scorers for Norwich City (Compare)
1 Borja Sainz 6 goals in 8 appearances
2 Josh Sargent 3 goals (same as Haji Wright but on a better team)
3 Callum Doyle 1 goal
Johnny Cardoso – Defensive Midfielder not expected to score or assist
More playing time than…….lets say Gio, lol
Betis vs Espanyol (came on in the 79th min) SEP 29
vs Las Palmas (went full 90 min) SEP 26
vs Mallorca (did not dress) SEP 23
vs Getafe (did not dress)
vs Leganes (Unused sub)
vs Real Madrid (came on in the 57th min) SEP 1
vs Alaves (Unused sub)
vs Girona (came on in the 77th min)
Yunus Musah – Not bad in that he’s still having opportunities to be a starter (but I wonder if his playing time is limited by the serious discussions going on with Lyon)
AC Milan vs Lecce (came on in the 63 min) SEP 27
vs Inter (unused) SEP 22
vs Liverpool (unused) SEP 17
vs Venezia (came on in the 74 min) SEP 14
vs Lazio (came on in the 70 min) AUG 31
vs Parma (started subbed off 67 min) AUG 24
vs Torino (came on in the 73 min) AUG 17
Bizzy: since the last window Johnny, Haji, and Yunus have not been important contributors for their clubs. Haji finally scored again the last game and as you pointed lack of goals appears to be a team issue, but Haji has seen his minutes go down this season, so he’s not exactly hot either. Far too early to tell if Poch means what he says about club minutes. But based on the others chosen, if Gio was healthy he’d be on the roster this time whether you like that or not.
USSF made Poch the richest national team coach, friendly reminder. This means expectations for Americans is through the roof. There’s no room for coddling. Im letting yall know. The results needs to match the money he’s making. Yall criticize GB, who has put out the same lineups, let’s have even MORE energy for someone who has a better club record. I am not apart of a cult. Neither should you be
good post
“There’s no room for coddling. Im letting yall know. ”
To coddle someone means to treat them too kindly or protect them too much.
How does that apply here? International players are notoriously injury prone. Why?
Maybe because most call ups happen when the players would normally be resting or rehabbing. That tells you they are worn down and vulnerable.
And then they often get put into situations that are out of their normal routine. High level athletes are creatures of habit. Destroy their routine and injury becomes more likely.
This is why clubs hate national teams.
A national team only borrows players. Their day jobs are with their clubs. The USSF does not pay Gio about 2.3-2.5 million per year. BVB does. So, when Gio gets hurt on international duty it is like your brother-in-law borrowing your pickup to move and then bringing it back a week late and damaged (and not telling you).
The way I look at it given the circumstances, the USMNT needs to be extra careful with the players because an injury is bad for all concerned. Gio, for example, has been hurt a couple of times on international duty resulting in his club status being negatively affected.
Besides, this latest callup names twenty-five players.
Outside of those twenty-five can you name twenty-five more healthy international level USMNT eligible players that you are sure are worthy?
The point is this is not Chelsea. If Pochettino finds, to his horror that all our keepers suck he cannot go out and buy a starter and a backup. We only have so many players who are worth a fuck.
The pool is what the pool is. He will have to work with what is there. That is why you call in Horvath instead of Cohen.
There are only so many international quality USMNT eligibles. My way or the highway does not work as well with them. In that sense the players have the USMNT held hostage. The numbers force the manager to give them more leeway.
“The results needs to match the money he’s making”
They will not. Unless we win the World Cup. Money cannot guarantee results.
The USSF is paying that money to show the world that they are trying.
” Yall criticize GB, who has put out the same lineups, let us have even MORE energy for someone who has a better club record. I am not apart of a cult. Neither should you be”
Gregg deserved every inch of the criticism he got. Much of his trouble was self-inflicted.
Pochettino is unquestionably a superior coach. What you can expect is that the team will look more organized, that they will be able to handle adversity better. I expect them to be more confident.
But Pochettino cannot guarantee results. No coach can.
All Pochettino can guarantee is that the team will be better prepared to win, not that they will win.
Gregg was fired because at the end of the day his teams always looked like they had just enough but no more than that. For the USMNT to do well in the World Cup they will have to upset some big teams.
They beat crappy teams but never upset anyone. He got the results he was expected to and no more. At the end, the players seemed caught up in the mindset that mediocrity was okay.
And the team’s mindset is entirely, completely, on Gregg. When Pochettino took over Southampton and Spurs they were not highly thought of teams. Pochettino changed their mindset. Hopefully, he can do the same thing here.
@Vacqui,
GB won against Mexico, our biggest rival, in the regional battle of dominance, and it was JOYOUS for all. Belittling that is weak. You ever coached man?
Anyway, yes he was fired after 5 years or whatever, probably too long enough for any national team coach, and he had failings, but the regional dominance was in doubt in those competitions and games…and his teams won them. And it was wonderful and a blast. Yes, he also had failings.
beachbum,
Are you telling me that one win over El Tri is so important that we should lighten up on Gregg?
I’ll lighten up on Gregg if you lighten up on JK.
“Jurgen Klinsmann was the first US coach to win a game at the Estadio Azteca in Mexico City when he led the US to a 1–0 victory over Mexico on August 15, 2012. This was the US’s first win in Mexico. In 10 games as player and manager, Jurgen Klinsmann has never lost to Mexico.”
Dang thought Luna would get called in.
steffen to me is the “tell” this is just about experience and in-group snobbery. dude has had a very mediocre year this time, atop a series of mediocre or bench/loan years, after his last caps being miserable games like costa rica away.
he is just the most obvious of about 6 or so guys on this roster who in a fair world would have played themselves off the team long ago with either poor or indfferent play.
they did keep a handful of the performers from last time but it turned out the nitpicker was right, that it wouldn’t really be “fresh” faces. it’s kind of like if in 2017/8 you responded to what happened by bringing back brooks and the germans and not looking for new recruits.
setting aside the people i liked last time, eg, schulte and morris, the only guy off this list i think might be a sleeper is malik. malik showed some ability to hit a long pass in transition last time, which i think will fit the scheme. but i don’t buy many of the other retreads eg busio weston musah, can actually hit the balls forward this scheme needs to get after teams in transition, ie, balls between the backs accurate enough to hit a runner. some of them struggled to hit someone standing still……and are really boxcrashers who should be on the other end of the counter-passes.
Pochettino would know Steffen from his time as the backup at Man City. I don’t think they ever faced each other, but he or members of his staff would at least know a little about him. Steffen hasn’t played and only been in one camp in 2.5 years I don’t think anyone at USSF is now forcing his callup. I tend to agree with you that he hasn’t been up to a callup. He does make a lot of saves because Colorado does give up a lot of chances but his Goals conceded is 48 and his xGot is 41 so he gives up more than he should. Whereas Schulte or Celantano give up fewer goals than their xGot. Zach has had some better games this year but he still hasn’t been very consistent. He had some great games in Leagues Cup (clean sheet against Club America) but also a 4-0 defeat to Portland.
Man what does Maloney have to do to get a look? Constant minutes in the Bundesliga for a top 6 club in the league.
who are you bringing him in over though? And you have to consider system when these call ups are made, so maybe Poch doesn’t feel like Maloney fits into what he wants to do with this group atm….just my opinion however
Right now, I don’t think Poch has a system yet. With the usual retread of players here, it looks like he’s just going by the list someone gave him since he doesn’t know all the players yet. And these are friendlies so there’s no limit on who you can call in which is perplexing. 4 goalkeepers for example….
You’d bring Maloney in over Busio, Cardoso or Morris.
I haven’t watched Maloney this year at all. But he struck me as kind of a one trick pony. Destroyer, clogs passing lanes, good tackler. But not much with the ball at this feet.
Busio, Cardoso and Morris all may offer a little more than that. So I get leaving Maloney out.
And I’m not saying leaving anyone out. There’s no limit in friendlies for rosters and one thing this team has lost is the grit when punched in the mouth by physical teams. Nothing wrong with a defensive/destroyer enforcer type on the field. Musah is played deep but he has limited tackling ability and over dribbles into trouble. McKennie can tackle but he also drifts out of the center a lot. Since friendlies, figured why not a clean slate and just see who can fit in. Same thing with Ream a few years back. He was playing consistently in the Premier League but Berhalter never called him in until Ream forced his way in.
ac: or these are actually our best players and the challenge will be getting them to play with more purpose in the attacking third and more connected in the defensive third. Perhaps the reason Berhalter, Varas, and now Pochettino isn’t laziness but in fact because they have studied hours of film instead of checking the yanks abroad page.
you have it precisely backwards. find ones known for defense. then if there is a tiebreaker favor someone who does the 6 job right but can also pass.
part of the reason we are mediocre is the 6 and backs don’t keep clean sheets. and i giggle at the supposed offensive abilities of the passing 6s y’all want to look at. if i am calling a deeplying playmaker he better be pirlo.
otherwise we get our tushes kicked on transitions. fix it.
re maloney, having been around to see armas, you are nitpicking. he is not a legbreaker who can barely complete a pass. he is a solid 6 who can keep the ball moving on the pass good enough to keep a job top end of B.1.
we have 2 other mids who can also do the creating. the irony is a lot of the folks dissing the 6 options as not passers don’t actually demand the 8/10 types be much better than a 6 at their job. you’d think if you were so concerned about passing we’d call people more the reyna/green/sullivan/RSL guy end of the spectrum. actual 10 types.
the fanboy favorites seem to trend two way mush, mediocre on defense, not setting the world on fire on offence. but they play for Fancy FC and get a couple goals a season. can the NT live off 1-2 G or A a season from mids? not really. but that would be breaking down the snobbery for actual production.
this was the thrust of my “nagbe diss” the other day. 2018 cycle after bradley, beckerman, and jones got old, the defense started leaking, and we were no longer getting bradley’s offense the same. nagbe became a fetish. nagbe neither dominates defense nor produces much of anything on offense. that concept of a US mid got popular at the time. we couldn’t even stop TnT and nagbe and feilhaber aren’t creating any offense.
please stop and think about what exactly your midfield concepts are designed to do. are they going to destroy opposing attacks and allow nothing? or are they going to set up themselves or pulisic on a platter? if your explanation veers over towards telling me “where” they play club ball, or telling me about that one goal they had this season you liked, you are wandering off from the normal point of a midfield, which is not just to be there and hustle around and have an impressive team affiliation for the press release and the fanboys.
I was thinking the same thing. This team can get smoked on transition. Adams isn’t there and who knows if he ever will be (hate saying that). Even if Maloney doesn’t work out, at least a clean slate with players. Still hope Poch works out tactics and pushes this team to another level.
i like adams but dude is so fragile and consistently hurt we should be shopping the 6 spot to find 2-3 other reliable 6s as though he may be unavailable at any time. as though the position is empty and up for competition. if the duct tape and bailing wire holds up for one week’s window, treat it as a bonus.
to me the position should be picked like you want either kante/gattuso, snarling/speedy midfield sweeping; or pirlo/valderrama, literally a 10 type playmaker who prefers to do their plentiful damage from further back. that as with wingbacks, if i am giving up some snarling sweeper work, it’s for regular upside.
and then like i said, i’d like to see some consistency of purpose across the selection. it might be seen as a tad naive or negative, but if we’re gonna defend, pick 10-11 who can do that. if we’re gonna take attacking risks, have every mid be a slick assist merchant. we may not have messi or rice, but i think we could pick enough mids and wingbacks of a type where the tactical carpet matches the drapes.
IV: most of Nagbe’s time with the nationals came as a wide midfielder not as a replacement to Jones or Bradley. Early in his career his managers couldn’t really decide what position was best for him. Nagbe has always been best when played next to a specialist. In Portland in a dual 8/10 role next to Valeri and then as a dual 6 in Atlanta and Columbus. He’s similar to Musah in that his greatest asset as a player is his dribbling and his press resistance. He needs a 10 creator like Cucho or Almiron that he can dribble thru the lines to get the ball to. Musah hasn’t yet figured out how once he’s broken lines with his dribble how to find the next pass. Largely I believe because Berhalter left no one in the middle to pass to. It took Nagbe until he was 26 or 27 to really figure that part out, Musah is still just 21. Unfortunately for NT fans by the time Darlington figured it out, he had kids and didn’t want to miss all that time playing with the NT.
Some of it can be related to the system but Maloney just doesn’t contribute to progressing the ball or scoring (other than a set piece header here or there). His passing percentage is around 64% down from last year. Compared to all DM in top 5 leagues over the last 365 days Lenny’s rankings: Passes attempted 13 percentile (as 87% had more attempts per 90), pass completion 6 percentile, progressive passes 3 percentile, progressive carries 1 percentile (basically the worst DM in top 5 league dribbling forward). What does he do well blocks 62 percentile, clearances 99 percentile (the most for DMs), aerials won 98 percentile. Heidenheim doesn’t have a lot of possession so some of that is by design and I’m sure pressure affects that passing accuracy but 64% is low especially when half his passes are 5-15 yards. I’m not saying he never deserves a look but you can see why he doesn’t get called. FBref lists Johnny as a DM so they are compared in the same pool of DMs in top 5 leagues. Johnny’s defensive numbers are pretty comparable if not better. His passing is slightly better than Maloney, and Johnny’s assists and dribbling is far better.
my response would be if you watched real-atleti over the weekend, 2 good defensive teams with honest offenses trying to get the ball downfield and create chances as opposed to possession obsessives, as long as i am not turning it over a la steffen or ream, right in front of my net, so what. and if i pick the better defender, so what that he turns it over slightly more, he also stops it slightly more.
it’s weird to end up unapologetically touting the same folks i just watched run my NT summer into the ditch. weston hasn’t been productive. musah didn’t look himself. johnny looked out of his depth.
we tried that, you’ve explained why, but it didn’t work. try actual defense, or actual offense. push it a little more in a results-impacting direction of either more goals or fewer allowed. we might ship more if we risked attack, but the goal then is 3-2 until we sort the defense. or we might struggle for goals if we emphasized defense, but the idea is 1-0, and meanwhile find a set of guys on a page who produce together.
i think a lot of this disagreement comes down to i played 352 counter soccer growing up and see wide wing play as how you outlet the ball and get downfield in a hurry. i would much rather send weah or pulisic down the line than put our fate in musah, LDLT, malik, or some other mediocre 8’s hands. now, if reyna was the one pushing the central thrust, that’s different. i think they can deliver the final ball. but then that’s my point, 10 vs. 8. i don’t get our fetish for the 8 and think it basically boils down to an excuse to get reputation players on the field even if nothing much happens when they do.
IV: you have such a simplistic view. You think you can only play defensive, offensive, or possession. That’s so naive. Caleb Porter ran a possession based system at Columbus. Wilfred Nancy runs a possession based system at Columbus. There is almost nothing the same between how the 2020 Crew won the Cup and 2023 Crew won the Cup. And neither of them resembles a Pep Barcelona side. The US will never win a major competition sitting in a low block hoofing it up the line to the fast guy. That style might have been effective in the 90s club soccer, it doesn’t win World Cups.
my ideas are not simplistic. there are teams like italy that have won world cups barely scoring but also allowing almost nothing.
we are good at neither end of the field. we need to aspire to “RSL” or “Charlotte” — good at one end — before we can try to be a top team “good at both ends.”
i think you have watched too much city or liverpool, good at both ends, but also able to buy that result — and don’t seem to grasp this currently is a midtable or below average type team in that kind of world. malfunctioning system, adrift.
teams like that actually do tend to simplify. they will emphasize naive attack like brighton. or they will grind you like fulham does.
the best way to be some forgettable bad EPL side is to try to be average both ends and end up even GD and sitting about 12th.
and then if you get really bad at one or both ends you get relegated.
mock me all you want. i have plenty of personal history of playing on tough defensive teams that won state twice while being lectured on “correct ways to play” by the teams who usually didn’t make state.
you win soccer by scoring more than you allow. that tends to reward, ideally, both offense and defense, but if you want to have a positive GD and win games, either a stout defense or a good offense. look through any league table, pro, college, same pattern.
i grant teams need people who do dirty work and are willing to get on the ball and bring it up, and so forth. but in my personal experience that’s more about does your 10 have work ethic. and is your 6 good.
my personally belief is the US has struggled in recent years because the 8 fetish means weakened mid transition defense, plus we don’t get much production outside of a handful of forwards. it’s not as bad as 2017 but it’s stuck in the same STUPID mindset. most teams want a messi and not a plowhorse. and likewise want kante and not some overrated passing 6.
and if you’re gonna play hybrids, maybe tilt the choice of hybrids and lineup in a direction where it pays off. to me it’s idiotic to have 8s for defense but wingbacks to attack and a 6 to pass the ball. we do stupid crap like that.
i do not get the current mentality.
IV,
“i do not get the current mentality.”
There is no current mentality.
You’re still bitching about Gregg . As you like to say, you’re fighting today’s war with the last war’s weapons.
The single person most responsible for the stench that permeates the USMNT is gone. The USSF and the rotten players are still around but one step at a time.
You’re going to have to wait until this two game set is over to have some insight into the “current mentality”. And even then it will still be evolving probably for a while.
You’re mad because Pochettino isn’t operating like you would.
He does not appear to have judged everything about the USMNT by using the remote analysis and research that you and many here on SBI all use. He certainly has the wherewithal to do what we all do and maybe more.
But you’re pissed because, if Pochettino had done what you would have done before he even met any of these guys, it would have validated IV and his methods as THE authority on the USMNT player pool. But Pochettino did not make the IV approved moves.
The difference is Pochettino is the REAL USMNT manager. He, not JR, not quozzel, or anyone on SBI will be the guy who actually picks the players and chooses the tactics. Now for all I know he religiously reads SBI. We’ll know when he caps Duane Holmes and Julian Green.
The point is as the REAL USMNT manager he wants to actually meet what has been the rotten core ( more or less) of the team and go through a game or two to see for himself what he has and what he needs to do.
I’m not as smart as you but this seems like a perfectly reasonable approach given the circumstances.
You can’t do that. None of us on SBI can and but Pochettino can.
Most of us on SBI seem to realize and accept that but you can’t. Newsflash, you better get used to it.
Does that mean he’s perfect?
No, but I think most normal people will allow him to actually meet his team in person before pissing all over Pochettino and the “current mentality.