USA-ARG blyve
lol 3rd world, it's the main sport for the entire developed world except the US
look at the high school football programs around the country hundreds of teams being coached by ex college players recruiting the best amatuer athletes. Same with hockey, baseball, basketball the best Basketball and Football players in the world are here in this country. Canada has their amatuer Hockey programs across their country being coached by either pro players or Junior pro players hense they have an awesome hockey team from Canada using the best amatuers. The US is right there as well as Sweden, Russia, it all depends on what the amatuers go through.
Soccer in the US not so much eh...
would Messi have been recruited to play any of those sports? The USA is a massive country, you have plenty of potential to mold into a fine team.
And look at it this way, if anything, the USA constantly over achieves. You could have it much worse, and be a constant under achiever like England or post communist Russia.
Or India or China
India does probably underachieve in cricket
athletes here who are 'somewhat good' at football/basketball/baseball take their long shot into college and minors. Messi either would've done this (maybe a guard in basketball?) or would've never gotten into soccer at a young age and instead sought out a non athletic career
the other possibility is people around him realize his potential at soccer by age 10 or so, he plays for a shitty indoor team with half a field till age 15, ends up on the national team having been coached like crap all his life just like his teammates, *maybe* he can eek out a substitute spot on a relegated Euro club team by 25
Amateur. Not amatuer.
(I wasn't going to say anything, but five misspellings of the same word in one post is probably an MGoBlog record.)
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I'm a little tired of hearing them go on about Argentina being the #1 team in the world. Yes, according to the weird FIFA rankings, they are. (They had Belgium #1 in the world a few months ago.) They didn't win the last World Cup, or the real Copa America last year. They're very good but exactly how good is debatable. They certainly looked like world-beaters tonight, but we did a bit to help them out, too.
Wow - Lalas went off on the team. I don't blame him.
I think that was the most obvious thing to come away from that game with. Argentina is really good. DiMaria and Aguerro didn't even play, Gaitan was suspended. They were two horrific Higuain misses from winning both those finals, and just strolled to their third major tournament final in a row. They're not bad.
Obviously they're good. But the announcers went overboard with the #1 ranking stuff, failing to explain how arbitrary these rankings are. Argentina doesn't currently hold any title, world or confederation-wise.
So only a current title holder is worthy of the #1 ranking? This team barely lost in the last world cup final and have made the final of their last three international tournaments. Their bench consists of elite EPL talent. If they aren't #1 in the world the only team you could argue is better is Germany. At worst they are a close #2. The eyeball test also confirms this. It looked like the Globetrotters versus the Washington Generals out there. The individual technical ability of the players was absurdly higher than any US player.
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Starting Wondo and Bekkerman was mind-numbingly dumb.
They're too slow and made it seem like the US was playing shorthanded!
We were exposed by the #1 team in the world for the huge gap in talent between a team that is two-deep of players who populate and compete in the most elite European leagues, compared to our team of two or three European club level players and a bunch of MLS (third tier) players. In college football terms, think Alabama vs. a regional team like Iowa...no contest when it's a legit tournament, not a "friendly" summertime match where the best players make cameo appearances for the paying customers.
We went up against the real deal and got our asses kicked. Home field advantage had no bearing against vastly superior players. Yes, we could have "parked the bus" and kept the score down a bit, but IMO, it's not bad coaching to at least see if the scheme and players could make something good happen. No surprise that we didn't measure up.
But for me, just seeing the GOAT doing what he does against our best was a real treat.
when they beat Spain 2-0 in 2009 Confederation Cup. Spain was probably the best team for 3-4 years running and USA broke their 35 games unbeaten streak.
USA roster was arguably worse than the last few years which tells you that Klinsy hasn't done much as a coach. It's not his fault that USA got their ass kicked? He made a shitty choice of starting certain players and isn't good in X's and O's. He's not a good coach.
Beating Spain in the semis of the Confed cup in which it took an absolute miracle to get to the knockout round?
This goes beyond Klinsmann. I get the hot idea is to fire the coach because he just lost to the #1 team in the world, but what do you expect to happen? You want another Bob Bradley-type coach who basically does the whole "hard work, we are underdogs, back against the wall stuff?"
The USA soccer program is going to need a solid decade of youth development before they can even think about being on a similar playing field.
You tell me who Klinsmann starts last night that doesn't result in them getting absoultely trucked. I love Pulisic and Nagbe. You think if those two started over Wondo and Beckerman that it would have made ANY sort of difference? No.
didn't lose to shitty team like Jamaica or struggled against CONCACAF teams like they did in the last few months.
Klinsy isn't a good tactical coach. That's the biggest reason why I want him gone. He doesn't know how to pick the right players to be on the roster and doesn't know how to utilize them properly.
one can't overlook the obvious lack of world class talent the US has produced under every USMNT coach.
That said we have no playing style/system.Yesterday's match was disappointing not because we lost to a much better team, but I had no idea what the US were trying to do and I do blame coaching for that. I don't understand why so many players play out of position but I am not at practices and give JK the benefit of the doubt.
The lack of touch and soccer IQ is also disturbing. The only short term answer is to have our best 14 year olds go play in European Academies and learn to play the game correctly against the top competition.
When US soccer produces its first Tiger Woods, I believe a chain of positive events will occer as well. Please don't think Donovan or Dempsey is that guy. And it has to be a goal scorer not a goal keeper.