Who the f&&k are you kicking it to? (long)

So, with a few days to sit back and think about our World Cup performance, I think my biggest gripe/disappointment and what I feel to be our biggest weakness at the WC is the number of times I had to say the above.

I think there are a number of reason for it, but I also have some questions about it for those with more tactical knowledge.

Obviously Jozy being out was huge. We defend with 9 and clear the ball to him to hold play up and allow everyone to push forward. Especially against teams more talented that us, thats been our strategy.

That being said, the number of times where our clearances, many many times with no direct pressure on our defender, went nowhere near Clint was very depressing. Is this an issue of on the ball skill/comfort for our defenders? They don't feel comfortable taking a look up and seeing where Clint is and therefore just kick it and hope? It was very frustrating to watch Belgium, Ghana, and Germany just put the ball straight back into our defending third.

A lot of times for other teams (club and country) I will see a defender clear a ball without looking and it goes straight to their offensive player (FIFA video game style). It doesn't happen every time, just with enough frequency that its clearly not an accident. So does a player like Robben for example(at Bayern under Jupp), have a set zone or place that he sits (along the sideline right at midfield) and teammates know to hit it there? Do defenders not know this as well? It seems it can't just be a static point on the field or else it would easily be shut down.

Back to the US - do we need to defend with 9? I think part of the problem, especially with Jozy down, was that we only had one up top (and that one being nowhere near Jozy's ability to do this part of the job) Thats a lot of potential ground to cover for all clearences. I watch Argentina sometimes defend with 7 and leave 3 up top and not give up goals(though maybe only against overmatched oppponents?)I watch several other countries do the same at times but not often. I see most of the better countries defend with 8 for the most part.

Wouldn't leaving two up also make the other team a little more concerned about counters and maybe not have 7 or 8 (at times) push up into our third?

Of course, even defending with 9, we're still give up tons of shots. But I think this is more about the game taking place in our defensive third for long stretches more than it is about our teams ability to defend. Our maybe our defenders aren't tactically sound enough to defend all that movement on a consistent basis without superior numbers?

TL:DR - why are we not able to clear the ball with a purpose like so many other teams and therefore retain possession instead of giving it straight back? Lack of tactics, comfort on ball for defenders, or too many guys defending.