re: Why Can't the United States Assemble a Championship Soccer Team?

Here's where you're wrong SFP. FIFA hasn't changed the Laws of the Game to further accomodate possession football, like the NFL and NBA have to inflate scoring. There hasn't been a major rule change in soccer since they stopped goalies from picking up pass backs in 1993.

Essentially fouling has become the last line of defense for stopping supremely gifted possession players. There's basically no other way of stopping them, except dropping deep and ceding everything outside of the box. Then you pray that they can't unlock the defense or score from outside the box a la Chelsea, Switzerland, USMNT etc..

Today Gerard Pique pulled off a juggling trick deep in his own half when most other players would clear the ball long. There's no way to defend against that.


To carry on your economic point, I do subscribe to the belief that nations need to stick to their comparative advantages in soccer resources. Total Football originated from the Dutch's need to capitalize on limited space in the Netherlands. Spain realized that a player like Xavi could both effectively defend and attack by completing 100 passes a game. Soon they had 12 Xavis available and realized that they could play as many as possible and win even more effectively. We have great athletes, better athletes than almost everyone else. We just need these athletes to be above average technical players. Right now we have probably 8-9, technically gifted players and some other projects.