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Posted on 10/14/15 at 12:59 pm to crazy4lsu
quote:
This is absolute horseshite. We beat fricking Spain with Ricardo Clark at CDM. Jay fricking Demerit was our CB. He wasn't even starting at the beginning of the tournament. He was a back-up who was asked to do a very simple job. How are we supposed to move forward if we've moved back? Moving forward is a misnomer as well. It's clear there is an American style that works on the international level. Up until 2012, it was the same style the god damn Germans used on the international level. There isn't moving forward because our style was in its infancy. Outside of Spain and Germany, the possession style is extremely hard to implement. It's why international soccer is much less entertaining, because teams basically live in the low-block and look for opportunities to counter.
I'm with you, it's time to get back to basics.
Posted on 10/14/15 at 1:02 pm to crazy4lsu
How is what you're saying different in any way from what I'm saying? We both completely agree that we're underachieving and that we're trying to play in a way that we're ill-equipped to implement tactically. The only thing I'm adding is that we have still struggled and will continue to struggle until we find a way to translate the American style we've employed so far successful to the next level where we can play that style while not completely giving control of the match to whoever we're facing.
This isn't about Jurgen not having players to succeed. Saying we beat Spain with players like Ricardo Clark and Jay Demerit makes it seem like that was anything more than an absolute upset. We also came out and dictated the match against Brazil until we were up 2-0, went into a shell, and handed them the keys to the match. They immediately started to punish us for letting them take back control of the match after putting them on the back foot early by attacking.
The point I'm trying to make is that we shouldn't abandon what got us here, but we have to find a way to avoid that style being one where we rely too heavily on sitting deep and counter-attacking. The best performances we've seen from the USMNT are ones where we go out with the approach of focusing on using our athleticism and physicality to make them play to our strengths. Play smart in the midfield over going for the homerun balls, keep them from stretching us too thin without completely committing to sitting deep, and using our more physical, fit athletes to wear them down. When we force opponents to play the match on our terms, we are hugely successful. If we can't even keep possession for more than a few seconds, we can never even try to do that.
Without Landon Donovan, our midfield is far worse than it should be because we have to play our best players out of position to have someone who somewhat link up with the attack. As a result, we're lacking Bradley's strengths centrally in the midfield and struggle to keep possession. If we had a suitable 10 to play that role, the midfield and, therefore, the whole team in general would be infinitely better immediately. We can say that that's Jurgen's fault, but he was always going to retire at some point. We need to face the facts that our player quality creates a glass ceiling that we can't break through or even knock on without another golden generation of guys like Dempsey, Bradley, Donovan, etc. coming through. They all were results of the early-90s push, and hopefully, this boom in the sport's popularity here will go a long way towards helping this.
This isn't about Jurgen not having players to succeed. Saying we beat Spain with players like Ricardo Clark and Jay Demerit makes it seem like that was anything more than an absolute upset. We also came out and dictated the match against Brazil until we were up 2-0, went into a shell, and handed them the keys to the match. They immediately started to punish us for letting them take back control of the match after putting them on the back foot early by attacking.
The point I'm trying to make is that we shouldn't abandon what got us here, but we have to find a way to avoid that style being one where we rely too heavily on sitting deep and counter-attacking. The best performances we've seen from the USMNT are ones where we go out with the approach of focusing on using our athleticism and physicality to make them play to our strengths. Play smart in the midfield over going for the homerun balls, keep them from stretching us too thin without completely committing to sitting deep, and using our more physical, fit athletes to wear them down. When we force opponents to play the match on our terms, we are hugely successful. If we can't even keep possession for more than a few seconds, we can never even try to do that.
Without Landon Donovan, our midfield is far worse than it should be because we have to play our best players out of position to have someone who somewhat link up with the attack. As a result, we're lacking Bradley's strengths centrally in the midfield and struggle to keep possession. If we had a suitable 10 to play that role, the midfield and, therefore, the whole team in general would be infinitely better immediately. We can say that that's Jurgen's fault, but he was always going to retire at some point. We need to face the facts that our player quality creates a glass ceiling that we can't break through or even knock on without another golden generation of guys like Dempsey, Bradley, Donovan, etc. coming through. They all were results of the early-90s push, and hopefully, this boom in the sport's popularity here will go a long way towards helping this.
Posted on 10/14/15 at 1:34 pm to Dijkstra
I do agree with you that there are a lot of issues and some are Klinsmann's fault and some simply product of the general "zeitgeist" of USMNT decision makers/fans that surrounded his hiring.
1) Clearly, and most importantly, Klinsmann is not doing a good job with what players he does have available putting them in positions to succeed.
Whether you're Faroe Islands or Germany, you will suffer if you're not keeping compact formations with whatever "style" you play, never creating proper triangles in possession, continually allowing 2v1 match ups in your attacking third etc. . .
2) I do agree, if I understand your point correctly Dijkstra, that while this is ultimately Klinnsman's responsibility, he was hired with a "mandate" from fans etc to not play what most Americans seem to still consider "Bob Ball".
At the time of his hiring, almost everyone seemed high as a kite on Spain/Barca or Arsenal type passing games, the pressing/attacking styles of Bayern, Dortmund or the German or Chilean NT and, perhaps mainly, the wide open, balls to wind style of many EPL matches.
Any more pragmatic approach resulting in winning football in the world was almost seen as a stain on the true Platonic beauty of the game.
It made for "unwatchable football like they play in Italy or France" (when, in fact, those places are probably where the USMNT would get better ideas since lower table sides there are much less likely to play the National Generals to the table-topping Globetrotters and change their tactics successfully based on opponent.)
It wasn't Klinsmann bamboozling cautious buyers but being begged for his wares in a setting where "German" translated to the trendy football a growing US fan base was demanding.
In that sense, I do agree that he was set up for either runs of inconsistent performances or of not keeping the mandate to "change the way we play" -- like at the WC were we had very good final results but played much more defensively and by the seat of our pants than I recall "Bob Ball" usually being.
In short, I think the decision makers, to please fans, asked him to have Watford play like Arsenal.
His ego was such that he thought he could do it when I'm not sure he could actually get Arsenal to play like Arsenal.
1) Clearly, and most importantly, Klinsmann is not doing a good job with what players he does have available putting them in positions to succeed.
Whether you're Faroe Islands or Germany, you will suffer if you're not keeping compact formations with whatever "style" you play, never creating proper triangles in possession, continually allowing 2v1 match ups in your attacking third etc. . .
2) I do agree, if I understand your point correctly Dijkstra, that while this is ultimately Klinnsman's responsibility, he was hired with a "mandate" from fans etc to not play what most Americans seem to still consider "Bob Ball".
At the time of his hiring, almost everyone seemed high as a kite on Spain/Barca or Arsenal type passing games, the pressing/attacking styles of Bayern, Dortmund or the German or Chilean NT and, perhaps mainly, the wide open, balls to wind style of many EPL matches.
Any more pragmatic approach resulting in winning football in the world was almost seen as a stain on the true Platonic beauty of the game.
It made for "unwatchable football like they play in Italy or France" (when, in fact, those places are probably where the USMNT would get better ideas since lower table sides there are much less likely to play the National Generals to the table-topping Globetrotters and change their tactics successfully based on opponent.)
It wasn't Klinsmann bamboozling cautious buyers but being begged for his wares in a setting where "German" translated to the trendy football a growing US fan base was demanding.
In that sense, I do agree that he was set up for either runs of inconsistent performances or of not keeping the mandate to "change the way we play" -- like at the WC were we had very good final results but played much more defensively and by the seat of our pants than I recall "Bob Ball" usually being.
In short, I think the decision makers, to please fans, asked him to have Watford play like Arsenal.
His ego was such that he thought he could do it when I'm not sure he could actually get Arsenal to play like Arsenal.
This post was edited on 10/14/15 at 2:55 pm
Posted on 10/14/15 at 2:07 pm to wm72
quote:
2) I do agree, if I understand your point correctly Dijkstra, that while this is ultimately Klinnsman's responsibility, he was hired with a "mandate" from fans etc to not play what most American's seem to still consider "Bob Ball".
This is exactly the point I want to get across. After his ESPN stint and the comments he made about our style, people wanted him on board. He didn't come in and decide to do everything different on his own. He was hired to try to evolve the program into one with higher standards that would heal the fans of the pains of "Bob Ball". The problem is that we don't know what we really want outside of winning. If he sets the team up to win as we did in qualifying and the World Cup, the narrative was "This is what we had before! Where is the progress?!" When he tries to experiment and find that "magic" solution that clicks, people are furious because he won't do what's worked. His ego won't let him admit that he's not capable of making it happen, and here we are. Exactly as you've said, he was hired to do a job that was unrealistic and thought he could pull it off.
Obviously, he has lost even some of his staunchest defenders, including myself, due to his handling of the Gold Cup and our performance against Mexico. He's not the answer, but that doesn't change why we brought him in from the beginning? We have to decide if we're okay with the way we've played and just want minor improvements or if we actually want that "revolution" to take place? This has to be decided before we move forward with a new manager. Otherwise, it'll be the same situation.
We want to take that next step, but we also don't want to endure the growing pains of finding what that next step is. Just to be clear so this isn't taken the wrong way, Jurgen Klinsmann is responsible for a lot of the problems we are currently seeing. I just feel like we need to be more realistic about why experimentation has gone so terribly and will continue to go badly under any manager who tries to change our style of play. We're really good at what we do, but if we really want to see a "revolution", we need to make that very clear before we decide on what path we're going to take and whether or not it's even feasible to attempt it with our current player pool.
This post was edited on 10/14/15 at 2:09 pm
Posted on 10/14/15 at 2:18 pm to Dijkstra
quote:
We have to decide if we're okay with the way we've played and just want minor improvements or if we actually want that "revolution" to take place?
I'm the one who started the vastly unpopular thread on here back when it seemed like Bob Bradley would be replaced suggesting that the USMNT may do better to approach Marcelo Lippi instead of Klinsmann.
This post was edited on 10/14/15 at 3:03 pm
Posted on 10/14/15 at 2:20 pm to Dijkstra
I think the problem is we are combining technical director and coach. The TD can lead this revolution in youth development that will take lots of time and money. This doesn't happen over night. The coach needs to get his best 11 on the field and deploy them in a way that fits their strengths.
Posted on 10/14/15 at 2:33 pm to Dijkstra
quote:
This is exactly the point I want to get across. After his ESPN stint and the comments he made about our style, people wanted him on board. He didn't come in and decide to do everything different on his own. He was hired to try to evolve the program into one with higher standards that would heal the fans of the pains of "Bob Ball". The problem is that we don't know what we really want outside of winning. If he sets the team up to win as we did in qualifying and the World Cup, the narrative was "This is what we had before! Where is the progress?!" When he tries to experiment and find that "magic" solution that clicks, people are furious because he won't do what's worked. His ego won't let him admit that he's not capable of making it happen, and here we are. Exactly as you've said, he was hired to do a job that was unrealistic and thought he could pull it off.
But Jurgy never actually tried to implement a new style. (I'm about to get bashed, but...) I would have been fine watching the US take its lumps as it tried to adjust to a new style. It's what happened last season with Celtic under Deila. If he then gave up and said 'we can't play that style with our player pool', it would then be fine to try something new. Instead, he started talking BS about playing a new attacking style while trotting out Bob Ball + Germans. He then gave up on that and, for the last two years at least, he's basically just thrown shite at the wall. This is why our positioning is so fricking awful. This is why our defending at set pieces is terrible. This is why we suck when we have a corner.
I've been quite vocal on here about what I want from the USMNT manager and why Jurgy doesn't cut it. I've also given my wishlist for the next manager. I want either someone who will go balls out with a new style (Bielsa-type) or someone who will basically turn the US into a CONCACAF steamroller with the ability to counter more technical nations (Lennon-type).
Posted on 10/14/15 at 2:45 pm to TN Bhoy
I truly believe that he realized early on that doing it in the last cycle while trying to qualify for the World Cup just wasn't going to happen, and he reverted to what we were already doing. He started in late 2011 with the World Cup around 2 years away, and he probably planned to make the real changes afterwards.
The problem is that since the World Cup, we've been in a state of perpetual drastic experimentation. For all of the tinkering, absolutely nothing has come from it outside of maybe Bobby Wood's existence. He's thrown out every formation change and rotation change that you can imagine, and so far, nothing has worked. His ego, however, refuses to let himself accept that US Soccer isn't as easy to improve as he thought and that he may not be capable of doing that. That's where he has failed to the point of me supporting a change. I can live with experimentation when the results don't matter, but when you've struggled for a year with no direction or consistency and don't make changes leading into a tournament and playoff that decide a tournament spot, you've put your ego and desire to be "that guy" above the success of the team.
I still, however, believe that we will struggle to support any manager going forward without a clear vision of what we want from them. What we want from Jurgen has changed, and he hasn't made those changes which has probably already lead to the beginning of the end for him. We need to sit Sunil down, though, and tell him what the SB wants before the hire is made so we don't have to go through this again. The SB was still a baby when Jurgen came on, but after 5 years, we're ready to make the tough calls.
The problem is that since the World Cup, we've been in a state of perpetual drastic experimentation. For all of the tinkering, absolutely nothing has come from it outside of maybe Bobby Wood's existence. He's thrown out every formation change and rotation change that you can imagine, and so far, nothing has worked. His ego, however, refuses to let himself accept that US Soccer isn't as easy to improve as he thought and that he may not be capable of doing that. That's where he has failed to the point of me supporting a change. I can live with experimentation when the results don't matter, but when you've struggled for a year with no direction or consistency and don't make changes leading into a tournament and playoff that decide a tournament spot, you've put your ego and desire to be "that guy" above the success of the team.
I still, however, believe that we will struggle to support any manager going forward without a clear vision of what we want from them. What we want from Jurgen has changed, and he hasn't made those changes which has probably already lead to the beginning of the end for him. We need to sit Sunil down, though, and tell him what the SB wants before the hire is made so we don't have to go through this again. The SB was still a baby when Jurgen came on, but after 5 years, we're ready to make the tough calls.
Posted on 10/14/15 at 7:24 pm to TN Bhoy
quote:
Instead, he started talking BS about playing a new attacking style while trotting out Bob Ball + Germans. He then gave up on that and, for the last two years at least, he's basically just thrown shite at the wall. This is why our positioning is so fricking awful. This is why our defending at set pieces is terrible. This is why we suck when we have a corner.
Pretty much exactly right.
From this point all I'd really like to see is a back to basics approach. In the American parlance, there shouldn't be such a thing as moving forward because we haven't really moved at all. Klinsmann probably thought the could teach us the possession game, but the game that he knew and the game that is played now are two very different things. The game is even more different from when he coached Germany.
It's a shame that we couldn't get a German who could bring the very advanced game because Germany is at the forefront of the tactical revolution. Klopp will soon bring it to England and teams will adopt it, but we have to retreat to the low block game.
Posted on 10/14/15 at 7:27 pm to Dijkstra
quote:
The point I'm trying to make is that we shouldn't abandon what got us here, but we have to find a way to avoid that style being one where we rely too heavily on sitting deep and counter-attacking. The best performances we've seen from the USMNT are ones where we go out with the approach of focusing on using our athleticism and physicality to make them play to our strengths. Play smart in the midfield over going for the homerun balls, keep them from stretching us too thin without completely committing to sitting deep, and using our more physical, fit athletes to wear them down. When we force opponents to play the match on our terms, we are hugely successful. If we can't even keep possession for more than a few seconds, we can never even try to do that.
I don't disagree with this, but we've chosen the wrong German to bring us this game. Jurgen Klopp would have been an ideal choice in terms of bringing this, as his Dortmund teams were undermatched, at least in the transfer market, but could dictate the press to the opposition. What we are going to get is the low block, deep line with the counter-attack. At this point that's all I want.
Posted on 10/15/15 at 11:15 am to crazy4lsu
For those that think that results can not happen swiftly if the correct coach puts the players that exist in the position to win I present the 2014 Mexico World Cup run. From having to make the Cup through the back door to almost making it to the semis. Roughly the same players.... different results with a different coach.
Posted on 10/15/15 at 11:19 am to NewbombII
Stuart Holden said during the game:
"You bring up Costa Rica, I think they're a wonderful example. For people who want to argue 'the United States doesn't have the players', well then find a tactical gameplan that suits your players. Costa Rica went to the World Cup Ian, look at the likes they played. They got to the quarterfinals with a tactical gameplan."
"You bring up Costa Rica, I think they're a wonderful example. For people who want to argue 'the United States doesn't have the players', well then find a tactical gameplan that suits your players. Costa Rica went to the World Cup Ian, look at the likes they played. They got to the quarterfinals with a tactical gameplan."
Posted on 10/15/15 at 11:30 am to NewbombII
"Keepers: We have two starting in the Premier League, and plenty of depth between MLS and European rosters
Defenders: Are guys like Johnson, Besler, and Cameron that much worse than we've had in the past? We've never had two good fullbacks on both sides simultaneously, but we have serviceable guys that can get back there. And with Gonzalez, Alvarado, and Brooks, we at least have some depth and options on the back line, not to mention all the guys that haven't received calls and probably should.
Midfielders: I actually think our pool here is decent. Bradley is at worst one of the top 3 players of the past decade and is in his prime. The problem is we are seeing Bedoya at DMF, Jones on the wing, Yedlin pushed up the pitch, Zardes out on the right, virtually every midfielder is being played out of position. Maybe if Klinsmann tried playing guys where they know how to play we'd get better results.
Forwards: We've NEVER had good forwards. Do people really forget that not that long ago our best options were Eddie Johnson, Brian Ching, and Conor Casey? Let that sink in. Conor Freaking Casey. Even for their flaws, Altidore, Johannsson, Wood, and Morris are better options than we've ever had at one time before."
-----This puts words to my thoughts----
borrowed from bigsoccer forum posted by;
brewcity77
Defenders: Are guys like Johnson, Besler, and Cameron that much worse than we've had in the past? We've never had two good fullbacks on both sides simultaneously, but we have serviceable guys that can get back there. And with Gonzalez, Alvarado, and Brooks, we at least have some depth and options on the back line, not to mention all the guys that haven't received calls and probably should.
Midfielders: I actually think our pool here is decent. Bradley is at worst one of the top 3 players of the past decade and is in his prime. The problem is we are seeing Bedoya at DMF, Jones on the wing, Yedlin pushed up the pitch, Zardes out on the right, virtually every midfielder is being played out of position. Maybe if Klinsmann tried playing guys where they know how to play we'd get better results.
Forwards: We've NEVER had good forwards. Do people really forget that not that long ago our best options were Eddie Johnson, Brian Ching, and Conor Casey? Let that sink in. Conor Freaking Casey. Even for their flaws, Altidore, Johannsson, Wood, and Morris are better options than we've ever had at one time before."
-----This puts words to my thoughts----
borrowed from bigsoccer forum posted by;
brewcity77
Posted on 10/15/15 at 11:45 am to NewbombII
I would agree with most of that.
Posted on 10/15/15 at 2:44 pm to pvilleguru
The only place we have regressed in regard to players is wing play. Donovan can't be beat. Then Dempsey was serviceable as an inverted winger (which is a position I'm still ok playing him at if we do a 4231). Now we got nothing. We should have Nagbe soon, and hopefully Lletget. And Finlay. If Jurgen even tries looking like a competent player manager.
Posted on 10/15/15 at 3:52 pm to cwil177
quote:
The only place we have regressed in regard to players is wing play.
Yep. That's why I wish we could find some outside backs so that Fab could be there full time.
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