No, they'll dominate possession but we'll kick there ass on two really good goals for 75 minutes than give up two gols and the lead ; )

Completely agree. USA had built a reputation for being very hard to beat. Bradley knew how to get the best from modest resources. You'll never be world beaters but the way he had you play you were always capable of getting the odd shock win, because of how well organised you were and what seems now like a far more unified team spirit than appears to exist under that self-promoting cunt Klinsman.

ha ha ha

he may be that (is he really?) but USA under Bradley was HORRIBLE. reputation be damned.

any team who puts 10 men in the small area is going to be "hard to beat". kick, run, kick, run. they played like simpletons. it was a dead end. eye-poking horrible. no kid would ever been inspired to play after watching grown men do that.

frustrations aside from the limited talented, injuries, and my disagreements with bradley's shifted role, the last world cup USA did great. better than any i've seen.

yes, reports say there is no "team spirit"-- that's because new players are being tested constantly. and friendlies with unlimited substitutions. this is a good thing for the future-- it will give us much-needed options. it's not like we have a ready roster of stars. growth takes time. give it time.

Your bias is showing as plenty of American kids are inspired by USMNT.. and sure any 10 guys out there should be hard to beat, accept for the USMNT the past few matches ; )

I love US mutant Ninja Turtles....

no entiendo. seriously.

my bias = which is...? i'm not saying it doesn't exist (everyone has one, i'm aware of mine), just i'm not sure what you think my bias is.

plenty of kids = of course. more inspired by the recent world cup performance than ever. that's under klinsmann.

any 10 guys out there what? please rephrase or expand.

i accept reality as it is. namely:

bradley = dullsville national team coach

bruce arena > bradley

klinsmann > bradley

last few matches = experimental

---

if they are shit at the gold cup, that's what will count. but the future is not here yet. tournaments count, friendlies are just testing grounds. they were not shit at the world cup, so... the record backs him up so far.

http://www.ussoccer.com/stories/2014...mnt-head-coach

^^ needs an update

===

ETA: here's what seems a good discussion of klinsmann's shortcomings, and his conflicting multiple roles:

http://www.topdrawersoccer.com/the91...phy-explained/

Your bias is you generally shit on the US team..

No disputing that jurgen is superior to bradley but US have lost ground gained. Having atop tier defense is what always made US competitive like demonrail mentioned.. from 2011-2013 Gold Cup and WC Qualifiers the US was developing an identity on offense while always being able to fall back on its stout defense, especially when having fo clamp down in the box.. however during the WC and since this identity has disappeared and more t troublingly the defense has slipped significantly.. if its an experiment its failing

see, that is wrong-- that's not my bias at all

i generally shit on the MLS and CONCACAF-- not the US team

yes, i dislike both

the MLS is an inferior league where european ex-stars come to die. absurd schedule, terrible ownership rules (prohibiting member-owned clubs). no lower divisions hence no relegation/promotion are incentives for mediocrity. i have little respect.

and i think the US team needs a better confederation to reach the next level-- play chile, uruguay, argentina, brazil on a regular basis. yes, brazil had a terrible world cup-- still, playing world cup qualifiers and copa américas vs them would be *fantastic.* wishing that for the US team is far, far from "shitting on the US team.

i also really disliked coach bradley's lack of imagination. arena was better, but he always brought along the same old players.

always 4-4-2 and always the same old players may be an "identity" in the familiar repetition of old faces and tactics, but it advances nothing and leads nowhere.

i'm glad klinsmann is out there scouting and recruiting and always testing new players and pushing for higher fitness and tactical and professional standards. he's building a good future for the US team and i support him. is that "shitting" o the US team? no fucking way.


if i recall under bradley the US had the habit of always conceding the first goal. that's not "top tier" anything.


that's under klinsmann-- but how can you compare our rivals in the gold cup vs. the world cup group of death??? i mean. it's not. even. we faced the world champions. we faced portugal. we faced our eternal nemesis ghana. then went against belgium which without having fully gelled had tremendous individual stars- courtois, kompany, hazard, de bruyne, lukaku, fellaini... they were favorites to win it all... and we held till overtime. jeezus. what's the gold cup-- honduras? for fucks sakes. does not compute. anyone can have "stout defense" vs. fucking honduras. it's a whole other fucking planet/universe/ dimension.


vs

no idea who any of these guys are

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7t8xwpW8gJQ

Its not just the Gold Cups in 2011 and 2011-2013 that i am talking about.. Its ALL the international matches and especially the WC Qualifiers...

I've seen US defense simply play better against even the most elite teams.. yes our D was mildly impressive considering the group in WC but even then defensive lapses cost what could have been wins against Portugal and later Belgium..so i agree with you more or less i just don't like what i see using the eye/smell test

that's CONCACAF! that's kramer's dojo with the little kids.


wait for the gold cup and compare it to the previous one.

that is if piojo herrera and the colombian who coached costa rica are still there... very good coaches both. could present a big challenge.

anyway i must go shovel some bull manure... SERIOUSLY NOT JOKING. looking forward to tuesday's match though.

btw, just found out benaglio retired from international futbol! insane as he's merely 31, and for a keeper that's nowhere near old, but it works in our favor.

As per that article you linked, Klinsmann should've never been given the role of head of development and head coach. It's just far too big a conflict of interest. I agree with you about his value as a scout and could definitely see him working well purely in a developmental role, but as a manager he's always struck me as someone who doesn't want players so much as devotees. You have to be seriously successful to pull that off, with a really solid record, but, as a manager, what has he actually won, in terms of titles?

And yeah, you did better than expected in the last WC, thanks largely to Portugal having a meltdown and Tim Howard playing out of his skin.

I agree with demonrail, in the NBA its the same problem the LA Clippers have where coach is also the GM.. too much power not enough accountability..

As to WC, i simply disagree that we did "better than expected".. i don't mean results or stats wise, yes we were exactly where we should have been, rather again im talking about the eye/smell test. Again at least under Bradley in 2010 US had a defensive identity and a sense of team personality and cohesion, our 2014 WC often looked lost and disorganized, especially on the defensive side.. THAT was previously our bread and butter so it seems that Jurgen has taken a step backwards and i blame that on all his roster changes. He said he is trying to create a certain kind of performance based accountability where guys make the 23 based on performance BUT it LOOKS like too many guys aren't buying into it and i think demonrail nailed it with the "what has Klinsmann really done anyway?" explanation. He is doing radical things with the team but doesn't seem to have 100% pkayer support..

Also i know its just sour grapes on my part as a fan but it also clearly looked like the team chemistry suffered from snubbing Donovan for essentially nothing but a personal quarrel which it looked like much of the team resented. Its like being a teacher, you can have all these radical and revolutionary ideas but if you don't KNOW your students, if you haven't established a solid rapport and relationship, none of it is worth shit until then.. so maybe Jurgen rocked the boat too soon after the successes in 2011-13? The players were clearly starting to gel and build chemistry both with Klinsmann and his system until he tweaked it too rapidly in prep for the world cup. Maybe Klinsmann overthought it?? Again with teacher annalogy, Tharp and Dalton describe an "effective pedagogy" as being built principally on teacher-student creating together, not a top down approach. So possibly Jurgen needed to focus more on working with where his players were AT rather than thinking too far ahead about where he wanted them to be? Should have built his strategies around what was currently working well..

yes, exactly, that is a good discussion. there's a conflict in the positions, and there's a problem managing veterans that way, etc. which is why i linked it. it's a good line of argument.

at this point time i don't think that's so terrible however. because we're never gonna have perfect, and he's as good as the US has right now. it's not like we have fergie waiting in the wings. there's a certain advantage in having the technical director as manager which is he has the power to shape the future by locking down the present-- i.e., "be a pro or GTFO". he's setting standards. once the standards are set, he can leave it to someone else.

the real problem is that the current standards are low.

i'd be happy to have it sitting as technical director if we can find a better manager for the team-- but who? bradley no fucking way. arena was good in his time but he's not ambitious enough. one could always hire a nomadic coach like bora in his day. hristo stoichkov knows us soccer but his coaching career is pretty awful.

please point out one-- i'm not saying this to be a contrarian, i'd like to see an alternative but i just can't.


and finally beating ghana who had previously punked us repeatedly.

getting out alive of that group was much better than the tie vs. england in 2010 when gerrard scored early only to have an easy ball slipping out of your keeper's hands and gift us a tie--- which was arguably our previous world cup moment of glory.

in 2002 when we reached quarterfinals... portugal had a worse meltdown (beaten by korea too) and no CR7's magic goals. then in the round of 16 we faced who? our old neighborhood rival mexico. to quarterfinals, but too easy.

Again im not disputing the results of WC rather the way such results were achieved. Really, it felt like we got lucky more so than earned our draws and win when we could have had a better style or approach which would have reflected progress.. sport is a "what have you done for me lately" business so hedging on futures is not efficacious as it could be. I totally understand that Klinsmann has a plan, especially for WC 2018 but that is at least a year away and in the meantime US has a Gold Cup and good chance at Confederation Cup that are more pressing issues than experimenting for WC

It almost seriously feels like Jurgen is trying to scare off all of American veteran talent to start fresh with a roster entirely of his own creation. THAT seems to take development too far, why waste current talent gambling on future potential?

I think USMNT best bet is to continue to improve to attract the best American talent,young or veteran, and build a positive culture and reputation. Snubbing Landon and underperforming because of experimental rosters and strategies seems counterproductive to this goal..

usmnt is like a middle of the pack league team, talent comes at a higher premium and conventional approaches don't always work, flexibility is the key

you're still sore about landon?

don't make me insult him but good riddance and i hope he found his soul dancing under the fucking moonlight somewhere, or communing with dolphins, singing kumbaya.

didn't klinsmann already win the gold cup in 2013? why the panic? have some patience.

----

ETA:

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/former-...7399--sow.html

Dude when Jozy went down it revealed how foolish it was to snub landon and further if you honestly believe the guy wasn't at least the 23rd best guy on available roster you're talking out your ass! Personally i think the bigger issue was the message it sent to the players and i think it wasn't as greatly received as Klinsmann planned.. sure it was "be a pro or GTFO" but looking at how Landon performed in training camp, the esteem his players had for him, and his "revenge" in the MLS Cup shows that it sent the totally wrong message. It was KLINSMANN who came across as being very unprofessional and frankly needlessly personal and petty.

im not saying he wasn't "23rd best". ass had nothing to do with it. im saying he acted unprofesionally and paid the consequences.

STANDARDS.

lol:
https://twitter.com/footballfunnys/s...25009083154432

===

ps- and dropping landon opened the door for this:

Dude didn't act unprofessionally, other players take sabbaticals, Klinsmann just took it the worng way. Is howard being unprofessional for taking his sabbatical too?

kumbaya, my lord, kumbaya
he got fat, my lord, kumbaya...

Dude you know futbol tactics better than i do, youknow damn well that Dempsey was playing put of position and plays better off the pass than creating his own shots.. sure if jozy doesn't go down it would have worked better, but that injury was precisely why snubbing donovamewas a bad gamble that caused offense to sputter..

Clint and Landon had great chemistry and would have played well together. It would have allowed Dempsey to have better off the ball scoring chances and kept opposing defense honest..

Proof is in the pudding. You ain't got to like Donovan personally to recognize he was needed after the jozy injury..

One word: Bielsa. And he'd take it too.

i liked donovan fine, he had his glory moments, but you're just talking hypotheticals, what ifs, bla bla. for all you know landon could have collapsed vs ghana from fatness and then we'd be with one more casualty, clint in the same predicament.

you keep rehashing this as if he still was available to play. empty speculations. move on. it's 2015 and we have a new crop of players.

AAAAAAAAAH. BIELSA. YES.

he just started in marseille though. are you sure he'll be free?

...

not sure he'll be a good ideological match w/ 'merica though. seriously.

Landon played very well in MLS cup so its not purely hypothetical..

My point is more so how that decision by Klinsmann may have negatively effected team chemistry and trust rather than to argue the tactics. Even if Landonnever played i think the team would have preferred he joined them

it's over

Yep, his contract ends at the end of the season.

Japan and Saudi Arabia are supposedly already making big plays for him.

What would the ideological objections be?

he's a very catholic leftist-- american catholics are more right wingers

he loved bachelet & hated piñera

his brother was a minister of kirchner

can't see him shaking hands w/ jeb bush

Away from all this U.S.A talk. Well Harry Kane starts as he means to go on, with a goal 80 seconds after coming on as a sub on his England debut. Good on him.

Baines had a shocking game though.

Yeah, but it'll be Hilary's hand he'll be shaking, surely. And as for the religion thing, isn't Klinsmann meant to be some kind of new age Buddhist? Can't imagine that went down well in the corridors of power.

Oh FFS! I got my days mixed up. Missed it completely.

ha ha ha no idea about the buddhist thing-- but he married a model and he's a californian now so new age would be fitting. did you read the link i posted above about berti vogts? berti explains it well-- how klinsi is now american-- i won't requote since it's a good read anyway.


did he scream "i love you sugar kane" when he scored?

(badum-tshhhh....)

Re Kane. Right now it seems he can do no wrong but I suppose we'll need to see how he bounces back from a dip before we can really judge him. But right now he does seem unstoppable.

What were we like generally?

Dammit. I missed a trick there. There'll be plenty more times to say though.

Yeah, read that. He does seem very 'californian' (I say, never having actually been there). He strikes me as someone who spends a lot of his time wearing flip flops.

They weren't too bad. Rooney could've had a hat-trick in the first 30mins but hit the post twice. Other than that the first half they seemed tense till the second goal just before half-time. They picked up a hell of a lot in the second half though. Sterling got much better, Carrick played well, Welbeck played well (he's one of those players I go hot and cold on with every game I see him) till he came off injured. Having said that, Henderson was a bit meh for me tonight.

Defensively we'll only get to see them properly against Italy on Tuesday.

Highlights are on itv4 now.

Germans readjust well to California, ive known a few

Thanks, just watched it. Am I being ridiculous when I say that if we can sort our defence out we could be a pretty decent team?

Nope I agree totally. Although the horizon doesn't look that great for the defenders. Stones, Clyne and Luke Garbutt (I'm biased but he's been great when he's played for Everton) are the only ones I can think of who are coming through that could be decent. Anyone I've missed?

The players available up front is just insane though.

Also its funny how California is essentially its own country. Y'all should all expatriate and join us, you can marry a model and get in touch with your Buddhisty New Agism