USMNT: Watching From Outside The Arena

Cellar-Door

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ESPN posted a bunch of Q&As with candidates here.

Martino's is totally reasonable for the most part, then there's this



Woof. Some questions/thoughts.

1. Can we stop with the winter season talk? It doesn't even have anything to do with pro/rel, anyway.
2. Why in the world would you both freeze expansion after 2024 AND prevent new clubs from working their way from the pro soccer system after that point?
3. Can we stop pretending the NASL will exist in 2030...not to mention, say, 2019?
4. Six tiers of professional soccer seems unnecessary and unrealistic, especially considering the US is a very large country so the pyramid should be "fat" with lots of regionalization rather than "skinny" like England.
Pro-rel is the part of his platform I like least.
As a general idea, yeah pro-rel is what the majority of USSF members seem to want, and I think long term it's needed. On the other hand I agree with most of your questions.
1. Winter season makes sense for many many reasons..... unfortunately the biggest reason it doesn't: weather means it's only possible with an insane cost in the northern states which kills your pyramid.
2. I get that at some point you need to freeze the top 4 tiers to new expansion and from then on teams have to work up from the 5th/6th tier, but a 14 year holding period?
3. This I'm fine with, if you lock in that NASL is the 3rd tier it should exist, it may have all new teams and owners, but the vaccuum would fill.
4. Yeah that seems to much, it should be 3 or 4.
 

Titans Bastard

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3. This I'm fine with, if you lock in that NASL is the 3rd tier it should exist, it may have all new teams and owners, but the vaccuum would fill.
If pro/rel comes to fruition, we'll have to deal with whatever the league landscape is at that time, but I think the NASL is done for. They've lost almost everybody, the two somewhat more legit expansion clubs in San Diego and OC are pretty radio silent, and Puerto Rico FC is very likely a lost cause. That leaves the Cosmos, Miami FC, and Jacksonville. There's loose talk about a bunch of NPSL clubs stepping up, but they are all ramshackle clubs who could only play at the pro level if they are heavily subsidized by Commisso (Cosmos) and Silva (Miami). I don't see it.

Frankly, a world in which USL controls D2 and D3 better facilitates pro/rel. The fewer empire-builders and league egos bumping against each other, the better.
 

allstonite

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That's a classic by carter, pure marketing strategy 101. I don't like the question so i'll 'reframe it' and answer the question i came prepared to answer.
She was on with Simmons and it’s more of the same. She was on for 40ish minutes and I have no clue what she wants to do. A lot of it is his fault because he was just venting as a youth soccer parent but still she didn’t say much beyond platitudes about doing better and more gender equality.
 

kenneycb

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The worst part of her platform was at the beginning of the interview where she stated something along the lines of “parents need to decide which clubs to invest their money in”, which isn’t a great way to thing about it.

I haven’t thought this through, but hockey has been able to succeed greatly over the last decade, achieving much greater parity with Canada at the U-20 stage, with the pay to play method. I’m guessing it’s because it’s pay to play everywhere but I have a degree of ignorance when it comes to youth hockey in other countries.
 

Cellar-Door

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The worst part of her platform was at the beginning of the interview where she stated something along the lines of “parents need to decide which clubs to invest their money in”, which isn’t a great way to thing about it.

I haven’t thought this through, but hockey has been able to succeed greatly over the last decade, achieving much greater parity with Canada at the U-20 stage, with the pay to play method. I’m guessing it’s because it’s pay to play everywhere but I have a degree of ignorance when it comes to youth hockey in other countries.
Also the silliest part is that if Parents want their kids to have a shot at youth teams they can't choose which to invest in. Most live in areas where there is only 1 DA club within 50 miles if they are lucky and USSF only scouts DA clubs for the youth teams. It's why DA clubs are insanely expensive, they are being granted a defacto monopoly on opportunity for their market.
 

dirtynine

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Carter’s answers are terrible. I’ll take a flier on a candidate with a few overly-progressive ideas over more of that drivel.

(For the record, I think modified winter calendar and modified pro/rel can both work and should be seriously considered.)
 

moly99

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I haven’t thought this through, but hockey has been able to succeed greatly over the last decade, achieving much greater parity with Canada at the U-20 stage, with the pay to play method. I’m guessing it’s because it’s pay to play everywhere but I have a degree of ignorance when it comes to youth hockey in other countries.
The issue is not the idea of paying something to participate in sports. Once you add in the cost of driving to away games, equipment, etc hockey costs about $2,000/year. Little league is a bit cheaper, but still pricey.

Soccer costs about $4,000/year for a good team even before getting to the travel and equipment costs. It is three times as expensive to play soccer as baseball. That's the problem.
 

OCST

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The issue is not the idea of paying something to participate in sports. Once you add in the cost of driving to away games, equipment, etc hockey costs about $2,000/year. Little league is a bit cheaper, but still pricey.

Soccer costs about $4,000/year for a good team even before getting to the travel and equipment costs. It is three times as expensive to play soccer as baseball. That's the problem.
Why so much more expensive?
 

Cellar-Door

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Why so much more expensive?
Bunch of reasons.
1. Usually at least 3 seasons.
2. Travel, most teams travel a ton.
3. Clubs are either in the DA or trying to get in the DA and meeting the requirements is expensive.
4. Profit, lots and lots of profit.
5. The DA clubs drive up the price more because they are a semi-monopoly in most areas, and the non-DA clubs follow the pricing.
 

OCST

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OK, so nothing germane to the sport itself, ie high equipment costs.

It's absolutely insane that hockey, with much more expensive equipment and the high cost of ice time, costs less.
 

moly99

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Why so much more expensive?
There are cheap programs, but you have to pay things like membership fees to join select teams. People pick soccer teams for their kids the same way they pick schools; hence the country club/private school identity of soccer in America.

The simple truth is that the development of the best athletes in the world is just as much (if not more) a product of pickup sports as it is a product of organized leagues. 90% of my skills as a basketball player came from playing against neighborhood kids and in playgrounds at school, and I assume it is the same for soccer-playing kids in Brazil and Germany.
 

Titans Bastard

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Do we know for sure that DA clubs have jacked up costs? Obviously DA clubs are way too expensive (except funded MLS academies), but clubs were way too expensive before the DA too. (Maybe it's gotten worse though, I don't know.)

I don't have kids and none of my friends have kids old enough to be involved in expensive youth sports, so I don't have as a great a sense of this as others around here might.

Here's another issue. I'm going to list the individual cost of each level of coaching license (cumulative cost in parentheses) based on courses offered in MA, though I understand the cost varies from state to state.

F - $25
E - $125 ($150)
D - $325 ($475)
C - $1,700 ($2,175) <--- Lancaster, MA. Add $500 (single hotel room) to $1,000 (double hotel room) to package if needed
B - $3,000 ($5,175) <-- at the new National Development Center in KC. Hotel included. Travel not included - three separate meetings in KC.
A (youth) - $4,000 ($9,175) <-- same as above, though it's not made clear whether or not hotel is included for the three meetings in KC

So with all the travel, that's easily over $10k for an A license and likely over $6k for a B license.

I would love to see a detailed breakdown of the finances of a typical American youth club and a typical foreign club. There are so many factors on both sides it is hard to know which ones are the most important to costs.
 

kenneycb

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OK, so nothing germane to the sport itself, ie high equipment costs.

It's absolutely insane that hockey, with much more expensive equipment and the high cost of ice time, costs less.
It depends where you are for hockey. It’s cheaper in MA than in IL, which runs about $3-4K depending on age and level without accounting for equipment or travel to tournaments. I don’t know enough about other states to speak intelligently. Over the year, I would imagine equipment accounts for an extra $100-500, depending if you’re at the age where you can actually break sticks.
 

Titans Bastard

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MLS approved for 14% of U.S. Soccer presidential vote - sources

Major League Soccer's delegates will account for 14 percent of the overall vote in the upcoming election for the president of the U.S. Soccer Federation, sources have told ESPN FC.
The proposal -- put forward by MLS, the USL and the NWSL -- sees MLS control nine of the 16 delegates in the Pro Council, which is comprised of representatives from the country's professional leagues.

The USL and NWSL will get three delegates each, with the NASL -- which is currently engaged in an anti-trust lawsuit against the USSF -- getting one delegate.
The Pro Council's votes are weighted to take up around 25.8 percent of the overall vote taken by the USSF National Council, the same as the Youth Council and Adult Council. The Athletes Council will be weighted to account for 20 percent of the vote, while the remaining votes -- approximately 2.6 percent -- will be taken up by national associations and affiliates, board members, life members (up to 12 votes), and two fan representatives.
 

Cellar-Door

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Titans Bastard

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Wasserman is the CEO of Wasserman Media Group, which is one of the most influential agencies in the world of US soccer. Very strange choice to lead an "independent" commission.
 

Titans Bastard

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All eight candidates spoke at the United Soccer Coaches (formerly NSCAA) Convention in Philly over the past few days. From what I've seen, Beau Dure's twitter account has the best blow-by-blow of comments, questions, and answers.

Some reviews:





I have absolutely no idea what will happen in this election. I'm not in love with any of the candidates, but right now I think the best option is Martino. The candidates I want to avoid most are Carter and Wynalda. (I'm not too keen on Caligiuri or Solo, but I suspect they are the two candidates with the longest odds anyway.)
 

Cellar-Door

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All eight candidates spoke at the United Soccer Coaches (formerly NSCAA) Convention in Philly over the past few days. From what I've seen, Beau Dure's twitter account has the best blow-by-blow of comments, questions, and answers.

Some reviews:





I have absolutely no idea what will happen in this election. I'm not in love with any of the candidates, but right now I think the best option is Martino. The candidates I want to avoid most are Carter and Wynalda. (I'm not too keen on Caligiuri or Solo, but I suspect they are the two candidates with the longest odds anyway.)
I'm basically in the same spot, though I'd probably put Solo and Wynalda as the only 2 that I think would be outright disastrous. Carter, I don't like, but 4-8 more years of Sunil and Garber as the most influential people would suck but it's more of a stuck in neutral suck than a "oh shit everything's on fire" suck.
 

Cellar-Door

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Shit IS on fire, though.
Meh. The men's team missed the world cup, and the youth system is garbage. On the other hand, the women's team is still elite, there is actually a strong generation coming in, MLS and NWSL are in good shape. Honestly if nothing changes..... the men probably make the Qatar world cup, the women stay the favorite for the next women's world cup.

On fire, is Wynalda burning down the pro leagues with his incompetence, lawsuits galore as he tries to enforce solidarity, a calendar change, pro/rel from day 1. Completely ignoring the youth system, and assuming a system that works in tiny little countries in Europe will work in the US.
At the most basic level Wynalda is either the stupidest motherfucker ever, or he's just looking for attention and Ricardo Silva's cash.
 

moly99

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Shit IS on fire, though.
Why? Because the mens national team missed the world cup?

All of the people who want us to simply copy what the Europeans do should actually look at Europe. Italy and the Netherlands, two of the strongest footballing countries in the world, have missed the World Cup. The Dutch in fact have the best amateur system in the world and made top 4 at the last World Cup. Italy won it all in 2006.

Football is a religion in Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, et al. When the group of USMNT players in their prime is thoroughly mediocre it is not surprising that we would struggle even in CONCACAF.
 

moly99

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Right. That's the fire.
My point is that there's nothing the USSF president can do about that directly. Even the best countries in the world go through cycles where they have stronger groups of players or weaker groups of players.

Right now the USMNT is mediocre because the Jozy Altidore generation is mediocre at best. There's not much either the coaches or the federation can do to improve but to wait for the Pulisic generation.
 

Dummy Hoy

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Why? Because the mens national team missed the world cup?

All of the people who want us to simply copy what the Europeans do should actually look at Europe. Italy and the Netherlands, two of the strongest footballing countries in the world, have missed the World Cup. The Dutch in fact have the best amateur system in the world and made top 4 at the last World Cup. Italy won it all in 2006.

Football is a religion in Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, et al. When the group of USMNT players in their prime is thoroughly mediocre it is not surprising that we would struggle even in CONCACAF.
What do you think is a bigger challenge, qualifying in UEFA or CONCACAF?

I don't disagree wholly with your second point, but the United States, with 350 million people and a thriving soccer community, should essentially never fail to qualify out of the Hex.
 

moly99

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What do you think is a bigger challenge, qualifying in UEFA or CONCACAF?
Of course UEFA is stronger, but Italy and the Netherlands are also much stronger than the USMNT. (Even if American nationalists don't want to admit it.) Italy is to Denmark as the USA is to Honduras.

I don't disagree wholly with your second point, but the United States, with 350 million people and a thriving soccer community, should essentially never fail to qualify out of the Hex.
By that logic China and India should be dominating at the World Cup. (There are ten times as many Premier League viewers in Asia as there are in North America.) And yet China and India also both failed to qualify for the World Cup.
 

wonderland

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What do you think is a bigger challenge, qualifying in UEFA or CONCACAF?

I don't disagree wholly with your second point, but the United States, with 350 million people and a thriving soccer community, should essentially never fail to qualify out of the Hex.
Mexico has a population of 120 million and a much stronger soccer community yet they needed a late second break to get in the 14 World Cup.
 

Dummy Hoy

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Of course UEFA is stronger, but Italy and the Netherlands are also much stronger than the USMNT. (Even if American nationalists don't want to admit it.) Italy is to Denmark as the USA is to Honduras.
Well, I was referring more to the qualification process- much easier to get out of the Hex.

By that logic China and India should be dominating at the World Cup. (There are ten times as many Premier League viewers in Asia as there are in North America.) And yet China and India also both failed to qualify for the World Cup.
Their soccer culture is quite a bit behind ours, and certainly in the case of India may never get there. If in 20 years China isn't a perennial WC qualifier, then we can talk.

Mexico has a population of 120 million and a much stronger soccer community yet they needed a late second break to get in the 14 World Cup.
Which is why I said "essentially" never fail...shit does happen. As @moly99 alluded to, maybe that's all this was for the US- a bad cycle.
 

SocrManiac

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Totally counter to the population point, Iceland is in from UEFA. Their youth program is well documented at this point, however, and that's what the US needs to emulate.

Italy are facing their own internal rot crisis right now but don't seem to have the wherewithal to do more than continue to paper over the cracks. It's a testament to the strength of their development system that they remain competitive at all.
 

Titans Bastard

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The relative lack of corruption from the US compared to most of FIFA is always going to be a handicap, but I'm sure President Shithole is going to be real liability as well.

 

Titans Bastard

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BTW, any country can miss the World Cup if they are dysfunctional enough. I don't see how pointing that out should make any of us feel better about the fact that US soccer is pretty dysfunctional right now.
 

moly99

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BTW, any country can miss the World Cup if they are dysfunctional enough. I don't see how pointing that out should make any of us feel better about the fact that US soccer is pretty dysfunctional right now.
We were also dysfunctional in 2006, 2010 and 2014, though. It's not as if Chuck Blazer was in any way better than Gulati.

The USMNT missed the World Cup because the Jozy Altidore generation of players sucks ass, and unlike Brazil we are not good enough overall to qualify even when we have a crap pool of players in their prime.

My frustration with people expecting everything to change if only we get rid of Jurgen Klinsmann, Sunil Gulati or MLS is not with the idea of changing things. The problem is the idea that we are one move away from becoming Brazil or Germany. The USA has a massive amount of work ahead of it in every single aspect. We are behind Germany in our federation, national team coaching, youth development, academies, our top league, etc.

None of the candidates for USSF president can do anything to ensure that the US qualifies for the World Cup because they don't have direct control over the player pool. We should choose a president that has wise policies on investing in youth development, national team training and how to solve the MLS vs lower level leagues problems because that's what the federation actually has control over.
 

InstaFace

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I'm not seeing anybody saying we're only one move away from Brazil or Germany. I don't see anyone asserting that Italy and the Dutch aren't far superior footballing nations to the US right now - not sure why you stood up that strawman.

We all pretty much agree on the core problems: The costs and inaccessibility of the youth system, the costs and inaccessibility of good coaching, and an irrational player selection process for both the youth and senior national teams. There is plenty the USSF President can do about those inputs, even if it might take a while for the outputs to show it.

(MLS, pro/rel, league calendar, and frankly even gender-equity issues are sideshows that are worth discussing, but have nothing or nearly-nothing to do with us having success with the senior men's team).
 

moly99

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I'm not seeing anybody saying we're only one move away from Brazil or Germany.
Because Germany and Brazil are the only countries that are good enough to qualify the world cup even when they run through an awful generation of talent. Although even Germany has sometimes failed to qualify.

I don't see anyone asserting that Italy and the Dutch aren't far superior footballing nations to the US right now - not sure why you stood up that strawman.
The discussion is specifically that the USA should never fail to qualify for the World Cup simply by virtue of its population and interest in the sport. My point is they are far better than us even accounting for the competition and still missed the World Cup.

I will admit that am probably harping on this too much. I am just so sick of the jingoism and insane knee jerk reactions in American soccer and the hope that the next move (be it firing Jurgen Klinsmann, dumping Michael Bradley from the national team, forcing MLS to adopt pro/rel, etc) will enable the USA to win the World Cup.
 
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Titans Bastard

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Because Germany and Brazil are the only countries that are good enough to qualify the world cup even when they run through an awful generation of talent. Although even Germany has sometimes failed to qualify.
Germany has never failed to qualify. In fact, they've never failed to make the last eight since World War II. They did miss the first WC because they didn't enter. So other than that, the only reason Germany missed the 1950 WC was for being Nazis and from the US perspective it's not like we have to worry about that.

The discussion is specifically that the USA should never fail to qualify for the World Cup simply by virtue of its population and interest in the sport. My point is they are far better than us even accounting for the competition and still missed the World Cup.

I will admit that am probably harping on this too much. I am just so sick of the jingoism and insane knee jerk reactions in American soccer and the hope that the next move (be it firing Jurgen Klinsmann, dumping Michael Bradley from the national team, forcing MLS to adopt pro/rel, etc) will enable the USA to win the World Cup.
I hope that we, as a soccer nation, can aspire to a level that constitutes something more than fucking up at a roughly similar rate to certain other prominent soccer nations who face a more difficult path to the WC.

Just because some people are advocating dumb solutions to our problems doesn't mean we should retreat to the Gulati-esque refrain that, well, sometimes other countries miss the WC too.
 

moly99

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Germany has never failed to qualify.
You're right. I knew that they didn't play in one World Cup in the 1950's but now that I looked it up they were banned rather than failed to qualify. Anyway the point stands: Germany and Brazil are the only countries that can expect to qualify for every World Cup.
 

page 2 protege

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I would also say that those other countries who don't qualify every year, namely Italy and Netherlands, have a much higher ceiling than we do. I think this is where additional frustration lies, and why people are convinced that there needs to be a change.

Our worst aligns with other good countries, but our best does not. It's a pretty natural reaction to knee jerk if you feel the same line of thought isn't working.
 

InstaFace

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My point is that there's nothing the USSF president can do about [the USMNT missing the world cup] directly. Even the best countries in the world go through cycles where they have stronger groups of players or weaker groups of players.

Right now the USMNT is mediocre because the Jozy Altidore generation is mediocre at best. There's not much either the coaches or the federation can do to improve but to wait for the Pulisic generation.
First of all, the USSF President can put us on a better path or a worse path. Can make us feel optimism for the future. And he or she also appoints the coaches and management of the team, who can be chosen wisely or poorly.

Secondly, the Pulisic generation is already here, nobody's "waiting for it", and we've already pissed away a quarter of it. That's why you've seen so many people do the message-board equivalent of pounding the table in frustration, in the weeks following the T&T loss. He and his fellow age-mates breaking through at big-boy teams had given us hope for the future growth of the sport, and a serious of tragicomic overreactions and mismanagement worthy of Montgomery Burns have snatched that hope back from us. I do not understand your equanimity.

Of course UEFA is stronger, but Italy and the Netherlands are also much stronger than the USMNT. (Even if American nationalists don't want to admit it.) Italy is to Denmark as the USA is to Honduras.
Well, I was referring more to the qualification process- much easier to get out of the Hex.
I don't think you're acknowledging the truth here, Moly, in your continued statements comparing the US's situation to any other country. The WCQ structure is designed to give the USA a cakewalk to the WCF because of what it means for TV revenue. It is designed to give UEFA and CONMEBOL far fewer bids than they collectively deserve on team strength, because UEFA lacks both the sheer voting numbers as well as the bribery skills of CAF and AFC. Any comparison of the US to a UEFA or CONMEBOL qualification situation cannot ignore this and be taken seriously.

Nobody can realistically assert that we should be consistently winning knockout-round games in the WCF - we're a few cycles away from having those ambitions. But likewise it's ridiculous to assert that it's anything but shameful to fail to qualify given the format we're handed.

The discussion is specifically that the USA should never fail to qualify for the World Cup simply by virtue of its population and interest in the sport. My point is they are far better than us even accounting for the competition and still missed the World Cup.
Yes, because they have a much harder qualification process, by design, which screws teams that deserve to qualify in favor of far worse teams in other confederations. Again, the comparison is apples and oranges.

I will admit that am probably harping on this too much. I am just so sick of the jingoism and insane knee jerk reactions in American soccer and the hope that the next move (be it firing Jurgen Klinsmann, dumping Michael Bradley from the national team, forcing MLS to adopt pro/rel, etc) will enable the USA to win the World Cup.
I don't see anybody flogging jingoism or "insane knee-jerk reactions" here. Again, you've been the one bringing these strawmen to the table. Could you please start quoting actual people saying these things you're responding to, before labeling us all implicitly as having said jingoistic things, or that we're "one step away from being Brazil or Germany", or that certain moves "will enable the USA to win the world cup", or what-have-you? Because from where I sit you're putting words in imaginary people's mouths so that you can make... someone, I guess... eat them. And it's really distracting from an otherwise engaging conversation.

It's perfectly appropriate for US fans to be discussing the national team's manager, its lineups, and the domestic league. When it comes to selecting the next USSF president, it's perfectly appropriate to be focusing on what sorts of foundational moves will put us on the right road towards realizing our potential. I really don't see how that's a controversial notion in any way.
 

Spacemans Bong

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I can't tell whether moly99 is arguing against 2007 Big Soccer posters or Pardon the Interruption "What if LeBron played soccer?" normies. He's not arguing against anybody in this thread, that's for sure.

CONCACAF is a cupcake confederation that many Europeans (probably correctly) think has way too many slots precisely to let the USA qualify. So the USA failing to even clear that very, very low hurdle is an indictment of US Soccer and worthy of anger and contempt.

At the same, the US is in the nearly unique position of a country that can realistically hope to become a world power when it isn't one yet, while possessing an established track record of competence at soccer.

China and India have never been competent at soccer. Australia is, but is too small to realistically become a world power. Canada is not competent and possibly too small to become a world power. Japan and Korea are the only other countries that could claim a similar position.

So I think it's perfectly realistic for people to say they want a chief of US Soccer who can actually make decisions to put us down the path of becoming a world power, because it's realistic to aspire to be one.
 

Titans Bastard

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Herculez Gomez and Max Bretos do a podcast together and on a recent episode, Gomez reported some shitty things about the Jonathan Gonzalez ordeal:

- Both Jonathan Gonzalez and his dad swear up and down that nobody from the USSF ever visited their house, despite Thomas Rongen's claim that he had visited three times.
- During a phone call, Richie Williams once gave Jonathan Gonzalez 10 minutes to consider an offer to join the residency program at Bradenton when Gonzalez was 14.

Per Gomez, Rongen admitted he hadn't visited Gonzalez when confronted with this information. Williams denies the second point.

The incompetence is infuriating. It's not just Rongen and Williams, it's the fact that these failed youth coaches stick around in USSF employ forever.
 

Titans Bastard

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If you are wondering why you have that extra spring in your step or why there seems to be a bit of buzz in the air today, it's because it's January Camp Game Day.

The all-star coaching lineup of Dave Sarachan, Kenny Arena, and Richie Williams shall lead the US to glory against Bosnia & Herzegovina's B team, featuring Vedad Ibisevic's cousin who plays for the University of Nebraska at Omaha.
 

Cellar-Door

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If you are wondering why you have that extra spring in your step or why there seems to be a bit of buzz in the air today, it's because it's January Camp Game Day.

The all-star coaching lineup of Dave Sarachan, Kenny Arena, and Richie Williams shall lead the US to glory against Bosnia & Herzegovina's B team, featuring Vedad Ibisevic's cousin who plays for the University of Nebraska at Omaha.
B is generous, 70% of the declared roster have no caps. This is the C-/D+ team
 

Titans Bastard

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Dec 15, 2002
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B is generous, 70% of the declared roster have no caps. This is the C-/D+ team
Yeah, fair enough. Just over 50% of the US camp is uncapped as well, but MLS is considerably stronger than the Bosnian league, where most of the opposing team is based.

Lineup's out. Per the USSF release, it appears to be a 4-1-4-1

Sapong
Morris - Trapp - Roldan - Zardes
Adams
Morrow - Opara - Zimmerman - Polster
Hamid
Bench: Steffen (GK), Lima (RB), Parker (CB), Canouse (CM), Delgado (CM), Arriola (AM), Rowe (AM), Agudelo (FW), Rubin (FW)

Not dressed: Bono (GK), Cropper (GK), Vincent (LB), Acosta (LB), Glad (CB), Harkes (CM), Hairston (AM), Lennon (AM), Ramirez (FW)


Given that we have a fair number of decent CBs and CMs and shit for wingers, a 3-5-2 would have made sense. Arriola or Adams could play RWB, and we've avoid seeing Zardes play on the wing...

I also find it interesting that Agudelo and Rubin made the bench over Ramirez, who has been far more productive than those two.


EDIT: Carlisle says that the formation on the release isn't quite right, Adams and Trapp are swapped, which makes sense.