Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #224: Monday Review — Pulisic False 9s, McKennie flies, the Busio Discourse

Episode Date: November 22, 2021

Quick recap of the weekend's action for Yanks Abroad with Belz, Watke and Jordan. Join the Discord so you can vote in the next power rankings and determine the format of the Monday Review episodes.support Scuffed on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scuffedjoin the Discord: https://discord.gg/X6tfzkM8XU (the power rankings are linked in the #announcements channel, fyi)buy our merch: https://my-store-11446477.creator-spring.com/drop us a question at this link and we’ll try to answer it: https://forms.gle/vEatDVE6wsMzekep8 Skip the ads! Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon and get all episodes ad-free, plus any bonus episodes. Patrons at $5 a month or more also get access to Clip Notes, a video of key moments on the field we discuss on the show, plus all patrons get access to our private Discord server, live call-in shows, and the full catalog of historic recaps we've made: https://www.patreon.com/scuffedAlso, check out Boots on the Ground, our USWNT-focused spinoff podcast headed up by Tara and Vince. They are cooking over there, you can listen here: https://boots-on-the-ground.simplecast.comAnd check out our MERCH, baby. We have better stuff than you might think: https://www.scuffedhq.com/store Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to the scuffed podcast. I'm Adam Bells in Georgia. With me is Greg Velasquez in Iowa. We talk about U.S. men's soccer. Welcome to the Monday review. The player pool is back in action after the international break and we're going to run through the top 20 as ranked by the scuffed discord after the October window. As a matter of fact, the new power rankings are going to be open today and you can participate if you become a patron of the scuff podcast and go on the discord and vote. You might say, hey, there's no reason Tyler Adams should be the number one player. And in the rankings, well, you know, This is a democracy. Make your voice heard. Join the SCOFT Patreon and vote. The links in the show notes.

How's it going, Waki? It's going very well. It's good to get back into the club rhythm of these games. And we really do encourage everyone to vote in this thing. Yeah. The club rhythm is kind of like a safety blanket for us. It's just something easy to talk about. Jordan, how are you doing?

I'm doing good. So, yeah, vote. If you want your voice to be heard in this, vote. if you want to have a choice and who gets ranked. Yeah, the reason we're so enthusiastic about getting you to vote is so you don't criticize us for where the players are. Because we take that personally, and it hurts. We don't, I for one, do not like being criticized.

It's the worst. It's the worst. All right, let's do it. Number one, Tyler Adams. You played 90 minutes in a 2-0 loss on Saturday against Hoffenheim. And Jesse Marsh looked real dower on the sidelines. You might be in real trouble after this game. Yeah, man, it's almost like I can't even watch Leipzig. It's too stressful.

And it's frankly not all that relevant because Adams is too valuable to the U.S. for me to get bogged down and watching him make a mistake for Leipzig. That being said, I thought he had several good moments. And the stats say he was 48 to 49 passing, which obviously doesn't mean that much. But he was culpable on the second goal, a very bad giveaway in front of the box. and yeah, Leipzig needs some rejuvenation. It's emotionally overwhelming watching both an American coach and an American player on the field,

particularly when you're watching a replay and you know what's about to happen. And you just have to sit there and take it. I'm too tender for it. Yeah, well, I did it, and I did not enjoy it at all. And now they have to go play Bruges in the Champions League. It's a game that doesn't matter. so if they win, who cares, if they lose, it's bad again.

So that's the type of lose-lose situation you want to avoid in life and in soccer in this case. That's definitely a big game in terms of getting the Europa League spot, though. If they do lose that, then that's real bad. Okay, well, so it's a little bit good if they win. And there was, I don't want to be too negative, there was this great moment in the game, when the TV people, when the ball was still in play, cut away for about one second to a man in the stands eating an ice cream cone, and then immediately cut back to the action. I appreciate that

just because the man is not bowing to convention, he's going to eat that cone as winter closes in. And I also like that the TV people thought it was important enough to show us. So it's, you know, there's good moments too. This is a real out-of-season ice cream cone, man. I don't think it's not warm in Leipzig. No, it's probably the last day you could eat ice cream outside in Germany. That's probably what he was thinking. And be socially respectable about it, right?

Right. Number two, Christian Pulisic. He was a 62nd minute sub in a 3-0 win on Saturday against Lester, and he played as a false nine and scored Chelsea's third goal. Yeah, there's a lot. I feel like there's a lot to talk about here. So he had two excellent chances to score, thanks to what I consider very clever runs at the near post. And then some mind-bending service from Akeem Zayek. What a player Zayek is. That was such a good pass from him. But also the run, just to make it. He kind of cut, tiered toward the near post. There's not going to be a pass play there at 90s.

88% of the time, but he just hit it right in there. It was incredible. Yeah, you're talking about on the goal, right? On the first one, no, the one that didn't score. The second one was good too, but go on. Yeah, the first one was even more, it was an even more mind-bending pass. Right.

Like an in swinging knee-high, whipped-in ball that only Pulisic and Zyak knew about the spot where they were going to intersect. Yeah, yeah. The ball and Pulisic. And then he squares a guy up and does the same thing, just kind of in miniature form. And Pulisic puts this one through Schmichl's legs. So, I mean, all that to say, the false, we don't have anybody like Hakim Zayek, of course,

but the false nine thing is interesting for the U.S. Don't you guys think? It's at least interesting. Give it interesting. Particularly when we're not quite sure what our striker depth is. so I'll say it's interesting I'll yeah I'll

I'll say it's interesting I think I just think like after the big after all the hubb was made about getting peppy now three windows later we're already

throwing him in the trash and trying to have like a fluid front three well well we need we need more than one striker nobody's being thrown in the trash nobody's going being thrown in the trash here that's fair

I do actually do agree with that instinct though because it's like we have you know we have this striker of the future from el paso we we should we should ride him i feel that too well but i just yeah i'm pretty reactionary so i'm i'm willing to just go with a radical change here just whenever i just think on a pure soccer level this idea of like pulasek waya and reina and it's and it's those three in my mind just running wild in front of the MMA midfield. It's got to be intriguing. Anything else on Pulisic?

My interest is at least peaked. I would say just his movement was so good. You already talked about it. But on that goal, he did a double move and then didn't work, so he then did a triple move just to run right in front of the goal to kick the ball in, which is the best thing you can do in soccer. And it's really just him and Tim Leia

who are constantly moving like that. I mean, other guys move too, but those are the two guys that I enjoy watching move. And it does feel like this is, it's not a recent development for Pulicit, but he has not always been this kind of player. It's kind of a result of his learning

in the Frank Lampard School of Box Arrival, I think. At least that's when we first started talking about it. Yeah. It really, it became, Well, he's always kind of crashed the box, but it became pretty noticeable when he came back from the COVID reset, or whatever they called that phase. I think he was moving pretty well there. The Great Reset. Is that what you're referring to? The Great Reset.

It also could be all this chess he's playing. Restart, that's the word. Yeah, the chess may be a major factor. He's kind of a bishop, really. He is a bishop. Although he has some horse movements in him. Some people call it the night. Some people do call it the night, yes.

Apparently in the chess world, they call it horsey as slang sometimes. So if you want, you can really call the pieces whatever you want. We'll get more on that on our chess podcast. Yeah, when's that coming? Can you give us a little update? A little... We need to have a meeting about it because I haven't worked on it. But I do think we need to cover all the chess strategies of different American players,

because there's a lot of them. There's like seven or eight of them who play online chess. I'm anxious for that to drop. All right, let's move on to Sergenio Dest. He did not make the squad for Barcelona's one-no win on Saturday against Espanio. All right. Still out with the injury. Yeah.

Same for the next one. Number four, Giovanni Raina. Also did not make the squad still out with entry for their game against StoCardt. Is it look like he's going to be back next? early next year, or are we still going off a quote from a few weeks ago? Have there been any updates? That's what I'm asking. I think from Dortmund, they said it might not be until next year, but I also read a quote from Claudia Raina is part of an overall Austin FC thing. They just asked him, hey, how's

Gio doing? And he said, he might be back in the next couple weeks. So I don't know. That's cool. I think. I'm not, I didn't actually. you read the article, I just read people quoting that little section from the article. Well, I say, you know, take your time. There's not a huge rush, except it would be good to have him for Canada because we do not want to lose to Canada. Right. Exactly. That's exactly what I was going to say. That's the biggest scheme of the cycle of the cycles now. Can you imagine how out of hand it would get if we lost to Canada? It would be, it would be too much to bear.

I'm not even considering the possibility that we lose to them. We have to win that game. Number five, West McKinney. He went 90 and a two-no win on Saturday against Lazio. He seemed to be, he seemed to play pretty well to me. He had fewer, from my eye, remarkably few giveaways. I don't really start counting them until he has about four. So as far as I'm concerned, he had zero.

Yeah, that wasn't zero, but I agree it was a tidier game. than usual. There's still going to be a few messy moments per 90, but this game is not a good example of that. He's pulling some, he's playing with confidence, man. He's pulling some turns on guys at midfield, playing one touch football at a pretty elevated level. I mean, he does play for Juventus after all. Seems like our best player right now, if you're, you know, if he put a gun to my head. He is the player. I was going to say he's the player. I would most want to not want to not be in a next big game we had to win, but then I remember Tyler Adams, so I'm going to, I'm going to track back a little bit on that. He had this great thing at the end

of the game where they were playing out of the back, and he received it with his back to the direction they were going, and it looked like he was going to play it inside. He did a little one-top tap, to one-touch tap. I think it was Cordato running up the side. That was a very fancy moment. and then it led to him getting fouled and then there was a kerfuffle between Allegri and Sari and you're just reminded how cool it is watching Americans

play in games where there's these famous coaches and they started gesticulating wildly at another. And I really like the contrast between those two coaches because one wears a suit and one has that long coat and one is wearing a track suit with a cigarette butt in his mouth. And they're both cool, they're both very cool in their own way.

Not that smoking's cool obviously. But I mean, Sari is pretty cool when he does it. I wonder if Allegory smokes just not publicly the way Sari does. He's probably a cigarette or two. He probably has.

Yeah, it is cool to see that. I mean, we say this all the time, but it's so we would not have believed that this was going to be occurring if someone had told you this three years ago, four years ago. Anyway, number six, It was a 72 minutes of, 77th minutes of, in a nil-nitra on Sunday against Real Societad.

Well, I could say what happened at the beginning of when he came in was he did some exciting dribbles and then lost the ball. It's possible some very exciting things happened after the 85th minute, but I did not see it. Nor did I. But, you know, it doesn't matter. It's like Adams. It doesn't matter what Musa does. It doesn't matter if he, plays goalkeeper for Valencia. That would be interesting, though. But it would be definitely interesting, but it doesn't matter. I would love to see him in that goalkeeper spot once. Because we don't know where our emergency keeper is.

Isn't it Christian? On the national team. Well, is he going to be on the, well, are we assuming that just because his brother did it that one time? I thought Christian's done it before, hasn't he? I don't know. I don't need an emergency goalkeeper. Yeah, it was a bit of a ridiculous situation I proposed there. We don't actually need to know that.

You're right. Speaking of goalkeepers, number seven, Matt Turner. They are not playing it. The revs don't start their playoffs until next Tuesday because they get a buy. Number eight, Anthony Robinson. He went 85 minutes and a 4-1 win on Saturday at home to Barnsley. The most exciting moment he had in this game, he did about, a 90-yard overlapping run that went from the top of his team's D, wide all around, sprinting the whole way and crossed it from the end line.

It was amazing. He's fun as hell, man. When he's playing well, but give me those 90-yard bombing runs anytime. I do think he was, you know, in the whole discourse about what happened against Jamaica, I do think Anthony's general sloppiness was a pretty big factor that maybe a lot of people aren't talking about. Maybe they are. I don't know. I don't know what people are talking about.

But he, that was a factor. But I don't think he's going to have another game like that anytime soon. What else? What else about Barnsley? Yeah, I looked into Barnesley a little bit because I realized I didn't know much about other than having watched the play some not particularly attractive soccer at one point. But they are the town of Barnesley.

they're famous for the tradition of brass bands, you know, like trombones and trumpets and tubas and that sort of thing. And they have one really famous brass band in particular called the Grimthorpe Colliery Band. Coalery means coal or something. The bands, they have a bunch of different bands for the different mining industries. And this one became famous from the 1996,

Ewan McGregor film called Brastoff. But I haven't got a chance to see yet, but I am planning to check that out. So that's Barnsley. I didn't know England had brass bands. I thought that was a pretty American thing. Me too. That's why this was so interesting to learn

and why I thought it was really important to share with everyone. Thank you. Miles Robinson, number nine. He went 90 in a 2-0 loss in the round of 16 of MLS playoff. Wait, no. Yeah, round of 16 on Sunday against NYCFC. So this means he's done for the year, right? Yes, the one and done in the MLS playoffs.

We'll see him in the, presumably, in the December camp to keep him fresh, because otherwise he wouldn't play again until the end of January, which that's a little bit of a weird situation that I hadn't considered that we'll now be dealing with. I think they're also going to have like a regular January camp, and then the European guys will join right before the actual games. So a really long one with guys in there as soon as they're as soon as it's reasonable and other folks gradually funneling in?

I think they're going to have a separate December camp and then a separate January camp. I'm not sure what the overlap is going to be. Probably are going to give guys time to have an off-season. You've got to let people celebrate Christmas and New Year's and, you know, the holidays in general. And the Bundesliga, don't they restart later in January?

I really should have just checked. They do. They do. They usually do. But this year, because of the January window, they're starting, they're resuming their season in early January. Okay. Great. Number 10, Ricardo Pepi.

Because he plays for an MLS team in Texas, his season is over. Right. So there's really nothing to say, Bob. him except did you guys see that little feature that fox soccer put out about him it's pretty good i did not i want to know it's like a 10 minute video uh sort of bracketed by his his uh heroes role in san pedro sulla but like with a bunch of him and his parents talking in the middle and if he didn't already love ricardo peppy and his family then watch that and you will you will love him even more just like a real working class kid that his family made a ton of sacrifices for him to have a chance to be a professional soccer player

and here we are and he chose the USA he came from El Paso and he chose the USA number 11 John Brooks he went 90 in a two-two draw on Saturday against Bielefeld yeah his his long diagonal game was on I think he, according to Weiss got attempted 20 long passes, most of them on a straight diagonal line from his left centerback position to the right corner. And he dropped a lot of dimes. He was also not at fault for either goal. I should mention that. Neither goal was his fault. So do you think that now he's going to be, did he do enough to change for whatever reason, Burrhalter or not think he should be called up?

I think that's the big question now. Do you think he'll be in the next camp is my question? I do, but not because he did anything in this performance that's different from normal, to your point. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And they were down to zero and then did kind of a miraculous comeback. Some more Florian Colfault magic.

So he's gaining steam. And then they could have won the game, but did not. And then the other thing is we talked about Bochum at one point, a team in Germany. Beelofield, who they were playing. is similar in that they're a town that sounds like it should be really small but it has 340,000 people in it which I did not know

Yeah And they have this they also They're right above this forest called the Tudorberg Forest Which honestly looks like a really boring forest But it was good to learn about that forest It's just some kind of low rolling hills With pretty nondescript trees on them So it's no black forest

But it is another forest to be aware of of. Yeah, Bielfeld is also the source of satirical conspiracy theory that the city does not exist. It's been mentioned like by Anglo-Marcle and whatnot. So really a good insight into German humor. Well, just, I didn't, just looking at these hills, I completely believe that they would be the butt of that sort of thing. I can't believe how much disdain you have for the hills and the trees in the, in the, Tudorberg of Forest. No, I encourage people, I encourage you and others to look at these hills. You look at them and like, what is even the point of this picture?

You should have not even, it's on their Wikipedia. It's like Tudorberg Forest. Like, if that's your picture, don't include one. I've never seen a dumber looking forest than this. I know I've gotten more aggressive. I was kind of soft peddling it before. I don't like this forest. Maybe the pictures inside the forest are better, but not the overhead picture of these hills.

Because they're too low and they're hardly rolling at all. all and there's nothing interesting about the trees. Sorry to go on like that. We can move to the next player. I was just going to say, just to go refer to something I said a few weeks ago, it is, Bielefeld is right in that sort of

heart of the former West Germany, which is really where like a lot of the people and everything in Germany is, you know, three hours from Amsterdam. It's all very close over there. Number 12, Brennan Aronson. He went 90 in a nil-nil-nil draw on Saturday at home to Admirro Mulding.

I think that's how you pronounce it. I've been wondering how to pronounce that. I was just going to say it however you said it. He had a good dribble. He had some long shots from outside and a couple closer in shots he could have scored, but didn't. It looked like a normal Brendan Aronson performance to me. The first of the shots he should have scored, he put on frame, so he will escape, you know, the harshest criticism for it, but he still probably could have done better there

rather than putting it, you know, hitting it right at the goalkeeper from five yards away. The second one was tougher. The second one was tougher, I would say. Yeah, that would have been a really cool goal. The full name Jordan of this club is FC Edmira Wacker Molding, Modling, which however you pronounce it. I don't think that's a very good name. I know I was just going after these hills, so I don't want to go in too much.

Austrian club names seem to be a little bit weirder than German ones for reasons. I don't understand. I think we should take a closer look at what's going on there. Their team is actually, like, sponsored. Like, if you look at their crest, they're sponsored by a company called Flyer Alarm. So, like, if you look at their Wikipedia, it says they're known as Flyer Alarm at Mirah for sponsorship. I didn't want to include that because that would complicate the name even further. Because then you're looking at Flyer Alarm, FC, and Mira Wacker, Modeling.

and what are we even doing here at this point? Yeah, that's a lot. Yeah. Okay, number 13, Timothy Weyer. He went 90 and a 2-2 draw on Friday against Monaco. So there was a couple times he could have scored, but he just didn't. I don't know how to feel about the game overall.

Yeah, they were decent chances, but nothing he should be ashamed about. That volley on the, when David played him a ball at the back post, and he took it first time with his left foot. That'd have been a gollazzo if he'd put it away. So I think he was his normal self, active off the ball, bright in the attack. Didn't score, though. And I realize I've just been so negative so far.

I just have one little gripe with this stadium. Monaco is the richest place in the world, and they have a track around their soccer field. I really, why don't they do a specific soccer-specific stadium? for their team. Because they don't have the track in another place. They don't have the room for it. It's a very, very small country or whatever it is.

I look at a map. Yeah, that's a good point. I'll look at a map, see if I can find a spot for it. You look all you want, Chris. You won't find a spot. I promise you. Unless they build out into the Mediterranean Sea. All right, we can move on then.

Number 14, Chris Richards. It was a 73rd minutes of. in a two-no win on Saturday on to Leipzig. He had a chance on a corner he put over a little bit. Other than that, he was a sub,

center-back sub. So, not a whole lot to say. Yeah, I mean, it's a big win for Hoffenheim. Not, but as for his chance on a corner kick,

I'm not super optimistic that he'll be scoring a lot of set-piece goals in the near future. That's just not a strength of his at the moment. So it's just kind of par for the course for him to, that would have been a difficult header to steer into the net and he put it, he put it over the crossbar. I guess the one thing it would be good if he could fight his way back in that starting lineup.

That's true. But I guess starting, at least getting on the field is good. He's probably on pace for a record for substitute appearances by his center back for the Buddhist League. I'd have to imagine. Yeah, to take some serious research to get to the actual record for that. But, you know, the Germans are pretty good at record keeping. If there's one place, we could find that, it would be there. Number 15, Zach Stephan.

He was an unused sub in Manchester City's 3-0 win on Sunday against Everton. Okay. Number 16, Walker Zimmerman. They did not play. Nashville doesn't start their playoffs until tomorrow. Number 17, Joe Scali. He went 74 minutes in a 4-0 win on Saturday against Groytafert. And Gladbach has like six dudes who look like Joe Scali from the broadcast angle.

I think he should pull his artist and dye his hair blonde so we can tell which one is who. It really is a real problem. It took me 90 seconds into the game to find a part of that. I just didn't see that he was going to be playing left back. But even in the close-up, because he changed his hairstyle too, he kind of did a parted thing with some product in it, which makes him look even more like the rest of his teammates. And then, like, he had faint neon shoes,

so I was trying to track by that. But the centerback next to him was also wearing that. And there's so much shifting going on, I ended up watching the center back for a while. So I actually do think he should do something with his hair, probably color in some way. Yeah, it is kind of funny that he's on a team full of Joe's galleys. It's weird. I would say not his sharpest performance seemed a beat or two behind the pace

in his little patch of real estate on the left flank, but kind of didn't matter. This team was up 3-0 by halftime. It seemed like Firth was trying to really push the game. Maybe that's what they always do. Julian Green was playing in the game too, so it was interesting to see him play. Was he any good? I didn't actually notice that much. I was so much focusing on Scali.

I guess it wasn't that interesting, but I am aware that he was in the game. It was theoretically interesting that he was in the game. I think I just showed my anti-Julian Green bias. Number 18, John Luca Bousio. He went 80 in a one-nale win on Sunday. against Bologna. And he assisted on Venetia's goal, though I think it's pretty debatable if it was intentional or not. If you slow it down, which I did down to like two tenths of real time, it looked like he meant to poke it through to O'Quareke.

It happened fast, though, so I can't be 100% sure. But you see a little bit of like the intentional motion from his left foot and his eyes going immediately to where the ball was. again, not 100% sure, but I'm inclined to believe it was a wonderful moment of quick thought and technique. But I don't have doubts about Bousio's quality on the ball. I'm on watch for whether he can be a non-liability defensively. And I watched all of his duels in this game and gives me no pleasure to report he was mostly overcome in his individual confrontations. If he can get a little tougher, a little quicker to notice danger, I'd feel more comfortable with him on the field for the national team. Not saying he was bad against Jamaica, just need him to become a replacement level defensive

slash pitch control, stealing a phrase from Greg there, presence if he's going to fulfill his destiny as the future of America. He also did have one giveaway just outside the box that went unpunished. But that happens sometimes, you know, happened to Adams as well. I am just impressed and amazed by Busia's ability to continue to be kind of, it's all. always kind of the center of a debate. He's always how has this happened? It's been going on for so long. It's been like five years. Yeah. I guess it's just

his profile as a player where because there's some pretty serious. This is the main thing people were arguing about, at least in the little chats that I read. And it's just the concerns about his defensive stuff and how it impacts

everything going on around him. It is, but I mean, it's such a, it's such a consequential debate for the, for the national team because we don't have, we have not solved what we're going to do if one of McKinney, Musa, Adams is not available, you know. Yeah, it's his ability to, it's not just debates. They're actually real and, I'm using the word important loosely here, but important debates, at least for midfield. Important within the context of what we you're doing here. Yeah. Within the context of something that doesn't actually matter at all in the end.

I don't know about it doesn't matter at all. I mean, in the grand scheme of things. You got to remember, the universe has, it's infinite, you know? Yeah. Well, then nothing matters at all, right? Yeah. Yeah, I guess we don't want to go down that road. That's a slippery slope, isn't it?

Sure is. I'm going to walk it back. It's really important. One thing I liked about this game is it started in a light fog and it got gradually heavier. And I looked it up and they were playing in Bologna and it's in the Poe Valley and they're famous for their winter fog. So that's a sign that winter's coming in. And if you are looking to visit Bologna, you want to go in April or May. It's when the weather's nicest. Unless you're really a foodie, then go during the harvest season because their food gets more complex during that time.

Interesting. I did notice the commentator was talking about the fans, you know, shouting up into the fog. and I thought, well, he must have done his research too on the Po Valley. Famous Fog, famous Valley for Fog. Surely that commentator was not live in the stadium. You know, he's watching on a feed, just like the rest of us. I mean, I watched without sound down, so I... You didn't catch that. Without sound. I didn't catch that.

So me and the commentator stepping on each other's research there. Number 19, Kell and Acosta. He did not play. The Rapids don't start their playoffs until Thursday. They are in the first ever MLS Thanksgiving game. Here's the thing about Acosta. I mean, obviously no action to describe. But I do, when it comes to that Busio discourse,

Acosta is a part of that. Would Acosta have been better in that game against Jamaica? Maybe. I don't know. Maybe. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. Yeah. We'll give it a maybe. I'll give it a maybe.

I'm interested in this. I didn't know about this Thanksgiving game. Are they aware they're competing with the most popular sporting event in the entire year in the NFL? Maybe they're putting it on after. Well, they're playing against the Detroit Lions, so it's going to be. If the Detroit Lions are in this game, that would be just infuriating. Yeah, man, I was a huge Barry Sanders fan as a kid, so my life revolving. around those Thanksgiving games, man. I think I was embarrassing his fans because of those Thanksgiving games. Maybe that was it.

It's a chicken or egg thing, probably. Boy, was he fun to watch, though. Number 20, Luca Deletori. He went 90 in a 3-1 win on Saturday at home to Fortuna Sitar, which is a big win in a relegation battle. I did an enormous disservice to Luca by now watching this game. Yeah, I just, I just can't figure out why he wasn't called up for the last window.

I'm not furious about it or anything, but it's weird that he wasn't even called up. Can we do a couple of others who aren't in the top 20 real quick? I just want to mention that Mark McKenzie, who is ranked 21st on the top 40, was an unused sub in a 2-0 loss for Gank. So I think out of favor is a pretty fair way to describe his situation. and then Josh Sergeant ranked 23rd, played the second half in a 2-1 win for Norwich City over Southampton. A huge win for Norwich. Energetic and mostly fine, but not all that dangerous, which is how he always looks pretty much.

Norwich did a tweet about how good he was. I assume that they just didn't have other things to tweet about because it seems like something. people objected to saying he wasn't that good. Yeah. I'm not saying he was bad. Just kind of the same. There's no, there was a corner wasn't turned in that game for him, in my opinion. Let's see. Anything else we should discuss?

I don't think so. There's going to be a little bit of a lull here. I don't think we're going to do any more podcast this week. Yeah, but I am going to post the top 40. Power rankings spreadsheet in the Discord, so please join us there and make your voice heard if you'd like to. I know my ranking is going to change quite a bit for this one. It'll be interesting because these rankings didn't shift since the last window, right? No, these are still October's ranking.

That's right. All right. So they'll be shaken up next time. Yes. Exciting stuff. Very. And then I guess the other thing, we should get into this chest stuff. because we're going to have a plenty of time to do some excessively detailed chess analysis.

I am not being ironic, I am really looking forward to that. Also, when we find out where the Canada game is and where the home qualifiers against El Salvador and Honduras are, we will come up with some kind of tailgating plan and circulate that. Fantastic. I'm anxious to get that sorted out. All right. Thanks everybody for listening. Happy Thanksgiving to y'all. We'll see you.