Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #380: USWNT-Ireland, second edition

Episode Date: April 12, 2023

Not our finest hour. Maybe some people played themselves out of World Cup contention. Fluke goal wins it. Full timeline, Vlatko prosecution. Then we briefly discuss the USMNT roster for Mexico.----Scuffed is an ad-free podcast. Support that and get exclusive episodes once a week, plus access to the Discord and live call-in shows, by signing up for our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scuffed 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 scuff podcast where we talk about U.S. soccer. The U.S. women beat Ireland in one of the least entertaining games of soccer I've ever seen, thanks to a probably accidental goal from Alana Cook. Greg, how you doing? I'm all right, bells. That soccer game definitely occurred at the time that it was said to have occurred. Yep. 7.30 p.m. Eastern Time in St. Louis, Missouri.

It, you know, it was a nice homecoming for Becky Sowerbrun. She got feted at the beginning of the game and then nearly scored ahead her, which would have been a great moment, big smile on her face. It was fun even though it didn't go in. And if you're kind of new to following the women's team closely, Becky Sauerbrun is a running bit because she has not scored for the national team in her 215 caps. So she has 215 caps?

They had a 200 shirt on the field last night. Yeah, I'll have to double check now. We're not going to go back and edit this. But I keep thinking that they'll, like, have a ceremonial game, even if it's not exactly the 200th game. But maybe it was her exactly 200th cap. And I'm thinking to somebody else who's ahead of her with 215. Yeah, regardless.

Living legend, zero goals. That's part of her lore. Right. So she was almost maybe pleased that it didn't go in. It rang the crossbar. We'll get into that. in a long and illustrious timeline. I admire your commitment to a timeline in a game like this.

Do you admire it? It would basically be three events. It would be that header from Sauerbrun and the goal from Cook and Julia is getting dusted once just to talk about how she's still human. You talking about that time by O'Sullivan? I don't know. She got a little shoulder shrug over committed upfield. never actually made it back to recover on the play.

The one, did it end with a shot that was wide of the near post? Yep, that's the one. Okay. Yeah, we'll talk. Yeah, I want to talk about that because I don't put it on, I don't put it all on Earths.

Well, let's do the lineups. Casey Murphy and Goal, spelling Alyssa Neer, Sophia Huerta, Alana Cook, Becky Sauerbrun, and Kelly O'Hara across the back line. Andy Sullivan got to start at the six.

Haran and Sanchez. also in the midfield, and then Sophia Smith, Alex Morgan, and Alyssa Thompson, the youngster, across the front line. Vlako said after the game, he said, a lot of the wingers have gotten a chance to start. They wanted to see Alyssa start, and she did. Again, Mallory Swanson, likely out for a long time, including for the World Cup, with a pateller tendon. Is it a patella tendon?

Patella tendon, and I think technically it's a ligament. There's a lot of medical jargon I've discovered that exists for doctors. Yeah. Well, we continue to, you know, grieve that. It's really, really sucks. And then Ireland's lineup was Courtney Brosnan and Goal. She was a gift giver on the night. Heather Payne, Megan Connolly, Luis Quinn, Diane Caldwell, and Katie McCabe across the back line is kind of a 5-4-1.

and then Lucy Quinn, Deniso Sullivan, Rueisha Little John, Marissa Sheva, Shiva maybe, and Kira Karusa, the striker, was the lone striker. Did a lot of, you know, did a lot of good work put in a shift on the night. Yeah, you know, you talk about it being the least entertaining game of soccer. I bet the Irish version of scuffed that's reviewing this right now is pretty thrilled with how they looked. And, you know, as far as the window right before the World Cup, they probably feel pretty good about that.

Yeah. That's a good point. They were playing some flowing soccer at points in this game, cutting through us without much trouble. Man, not much good to take from it from the U.S. point of view. Is there? No. No, there's not.

You could say that there's a little bit of like a positive moment by negative decisions where if you're trying to narrow a group of players down to a World Cup roster, you might have gotten information you need to make that a little easier. As a coach, you probably prefer it to be much harder, where the choice is excruciatingly difficult to make, but you know that that's good because it means whoever you're bringing along is playing very well and doing the things that you want them to do. But there might have been some players who maybe eliminated themselves a little bit yesterday. Interesting to hear who you think that is.

I thought Ertz was again pretty good. That's my opinion. We'll get into that specific moment you referenced earlier. But I do think she's in her current state, which is, you know, a player without a club. She's, in my opinion, a major upgrade over Andy Sullivan. And let's play what Vlako said. He was asked about Ertz's club situation after the game. Here's what he said.

Julie has this mentality when she's on the field. She imposes herself in the game. and the players rub off of that. And I think that we could see that coming out in live a little bit more in this game. And we're hoping to see that more and more as she gets more games with her club team. We expect Julie to make a decision pretty soon. I mean, I will leave that for her, but I wouldn't be surprised if we have, news by the end of this week.

I wouldn't be surprised if we have news by the end of this week. That's good. Yeah. In Vlako, I'm sure, is aware of all the different developments in her search for a club or decision. So I bet she's pretty far along on that decision. Yeah. Yep, yep.

What do you think about that, how she, her mentality sort of rubs off on the other players and we become a little more dominant, I guess? Yeah, I mean, it's interesting to say that. a game where in her half of soccer, we weren't dominant. And at the end of the game, Ireland actually started to kind of grow into it even more on the attacking side. You know, they did well through both games, or through this game in particular, of keeping us from being dangerous.

But they never really threatened in either game. And then at the last 15 minutes, they really started to control more of the field, tilt the field a little bit. I shouldn't say they didn't threaten at all. Obviously, in the first game, they had some moments of goal mouth scrambling. but this this they were actually like tilted the field against us in this second game yeah especially down like like last 10 minutes or so yeah yeah so but but generally I think I agree with Loco on what Juilliard's brings uh the the big moment you know that kind of demonstrated that

was her on the ball in just past the midfield stripe carrying forward and literally like you know we talk about the pissing movements we need more of for a team to to break defensive blocks down in possession and she is like literally remonstrating to make players do the pistony movement she brings Ashley Hatch upfield towards the ball with her arm and then like points for Ashley Sanchez

to make the next move in behind her into the vacated space so like I think she does sort of she just demands you know I mean she just demands that the players around her are executing it's a real I noticed that too and it's and my takeaway was one of more frustration.

Like, why are we at this point where nobody's showing to the ball? Like, what the hell? I mean, it's what I said in our last recap. And, you know, we had that couple of sequences in that in the first game that brought me back off the brink and, like, got my hopes up again. And then this game, like, crashing back down. And it's back to, like, if it's not automated at this point, it's probably too late to get that sort of flowing, fluid, coordinated movement.

as a real part of our attack. You hope maybe a couple of sequences will pop during World Cup games, but it is not, I don't think it's going to be a feature of our team, a consistent feature of our team. And again, I know that there are caveats for the personnel in this match where it was very much like a rotated side,

seemed like a lot of tryouts for the marginal calls. But, I mean, just overall, the theme for this national team right now is not one of coordinated fluid. team movement. Yeah, and I think a lot of people, well, including us, blame Vlako for that mostly. But watching this game, I'm like, you know, I mean, at some point the player's got to take responsibility.

You see that nobody's showing the ball, make a run to show for Julie Ertz in the pocket of space. When Ashley Hatch receives it in the pocket of space, try to lay it off, do something with it. Don't just flap it 30 yards out of bounds. It is, I mean, you would want that from the players, but the fact that it hasn't happened over 20 games, you know, I mean, over, again, since we started doing these recaps last summer, against teams where we had so many chances to just do attacking pattern reps, I totally put it on Vladco. Okay.

Like, it's his job to correct it. If this was a one-off, or if this was his, you know, first through fifth window of taking the team over, okay fair enough like the team's not up for it yet but he's had the time again to demand this like if julie urts is the coach of the team and she's demanding it and and it looks awkward but you're at least getting it started in that direction okay you can take that but the fact that you know we're one month from the or we're two months from the world cup in our last window no like this is blacko this is who he is despite the fact that he got his little bored out in the last 30 seconds of extra time to do some tactics yeah i noticed that

everybody's looking at him like what or what he thought the window was great he thought it was uh i mean maybe that's just coach speak yeah certainly it is but uh i thought it was a good evaluative window a good chance to get players before the minutes before the world cup and um yeah i guess in a sense that it could be a narrowing of the pool or a shallowing of the pool or something whatever weird verb you want to use maybe that's true but i don't know how i would have like to hear him say yeah this was garbage the way we played tonight, and it's not going to be good enough.

But he seemed to be, you know, relatively pleased. Well, and he got Tierna Davidson in back from injury. Casey Kruger, who's missed a lot of time with injury, got on the field. And I think you made a point to say, you know, at the very least, I got, I got their boots, some grass on their boots ahead of the World Cup. I don't think he said it like that. I don't know why. I wish he had said it like that.

But ahead of the World Cup, so their first action with the national team isn't, you World Cup group stage. So I guess fair play there. Yeah, good to see Tierna Davidson out there with dumping it at the opposing team centerbacks with her left foot instead of Alana doing it with her right foot. That's what occurred to me too is, I mean, we're all over the shop here before we get into the timeline, but I'm glad because, again, this game doesn't deserve a full timeline. But it does strike me that like if Kat can come back, you don't have to worry about her

upsetting the team chemistry on field because there just there just is none to speak of right like and we've seen this this movie before um again we are we are in a good in a good place i'd say uh odds wise because our individual talent is outrageous in several places on the field and i'll also reiterate our role players are very very good for being role players like that's why we are can play such like uninspired soccer uh for so long and what we've won eight straight games including games against Brazil, Canada, winning against Germany's in there, Japan. So we have these real wins against real teams,

despite the fact that we're not playing the best soccer because we are just super capable. We just have a ton of floor-setting capability everywhere on our roster, even if it's not clicking. Yeah. I'm excited to see, you know, Rodman's still very young, and she's growing as a player.

I'm excited to see how she develops, even over these next two months, watch her with the Washington spirit, because we're going to need her to be at her best, I think, at the World Cup. Shall we do the timeline? Yeah, let's still do the timeline. All right, right in the first minute,

Ireland starts soccering their way through us. They play a ball into Zone 14. By the way, zone 14, I posted an image on the Patreon if you want to see where Zone 14 is and where the Man City zones are. It's nice work. Thank you.

Graphic design is super passionate. It was really slick. Passionate graphic design. They play it back out to the wing over and then it's a ball over the top to the back post and a missed shot. Nothing too dangerous, but Ireland came to, you know, came to play soccer. I'm not sure we did. I'm going to say here, like this was an early, early shot at Kelly O'Hara because that ball to the far post, like, she just looked lost on it.

And it's not just, I mean, she was kind of, she kind of was dealing with two attackers out there. So it's not that she had to deny, you know, the space to both of them. You can't do that. But like her judgment on the cross was not great. Like it's, it's that driven ball of the far post.

And she kind of runs with it for a little bit. And then at the last second, like, jumps, even though she's nowhere close to it. So she completely takes herself out of any kind of defensive posture by jumping for a ball that she cannot possibly reach. Oh, Kelly. So it was a bad one. So is she one of the ones you think might have played her way out of the World Cup roster?

Yeah, I think she did. I feel like she's going to be surplus to requirements. We have plenty of carryover, like, leadership and experience in other places on the roster. So I don't think that she's going to have done enough here to make her way in. And again, we just have a lot of versatility. I also wonder if that's why she started at Leftback was to give her a chance to demonstrate. demonstrate that she can be as versatile as an Emily Sonnet who can deputize at either side a fullback because normally O'Hara plays right back. So I just, I'm not sure she passed the test

she needed to pass to give it another go. Yeah. I mean, hopefully Fox, Emily Fox and Crystal Dunn get 80% of the fullback minutes at the World Cup. And, you know, I think Huerta's definitely a step down, but probably she gets, do you think Huerta's going to make it? She was rough last too, man. And she hasn't been great. I don't think she's been great at any time lately. And so she's great at lump lumping a ball into the mixer. Yeah, she is. I mean, she does have out of everyone who's going to lump a ball in if that's what we're doing. She lumps a good ball in. And she can play. Like she can invert. She can tuck in. Yeah. You know, we're 45 seconds into this timeline. But that was also a noticeable feature was that Horan did a lot less flaring out wide in

this game than she did in the first game. And in the first game, she can do that. And Crystal Dunn is so good that she can, or she can play in concert with anyone. So when Horan flares out, Dunn either pinches in or goes up high and wide, whatever the situation calls for. And O'Hara doesn't have that same nuance skill set, even though she used to be an attacking player. She doesn't have the attacking nuance that Crystal Dunn has.

And so I think that limited Huran as well. And I think that by limiting Horan, we limited it, we limited a, we limited a, we limited the ways that we could move the ball up the field efficiently. So, yeah, I mean, all to say, I don't know that O'Hara is going to be the player. Querta can at least do that from the right side. She can sit deep as a third centerback and buildup, or she can invert into the midfield as like a central midfield partner to whoever is sitting deep. Yeah, okay.

All right. Third minute, we get the Sauerbrun chance. It's a design set piece. Sophia Smith takes a corner kick. Becky comes flying into the box from deep, and it's a good ball from Smith. Sauerbund gets a free header from around the penalty marker, and she rings the crossbar with it. I think Brazening got maybe a fingertip to it. Definitely it touched Brosnan's hand coming off the crossbar.

The most exciting moment of the match, I would say. Oh, by far. The whole match would have been worth it for that moment. I mean, the whole match was basically worth it just to even get that crossbar action. but yeah if we could have traded a brazen is it brazenin yeah if we could have traded a brazman mistake for the later one i would have taken the brazman mistake here rather than rather than later yeah uh no relation to pierce brosznan as far as i know as far as i know all right eighth minute ireland cuts through us again shot from distance they definitely look to more fluid soccer specific team

out there okay so i got i got to stop it again here because it's they cut through us, but again, the way they cut through us here is relevant for the shallowing of the pool. It was just a throw in from their defensive third, edge of their defensive third that Ireland have. And, you know, they just throw it in down the sideline. And both Haran and Sullivan, like, over-commit on this player who just spins out past them, splits to double team. And then O'Hara comes racing up the field, and she just waltzes right by Kelly O'Hara, too. And that's how they then just romp the field unopposed and get a decent. look at us.

So another moment for Kelly O'Hara not not shining here. Yeah. Not great for Sullivan and Horan either. Yeah, Sullivan. I'm tired of Sullivan. What the, just as far as pitch control goes. And again,

Ertz had some moments here where she didn't quite control the pitch the way she usually does in the second half. But Sullivan needs to be almost like perfect to combat what Ertz is doing after two years of not playing. Because I think we got to bake in a little bit of sharpness for two years over the next couple of weeks and months. Oh, Sullivan, you know, she's scared to play on the half turn. And very rarely are her passes in rhythm with anybody.

And she's getting spun around like this. I don't know. I can't take it anymore. Let's just say if it didn't look like this, then Julie Ertz coming back wouldn't be a big deal because we'd be like, oh, that's cool. But we already have the new Ertz in place. And we just do not have the new Ertz in place. Yeah. I still think Sam Coffey could do a better job than Andy Sullivan.

but nobody cares what I think. All right, Cook plays it over the top to Thompson. In the ninth minute, Thompson runs into some space, cross deflected over and out. So we're trying to probe those wide areas a little bit. Nine minute mark, a decent set piece that's knotted across by Horan, settled out to O'Hara for a decent rip from 20. It's comfortably wide, though. I noticed,

jump in at any point, please. But 11th minute, I noticed the pressing from Ashley Sanchez and Alyssa Thompson is good, a lot of energy. But I'd say, on the other hand, overall,

Ireland is kind of able to handle our press most of the time. Yeah, I think one of the things I'd noticed, and this was on both sides of the ball, in our press and in our possession, is that our spaces, the spaces between us were a lot bigger than what I'd like them to be.

So even in that press, everyone's expending a ton of energy. But part of the reason Ireland didn't have as much trouble is because it seemed like everyone was starting from like too far away from each other. So we were hustling. We were hustling over a long distance. And it was like by the time we got there, Ireland had it solved already. So I mean, honestly, it just looks like the fields we're playing on are bigger. They're not.

That's just the effect of us having our distances be a little too big. In possession, that's always been a sort of a feature of the team. not a positive one, I don't think. But we start so far apart from each other that it's hard to get that rhythm combination passing going. We get a great, the press begins to generate revenue in the 15th minute. We get a great chance. Sanchez does well to get a little bead on a long setup touch from Diane Caldwell.

She closes, takes it right off her foot, and it ricochets to Alex Morgan. Morgan squares Thompson through the legs of the defender who's on her as from the right side. The pass is a little bit behind Thompson. So she has, by the time she settles it, she has her back to goal. She lays it off for a wide open arriving Sophia Smith, and Smith blasts it over from 14 yards. And there's some, you know, some debate about the quality of this layoff, which I think is fair, but I still think we need a little better technique from the NWSL MVP here. I'll give you that, definitely the layoffs, the layoff hurt her, because her momentum, she was like, curling around, Thompson was the run Sophia decided to make.

And Thompson's pass brought the, like, was well behind that run. And it had too much on it. Like, she had done well to collect the ball. She had the Irish defender sort of moving the wrong way. So the layoff really just needs to, like, kill the ball, get out of the way and let Sophia run into it. And Sophia couldn't do that. The pass kind of handcuffed her. And when passes handcuff, you, a lot of times they get blasted over.

She leaned back, too, as she was handcuffed. I'm not disagreeing with you, Greg. 20th minute, Sauerbrun gets beat for pace down the right channel. Cross flashes over. This is right before Sauerbrun was taken off for Ternad Davidson. Yeah, a nice curtain call for her in her hometown, right? That's her hometown. Cook Oopsy in the 22nd minute, just a casual giveaway in the center circle.

It results in a ultimately harmless cross, but, you know, Kira Kurosi. like I said, putting in a good shift. Notice a very whack touch from Sofia Huerta in the 23rd minute in the buildup. I mean, the buildup was just disastrous. It was nothing. Nothing, almost nothing good happening. Like, we don't have any cues. So there's like a difference between failed ideas and just lack of ideas.

And we're a lack of ideas team. So, again, we still have enough talent to threaten anybody and to win a game on any day. But like, this is who we are. We are a zero pass ahead team. Now, I haven't watched the teams from the other contenders yesterday, but they all had rough outings as well, at least outcome-wise. Yeah, that's the word on the street. Germany lost, Japan lost, England lost.

So, but I need to see them. But I know just from our games against them, these are teams that at least play with some level of coordination. Like they're one pass-ahead or one-and-a-half pass-ahead operations. and it just is not us. We just aren't that team. So we don't have cues to work off of as attacking players. We're all just winging it.

Yeah. Speaking of not being one pass ahead, 24th minute O'Hara and Sullivan tried to play it out of the back in the left side and it was like, you might as well put ice cream truck music to it. It was not successful. 24th minute, a half chance for Ireland. McCabe whips one in from the left

and Carusa just gets enough on it to kind of loop it up over, almost over Murphy, but she manages to push it over the bar. 27th minute, a good pass from Horan to Spring Smith down the wing. She faces up her defender and then just wax it across the box,

cut out easily. I mean, kind of like, you know, she's trying to like visit into the area, which isn't a crazy thing. to do but just wasn't there wasn't really any there wasn't anybody even in the vicinity of where that ball was going no and again we talked about it smith strength isn't her vision and her passing it's definitely her shooting and her one v one ability so in that scenario like man i'd really just rather have her take the player on even though it's going to have a fairly high failure rate like just see

if you can do her and then once you can do that then things will start to open up right right yeah i know this is probably kind of depressing and some people are going to be turning it off already, but, but you know, we got to tell it like it is. 27th minute, oh no, 29th minute, is when Sauerbrun comes off for Tirona Davidson.

Good to see Davidson back in the squad. Kind of. For sure, for sure. And this is where like, I don't know if Vlato has cook as a lock for the World Cup. I kind of assume he does. I mean, if not, that'd be a shock just from the way he's rotated to three centerbacks,

Cook, Sauerburning Germa, through the past year and a half. But part of that is also because Deeringa Davidson has been hurt for this long. So I don't know what it means for her coming back for the World Cup, whether he just carries all four or whether one of them loses out. I mean, Cook's a match winner now. You know what I'm saying? I would love if that goal actually somehow affects the evaluation process. You'd love that.

All right. 37th minute. We get a decent spell of attack. A nice idea from Smith with a pass kind of, it's like a reverse pass into the channel. It doesn't quite connect, but we put on a little pressure for a while. culminates in Sophia Smith, not Huerta, Sophia Smith, whipping a ball in from the left side and Horan, you know, with her outstretched foot trying to get some. purchase on it. She's just, she's a little bit offside. So it, it's a moot point, but it was a nice,

a nice little bit of pressure, I guess. I'll take it. We'll take, in this game, we would take any goal mouth, like goal area action we could get. That's right. 40th minute, there's a nice chest down from Haran to Smith after a good ball from Andy Sullivan into the mixer. Smith can't settle it in front of her and gets bundled off the ball. This happened a few times, actually. We had a ball, you know, like sort of laid into a dangerous area and we didn't like our approach angle wasn't right or something. So I'll say this. This is the variation of the home run ball that I actually hope we see more of. And that's again, that back shoulder ball where our, you know, extremely strong players can hold off a defender the way Horan does.

She did this to draw the penalty in the first game. Right. You know, post somebody up and then be able to play soccer. Way better than the ones that seem like, oh, we were so close to getting onto that end of that long ball. but really it's just a pass to the goalkeeper. So I was glad to see at least this going on, and a great idea from her and good execution from her. Yeah.

And Smith put enough pressure on them, or the defenders had to disrupt it and at least leave themselves vulnerable to either penalty or Smith just winning out and being in on frame. Yeah, some days that might be called a penalty on the defender. I wasn't, I didn't, I meant to do this, but I just, it's a hard, it's a hard thing to stay true to.

I didn't count all our long balls, but I'd say, you know, easily 10 by this point in the game. I'm talking about just straight lumps into the box. We get our goal in the 44th minute, and it's a short corner between Smith and Sanchez. Like, even on a short corner, we can't really get it going. So Smith plays to Sanchez, Sanchez back to Smith. Sanchez's pass is a little heavy.

Smith gets tackled hard. It sprays way back to Alana Cook. and she just winds up and drops a ball into the box. I don't think it was a shot. But I guess I can't say that for sure. Keeper gets caught out and ends up palming it into her own net. 1-0. Yeah, it's like 90% not a shot.

She's just floating it into where all our bodies are. And you see, like, Horan's right there for it. So Haran does the little, like, innocent arms right as the balls crossing the net, which she needs to cut that out because that's like usually the, tell that you did something you're not supposed to. And goalkeepers are so protected that you don't want to give the referee a chance to be like, no, this game doesn't deserve a goal like that. So I'm just going to blow my whistle, make the easy call and make them earn a real goal.

But no, there's no real analysis here. It's just a big oopsie from, I mean, Atlanta Cook gets to be on the good side of somebody else's oopsie. Yeah, Brosnan's oopsie. And then the half arrives And Ertz comes on for Sullivan Kruger, Casey Kruger returns for Kelly O'Hara Ashley Hatch comes on for Alex Morgan

and Trinity Rodman for Sophia Smith 47th minute, a pretty good ball from Ertz to Thompson. So this is one of the ones I was referring to earlier. Kind of a floated ball and it does drop just behind the back line. And I know you're saying well this is a kind of ball where it's just a pass to the keeper and I think essentially that's what it ended up being.

But if Thompson, I feel like I watched the replay pretty closely, if Thompson sort of attacks the ball as it's coming down, which requires a, you know, would require a really nice touch. She's probably in on goal if she gets the touch right. Instead, she kind of lets it ride past her to a less dangerous area and gets crowded off the ball. Yeah, and so if we want to use this one as sort of as a pruder case, that's what it is.

so close to it, right? So even just to get that close to Alyssa Thompson is like unlikely. You know, I mean, most of the time we're not that close. It's either we overshoot it. So it's already like the degree of difficulty is already high. And then you're asking Alyssa Thompson at full speed, because if you're not going full speed, the defender's going to overtake you because they don't have to try to control the ball. You need her at full speed to control the ball in a way that at full speed from that distance does not take her touch to the

goalkeeper who would then just come and swallow it up. She has to control it and then still have the time and space to get a shot off. And it's just super low percentage. It can happen, and it'll be amazing when it does. But it's not a high percentage attacking mode. The one nice thing about this one is it's not directly vertical. So when this is over hit, it doesn't run to the keeper. It's at an angle enough that it just runs more towards the corner of the box.

And Alyssa Thompson still has a play to make on it. The defender does well the shielder, and Thompson, you know, clatters into the back of her, and ref gives the foul. Excuse me. Just noting that Ashley Sanchez, who did bring a lot of energy last night, was just not precise enough in the final third. I feel like I've been saying this for the past six months, but like she's got to get a little bit cleaner.

Otherwise, it's not going to be good enough, I don't think. That's exactly where I'd land with it, too. And just to put a bow on what we just talked about, I'm not saying that that ball from Ernst to Thompson has no place in a game. Like sometimes you should be trying those high reward balls. It just if that's like how most of your possessions end, that's probably not a good thing. Yeah. And that would describe, I think, a fair amount of last night's game.

54th minute, another one of those earth's balls. We won't talk about it too long. But I thought, again, Sanchez was in on goal, but misjudged it, misjudged the flight of it slightly. You can Zapruder it if you want and disagree with me. No, no, no, we're just going to keep it moving. Okay, her handball to hatch his feet in the pocket, and she just sort of thrashes it out to nobody, even though she had two people to lay it off to in the 55th minute.

Saw 57th minute Kruger showing something on the counter. She blows past a defender and then blows past another one and then draws a cynical yellow card. So that's a nice thing to see. I don't know what Kruger's chances of making it on the roster are. Do you have a view on that? I don't. I mean, again, it's...

she hasn't played enough, right? So you get to a point where eventually a coach is probably just going to take what they know. So Kruger's been out with injury for a long time, probably just no, not enough time left unless she really is dominating NWSL for her to overtake Sonnet, who I think probably has the third fullback spot in my mind. And I think in Vladko's mind, and I think that might actually be why Sonnet didn't play in this game. Okay. Could be wrong.

Could be wrong. There's definitely room for interpretation there. 60th minute, Mewis comes on for, Christy Mewis comes on for Lindsay Horan. I think Haran was dealing with some kind of tweak or something. Maybe a cramp. 64th, but not as good of an outing from Haran as the game before. No, she's got to be able to flare. We got to have a, we got to have personnel to let her flare out to the sideline.

She seems so at home in that first game, getting out of the amoeba, collecting it. and then playing, and she didn't get to do that in this one. No. Also want to point out as Horan came off, kind of a funny exchange as she gave the armband to Julie Ertz. And like the camera goes to close up, and Ertz isn't paying attention as Horan approaches her. And so Erz is talking to another player coaching, of course.

And then Heran's like, hey, take this arm band. And Julie looks like she's saying, I don't know, there's got to be someone else here who should get the armband, not me, and like starts looking around the field. and Urtz is just, or her an is just like, no, come on, it's you. And I think that probably speaks to, like, the same thing Vlato mentions. Like, you can't just pretend that she's not the captain. She just is when, you know, like, part of it is the personnel in the field. If Sauerbrun's on, of course, you can give it a Sauerbrun.

But looking around this group of players, it's telling that Julie Ertz is clearly the person who should get the armband, despite not playing soccer for two years. It is, I mean, this is a pretty bad game, but it is great to have her back. that's a it's a it's a really big really big uh big news i think all right 64th minute we get a really a really nice sequence from the u.s this is uh you know maybe behind the sourbrun crossbar ringer this is the moment of the match for me murphy throws it out to sanchise on the run and sanchise just one touch to rodman rodman one touch back heel into space very lovely and uh sanchez with her with her first

touch after the back heel curls a left-footed ball into the path of Alyssa Thompson, who's running straight at the goal. Thompson gets kind of crowded off the ball pretty easily. And as she's being crowded off the ball, she tries a shot as she's clattering into the keeper. And it goes right into the keeper's chest. But, you know, she may have been able to handle that with a little more subtlety and get a decent shot off if she were given that chance again.

I don't know. Anyway, Washington Spirit connection with Sanchez and Rodman being the catalysts. Yeah, this is, this was really nice. And honestly, this moment definitely belongs on the timeline. So there is the one. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

This is almost that touch that we were just talking about that is required from a player at full speed. Like her first touch, she actually gets it under control despite getting crowded out by two players and keeps it away from the keeper. because if she takes, you know, like a normal touch at that speed, it's going to go far enough ahead of her that the keeper gets to swallow it up. She at least did enough to get a second touch on it. So, no, there's not really much to critique here.

Like, it would have been brilliant if she had felt that crowding around her. And instead of even trying to, like, control it or get the shot with a second touch, she just tries to dink it to her right to a late arriving Ashley Hatch. But that's asking a lot. Yeah. I mean, she could have maybe taken the show. first time. I don't know. You know, it's hard. It's hard to do this stuff. 72 minute, another little spell of pressure. Ertz plays it to Hatch in the pocket. Hatch

swings it out wide to Rodman. Rodman does her defender, gets to the Man City zone, tries to cut it back, but it's cut out. Then Mewis wax a ball into the box. I'm, you know, I'm growing weary of the timeline now. I do notice around the 80 minute mark Thompson mugged somebody in the center circle and led a little 3V3 break but again

rearing its head was our general shortage of subtlety in attacking moments she plays a pass behind Sanchez who is not really in a position to do anything anyway and it's just taken off of Sanchez immediately uh here's the moment let's let's talk about this moment

where Ireland gets a gets that shot that goes right of the near post. It was a header sort of, you know, a long ball to cook. Cook heads it in the air, sideways to Kruger, sort of. And then Kruger heads it in Ertz's general direction. But the header goes over Ertz. So she's kind of scrambling to get to it. And then number 10, Denise O'Sullivan, races through and just takes it on her chest.

And she's passed Ertz before the, before Ertz. I would say even has a chance to sort of get set. And then O'Eerts does not catch up to her, as you mentioned earlier. O'Sullivan slips Carusa into the box and her shot flashes wide of the near post. I don't know that this is a damning moment for Julie Ertz, really. It's not. And again, it's sort of like we see this from all of our centerments. We see this from Sullivan.

We definitely see this from Iran. It's just a pitch control moment. and it's where Ertz tends to stand out. So, you know, like Sullivan needs to get all of this stuff perfect. I think she will need to differentiate herself from Ertz as Ertz gets back into match sharpness. But it's just one of those things where like Ertz is still very much human at this point. We'll see if she gets to her superhuman mode by July. But this was just her like overcommitting before she had, you know, I talked about her situational awareness being perfect.

Like this was a mistake, right? Like this was committing upfield, committing her momentum upfield before it was time to. And she paid the price as Ireland just raced past her. Yeah. Okay. As we mentioned earlier, Ireland got a couple more half chances before the final whistle. I don't know that there was anything really that dangerous. But we were on the back foot, I think it's fair to say.

That's how I'd put it to. Just very little about that game was like, oh, this is definitely a team contending for the World Cup. Or should be World Cup favorites. Though I think we still are. And again, the outcomes of several other contenders yesterday would probably play into that. Yeah. Like we had a super uninspiring game for our eighth straight win. Yeah.

We got the win. I think Ertz is consolidating our hold on the number six position. That's me. That's my opinion. So those are both positives. But, man, we did not look good. I think we should leave it at that, unless you have any closing thoughts. Save us, Cat Macario.

Yeah. I don't think that she's going to save us, though. That's the thing. It's like, I mean, it'll help, but. I mean, so that's where we are, right? Like, I was hopeful. I think we've both been hopeful that, like, Sanchez would come in and drag us into this sort of fluid combination team. But she's not really, she did not become that player for us.

and so the question is like, is it just impossible to do that for the team or is Macario, who is a much better player than Sanchez? Can she come in and make that happen? Can she sort of orchestrate between her and Ertz running a show together? You know, again, throw Roselvel back in this mix

who didn't play yesterday. Right. Can it happen? Will it happen? I don't know. Yeah, it can, I think. But we can definitely win games. We are going to win some games

in New Zealand. I just don't know if we are, I don't know if we are at running it like what the peak of this team could be. Yeah, give the ball to Alana, let her snipe from 35 yards. We should, before we go, let's quickly talk about the USMNT roster

for this friendly against Mexico. I forget the exact name of it. It doesn't really matter. It's a, it's mostly, MLS roster. The one exception is Sergenio Dest, who is basically without a club for all intents and purposes at this moment.

That's the big exception, but we also have a big congratulations in order to Vince and the city of Louisville because Josh Winders in. Oh, yeah. I've heard you guys say it, but from from USL. And then Aless Niora, who hasn't actually played since even before the last window where he got called up in March, is also on the roster. But he's been hurt for Farras, so he has not actually played in a month. So, I mean, it's not a, you don't look at the roster and say, okay, there are like,

there are definitely some people on here who have a really good chance of being major contributors at the 2026 World Cup. That's my view of it. But it'll still be fun to watch the team play. And Dest, I think, will be most likely a starter for the U.S. in 2026. assuming, well, I mean, it's a long ways away, but he did well at the last World Cup. Drake Calendar, Dr.C. Calendar of Inter-Miamy, Roman Selentano of FC Cincinnati and Sean Johnson from Toronto FC, formerly NYCFC, are the keepers. Defenders are Sugenio Dest. Aaron Long, who's at L.A.F.C., Julian Gressel, who's in Vancouver.

Matt Miasga, who's at Cincinnati, making his return. Shack Moore, Nashville SC, Caleb Wiley, Atlanta United. I would say he is probably the most interesting player on this roster for me just because of the need we have at left back, the perpetual eternal need at left

back and, you know, him having a bright start to the season and being really young. You got any Caleb Wiley thoughts? No, not really just that I think at this point he's probably better than George Bello was when George Bello was at Atlanta, so hopefully Hopefully Wiley can inherit the backup left back mantle.

And Bello played in some World Cup qualifiers, you know? Yes, not always well. No. But he was who we were choosing. That's right. Joshua Winder, like you said, the Louisville City centerback on his way to Benfica, DeAndre Yedlin and Walker Zimmerman, round out the defenders. You guys all know what position each of those guys plays.

then the midfielder's are Kellan Acosta, L-A-F-C, Aidan Morris from the Columbus crew, a youngster getting another chance, Christian rolled on, James Sands back in New York City after leaving Rangers, Alan Signora, like you said, and then Jackson Yule, 16 caps for the San Jose earthquakes midfielder looking for that 17th. So midfield is where I end up the most disappointed in what, you know, is a roster that It's hard to be disappointed when the expectations are very low for an extremely meaningless match. Don't get me wrong. Like, we are absolute sickos.

We would watch like a 90-minute training session of like an Olympic squad if it was on offer. So we are for sure going to dive all the way into this. But we can also recognize what is meaningful and what's not. And this midfield is like I was just hopeful that in this meaningless game, we would finally get our Keaton Parks call up or our Tim Tillman call-up, and neither of those call-ups materialized. Right. Yeah, so congratulations, Vince, for Josh Winders' presence in this camp, but condolences that Tim Tillman's not there,

and I guess you're the one who's, you're the real Keaton Park's guy around here. I just, I think he's at least earned a chance to be bad in the national team uniform. Yeah, for sure he has. And the forwards are Paul Ariola, looking for his 51st cap. I think, I'm pretty sure he's the most capped player on the team.

And Cade Cowell, who's having, I think, a decent start to the season in San Jose. Heses Ferreira, Jordan Morris, and Brandon Vasquez round out the forwards. So we look a little light on wingers maybe, but it's only one game. Yeah, one game. This is very much like a drive-through contest where we are, the guys have games. They all play on Saturday night. so they're going to play on Saturday night and then they're going to have two days of recovery cycle

even as they join camp and then they'll train once on Tuesday and then have the game on Wednesday. And then they're back to their club. So there's very little in the way of like any kind of reps or anything that these guys are going to be doing together at intensity. Right.

Still no coach, no sporting director. That is, it's been all been quiet on that front for the last few weeks. It's, we're just going to call it the Serginio Dest Classico. We're going to do this every year to give Serginio Desk some minutes for whatever club he's on loan to that is not playing it. That's right. Well, you know, as long as Sergenio's happy.

I bet you will be. I bet he'll love Phoenix. All right. I think that's it. We'll try to preview this game on Tuesday. Maybe have a little more fun with it. Monday review coming Monday. Well, so Wednesday on Wednesday.

Just trying to hold it all together. Thanks for listening. We'll see you.