Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #430: USMNT v Oman recap

Episode Date: September 13, 2023

A more pleasant viewing experience than the other friendly this window. Balo and Pepi score, Tillman and Lund start, Wes and Yunus dominate an overmatched Omani midfield. Lots to discuss in a full timeline.Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon! Patrons get a private feed for the Monday Review, which is, among other things, a run-down of club action for national team players every week with Watke and Vince. We have recently added patron-only content that will be available every Friday. Patrons also 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/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. Hey, everybody. We beat Oman 4-0 in St. Paul last night, another pretty tepid crowd on a weeknight in the Midwest, the Great North, as they say in Minnesota, but a lot of fun at the ballpark. Wouldn't you say, Greg? I would say that. I would say I enjoyed watching the team that I cheer for a lot, and they're very good players, do soccer things.

They did a lot of soccer things. I'm guessing your view is that it wasn't all that different from the Uzbekistan game in that sense. So, I mean, I think it was different. I think it was quite a bit different. I just think that things that were different aren't things that had me terribly worried during the Uzbekistan game or like super. I'm not getting ahead of myself either about this Oman game. I think on y'all's Monday review, Vince said it. He said, you know, the cliche is it's never as bad as.

the seems, it's never as good as it seems. If you're the person actually saying that in the moment, you end up being a contrarian on both days to the ebb and flow of the conversation. But I think that's where I land after these games. Again, Uzbekistan and Oman are not very good teams in the context of where we are trying to get to as a program. So I think the results match it. And I think the performance was improved against Oman.

And it was, you know, we'll get into sort of the, I feel like we ended up with a bolted list on the discord of some of the things that were different. We could either do that now or we can do it as we go along. Yeah, let's go through the list. Okay, well, the very first thing was something that happened even before the game, and that was the lineup being dropped, and we see Malik Tillman's name on the list. And I'm saying, I feel like we heard Wes say Malik, or somebody said, West said Malik. So now we're free to go back and forth now again between Malik and Maik.

But sure. Malik being on the 11, like I think changed everybody's mood going into the game. game, which I think changes like the way you experience the game and things that would be frustrating if the player you wanted on the field happen, like you're not as frustrated because oh, these are the guys we wanted to see. So if things go wrong, that's all right. It's the right players at least. So I feel like that changed to the narrative surrounding everything. Definitely. For the better. And then for me, the actual most important thing here is Oman's defensive shape and structure versus Uzbek.

And Uzbekistan, as Vince noted several times, doesn't ship a lot of goals because their whole modus operandi is the 541 pack it in, like deep block, gum things up and just be hard to score against. And they're committed to that. And they showed that. And so that that is not a very good scenario for like aesthetically pleasing, free flowing attacking soccer. Right. And that's what we got in that Uzbekistan game. Oman is totally different. They're running this 4-4-2 diamond where, you know, the two forwards aren't always particularly committed to defending.

The furthest player in the diamond is not always particularly committed to defending. Tons of space. And then even their back lines weren't super disciplined. And we pulled some of these videos from them from their previous couple of matches to show like they get stretched. And you have players in each line who will kind of freelance and go chase the ball somewhere and pull themselves totally out of position. And when that happens, tons of space to attack into, I mean, just their natural narrowness opened up all those big sexy switches from McKenny to the weak side player. And it's just, that's just more fun to watch.

So it's not even like, you know, better or worse. I just think it's a better viewing experience. It's not something that we can control, like that Greg Burrhalter can control. Right. Burrhalter or the players, you can't just choose to drop six goals on that deep block against Uzbekistan. Like that's that you can't just pick the tactics that do that. There aren't necessarily those tactics. but it doesn't mean that you can't focus and play better soccer.

And that was another big difference between these two games was in this one, zero of the full-on whoopsies that led to Uzbekistan's really good chances that we were a bit lucky they didn't convert on. Ask Mexico. And then also in this game yesterday, way fewer even of the little whoopsies that were just like nothing mistakes that we made over and over and over again to just blow up our own attacks. Yeah, I would say Dest and Wea were in perfect. rhythm as they often are well perfect is a is a pretty sweeping word but very good rhythm but also Wes

and Eunice were in were quite a bit in rhythm as well and Malik had some moments of in rhythm some moments of out of rhythm but also provided some harmony in there and Lund I thought Lund too he was a player who who fit into

the game well I thought yeah he didn't just he didn't just sort of like disappear not make mistakes like he was He was contributing. He was adding with some simple stuff, but that's what you're hoping for out of a guy who's stepping in for Jedi. And then even Christian Pulcic upgraded from like a really rough game against Uzbekistan to a quiet game against Oman.

So that was nice, nice to see. I can still think it was pretty rough from CP10, but he did have some good moments. You asked, you asked earlier this morning what were his top three moments of the game. And I think we kind of agree on what they were. or a two out of three at least. I would say it was one, the ball that he whipped into Wea, that Wea very sneakily. Chicken winged. Chicken winged into the upper 90.

And then the time where he backboarded with Baligan and then made a run into the, I mean, he was wide open for either a pass on the ground or a clipped ball over the back line. And Malik Tillman didn't even consider passing him the ball. I thought that was nice. And then he also found Malibu. in the box, found Malik's feet. So he's over there, he's over there squaring up his defender on the left wing.

This is right before the half. Sometimes he'll just bang it off the guy's shins in that case. But in this case, he was patient and he found Malik's feet in a more dangerous spot. It didn't come to anything, but those would be my three top moments for Pulisic. Yeah. And if those are your three top moments, then again, it's a pretty quiet half. He played 45. He's maybe already got one foot back in.

one foot back in Milan. Hopefully. Hopefully it gets to start this weekend. It doesn't seem super likely. A.C. Milan plays Inter Milan this weekend. The Derby, the Derby. And do we have to say it Derby if it's in Italy?

No, it's a... I'm not even going to try to do an Italian accent. I was about to try to do an Italian accent, but I'm going to save that until I've had time to hone it. Good, good, good, good. So what are the other reasons that made it? more pleasant than the Uzbekistan game. It would have been a super offensive accent.

I'll just say that. That's pretty much it. Like for me, that was pretty much it. Like, I didn't get the whole like, skies falling stuff or the Burhalter Balls back stuff about the Uzbekistan game.

And I don't think that this game is like, now we're cooking. Now that we play to 10, we're on fire. We're unstoppable. It was, these were just two pedestrian opponents. And we handled them pretty,

comfortably. And we got to see some of our good players do cool things. That's where I'm at. I guess, you know, Berthelter mentioned in the post game that Oman was missing their best player, I think. And because Oman split the series with Japan and World Cup qualifying. So they're not like nobody, nobody. But yeah, they didn't look very good in this game.

Yeah, they beat Japan. This is almost like two and a half years ago now, I think, to open up. their qualifying campaign. And then I know people were pointing to like how close they were to the playoff spot out of Asia. But I mean, they kind of weren't. Like they tied a game against Australia that eliminated them with several games

remaining in the in the qualifying season. And then they won their last two games and Australia lost their last two games when those results weren't going to do anything to knock out of Austria. So it was like they made up a lot of ground when there was no way to actually make up all of the ground. I see. I mean, who really cares? But, no, Oman just glossed to Uzbekistan 3-0 in one of their last competitive games.

They're not a particularly strong team. I don't think there's any way around it. Yeah, fair enough. The other thing is the friendlies, you know, there is a lot of angst about why would we schedule friendlies against such weak opponents. Something I had forgotten about until I saw Bob Morocco mention it, but I remember it happening now. now is Doug McIntyre from Fox saying we had Brazil and Argentina scheduled for this window, but then Common Ball changed their World Cup qualifying schedule, which made it so Brazil and Argentina couldn't play us in this window.

And then by that time, you know, the options were somewhat limited. And I think that's a perfectly reasonable non-shilling for USSF reason to not feel too bad about these opponents. It's just what we got stuck with. And we beat them 7 to 0 over two games. I think we learned some stuff, which we'll try to get into in another episode tomorrow for patrons. But we'll get into it today, too. But that's one other note. And as you alluded to, one other thing, as you alluded to, Mexico lost, or not, didn't lose,

but it feels like a loss, I think, probably for the nation of Mexico. They drew Uzbekistan yesterday in Atlanta at the same time as our game was going on, or a little bit earlier, which is just very satisfying to see. They tied Uzbekistan. And again, that's the reason Mexico is playing Uzbekistan is probably for the same reason we are. I think the rumors about that Argentina, I remember hearing those rumors a long time before McIntyre dropped that they was actually, you know, a concrete plan. And the rumor was always Mexico and the U.S. were both going to play Argentina, you know, because that's a, that'd be a pretty, pretty swell window.

So when that falls through, Mexico is in the same boat, I'm guessing, and that's how they end up also playing Uzbekistan. because that was something that they were strongly pursuing 10 months ago. But yeah, it's nice to see, it's nice to see, like, Mexico in that flailing mode. I'm enjoying it. I don't want to forget that we definitely could have been there, you know, from the, based on the quality of our play, as much as it's like not, it wasn't worrying. It was definitely possible that Uzbekistan could have capitalized on some of our nonsense and turn that into a one-one game.

Yeah, good to see our centerbacks play a pretty much mistake-free game and look really, really dominant. Again, against a weak opponent. I want to, you know, we were super hard on St. Louis ahead of the, after that game for the crowd. And I think St. Paul is probably in roughly the same category, three-fourths full stadium. So that would be a one-fourth empty stadium just in case. I thought it was kind of interesting to hear Burrhalter get asked about the crowd in the press conference. Here's what he said. Greg, you've been very complimentary of the environment here in Minnesota.

Yeah. What do you feel about it tonight? You know, I think that, again, the crowd that was here was boisterous and supportive and pro-USA. And this is a fantastic place to play, an amazing stadium. You know, great pitch, great locker rooms, great facilities. So, you know, we love coming here. and we hope the fans appreciate us. The crowd that was here was boistered.

Very well-chosen words from the Gipper. Should we do the lineups? I got some other Burrhalter clips, but they kind of fit in with the player discussion later. Yeah, let's run through the lineups. I feel like we're going to do this game in less time than it took us to do the Uzbekistan game. Hopefully, hopefully.

Horvath and goal, obviously because Turner went home, I don't know if he went home, but he left camp to be there, be present for the birth of his daughter. Dest, Robinson, Richards, and Lund across the backline. Ream gets a little rest. He was on the bench, so he didn't head back to Fulham, but he didn't play. And then Lund gets his first start as a U.S. international.

The Danish-American dual nat got a little bit of time against Uzbekistan, but we got a much better look at him today. or yesterday. And then Musa and McKinney and Tillman in the midfield, what we'd been, many of us had been calling for. And then Wea, Baligan, and Pulisic across the front line. I was happy with the lineup. Pretty fun lineup, right?

I mean, I think maybe we were hoping for Paredes over Lund, but it's one of those just a, it's just a curiosity with Paredes. I'm certainly not like, we need to, we need Paredes in there. He's the next man up for left back. I was kind of hoping for Paredes over Lund, but I'm going to pretend that I wasn't. Now that Lund, now that Lund looked pretty good and then Paredes came on and, you know, he was fine. But I think in retrospect, Lund was probably the right choice. Oman was, like you said, in a 4-4-2 diamond.

I'll read the last names. Al-Mukani, Al-Mukaini in Goal. Al-Yamadi, Al-Braiki, Al-Kamisi, and Al-Kabi. across the back line from right to left. And then the diamond was Al-Sadi as the deepest-lying midfielder. And then Al-Balushi and Al-Agbari as the two-eights, I guess you'd say. And then Fawaz as the number 10. And then Al-Gasani and Al-Sabi as the strikers.

We're not going to talk a ton about the Omani players. So you're just going to have to live with that lineup, guys. To the timeline. Umann on the front foot right at the very beginning. I was a little surprised at how much verve they came out with and how we were kind of put on the back foot. And then at the end of that, I would say it was about a four-minute stretch

from kickoff to their chance where Dest gets beaten on the left. There's a cross and it's headed away by Richard. So he's beaten enough for the guy to get a left-footed cross off. Richards heads it away. but number two, Abelushi, one of the midfielders, gathers it and rips it well wide on the volley with his left foot.

It's a real chance, though, right? I mean, this isn't like a prayer. He's got it with time. He was able to size this thing up because I don't, I'm not trying to put this on Malik Tillman, but Malik Tillman was super late in controlling the pitch where, where number two was. So, you know, between the three center mids,

nobody was accounting for this pocket of space as that cross came in. And so, yeah, so he totally got to look at the goal, look at the ball, step into it, and take his cut. Yeah. Lucky for us, it was about six yards wide. And we shut it down from there. I thought that was the one part of the game where Oman looked good. Yeah, I think that's fair. I think because we avoided any real, any real,

huge mistakes to gift them chances, there wasn't another moment in the game where it was like, oh, we're in trouble here. Maybe that's a half-truth, but it was, that's what it felt like. Let's get into some of the good stuff, right? At the five-minute mark, a good work up the left from Lund, Pulisic and Tillman.

Pulisic finds Tillman in the pocket. Pulisic's on the sideline. He finds Tillman in a pocket. He, and then Tillman turns and Meg's a guy to feed Pulisic to the end line. He whips it across and it's sent out of bounds. I'm going to just try to go fast through these. So jump in and interrupt me whenever it feels like you need to.

Seventh minute, good West McKinney switch. So he was hitting these diagonal switches all night and very accurately. He switches one to, I think it was to, I actually don't remember if it was way or a desk, but it goes back to Tillman and he tries to fizz a low ball into the box. And it actually just misses McKinney in the box. and I'm noting it because it was a cross and people were talking about us being really cross happy in the first half

and I didn't see that on the initial watch on rewatch you know I would say there were probably five or six crosses in the first half but most of what we were doing was this very intentional diagonal switch usually from McKinney over to the other side

not a cross in my point from my point of view and you're talking about yesterday against him on right Yeah. Yeah. And I think Greg commented on it. I think that was the instruction would be for McKinney to pick it up deep and then look for that big switch. And again, that's exploiting Oman's narrower shape with the diamond.

So we draw the diamond to one side, hit the big switch to a player who would just be standing all alone, and then sort of commence the attack from there. And we weren't always super clean once we did that. I felt like we didn't always have a little. like the next three ideas down. But again, it's a good way to initiate an attack is to get a ball to a free Sergenio Dest or Tim Wea with a lot of open space to work with. Yeah, let's listen. Burharto was asked about the role that Wes had in the game.

And here's, I think, part of the question and the answer. I'm wondering, you know, where you kind of cooked up Weston McKinney's role today because it seemed like it was a very unique role, even for a unique player like him, those long diagonal balls just seemed to be turning Oman in knots. You know, I guess the game plan was, we know a diamond, how they have to really commit to get to one side if they're going to put pressure.

So we wanted to purposely go to one side, drag them over, and then, you know, we'd have two in the infield that their attacking me would have a hard time. time dealing with and they'll switch the ball. So, you know, fortunately, it worked out a number of times. You know, I'm a little bit critical. I think it could have been even better and more effective. But overall, you know, Weston was a key contributor to that.

He saw the space and was able to take advantage of it. I was a little surprised to hear him be a little critical of how that switch was working. But I guess it squares with what you're saying about them, us not always having the ideas and the quickness when the ball came across. maybe I think he also reading between the lines maybe thought Wes wasn't quite fast enough in his decision making because I mean Wes had all kinds of time to work with and tee up those drives yeah could have been I'm I mean I was happy with it but again part of it's just because like I said in the beginning the aesthetics of what we're doing here are just gorgeous so we posted a bunch of those long diagonals in the discord the clips and it's like as you can see this one didn't lead to anything and we're saying that a bunch of times but they just look real, real nice.

So, you know, again, we get a precious few opportunities to watch this team play. I'm just going to enjoy the really nice aesthetics when I can't. Yeah, somebody on Twitter said that clipped ball with backspin, you know, there's something really beautiful about it. It's just straight as a, straight as an arrow. 10th minute, we get a good driven way of ball across after some interplay over on the right side. I'm noting this also because it's definitely a cross and it was it was going to, you know, Lund was arriving on it and it was just saved from him, him latching onto it by a good header from number 10, the right back, Yamadi, Al Yamadi, who just guided it out of bounds. And this is where I'd say we were still, I think, leaning into once we hit that big switch, like, all right, I've got it, I've got under control.

Now I'm going to go ahead and hit across into the box. So one thing I want to ask Greg Burholter, if anyone is listening who has access to him, is what the team understands the meaning of for a soft set cross. Did you see the Brendan comment? No, I didn't. Somebody had Brenda in between the games to ask him what they were working on. And he said that they were really working to improve on their soft set crosses. And we couldn't figure out if that means crossing while the defense is not set yet.

So they'd call it a soft set. or if it means working back to the end line like Lund was doing and then setting it back to McKinney to then hit the cross. Or if it meant like that backpost Nick Lima, you know, that cross to the right back like over the danger area where no one's going to score on it. But then you can square it back. Das almost had a assist on one of those. And, you know, we've seen that from this U.S. team quite a bit. So we were trying to figure out which kind of cross Brenda was referring to. so we're going to need somebody to ask that specifically at some point.

Release the PowerPoint, Greg. We got our first goal off that over cross if you want to go all that. Yep, and it's coming up very soon in the timeline. We get a good switch from Ballot to Dest and another good ball. This one from Dest is also a cross. It sails across the six. Pool six is a bit too close to the fender to get to it, but that's three crosses in five minutes.

All pretty dangerous, but definitely crosses. maybe that's where the cross-happy game plan narrative comes from just from the when things come in bunches like that. 12-minute mark, a good pass from McKinney to Ballo. He tries to flick it out to Lund, but Pulisic is standing two yards away from Baligan and it blocks the pass. And I'm just, I just mentioned this

because I'm just increasingly of the opinion that Pulisic's side is the not fun one because of Pulisic. It's not just that he doesn't, seem to play super well with others in combination is that when he receives the ball, even in this game, he's rarely like turning into the space behind him and asking questions of the defense. Obviously, he wants to take people on with his feet on the chalk, but receiving in that pocket and playing on the half turn, he didn't do it much in this game. He would take a big

touch back towards the back towards Lund and then recycle it to, you know, Richards or maybe McKenny or Eunice. He does play hard. and he gets up for big games, which this decidedly was not. So I'm not trying to say anything crazy here, but I am saying I think the harmony and fluidity that we see on the right side just probably isn't going to happen

on the side where Pulisic is. That's probably correct, right? Whatever harmony we are going to get will come in those games where Pulisic is actually dicing the guy up on the dribble and disorganizing the defense that way. So if he's not doing that in a game, which he didn't in either of these two games, you're not going to see it. And when Timwaya was on the left side occasionally in this game and against Uzbekistan, you saw the exact same Timway of things that you see on the right.

He does him on the left flank as well. So I think that's probably true. I think it's just totally different styles between those two players. and it might even just be personal preference on which kind you enjoy more, but big Tim Wea guy over here. All right, let's do the goal. 13th minute. So much to love about this goal.

It starts with a big tackle from Chris Richards just inside our half. He kind of hurls the ball up the right wing. And it's definitely a whoopsie from that Oman left back. His name is Al-Khabi. but he kind of allows Wea to get him behind him with his initial touch on the ball. So Wea's gets him behind him and he plays a cut back as he goes to ground and the ball slips all the way through.

Pulisic kind of slipped on the grass. The ball was behind him anyway. I don't know if he would have gotten to it. And it trickles all the way through. And then McKenny does, you know, he's so good with his body and leverage. He just kind of like Big Brothers this other guy to get on the ball, a ball that he, you know, by rights, maybe shouldn't have one, but he wins it.

And then he turns around and just switches the ball over to Tim Wea, who's back up on his feet. Wea just quietly and efficiently, one touch lays it off for Dest, who's arriving at the top of the box. Desk takes a good shot on the half volley from the edge of the box, hits it on frame, forces a save from the goalkeeper who sticks both hands up. but the deflection falls straight to Fuller and Balligan, and he quickly side-footed in with his left foot, one-zero. Yeah, a lot to love about this. Again, as a fan of this U.S. team, watching them do these things. The way McKenney holds that Manafort,

even almost like drives him three yards past the ball with his body to then come back and get to ball. That was when it most sunk in. Yeah, this Oman team, it reminded me of the home qualifies. fire against El Salvador where both McKinney and Musa could do those kinds of things at will, where they would just hold on to the ball for however long they wanted and just like, you know, body two to three El Salvador players off one at a time until they did what they wanted with it. So loved that. Loved him just totally knowing what his, what his strength is here.

And then the way I set, like the way I lay off is just so elegant. Like just Washington way I manipulated his body and the ball is just my favorite thing about this team right now. So, you know, as this is floating up, it's a big floater. Waya is like approaching it. As he's approaching it is always going to smash it on the volley, right? And this is what's so great is that he can disguise what he's going to do this well because his whole approach is, I could swing through this if I want to do. And then at the last second, he just changes what he's doing with his right leg to just clip it

back ever so gently for Sergenio Dess to run on to. and then the aesthetics of death stepping through it with a giant smash are great. Even the goalkeeper safe here. I enjoy it's got like that where he's getting like he gets moved by the balls. It hits his hands and like rotates his body. He should do better with where the rebound goes. But yeah, just perfect aesthetics all around on this goal. He should tip it over the bar, right?

I mean, that's what he should do. Yes. Yeah. You don't want to, you don't want to get your hands up above it where you pot. pot directly to the ground in front of the goal. That's not what they coached you to do. Yeah. I mean, credit to Baligan for being led on his feet and ready to go with that finish.

Seems like he deserves a goal from these two games, and he got it. 16th minute, a good ball from Lund kind of curled in behind for Ballo to run onto. So this is a little bright moment from Christopher Lund. Ballo maybe could have flicked it over to Wea arriving in front of an empty goal, but maybe not. Maybe it was impossible. I think he tried to beat the keeper himself. It ends up over with Pulisic on the left.

He beats his guy and whips that ball in at Wea from the end line. And Wea uses his chicken wing, as you said it, to put it up in the top corner. And then kind of looked around, he knew. I mean, of course he knew. And it was called off justly, of course. It's a sneaky good chance for Balagan,

and it's a great ball in from Lund. And again, it also kind of illustrates the difference between this Oman team and Uzbekistan, but also, you know, something Greg talked about was, after Uzbekistan was after you beat the way, a wave of pressure and their defense isn't set, like attack it right away. And so Oman was not set a lot of times.

And I think we did a better job of attacking those spaces right away. So Lund hitting this curling ball. I mean, again, it's bad for Vermont in that Lund is under no pressure whatsoever, and they still have a high line. And we have Wea and Bolligan both trying to race him behind it. So, yeah, these are situations you're not going to be presented with all of the time. But when it's here in the game that you're playing, like see if you can do it. Like press your advantage. And so this is not a bad chance at all for Bolligan to sneak in and just give this a little dink over the onrushing keeper into an empty net.

And so we're not that far off here. Yeah, no. This was maybe not an example. I mean, maybe if you agree with me that Baligan could have passed it to Wea, could have flicked it over to him and didn't, then maybe it is an example of it. But I did think we still have a lot of kinks to iron out in the final third, it seems like. There's work to be done. There definitely is.

And, you know, I feel like most people understood that that wasn't going to be an overnight thing. You know, couldn't just be like, okay, now we're going to get our patterns right. You know, the World Cup, we kind of muscled our way through with the group that we were super young. These guys are all breaking through and emerging at their club for the most part. Now that we're past that, everyone's just going to come in and start cooking right away. And that really wasn't ever going to be the case, but it remains to be seen whether we get to that point, you know, over the next 10 months before the COPA. Right.

And I think Balagan's presence, he's still very new to the team. That's a big thing we have to work out. And Berthelter said something to that effect. Let me play that. This is going to be a real short clip. I think we're still trying to figure out, you know, the best way to utilize Ballo because we know he's high quality. He made a number of good runs behind the back line that we didn't pick up on.

So he's still integrating that side of it. Made a number of good runs behind the back line that we didn't pick up on this. This was not one of them. Lund picked up on the run and he played him a pretty good ball. But I guess we'll get into some more stuff about Ballow's runs being missed as we go. I want to say I love the left-footed passes from Chris Richards out to Lund. He could not do that four years ago. And they say humans never change, but here's an example of a human changing.

He can play a left-footed pass very nicely. Who are your sources that say humans never change? Anonymous, anonymous sources. Okay. And then the other thing is the cage matchability. You talked about it with Wes and that, you know, shielding that guy off. But the cage matchability of all three of our midfielder's in this game, but especially Wes and Eunice, but Malik too, to some extent, when he, you know, when he puts his mind to it,

it is very, very, it's a very big deal that the way that they can control the space around And again, with Malik, the caveat, like when he puts his mind to it, the way they can win the ball, come away with it and come away with it in a positive way. Again, caveat of the opponent. But they did that at the World Cup, too. Yep, they did that at the World Cup. And we're still sitting hopefully soon on one Gio Raina, who is not going to be out of place when it comes to that kind of leverage. and strength on the ball. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm pretty amped up for October. Another great ball from Wes in the 27th minute over to Dest on the back post. He tries to redirect it across. I actually don't know what he was trying to do here. Was he trying to shoot maybe? No, he's squaring it. He's squaring it.

I thought so. And he misses both the two runners in front of goal, Malik and Tim, and it goes just wide of the post. kind of look like a shot, although I agree it very likely wasn't. Ballo's arriving late at the penalty marker and he just stares daggers at Serge from missing that opportunity. It turns out he was off. Serge was offside anyway.

It was tight, but yeah, there's just, it's just too simple of a square. And the technique he goes for here is like the simple shape of the inside of your foot to just, you know, put it back across for the tap end for either of your team. mates. For me, if Serge is shooting this, then he's really going to let it be known and he's going to like go for again. Surgeon and Wei are both these like aesthetic gods. He'd be going for something.

He'd be putting on a show if you were shooting. He'd be swiveling and swinging the swinging his laces through it. That's what I think. Yeah. Eunice really being a cheat coat out there, just shrugging people off, dribbling for as long as he wants, at least until he gets into, like, anywhere near zone 14 and starts. It starts the head off to the corner flag. I noticed in the 29th minute, 2810,

Wes gets it from Malik in the pocket. It doesn't turn into space. I need a little more verticality from West there. That's the 2810 mark, Greg, if you're going to check my work. I am. Yeah, I do want to see this one. I know we had the Malik one coming up. Wes was in the pocket.

He didn't, I don't know that he had any clear options, but once he turned, things would start developing. No, I mean, I think you're right. And part of this is like the same. with the one Malik miss is where maybe Ed Poulos, like part of it is just a volume thing. Like if you, if we're finding people in those pockets a lot, there will be times where they failed to check their shoulder and they just aren't, they don't have that 360 awareness. And so, you know, the quick layoff, the quick bounce back to a safe option that you can see

is just going to happen sometimes. You know, you want them to do the more dangerous thing more often when they have the, the option to turn and go. But if you're if you're playing a team like this and you are constantly, constantly getting players in those pockets, there will just be the times where they just haven't, they got a little lazy on, before they received it, aren't sure, and so they just bounce it back. Right.

I think that's what happened here. Malik, right at the 30-minute mark, I'm dinging Malik for not pressing the issue a bit. This is when Pulisic, you know, takes a few dribbles from midfield, plays it straight on to Balligan, and then runs past Balligan, like almost brushes his shoulder as he runs towards the box, Baligan turns to his left and squares it for Malik kind of at the top of zone 14. So in the middle of the field, uh, outside of the box, Malik just recycles it backwards when he has Pulisik making a run between two defenders into, uh, you know, I mean, a clipped ball over the top or a ball in the ground would work there. So did I already say that? I think I already

did. You did earlier, uh, when we were just discussing Pool Six, uh, most memorable moment. So Yeah, one of his memorable moments was being missed here. This one, this one's more egregious if we're, if we're ranking them than the, in the West one we just talked about, because like, Balo's doing all this work. Poulsick and Bala both are doing all this work. And like, you can see the players they're drawing, right? So you should have just that sort of math in your head of like four players over around Balo means I have the space.

With West, it was just kind of like a nothing play where it comes to him. And it wasn't like we'd disorganized Oman yet. Here, Oman's disorganized. This is exactly the moment that we should be like, now can we spring it forward? Plus, Malik is standing side on. So he can see, I mean, he's looking right at all of Amman's numbers and should see, like, and put it together that he's the one with the space to now exploit the advantage we've gained from Balo's work and drive it forward. And instead, first touch, like, doesn't look anywhere and just pings it backwards.

Yeah, it's frustrating. This could just be him sort of defaulting to that. But game plan of being like, okay, ball comes to me. I set it for, I set it for Wes or Musa in this case. It's like switch it, I guess. But no, this is just a miss from Malik. It's not the end of the world. But yeah, check it in the film room and be like, you got to go here.

This is where we got to press. Baligan, we have a screenshot of it here. And Baligan has four defenders within four or five yards of him. He's drawn a lot of attention. Yeah, and Malik's got a 10-yard radius of, zero players around him. Yeah. Or even moving towards him.

Right. 31st minute Desper's Balegan's feet in the box from the right side and he turns with a guy on his back, waltzes across the box, just totally in control here. Maybe a little too slowly,

maybe a little too casual. And then plays it out to Lund. I think Balligan wanted to shoot and just realized he couldn't and then gives it to Lund and Lund tries to cut it. it back for somebody, but it finds nobody. This was right after the Malik casual recycle, we'll call it.

And so again, this is how in control we were. So we lose that chance, but then can very quickly get it out to Sergino Dest and who hits a really incisive pass. So this was a great example, too, of not going for just the aimless cross or any kind of, I don't want to say all our crosses were aimless. but the decision from Dest to hit a nice incisive pass into Bala's feet and then continuous run to add another attacker under the box. Very pleasing to me.

Yeah. Richards was dominant in the air against Oman. Miles too, but I just want to point out Richard's dominance because he hasn't always been so great in the air. Again, we'll see how dominant he is in the air against Ghana and Germany. Yeah. Yeah. But here's, Burharto was actually.

asked about Richards, and I think his answer was kind of interesting. What can he kind of bring from these national team performances to Crystal Palace when he does get those opportunities? I think confidence. You know, he's got a, he's got, we believe in him. His teammates believe in him here, and that goes a long way. And maybe he can bring that confidence back to London. And, you know, he's got to prove himself there.

And that's part of it. I mean, it's a tough business. And you're in the Premier League, the best league in the world. And, you know, when you get an opportunity, you've got to take advantage of it. And that's how it goes. You know, he's a guy we're really high on. And we hope that, you know, he takes us back with him and really pushes to be a starter. Or when he gets his opportunity, he'll have his fitness in him to be able to take advantage of it.

Three centerbacks to contend with at Crystal Palace. It doesn't seem like a super hopeful situation. But, boy, he looks good for the U.S. Yeah, we'll take it. If this is Rusty, Chris Richards, we're doing okay. and I think Pallas might, I think, feel like one of their centerbacks was on international duty and had to like come off injured. I'm not celebrating anybody's injury, but there may be, there may be some minutes up for grabs and we'll see if Richards benefits from that. We'll see.

33rd minute, we get that night. It was like a set piece for us and a hopeful cross from Pulisic. It kind of lands over with Way and Wes. Waya does some of the body contortion that you love so much. It plays it over to Wes. West then plays a diagonal to Tillman on the back post. And he lays it off. I mean, this is where you see the quality of a Malik Tilman.

He lays it off perfectly for Miles Robinson. Like he had the quality to hit that pass to Pulisic earlier. He has the quality to do that in like multiple different ways, which is why it's frustrating. He didn't even consider it. But anyway, on this one, he played a little layoff for Miles Robinson, who was in the box because it was a set piece. And Miles, you know, takes a respectable shot on frame.

Side foots it pretty hard. Draws a good save from the keeper. Yeah, this is just, again, going back to Wayas movement here, it's nothing special. It's like a completed pass. But just the economy of his motion, like the set piece had come in and gets headed out to him. And I just love how he will just stand perfectly upright and still as the ball is approaching him

and like just stop it dead under his feet. and then just like explode into some new movement even if he doesn't go very far. And then the economy of like driving that player like one step the other way and then just pure a wedding without even touching the ball until he just pushes it over to West, which is again a really long winded of saying, long winded way of saying he connected a pass six yards over. Right. A horizontal pass. The layoff from Alex amazing.

Like stops it dead. so that it dies directly in front of Miles Robinson to step into to allow that shot. If it doesn't come in, if he doesn't do that, then maybe Miles Robinson's shot from a centerback doesn't look as good as it does. So this was one of a couple of really good moments from Malik. So again, this is what he's in there for, and it's what we needed to seed who keep him, his name sort of in the hat for the next couple of matches. He's in my hat.

I'll tell you that much. Absolutely. Just real quick, a few more things. from the first half. Waya gets a chance cutting in from the left after he gets sprung down the left wing by Wes.

So he ended up on the left wing for a while and he rips it just wide of the near post. It seemed like the goalkeeper had it covered. So the half arrives. Let me just say right now, we're going to do a kind of a window wrap-up for patrons tomorrow.

That'll go on the patron feed if you want to become a patron of the scuff podcast. The link is in the show notes. After the half, Aronson's on for Pulisic. Peppies on for Fuller and Baligan. Ballo came off the first half shaking his head.

He did not want to come out of the game. And you'll love to see it. So he's not buying. He's not buying the preseason, no preseason, because that's the rationale Greg gave. So Ballo is saying, no, I'm good. I could have gone. And then I think Burrhalter even said, like, we want to get Moosa some minutes because he didn't have a preseason. Right.

That's the reasons the rationales are all over the place. They always have been, you know? Oh, yeah. That's like, that's just coaching because you. You always want to give like the softest rationale possible to say, I'm just going to play the other guy. He's not going to come out there and say, I feel really bad for not taking Pepe to the World Cup.

So he's going to play the second half of both of these friendlies. And Peppy, you know, I think Pepe's, peppy's earned in his minutes at this point. It's hard to argue otherwise. Early in the half, a lovely little, I just have to note this one, a lovely little outside of the boot help along from Wes. to Brenda. It's like the whole thing is vertical.

So it's a pass into Wes's feet. He helps it without barely changing the trajectory of the ball up to Brenda. And then Brenda turns his guy and they just cut right through him on. Then Brendan overcocks the through ball for Wea who is making a better version of the same run. Pepe is making.

I just want to stop here because this is really slick. the touch from West and the turn from Brenda are both fantastic and then the through ball we can we can it's over cooked but but the whole thing we'd talked about in this game and the Uzbekistan the Uzbekistan match where we were just not even attempting this pass enough

right so it's like we talked about Brenda being the guy who is going to bring that frenetic energy he's not going to like slow down at this point in his career and be like let's recycle the window's too small don't want to risk it let's keep possession it's like no this is what you do like hit the pass hit it better next time or hit it better often enough to to score some goals.

But like this is what we want. We want these passes attempted. We want to see this a lot with Boligan in the game from everyone else hitting these passes. So anyway, just this is what the past looks like when it doesn't come off. Right. It wasn't overcooked by too much either, just a little bit. And yeah, I love that impetus from Brendan.

53 minute mark. Pepe gets a chance on a corner kick, heads it off the side netting. Probably should have sent it back across, but he's hungry for goals. He's hungry for goals, Ricardo is. 58 minute mark, a nice find from West to Tillman

in the middle of the field. And Tillman, this is another example of what Tillman offers. Just a nice play on the half turn from him. He lets the ball roll between the two defenders who are bracketing him, and he eliminates them both. And then he passes it to Aaron's,

who is running right at the box, and Aronson gets trucked over for a free kick. This is what we need to see from him, that idea of how to take a pass and attack with it. You know, we've kind of nitpicked a couple of times where it came to him when he was conservative, but I don't think in general I'm worried about Malik Tillan being like an overly conservative attacker.

Right. The much bigger worry is his, is that early chance for Oman and his consciousness of the danger that he needs to help corral as a defender. That's a really self-important way of saying. He just needs to find somebody and mark him. Yeah, as you know,

Brennan Aronson hits the free kick right at the wall. It parts like the Red Sea. The ball is deflected through the gap off of one of the defenders in the wall, and then it wrong-foots the keeper who can't make a play as it travels right next to him into the goal. Kind of, I mean, if you,

you're an Oman fan, you're not happy with this goal. I mean, I'm in the union and I'm not, I'm not really trying to defend him too much. Like the slap, the slappery threw at it, uh, isn't, isn't great on the optics. Yeah. He did get wrong for it. I didn't think it was a deflection at first, but then I, you know, I was corrected on that. Thank goodness. Yeah.

So it deflected, which, you know, if, if he had started moving and was already diving to his left and then watches it helplessly go. to his right, maybe he'd have come off looking better. But the fact that it's still into his actual person and he just kind of takes a swing at it, gives it a high five on its way in.

Yeah. So that's a goal, 2.0. 63rd minute, a lovely little outside of the boot pass from Desk to Tillman. So Desk gets the ball on the right wing, dribbles across perpendicular to the, parallel to the edge of the box.

One of my high school math teachers would be ashamed of me. right now parallel to the top of the box and then plays that little that clever little outside of the boot pass into malik who is making a good run into the box malik gets down to the man city zone and pulls a patient precise cut back to peppy right at the near post and peppy hits it off the side netting i love everything about this um you know except the finish could have done better i think Pepe could have. I mean, yeah, that is, it's true that since it didn't go into the goal, he could have done

better where it does go into the goal. I'm glad we you got, I got, you know me, I've got no qualms on this. This is, this is lovely stuff. And it's what I want us to be doing when we're playing Oman, right? It's to just carve them up. I don't care that it's desk attacking three players. Like, don't cross it in. Like attack your, attack the four Oman players in the corner of the box and soccer through them.

And we absolutely do it here. So great look for Pepe here created by Malik Tillman. You know, this is it. This is the audition and this is what we need to see from these guys in their auditions. Yeah. So I guess as the timeline goes, Malik, the number of plus moments from Malik maybe is a little higher than I initially thought than I initially calculated. But we'll get into that more tomorrow, I suppose. Yeah.

Well, go ahead. But I'll just say like this is what I feel like we. are looking for is a player who quietly like sets up three chances. And it's not a big deal because he just kind of does it so effortlessly when he does it. That's what we're after. You know, and maybe you just don't realize it and appreciate it while you're watching it. But then when you stop and like compare it to what you've, you may have been used to, you're like, oh, this is actually, it's actually quite important to have a player who does this.

Yeah, it is. I think it's a, I think it's a pretty big development now that I, now that I consider at this very moment. Musa gets a little knock on his foot, splitting some defenders in midfield, just dribbling by people as he did all game. He looked a little shaken up, but he continued.

I guess he was okay. And he does, I mean, you know, by rationale B from Berthor, he does need the minutes because he's not getting him at club. Whereas Balagan, you know, he needs his minutes limited because he's not getting them at club.

Yeah. Kromoski comes on for Tilly. Hillman and McKenzie comes on for Richards in the 71st minute. I thought Kermoski was kind of messy at first, but he did settle in, as we'll see. 72nd minute, Dest gets a shot on the counter after an Oman corner kick and Horvath throws it out for Wea. Wea plays Dest into Zone 14 and he takes a shot and just drags it way wide. It was kind of goofy the way he shot that. But don't undersell the Horvath technique here for the not roll but not throw.

Right. He like fast-pitched softballed out to out to Wea. I was going to say he's like a really drunk bowler, you know. Yeah, it's like when you're just throwing it halfway down. The high school kids on the bowling bowling lane next to you and they're doing all this mad stuff. That was that was Horvath here. No, it was effective. It was.

Let's see. Jones comes on for desk in the 76th minute and then we get the peppy goal. it's a it's uh waya who's still in the game just kind of just kind of rabble-rousing over there and he uh he picks it up and uh hits a sweet diagonal over to uh over to jones um duan jones Jones uh Jones plays a lovely cutback reminiscent of the Denzel Dumfrey's dagger at the World Cup and um not quite as good but Kromoski leaves it and it travels over to Pepey at the top of the box. He takes a touch and hits it pretty well, low and hard to the goalkeeper's right. Goalkeeper gets a finger to it, but all he can do is push it into the side netting on the inside of the goal.

So that's 3-0 and Pepey gets his ninth career U.S. Men's National Team goal. I'm going to make this a bit and just keep doing it every time. That puts him tied for 28th all time in the, USMNT goal scoring list. Bells, I can't wait for the day that you say that that ties him for first all time with Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey. That's going to be a special day. It is.

Yeah, I mean, this is solid technique from Pepe to create the shot this quickly. His body's moving away from the goal. He doesn't have the momentum. So it's a good swivel hit. And yeah, Pepe just keeps delivering. Like, come off the bench score goal is a good way to stay in the roster, I think. Yeah, and he got on the end of that other chance. I mean, I don't know what the underlying numbers are for him in these two games,

but it seems like they were decent in this game, especially with the XA he gets for his setup of West. That comes coming up here. Then Paredes comes on for Wea. I do wonder how hard it is for these young guys on the periphery of the national team to come in and get, you know, they get there like 15 minutes, or in his, in Paredes' case, I think it was 13 minutes at the end of a game to do something. It's got to be pretty nerve-wracking. And it looked like both Kromoski and Paredes were pretty nervous, especially because

there's so many people on the field who are not in that situation. They're like totally established. So I'm going to give both of them a lot of grace. I mean, Kramoski doesn't need that much grace because he did some good stuff as the game went on. but um preface just looked like he was uh he wasn't ready for the moment to me i mean he did he did help create a goal so there's that but it's we was just getting thrown to the ground yeah it's you see it a lot for for guys coming in on their debut i mean i the the class example

for me is julian green's debut against mexico way back in 2014 where it looks like they're playing on ice a little bit and everything's a little slippery and they're just uh you know they're they're overreaching and sacrificing balance and maybe thinking about things a little too much. And again, if this is what you do on your debut and still manage to set up an own goal, like you'll take it. Right. It's almost like we got to give these guys some elbow pads when they go out there for their debut. Yeah.

Reminds me of my broomball debut. You know, I still have some shards of bone in my elbow floating around in there. I mean, so the other thing to keep in mind, too, is what a ask it was for Tanner Testman against Uzbekistan. Because he didn't come in to just be like, okay, maybe try something everyone's while. He comes in and it's like, okay, every single thing will go through you for the next 60 minutes. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, by comparison, Tanner Testament looked like a seasoned vet, you know? And, you know, when it comes to like professional minutes, that means something for your club.

He is a seasoned vet compared to Kevin Predis. Anyway, Paredes is, he's still got a lot of potential, and I'm excited to track his career, but it didn't seem, it wasn't a huge success for him. He did, like we said, caused the own goal. He helped cause the own goal in the 81st minute. There's a switch to Jones. Jones, who seemed to be very willing to soccer in this game, finds Kramoski in the half space.

Kramoski kind of hesitates on the ball and then just plays a lovely little weighted through ball inside the outside back for Paredes to run onto, and Paredes hits a good right-footed cross. I mean, it's a nicely placed and well-hit low ball at the edge of the six with his weak foot. So after all the criticism, I just leveled against him. He did do this very good thing. Peppie's arriving on it,

and the defender, number 16, slides to cut it out and just pokes at home, 4-0. Yeah, so you, you, It's fun to imagine that if the defender leaves that for fear of the own goal, then Pepe gets to add even more underlying numbers. That's how I'm choosing to interpret it rather than just saying own goal. And then even sticking with Pepe, there was another moment where Brenda probably could have squared it to him for a look that we didn't. So Pepe getting in a lot of good spots in his 45 minutes against, again, a one.

Just to be clear, the defender number 16 is Al-Briaki, the right center back. he's the one who scored that fourth goal. And then in the 85th minute, Peppy does another thing that's really good. Maybe his best thing he did in the game. He receives a pass from, again, from Jones at the edge of the box. It takes two kind of long touches, but they eliminate two defenders.

The first one by, did he kind of Croif touch it away from himself? I think so. And then so that kind of leaves the guy on his back behind, and then he gets to the ball before the left back can and pokes it past him in behind into the box. And then just makes the absolutely correct decision to play a soft cutback for Wes arriving, totally unmarked in the box. And West McKinney cannot get his feet and timing right on this ball and just scuffs it from roughly the penalty marker. drags it wide and rude the day that it happened immediately. Yeah, Wes knows. Yeah, fantastic from Pepe.

Again, this is when you're playing an opponent that you have outmatched late in a game that they're going to tire before we do, we bring in stronger subs than they do. This is what I want Pepe to be feasting on for the next cycle, right? And, you know, again, God willing, like making it a full-on. discussion of who's who's the striker that's what we want to be happening in all of these positions so um peppy absolutely doing his part here and then it's just going to be a matter of uh going back going back to holland and and maybe hopefully making some of those uh asking some of those same questions of one luke dion yeah yep yep i you know i just i'm i'm hopeful that he'll just get

he'll get to get some league minutes as Champions League gets going and, you know, PSV heads to Arsenal this Wednesday, right? Heads up to London. So there's going to be hopefully some rotation needed and he'll get plenty of minutes. That's it. That's it for me. Anything else from you? I don't think so. I mean, we're going to do a little more, you know, maybe analysis tomorrow.

of what we take away from this camp. But we gotta save it for paying subscribers, man. Come on. All right. Thank you, Greg. Thanks for listening everybody. We'll see you.