Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #440: USMNT v Ghana recap

Episode Date: October 19, 2023

A very pleasant, low-key, Gio-centric evening in Nashville.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’s 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. What a pleasant evening in Nashville beat Ghana 4 to 0. Gio Raina starred with a big friendly smile on his face. Greg, how you doing? I'm doing all right. You go to Nashville to party, and I believe that felt like a party. Yeah, it sure did. Even though it was a half-empty stadium, well, yeah, it was about half-empty, right?

It's still, it was a great feeling in the stadium, I thought. I mean, so this is one of mine where I know you enjoy the stadium talk, the venue talk, the location. And again, I've said before, I love that you love it, bells. My big concern for U.S. soccer scheduling games is like, selfishly, I just wanted an area that I want to go to that I can easily go to. And if they check that box, I'm good with it. Right. Yeah. But I mean, I guess people could see the attendance or the lack of people in seats and think, well, the atmosphere wasn't that great.

And I would say that's not true. It was a great atmosphere. I was having a ball. The fellows on the field seemed to be having fun. Yeah. I mean, I'm sure they would say it wasn't as raucous as the World Cup qualifier there. But yeah, it was just a good time. It was low-key, good time.

It was actually kind of nice to have a lot of empty seats in the stadium because at halftime, I was sitting with a bunch of other scuffed folks behind the goal that we scored all the goals in in the first half. The second half I went up by myself and sat at, you know, essentially the 50-yard line and watched from a tactical view. And so it was like, you had a lot of flexibility. You could sort of sit wherever you wanted. It was great. Let's do the lineups. Turner, Ingole, of course, Dest, Miles, Richards, and Lund across the back line.

Get another look at Lund. Dest back in his more comfortable right back spot. And then Cardoso, Musa, and Raina were the midfifers. fielders and Johnny Cardoso that is Johnny soccer. There you go. Wea and Pulisic on the wings and Fuller and Baligan up top. So Miles was kind of a, you know, we didn't know who is going to pair up in central, at the centerback spots because it could have been any two, to be honest.

Right. So CCV, just getting back from injury, maybe he's not ready to start. So it's a, you know, Miles gets the opportunity. and not particularly tested. And then Lund was another one. We weren't sure how the full back's going to line up. So the back line does have some coin tosses in there, doesn't it? Going forward to.

People are getting us about Lund. You know, he's looking at now. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I mean, I was, I was, you know, totally unfamiliar with Lund's game, to borrow a phrase from some other, I think, soccer podcaster. And, you know, the tape we'd watch was, it was not impressive. He has been, he has been totally fine, totally fine for the U.S. Very stable for us back there.

So I imagine he'll just keep getting looks until he doesn't end up totally fine. We'll talk about Johnny, too. There's a long line, though, of players who have been totally fine for several camps and then suddenly sort of aren't fine anymore and drop off totally. Right. And it's crazy that you would think. Lund would be tested a lot defensively in a game like this. He's up against Mohamed Kudus.

He did get beaten one time kind of for Kudos to hit a rip a right-footed ball, kind of a shot cross across the six. But I don't know that he was, I don't know that Lund was tested that much, which is strange to say, which kind of segues nicely into the Ghana lineup, which is kind of a mystery to me, why it is, why that game was the way it was,

because I'll give the names first. Abdul Nuruddin and goal, Alidu Sadu at right back, Nicholas Apoku, and Jerome Apocou as the centerbacks, and then Gideon Mensa at left back. He had kind of a rough night. Thomas Parti and Edmund Addo as sort of a double pivot.

And then Kudus at right wing, Jordan Ayu, at sort of a central striker number 10 position and then Joseph Pantel at left wing and then Inaki Williams as the striker. Now just for reference, this is, you know, Nuridine is sitting behind Gagas Lanina at Yupin. So he's in Belgium.

In the back line, we've got Liga-un, Liga-Doo, Turkey, and Liga-Doo. And then, so that's definitely the weakest part of the lineup, the back five. But the front six is Arsenal, Red Star, Belgrade, West Ham, Crystal Palace, a really good attacker for Gink in Paintsle,

and then Athletic Bilbao for Inaki Williams. So this, you know, if this was like a Concaf lineup, this would be, I don't know, roughly on Mexico's level. Probably about, I mean, for badge FCs, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, for doing badge economics, I mean, it's not a, these guys are playing for good clubs or they're at good clubs for the most part. Yeah, they didn't, Gana didn't call up like a bunch of nobody's just to just fill a roster. These guys aren't plumbers that we've seen in some Concaf games that we do win for zero. These are all really solid professional players. And I don't know if they're just, if they were disinterested. it's one of those things where we beat them so badly so early that it ends up taking like some of the shine off the actual win. Like it's almost better.

Our guys need to learn it's almost better to keep it closer for longer so that it's a more impressive victory. Because if you blow them out, then I was like, oh, they must just be terrible. So a little bit of a little bit naive from our guys to blow it open this soon. Very naive. You got to think about the optics a little more. They did kind of look bad. They didn't threaten us much at all in the first half. But I don't know why they're bad.

I guess judging by the postgame press conference, a lot of the reporters wanted Burhalter to comment on the, a lot of the Ghanan reporters wanted Burrhalter to comment on the Ghana coach. So I guess everybody's really mad at the coach. They've had a lot of bad results since the World Cup ended. You know, they got their one World Cup win. They got a win in the World Cup, so it's something. but yeah they they have been dropping results against bad competition they haven't played any good

competition uh since the world cup and depending on where you consider mexico up until last saturday night so right uh yeah i mean they're just it certainly seems like they are well below the sum of their parts yeah i guess that's it to the timeline we got about 40 minutes to get this done we're hustling we're hustling we're hustling But it's all right because I feel like our team kind of coasted for the last after 40 minutes so I think it's fair if we start coasting

after 40 minutes. Like first minute in, one minute into the game we get a couple of looks, right? A couple of moments where Johnny Cardoso steps up nicely into midfield to disrupt a Ghana buildup, disrupts it very well right to Gio Raina who gets to turn and immediately be in a geo-Rena situation.

I got a snapshot of it right as Raina wins it. once again, Balagan, making that immediate darting run up the scene. It's just like automatic for him. Rain is the guy that we're like, oh, he's going to see it. And I think he does clock it here. But Baligan's run is sort of pinning the centerback, who also has Christian Pulisick darting behind his shoulder. So he's going to end up essentially Rain is going to have twoverts here with one safety

for Ghana to try to play it. So it's almost like Raina's watching to see where the guy plays. And the centerback turns his hips. with with ball a gun. So Raina tries to hit Pulisic. The pass is undercooked. If it's a better pass, Pulcic has a chance,

maybe a chance to be an on goal, but it's sort of badly underhit. Poolick controls it and then gets bumped off the ball by the recovering Ghana right back. And at this point, Pulcic wants a foul, but it's a little soft. Ghana give it right back to us.

Johnny comes back into the play, disrupts again. Raina collects that again. No, excuse me, Raina and Johnny combined to disrupt. Johnny ends up with it and now Johnny does hit that immediate ball to Balagan on the transition.

So we win the ball and right there I was like okay Johnny you're you're coming back next next window just for that past because that's what we're looking for win the ball, immediate ball vertical to Balagan's feet and Balagan gets a decently powerful shot from the top of the box straight at the goalkeeper.

I think I liked Cardoso. I think he played pretty well. I'm sure we'll get into it more. in the sixth minute it just looks like Geo is going to be orchestrating all through like as long as he's out there he's going to be orchestrating our attack dropping deep left

and sends Lund down the line after a little combination. I think Lund gets dispossessed. 7 minute, 30 second mark a good sequence of short passing from Pulisick and Ballow. Love to see it. I haven't seen much of that yet. Yeah, so Balo had a few of those

against Germany too and we'll get into more of them in this game, where we do hit it into his feet. And he does have those little outside of the foot. So he drops that, you know, right foot deep. He's receiving side on, holding a center back off. Yeah. And he just sort of is able to just flick it with the outside of his boot. Kind of like you see Tim Waya do a lot when you got deaths running at him.

So Balo gives us that. I see people kind of, kind of dingin him for his holdup player, just saying he's not a holdup striker. And he's not a big burly holdup striker like the old days. But you can play it. Certainly play a ball into him. And if you got people running to join him, he's looking for that quick layoff. and then that immediate spin to go.

Yeah, I love that. I love the decisiveness of that from him. And yeah, I mean, the, the first goal has... Let's do it. Yeah, we're right there. So 11th minute, goal USA. Miles slides it out to Dest on the sideline. He skips inside Mensa and dribbles forward down the channel, so it kind of beats him.

And then plays just a lovely little one, too, with Ballot. It's exactly what you were just describing. It plays it on the ground to Bala. Balo flicks it with the outside of his boot into space that Dess rushes into, takes a touch to sort of clear any resistance, and he's in to the final third. He taps it back to Bala over to the right and into the box, and then Bala whips it across, probably, no, I mean, not probably, definitely aiming for Poulosik on the back post. And it's cut out on a sliding challenge by Nicholas Opoku, number 18.

and it just bounces up nicely for Gio, who is waiting for the cutback himself, and he smashes it past Nerudian. I think the goalkeeper got a hand to it, but not enough, obviously. Dest and Ballo do the heavy lifting there, but Gio's calm with the finish. 1-0, USA. Yeah, and again, we're cruising, right? This is great stuff. Everyone's happy for Gio.

Full team celebration around them if you're following those kinds of things and still worried at all about U.S. Gio's getting back into the team. Pulisic notably quite happy about the goal. There we go. So I'm glad that's noted. More than anything, I'm just thrilled with Serginio Dest on the right side. Again, everything has to be caveated here, right?

So if you're like, well, we were bad against Germany and so we were rough against Germany, we made these changes for the Ghana game and now we look amazing. You've got to be real careful with that kind of thing. So Dest is cooking all night, not necessarily just because he's on the right. It could be, you know, Ghana's not Germany. Yeah. Not as much, not as much threat the other way allows him more freedom. He did drop a highlight reel of his, of his 1v1s on Instagram.

So check out out out. Because, I mean, this game needs a Sergenio Desi Highlight Reel. There was a lot of fun stuff. Oh, man, it was a blast. Him and Wea. So when you gave the lineup and it's like Destin Way on the wrong, right side again. I am at the point where I don't care about the optimal soccer outcomes anymore. Dest and way, I just have to be on the right side for humanity's sake. They have to partner together

in every game we play. And it's often been McKinney who's done the combining from the middle with them over there, but in this game, obviously McKinney not on the field in the first half, it was geo a lot of times. And boy, he's a great addition to that combination. So, They are having, they're having so much fun. Like you can just see in their body language of those, those two. And then, yeah, Geo fits right in. And I just, I have to have that to when I watch this team. So I don't need, I mean, I appreciate all the debates about, well, we can, if we run geo on the left and we can get Scali or whatever, whatever all those conversations are.

But like, no, just for just for enjoying the game, I have to have way and dust together. Okay. I would love to, you know, give that to you if I could. 14th minute A subtle but very nice turn by Gio in the center circle Faints like he's going to square it to Johnny and then just glides forward He did this several times in the game

and plays Poulosick into the final third Loaded is lovely to see that ball just casually slid out there into Poulissick's path Also not the only time this happened I will say I love the tactical view from the from the half line but there's something about watching that lateral explosiveness from the

from behind the goal where you know it's like these guys go from a standstill to like five yards to the side just like in the blink of an eye and then the way geo the way geode moves and then just so casually flicks it you know like 30 yards perfectly in stride he obviously doesn't do it with every pass we've noted one where he didn't but it's a nice angle for that from behind the goal yeah again this is just this is just beautiful stuff to enjoy watching and Or, you know, in the past, certainly last cycle, early in last cycle, we just didn't have anything resembling this. There was just nothing like what Wea and DESE and GEO do when they have the ball. And again, it's almost for the aesthetic.

Like the aesthetic of it is just so incredible. Whereas before, when we didn't have that, everything just came down to like, okay, but how can we optimize these pieces we have? They're not very good. Can we find a way to put them in situations where we can, you know, do something worthwhile? and now we get to actually like, be like, I'm sure some worthwhile stuff will come, but man, do am I just going to enjoy that little shoulder faint? And I know there's some people who think we're too,

or like think I in particular are too, you know, I flatter Gio too much. If you think that I'm going to be really disappointing to you in this episode. I'm thinking of you, Daniel, Johannes. I'm laughing because, go ahead, go ahead. No, just a guy who disagrees in a very, a very gentlemanly way. So it's not like there's no acrimony here.

But man, he is, for me, Gio is, he just elevates the way we play so much. And I don't know exactly what the right midfield setup is. And, you know, it's going to be case by case. But he's a player. No, I'm laughing because we actually, I still get the business from people about the World Cup. and the view I still have on the World Cup in that there's zero chance in the world that any coach would rate, say,

a Jordan Morris over Giorina for any situation in a soccer match. And in fact, like, Jordan Morris is the one who takes a lot of the heat for that because he went in in the, what, 88th and 92nd minute of two games in the World Cup. Even rating Brendan Aronson ahead of Giorina for anything to do in a soccer game would just be nuts unless you're...

I mean, you could maybe stretch to like if you are full on murder ball team, which we were not in the World Cup and still are not. That maybe, maybe, maybe you could justify it. But no, like, Gio is the guy. Even, yeah, I know a lot of caveats apply, but I do feel like it's not just his incredible ability to find a pass in the attacking half, you know, to find, to create space for himself and then find a pass. it's the control he brings and the calm he brings throughout, like all over the field. We, it did seem like, especially in retrospect, like, we miss that so much in the second half against Germany. And it might be, yeah.

We missed it in the World Cup. Sorry to interrupt. But like, there were so many times where people, again, we're trying to justify not bringing a G.O. Raina into a game because it's like, well, we, you know, we're trying to protect the lead. He's not the guy he'd bring in. It's like, he absolutely would if he's, you know, if he's healthy. he is a guy who would help us here to stabilize a match.

Whereas Brennan Aronson, who was a guy coming in because Weston McKinney was on a minutes restriction or whatever it was, does not stabilize anything in a one-zero game. Like he adds chaos and you just hope that the chaos shakes out in your team's favor, but he is not a stabilizing force. Whereas Raina just simply is. He just can help control tempo in a way that like a frantic opponent

desperately pushing for a goal. can be subdued a little bit by Giorina. Yeah. That goes back to your point about every situation. He's the best guy to bring on in every situation. And I do wonder, you know, I'm glad he only played 45 minutes. We don't want him to get hurt again against Germany. But it would have been fascinating to see how that second half played out with Gio on the field.

I still think we probably lose. But it's a different game, in my opinion. All right. We've already fallen behind schedule. 15th minute. Dest roasts pencil on the right and then whips a ball across that Ballo meets at the near post but redirects right at Nerudin. This is actually a decent chance and it's all Dest just cooking over there. Oh yeah. Great chance. Great look here. So again, we're getting, we're getting Balo some looks. Yeah. 15 minute mark. Wea tries to do Gideon Mensa, tries to do to Gideon Mensa what he did to Robin Gerson's on Saturday, which is clip it long.

and then run past him down the line. And Gideon Mentson did not let that happen. So there are limits to that for Tim Way. Just thought it was funny. He tried to do the exact same thing. And then 18th minute penalty. Build out from the back after Johnny cuts out a pass and Turner collects it.

So it goes Miles, Richards, Eunice, Folleran, Johnny, Boleran, Wea, and then Gio. Gio kind of does a guy and slips and then gets back up with the ball, plays just a little no-look pass into Wea in the box. I mean, it's like every pass Geo makes his kind of no-look. He's always lying with his eyes. Wea dribbles around Mensa to the right.

Mensa foolishly leaves a leg out as Wea moves toward the corner, and it seems like a pretty cut-and-dry penalty to me. Yeah, no question. And this is just, again, more of that right-corner stuff that I'm just going to continue to appreciate from from Wea, Dest, and then whoever wants to go join them on the night. And, yeah, like, they don't look threatening. They're just making these little, like, six-yard passes.

The three of them just kind of stand in. And then very suddenly, they kind of have you off. Yeah, they're just have you off balance. And Geo starts the unbalancing and then Wea exploits it. Pulisic, of course, converted the penalty right down the middle. I know there was a little bit of looking around between Gio. Ballo and Pulisic on who was going to take it, but I don't think there was that much discussion.

And then again, if you're tracking this stuff, Gio was a very enthusiastic goal celebrator here after Pulisic put it away. 21st minute. Some nice work from Johnny to juggle the ball over a guy and find Gio. And then Gio does nicely to head it down for Wea. This is all kind of in the center circle. Waya sends it long, expecting Gio to make a lung-busting run in behind.

And I don't, you know, that's not what Gio is probably going to do. most of the time. So, but Gio gave him the thumbs up. Like, that was actually a good idea, Tim. And I mostly noticed noting it because, because Johnny did some cool stuff. What are your thoughts on Johnny?

I liked him. My, the sort of guide I'm using to temper my optimism here is Jen Luka Buzio, who, you know, people were very high on Buzio's first few performances for the U.S. but at the same time they were they were against like weaker teams uh they were in like very low stressed situations and it it sort of turned out he was never really adding that much um so it's just going to be a question of like whether johnny's really adding things and we won't know until we really see him in in more stressful situations again i thought he was solid in that is germany

cammyo uh and i feel like at this point you probably just keep calling him up until until he sort of makes it clear that he's not the guy or until somebody else makes some huge jump. And Tanner Tessman starts dominating in Sariaa next year. Should we call that the friend zone? Just keep calling him up until he screws up, put Lund there too. The friendly zone, yeah. We'll call it the friendly zone. Okay, the friendly zone.

22nd minute goal USA. We're pressing them. Jerome Apoku takes a loose touch. It's a bozo move by him. receiving the ball down in his left corner. Inouyea just pounces, takes it off his feet, slides it across to Bala with one defender between him and the goal. Pulisic and Rayno were both arriving in the box too,

so there were options galore. Baligan pirouettes with his first touch with his right foot, kind of drags it out to his left and then rattles it off the post and into the net. Real nice turn and finish, and it's 3-0 after 22 minutes. How nice. And our press through this whole game is not like, again, it's not a super intense press.

It's just sort of a high line of confrontation with geo adding another body to that line where he kind of gets right up next to Bolligan. And so it was just kind of a gradual press where Ghana was kind of very casual working around. They had plenty of options with enough space that they could have just kept kind of playing in a way that would never be dangerous. They weren't going to like carve us up and break through us. but we just kind of keep gradually advancing that wave up. So it wasn't like one pressing trigger and we all went. It was just our line just kept advancing up the field. Right.

And then eventually just the really, really bad mistake. And that was all she wrote. Yep. I mean, all she wrote after a delightful spin from Fallen-Balligan. Who was, he was chuffed after the game. He was pleased with that. I mean, you saw the hit, right? So he doesn't just have the spin.

He's seven yards out, but he's still just going to be like top bins. Why not? Absolutely. Keepers on the ground, but I'm still just going to put this in off the upright end post. Right. I just want to say I love Geotis Park. It's a really nice place to watch a soccer game. I know you don't care about this, but let me just give it.

Announce attendance was 18,000 and change. The stadium holds 30,000. That's what it felt like to me. It felt like a little over half because the top. The top bowl was almost empty. But we got a little bit, we got a little bit of the first few rows in the top ball. There were some folks sitting up there. 25th minute, a good ball over the top from Cardoso to Dest.

He takes a touch and then cuts it back in kind of in the air to Baligan, kind of like waist high at the top of the box. And Baligan tries for the double points volley and skies it. But a nice kind of different way of finding an opening there. It wasn't the triangles between. between Gio, Tim, and Dest, it was just Cardoso picking out a spot behind the line and Desk making the run. And again, we're going to beat, we're going to beat inattentive teams, right, with these

kinds of moves because Desk coming, Desk being the guy who's making the vertical run, it's just, it's just going to throw some teams off, like with the way way I can just sort of, yeah, can kind of flare out and drop off as Desk goes. Teams that aren't really well prepared are going to, are going to struggle with this. And that's, I think this is a compliment. There's still always going to be the question of like, what are we capable of against a Germany? You know,

what are we capable of in a World Cup round of 16 match? And that's just going to have to be a work in progress as we try to play more of those teams as often as we can. Yeah. Yeah, I still go back to like what, how bad was Ghana? I mean, disinterested maybe is what is what it comes down to. I don't know. 30

no 20 30th minute This is this is definitely in Dest's personal highlight reel But he wins the ball at our end line And then beats Paisal Mensa and Addo And sort of beats Ayu Before he gets hacked from behind for a yellow card This was the crowd was really into it on this one

And it's you know I would have hacked him down too So Because I think he megged Alaska I think the guy who ended up hacking him got megged I believe It's hard to tell and the replay wasn't conclusive.

But yeah, I think there was a nutmeg in there at the very end. So a combination tactical revenge clip. Wasn't trying to hurt him. It wasn't malicious, like malicious. No, no. No, no. You're not going to keep going after that. Right.

31st minutes, a simple bit of disorganization from Waya, Geo, and Dest. Again, way of dribbles kind of inside from the right wing. And then lays it off for Geo at the right corner of the box. and then continues his run into the box. Gio just kind of casually know looks at to Dest who's quietly arriving out wide. So, you know, just that little bit of motion, and all of a sudden, Dest has like six yards to tee something up, and he pumps a head high ball into the box.

Ballo meets it from seven or eight yards out and heads it right at Nerudin. So really good stuff again. Yeah, and again, this is an excellent chance. It kind of happens quick and it's done and Garner are coming out at us, but like if you're if you're compiling the chances uh that's two for balo that were like dead center middle of the six yard box uh those are those are good chances to be creating yes and it's um yeah i get three chances three three chances because the one he scored

i didn't even count that one because i was sort of not less created by our our buildup and more the the terrible turnover but like yeah we we had three chances that we've created now for him. We're doing all right. Yeah. And it's, there is a little bit of like when you're already up three zero in the 30th minute. It's not as important for the producers to put in replays of the chance you missed. I know. Because I don't think they even, did they even show a replay of that header in the broadcast?

Maybe one. I don't know, but definitely, definitely clock it for, for later finishing discourse, which will, I don't know if that'll ever come up again because Balo is the guy and he's going to be the guy whether he misses, uh, those chances or not. the the xg by the way the xg ratio was like i mean why scouts not i know it's not reliable with the actual numbers but the ratio is generally about right and it was like uh 30 to 1 or something no no 10 to 1 10 to 1 10 to 1 not 30 to 1 okay it was like 2.8 to 0.23 or something like that um 30 4th minute uh just loved the way geo took a sky ball down with his

chest and glided away from red shirts to find pool six feet out wide, it didn't result in anything. But that's a, that's another, that's sort of that calming quality he brings to the game. You know, you keep, you've said a couple of times it didn't result in anything, uh, for those nice balls that GOSIC played out to Poolsick. I'm not trying to like add a hot take to what's otherwise a fantastically enjoyable game. Pool sick was kind of quiet in this match. Like, you finished the penalty and he has the, the miss that I should have waited to talk about this until we talked about pool six missed. But. But there wasn't as, like, it was a lot of the fun side being fun to create the chances.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it doesn't surprise me that much, but I'm afraid to talk. That was my hot take. I got my hot take. I'm in the Jose Marino zone. Well, let's talk about the chance. How about that?

There we go. It's 36 minute. Wea plays it to Ballo coming back into our half. So we're playing it out from deep. Way is kind of pinned on his own sideline, on that right sideline. He plays a kind of long ball on the ground towards Ballo. Ballo comes back and lays it off for Dest.

And then does that peel off that you talked about earlier, just spins and makes a run immediately after laying it off. Desk plays him into the corner. Or kind of down the channel. And Ballo takes a touch and just squares it for Pulisic, who has beaten Sadu to the spot, meets it right. pretty much at the penalty marker and hits it right at Nuridine.

I initially thought he hit it well. I do not think he hit it well. I think he actually scuffed it. But he hit it right at the goalkeeper and, you know, could have been 4-0. So the echo here is Poulosick at the Azteca with the cross from way that he hit into M-Ochoa. It feels similar. Pretty similar. It happens.

But again, the idea here is this feels like what Poulosik is going to be giving us a lot of for him. to be contributing for the U.S., which is arriving on runs for plays that have built through the right side, because the right side seems to be our build-in side. Yeah. And it's certainly not like set in stone. This is the case, but this isn't just like a one data point situation, I feel like. No.

It seems more like the outlier tends to be more like the Mexico game and Nations League, where Poulsick was the one just doing everything down the left on his own. where it seems more likely, or it seems more often to be the case that things are happening on the right, and Pulsick is excellent at arriving on that side. I agree with that. And that that game at the Azteca, or not at the Azteca, the Nations League final was, it wasn't even the final, it was a semi-final. That Nation's league game, the data from that's very inconvenient for me, because I'm like, well, it has been mostly stuff up the right side, and then we have this kind of really high-profile game

where Pulisic creates so much on the left side. But yeah, I think that, I think what you're saying is right. Well, we got another Pulcic moment right here. 37th minute. Lund dribbles his way out of traffic and finds Geo's feet. He dips that shoulder again, glides past another guy, and then plays Pulisic down the left wing. This one was just a pleasure to watch in the stadium.

Probably a pleasure to watch on TV, too. and Pulisic, so he's arriving in a lot of space, he tries to square it for Ballo, but he gets it a little wrong, maybe a little late on the pass. Apoku cuts it out, Nicholas Apoku cuts it out, but then just kind of sits on it as Ballo tries to tee up a shot, so an indirect free kick is given.

What do you think, Greg? Well, so yeah, Pulisic, I feel like, could have driven directly at the goal at pace on his first touch from this ball from geo this one wasn't behind him but he kind of chose to slow down and then didn't have the square you know he didn't have the open square ball to balo tried it anyway and then a little bit of good luck that gana's player like falls on it and then continues to sit on it which you know that that can happen our first goal came on a little bit of obviously good luck from a squared attempt from balo that gana had a chance to clear out just failed so kind of a

similar situation here um but let's dispense with all that and talk about about the fact that we now have an indirect free kick in the box from from like 12 yards out because this is the fun part since 1987 um well before but what about just hitting it first time like what if pullisic just hit just slides it across first time as like as he arrives on the ball um you're saying he should take a touch at the goal he takes a touch that slows him down i agree with that and then tries to rifle it across and by then it's too late yeah uh i mean i guess he He definitely could square it earlier and then give Balagan more room to, like, run onto it. So there's more space to hit it.

Yeah, I guess what I would say is either of those options, the first time ball square or just driving himself at the near post would be better than kind of what he did. But the end result actually is much, much better because the indirect free kick is just a beautiful thing to experience. Yeah, I guess. Pulisic, Raina and Ballo, they confer and then they huddle over the ball. and when the whistle blows Balow rolls it to Pulisic, who is facing him, Pulisic rolls it back towards Balow and Geo has a shot with the side of his right foot, just kind of roofs it with a slight deflection off Pencil's head.

I think it was actually, not to be annoying here, but I think Pulisic actually made it a little more difficult for Geo than he needed to with the way he rolled it to him. It was like a slightly overcooked, indirect free kick roll. So, you know, I feel like I heard people saying you never practice these. You do. You practice them like once. And then you just always remember what you're supposed to do. I remember practicing it like one time back in 2002. And it's like, I now know what you're supposed to do. The decision tree is like as soon as the referee blows the whistle, you know that this is a super unusual situation.

And for the attacking side, the best thing you can actually do is use all of that confusion to just score immediately. So you have to really casually kind of jog up there. I think the referee blows the whistle at like 3650. So all of Gana's players are now surrounding the ref, like, what's he supposed to do? He's on the floor. What are we doing here? And they're all like talking to the referee, all of them in like a three-yard cluster. So if Gio can very casually, you've got to be casual, you can't tip off here what you're doing.

If you can very casually, just kind of pick the ball up, look really casual, and then just set it down and tap it to the side for Poole Sick to pass into the empty net. That's your best option. That's what you're going for because you're under no obligation to have the other team get an explanation for what this is. Like you know what it is. The referee's hand is straight up. It's an indirect kick. Just set it down, pass it, pass it into the goal. That's what you're going for first.

And if that doesn't work, then you do execute what our guys did here, which is the double touch. And it's a really control. What's the advantage of the double touch? Why not just do one touch? Because as ridiculous as it sounds, it actually becomes difficult for the shooter. Gio in this situation to like predict exactly where Balo's first touch is going to go, like how hard he's going to hit it, like where to where to aim his run. Whereas when you add the second player, it's like a holder for a place kicker and tackle football.

Like you run right at where that guy is going to stop the ball dead so you can start your run before because obviously the defense is going to be racing out at you in mass. They're going to be sent in six players sprinting out at you. And at that point it's like there's injury risk here. you know, they're not going to, they're not slowing down. So you're trying to just give a little bit more confidence for the shooter of exactly where it's going to go, which is why Gio or Pulsick rolling it back throws that off a little and forces Gio to just barely adjust his plant foot. Which he does nicely.

Yeah, he does nicely. And it's a, he's got to go, you have to go a little high with it like he does. And he finds a nice gap. And there we go. Yeah. 4-0. And it's a party. So a few quick things before the half.

Kudus does beat Lund 1V1 and rips that right-footed shot cross across the box. Did it hit the post? We never got a replay because moments after that, Ghana gets that ridiculous worldly that Turner denies being a worldly with a worldly save. Can you have a worldly save? Does that a thing? I mean, you tell me. I don't know.

We're going to need someone to rule on this. Yeah. So I don't know, I don't think it hit the post, but I can't say for sure. And then before we get to that, that worldly save, the 42nd minute as a long kick from Turner and Pulisik, he does juggle it. This is an incredible first touch, juggles it around Mensa with his first touch, receiving it over his shoulder like a wide receiver. But they can't beat Mensa in the foot race that ensues. He kind of takes a heavy touch. Oh, yeah, right?

Yeah, you just, you just, bells, I'm going to say the current. analogy that you had from where you were sitting is different from from where we were. The save, the big save came right after that Kudu shot and then on the ensuing corner after the big save. That's where Turner caught the corner clean and then hit that ridiculous punt that you just described for Kool's juggling touch. That's a clerical error. We'll get on the, we'll get, you know, we'll get to the bottom of it. So yeah. So the, so before the, the long kick I just described, Kudos gets a chance to shoot from just outside the box. And he kind of, he rips it. top corner left foot.

It's kind of, it's not a curler, really. It's like kind of traveling into out, right? Yeah. And he hits this so hard and the movement is such that I, same with that shot. I couldn't tell if it hit the post. I can't tell if this to flex off. I don't know if it's Johnny contesting the shot or Chris Richards turning his back slightly if it goes like slightly off his shoulder.

It's moving enough that it, for Keeper, it's sort of the same effect. It was moving a ton. Yeah. Amazing. It was a great save, yeah. And then Ghana had, that was the kind of good spell of the game for Ghana. Really, their only good spell in the half. And that was it.

Half time comes, and that's the end of the podcast. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. But McKinney comes on for Raina. Aronson comes on for Pulisic. Peppy comes on for Baligan. And they really didn't do anything. Like, that's not true.

They did some things. But it was not nearly as fun. second half as it was the first half. Yeah. What do you attribute that? Just us taking our foot off the gas? I think there's an element of that. And this is where, you know, you've had your mediator come on and talk to them.

We need to have like a sports psychologist on to explain exactly why it's just like that the motivation just drops off so much in a, I mean, in friendlies in general, even in 1-1-0, like you still just see that sort of fading intensity. And at 4-0, I mean, it was just sort of. inevitable. Yeah. Well, we did get a few little chances. There was a diagonal ball from McKenny to Wea in the 49th minute that Wea tries to

try to zip it over in at the far post and from a tight angle and just misses. He maybe could have laid it off for Pepey arriving in the box, but Pepe was, it all happened so fast, Pepe wasn't arriving right at the moment. So it might have been its only option. Desd was like a really sharp angled cutback. if you could have done that. But I think the defender who was tracking Way ahead, both those would have been discouraging them enough that I think the math works out

to just if you're Tim Way and you have that technique to go for it. And yeah. Didn't miss by much. Yeah, he kept it close enough that it's hard to judge it. If he'd missed it by a lot more, then we could judge his decision. But because he kept a little close. Then we'd call into account. It looks closer to the right decision.

50th minute, just a Musa through ball clocking because that's what we're looking for from him. It's like a slow developing counter in transition, but we end up breaking through them after a couple of near miss hit passes, the kind of mishit just enough to draw, gone in to like gamble to take it and they don't. So Moose ends up racing at a exposed back line. He has desk sprinting around him on the right and he tries to slip into the inside of the defender for deaths run on to, but not quite where it needs to be and it's cut out. Okay. He looked for it. He was looking. He didn't go to the corner. Right. No. Credit for that. Points for that. Fifty-first minute, Pepe wins it off Nurudin, which is exciting when the striker takes the ball off the goalkeeper's feet, but he's

kind of heading away towards the corner. So he squares it from wide right to Wea in the box, who dribbles at his guy, real energetic-like, and then slides it across for Cardoso. He tries to do a balligan pirouette onto his left foot and but has his shot block. Yeah, would have been, I think he might have just skied it. The ref gave the goal kick, but, uh, oh, tough for Cardos, not something I'd necessarily expect. Would have been really cool. Waya, though, if I'm going to ding him for anything, it just seemed like as Pepe's doing this, as Pepe's retrieving this ball with the goalie out of the net, like Way is in the box available

for it, but he just doesn't look like he's ready to shoot. And it's not like Pepe fired the ball into him. So instead of the one-time shot at a scrambling goalkeeper, he controls it first and then tries to create a new shot. And this kind of happened in the Germany game too, where one of our decent looks in the first half was a ball that got passed to Wea's feet on the left side of the box. And he wasn't ready to hit it first time. He's like standing straight up as that ball was coming to him. So it just has to control it and then try to create a new shot.

And in that one, he hit a weak one right at the goalkeeper. But just something I was kind of noticing. Like he was just a little bit like casual waiting to receive it. Yeah, it would, it could have been, would have been good to have a first time. time shot there. 54 minute mark McKinney, this was kind of exciting. He gets the ball on the left side, sort of ducks around a guy to his right, and then just uncorks from maybe 22 yards, and just misses the far post.

I think he had the keeper dead to rights if he had put it on frame. It's a pretty good shot from him. Good shot from him, and I just want to point out that the way McKinney got the ball was Serginio Dest doing right corner stuff of all things and he right cornered his way all the way to the left corner which was really I think the state I think the stadium was enjoying that like he got it in the right corner and Waya like made a slashing run through and so Desch just started dribbling and dribbled all the way across the top of the box like taking contact the entire time went to ground once and then ends up like on the left side left half of the field and hits

that ball out to McKinney just more more amazing stuff from Sergenio Dest. Yeah, we didn't get any refutation of the issues that Dest has defensively in this game, but we sure did get a lot of the fun stuff. So after that, McKinney Curler, after that Dest run and McKinney Curler, we didn't have, we had one more shot in the game, and it was in the 72nd minute, which was Lund. So it was a ball that trickled across from the right after a good way. across, well it's a good way across to Aronson. Aronson whiffs on it. Then it trickles over

to Lund and he tries, he just leans back as he tries to shoot and sends it into the upper deck. Yeah, we shouldn't, I think we should, we learn we should not try to build our attack to create shots for Lund's right foot. Like that's, that's not we should base our attack on. That, just on that one too, we got the cross from way on the right side and it was after yet again more right corner stuff from Waya and Dest. I think Waya gets the ball from death doing the pass off of his own plant leg.

Oh, that's right. Yeah. And then Wayet messing around. Yeah, he was. And then West, I mean, this is actually an interesting cross because he really cuts it across his body to hit it at Aronson. It's like, how do you do that?

But anyway, not Aronson's night. Really? according to Burrhalter as well he didn't think any of the subs had a great night I don't know we didn't do much attacking in the second half either none of their shots was particularly high quality

so it was as a result just kind of a quiet sleepy second half yeah sleepy second half and I feel like the punctuation marks were and maybe this is just me because I just eat this up it was like Wayan desk doing stuff yeah like 60s minute we had were way of flared wide and we swing it

on the back and Waya is able to spring Desk with a nice one touch ball into the seam. So Desk is just running vertically into the box, driving the one defender back, wrong foot sat defender. But then right before you can sort of get a shot off right outside the six, the second trailing defender catches him

and kind of pokes it away. Seems like that happens to Dest a lot. Yeah, we saw it in the last window. Shortly after that, we had the Turner long ball out to the sideline to the right side. That Waya does his chest and then flick. over Ghana's left back.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And left back's controller just got unplugged at that point. He was ready to be done. He just waved his hand at it. Oh, say, dude. He was right back in the first half and switched. So he was on, that was my side of the field where I was watching. So we got him the whole game.

But yeah, he was just like, nope, hand went up. Like, it's ridiculous. I'm ready to be done. Yeah. And he was actually, he actually looked like a pretty good player. He did. Yeah. Yeah.

We can just keep hitting the highlights here. 63rd minute. Leonard gets his first cap, which is a real special moment for any player, I'm sure. Yeah, and I don't know that we learned too much about him. He was fine, but he did immediately take part in a good build out of the back in which I remember watching this in the stadium and thinking, how are we going to get it out of there?

Surely Chris is going to just smash it down the line, and he didn't. He didn't do it, and he found Maloney's feet. you know, he played a pass to, who did he play the pass to? Somebody got it back under pressure, plays it to Maloney's feet, and then Maloney plays it out to Pepe, who pokes it out to Aronson, who dribbles out of bounds. But that was a nice little sequence to get out of pressure.

Clearly the training from the coaches is, or the instruction from the coaches is for the centerbacks to not blast it long. But I should say that. 66 minute we have Miles Robinson kind of, under no pressure, just blasting it along. No one was really making a run. I'm not sure if he misread somebody's hit movement. Got some shouting from Greg at that point.

And BJ too, actually. It's pretty animated. Greg shouted at him a couple of times, some sustained shouting. And then as soon as he got done, then BJ was like calling it Miles for something else. So took some shouting there. And then 68th minute, Miles had another errand pass. This time, like trying to line breaker from the back and just got, it was like nowhere near Brenda. He's trying to like a little diagonal from the right side of the left half space cut out very easily.

Nothing came of it though. Yeah. Well, Miles won it right back by intercepting the ensuing pass, I think. But also maybe Brenda could have come back to the ball a little bit more. Yeah, maybe. I mean, you got to know your personnel, I think, is what they say. CCV gets in in the 72nd, Luca in the 74th. I thought CCV was stout, sturdy, not particularly tested.

the entire back line kind of felt untested defensively. Yeah. Anything else? I mean, there were some more back heels. There were a couple of times that Ghana did some things. They had a tight-angled chance off a long throw. There was that moment that Lucas smashed a back pass to Turner, which was, again, when it's 4-0, that stuff just doesn't,

it sort of evaporates in your mind, whereas if it's a zero-zero game against Uzbekistan, then you're just furious about everything. Or is here just none of it seems to really register. Yeah, I don't know. I just don't know what we're going to try to do. We're going to do a patron-only episode tomorrow. That's the plan at least with Waki and sort of recap the window. But so we've got to save some of our, you know,

big picture. We're going to save a big picture. For that. But let's see. The next thing is the is the game on the 16th of November, right? Is that right? In Austin against Trinidad. Yep.

Yeah. And that's. part of a two-legged tie. The second game will be, presumably in Trinidad somewhere. Two-legged tied, basically to get into the Cop America, right? Yeah, we got this. I mean, I don't want to be overconfident, but we got this. Nothing can go wrong.

Yeah. Well, it'll be fun. Shout out to all the folks who showed up in Nashville, because that's a blast to see. For a lot of folks doing back-to-back games, it's cool, and dropping in on scuffed activities. I really enjoyed that. Thank you to Max

Max Cruz in Montana for helping us find a parking spot and that did open at 3 o'clock instead of 4.30. And yeah, it was a lot of fun. It was almost, you know, it was a lot smaller than the tailgate in Connecticut. But in some ways that's good.

It's a little more relaxing, less logistics, more time to talk to people. We brought a soccer ball and we got kids involved in the parking lot before we got too full. It was a great time. Yeah, hopefully something can come together for Austin. We'll have to see what everyone's commitment is there.

Give some barbecue for that one. We got the hot chicken to the tailgate for Nashville. Now twice in a row. Now we've got to make some barbecue happen in Texas. That's right. It sounds like Vince is 100% going to Austin. We'll see about the rest of us. Hey, thanks everybody for listening.

We'll see ya.