Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #539: Pulisic, Pepi, Balo, Pax score + roster speculation

Episode Date: September 30, 2024

Greg joins Watke and Belz for the Monday Review. Rundown of the key action from the weekend, plus each panelist offers a surprise inclusion and a surprise exclusion in Poch's first roster, likely out later this week. 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, the world keeps turning. USMNT has games October 12 at home against Panama, and then a rare fixture in Mexico and Guadalajara against L3 on October 15th, the first two matches of the Pachitino era. So we should have a roster later this week, and maybe we'll get into a little bit of that later. But we have a lot of action to catch up on.

I'm Adam Bells. With me are Greg Velazquez and Waki. Vince is still on a break. Our thoughts are with Daniel Smith, who was filling in for us last week, but is now in the middle of an incredible natural disaster in Western North Carolina. Send him a message if you can. How are you guys doing? I'm doing very well, Adam. Good.

Good. How are you, Greg? Yeah, I'm doing good. I'm excited to be here on the Monday review. I love this vibe. Welcome. Yeah. Should we get right to it?

Pulisic. Stay's hot. Another goal on Friday. The third in a 3-0 win over Leche. Is there a Maro Suma call? Yeah, there is. Let me play it. Seria of passages, Raffa,

Prova, intervenes. Alvarito, has taken the ball, Alvarito, El Barito, Dentro, Ebram, Palo, Paolo! Palo! Palum, Sfurtunatissimo, Ebram, a ball in an corner in an air, pretty of the

game, come on, baby, come on, yes, yes, yes. The third goal of A.C. Milan by the captain of the USA national team. Come on, baby, come on, baby, come on baby. Pretty good for having been the third goal. There wasn't really much drama to it, but he pretty good considering that.

Yeah. Are we charting, like, the American. amount of English he incorporates into each successive goal call for a Christian poolstick? Has he been increasing the English phrases that he uses or is it always roughly the same amount of English, just different phrases that he busts out each time? You know, that sounded like more English. Yeah. But I had thought.

Before this, he was basically rotating phrases in. Okay. I bet he really enjoys picking out the English phrase he's going to use. for that week, like, oh, this is a good English phrase. I'm interested by him saying yes, yes, yes. I don't think that's something he's ever done that. What is that? And sometimes we don't, we learn about it from him.

Yeah. The yes, yes, yes strikes me as more, sort of a more relaxed celebratory sequence. And then the captain of the U.S. national team, he's never said that before, I don't think. Yeah, that's wild. Totally. He's will say that in English.

Like that's some English phrase. Yeah. It's nuts. And it all has to be planned. The yes, yes, yes, has to, I feel like that's got to be a planned thing he's doing. Does it? I don't know. I think he does. I think he's got his English paragraph mapped out and slides that over as soon as

pulls his scores and reads it. You know what I? Let me get my yes, yes, yes set up here. It's all spelled out phonetically. Like it's not actually, yeah, it's just the sounds, the English sounds and he just shouts them. What it might be is, yes, he does a ton of preparation. It could be how Derek Ray, if you've seen the pictures he's shared, he has a paper

filled with notes that are too many to even read. So while he's calling, he's not looking at the notes, he just has them all in his head from doing all that prep. So Suma might have a sheet of just tons of American phrases that he scribbles before each game. I just can't imagine that any of that is him consulting notes to say. It's not the Italian way. No, that's what I'm saying.

He doesn't have to consult it. Derek Ray's not consulting. He's just done all the prep. Yeah, okay. Gotcha. He has copiousness with English phrases. Because the act of writing it down with the pen imprints it on the brain a little bit more. Yeah, I buy that.

Anyway, it's good that Christian Pool 16. doing some good things. I think... Man. I think this is pretty great that he's just scoring goals for fun. Yeah. This was a... You know, he's on the spot to clean up a rebound on a Tammy Abraham shot. That's why there was so much sort of roller coaster emotion in the clip.

But, you know, pretty straightforward goal. The thing that really strikes me watching these games and this game is Pool Six body language out there. even doing just normal stuff is totally commanding. Like he is as comfortable as I've ever seen him in his career. Comfortable is not even the right word. Commanding is the right word. He's the boss out there. So it's like that body language from that Chelsea Liverpool game

where he came in and scored all those goals. And we get the great Yergen Klopp reaction. But now he's just got that body language all the time. Yeah. It is. I'll take that. I'll take that in October. Do you think the body language comes as a result of all these goals he's scoring,

or did he have it? And that's what's driving the goals. I think it's a good feedback. I think it's a good feedback loop where there must have been something that was clicking to have the feeling like he could do this, and then as he's doing it, it's going to amplify each time. And also he's getting his buddy in on the celebrations with him, which I think that matters.

it's no longer like even his celebration body language is now you know like yeah uh shifted onto his teammate yeah for anyone who didn't see layout joined him in the tiger arm celebration and it was just over a year ago was that horrible celebration they had together where pool's like tried to jump into his arms and leow said what he was what is this man doing and he kind of half-heartedly half caught him. Yeah. I was kind of dangling off up to the side.

Yeah. I mean, you're not exaggerating. That was, I believe that was September 23rd, so just a year and a week ago. What a, what an evolution. What a proud moment for us

as a nation to have Rafa duplicate Poulissix celebration. And this was not the out-of-body fury of the celebration last week when he scored that huge goal against Inter. This was just smiling, kind of, you know,

going through the motions in a relaxed way. That's probably third goal versus, you know, massive Milan Derby emotions. And, I mean, I guess the other thing to say is, the other thing I wanted to say is besides how commanding he is and comfortable he is, the feel of A.C. Milan's season was just transformed by that win over Inter. because it felt like they were kind of struggling. Now they're one point behind Uvei, second in the table.

Those two teams play at the San Ciro on November 23rd. So it was a ways out, but one to mark on your calendar, I think. Anything else on Pulisic? I mean, it is the thing to be the most excited about, I think. Although there's other stuff to be excited about this weekend. There's a lot to be excited about. I think it's possible we broke a record. for most wins by Americans because only Busio lost.

Well, McKenzie also lost. Well, our other losses, an American was playing on the other team. Yeah, okay. And importantly, there was only one draw of the games that I am aware of. Gaga. Barnsley. Barnesley? It was a win, win, win, win, win, all weekend.

Well, let's get to the next one, because you've a beat General. in an empty stadium. The stadium was empty because the ultras from Genoa and Samporia in the middle of the week were clashing with each other and police. And I just have to throw a little bit of mockery in here. I watched some of the video of that and them throwing stuff at the police. And you can really tell that Italy is not a baseball nation. They just can't.

This dudes can't throw. I sort of was skeptical. that when I started to watch this that it was really going to be as bad as you say. It was. None of them know how to throw. They're just all. It's pathetic.

Yeah. The body's not... Like, they all need to go outside and play catch with their dad. Yeah, nobody's had a catch in Italy. Just the body not helping the arm at all. Anyway, in the game. in an empty stadium. I thought Wes was pretty good.

Assured performance, went 62 minutes before they were up to zero and he was subbed off. Some nice work breaking the press. A little bit of elegance here. Some energy there. You know, high usage for number eight, 32 or 34 passing. I mean, I guess the main thing is he appears ready to come into this poach era firing in all cylinders. He had a couple plays where he He got called for a charge on a play basically

Or he's just knocking guys over Running all out for a ball Several times he did that Yeah Last week he's jumping up blocking corners He's playing with an intensity It does seem like he brings kind of a calm

Also a calming presence To the midfield for them Like he's I mean that may seem at odds with what you're saying about him charging through people, but it's his personality, right? Like, even as he's charging through people, it's not,

it's not a fiery aggressiveness. He's just a bulldozer. He just moves that way, and he's got the body mass and he's just going to run through you. Yeah. Have we talked that often about how he runs leaning forward in a way that's pretty beautiful? I've never talked about that.

I noticed it on the chart. And less good news. Wea is hurt. Ankle injury out until late October, I guess. So we may need some winger reinforcements in the next camp. I mean, we're definitely going to need winger reinforcements in the next camp. So way out, Raina, still not back. So, yeah, we don't have a lot of really high-profile ones after that.

That's how we ended up with. Pepey starting on the wing last round of. So here I am. We're going to talk about inclusions and omissions, surprise inclusions, surprise omissions at the end of the show. I may have to change mine right now. Oh, no. Don't steal mine. I'm not going to say who it is, but just don't steal it, please.

And we're not telling each other what ours are. It's a Jordan Morris isn't. That's a great show. Why not? Why not? Ricardo Pepe, got a brace and a 2-0 win. He finally got a start. This was, I'm pretty sure this is correct.

His first start for PSV, I believe, since starting on the wing for them, you know, with Luke DeYoung on the field, against Heracles-Almello in February. So it's been a while since he started a game for them. And I don't know when he last started a game for them at Stryker. Maybe never. Is that possible? I think it was the Arsenal dead rubber in the Champions League. I think those were only two starts last year. It was, it's wild.

I mean, obviously, a lot of that is just Luke Diyong having a silly health streak, which, you know, at his advanced age, is incredible. Also doing some, what I would say, somewhat shameful lobbying to Peter Bosch, which he explained in the press after the game, he said, of course I discussed this with Luke beforehand. He's referring to Pepe's start. Last year he kept me from this. Last year he kept me away from this.

Then I sometimes suggested to give him a rest. Luke kept pointing out the games they had lost in the year before. But I didn't fall for that this year, purely because I thought Pepey deserved to play this match. End quote. So Luke's been, you know, both with his play and with his words, lobbying for Pepe not to start ever. Seems a bit greedy. Sounds almost like a little bit of possibly bullying that's going on of Bosch.

This could have been a cry for help. It might be, yeah. I thought you're going to say bullying of Peppy, but yeah, it is. Bosch doesn't seem fully in control of this situation, does he? I mean, he's not. Luke has a ton of leverage here, so. Apparently this is something strikers do.

Yeah. It's just normal Starstrikeer behavior. Yeah. I guess so. And they can do it as long as they keep scoring goals. So we really just need like, I'm not,

I definitely don't want Luke to get injured because I never want anyone to get injured. But I do want him to just have a terrible five straight outings. Like, let's see him, let's see him totally fall on his face in the midweek Champions League game. And then do it again on the weekend. put a little, that'll put the right pressure on, on Bosch to stop getting pushed around. I just can't see DeYoung having a bad,

five straight games, maybe until he's like 45. He doesn't, right? He'll be, he'll be kind of maybe ineffective, but then he'll just pop up and be like a couple of goals. And that's kind of how it felt with Pepey in that game. First half, not much going on. PSV probably just maybe having a hard time maintaining the intensity in these matches against weaker teams in the league. and then just as simple as you like, two goals.

Nice finishes, too. I mean, a glancing header on an in-swinging free kick from the left side. And the second one was an almost no-look side-foot finish on a good cut back from Karsdorp, the man who has exiled my beloved Richie Ledesma to who knows where since he returned from injury, since Karsdorp returned from injury. I mean, Ladezma is not in the lineup, not in the roster. maybe he's hurt, but we don't really know. Well, it was a strange one because Ladesma got,

he wasn't in the lineup or on the bench in their last match either, and Cars Dwarp wasn't back yet. So it was really weird for him to be going, for Ladezma to go from starting every match, to then after the Champions League loss, against by far the best team they've played this year so far, to just be like, okay, well, he's out of the picture now. Yeah.

I kind of assumed he was going to get transitioned out. I didn't think he was the right back for the season. But to have a go, like, that quick to not even being on the bench. I was kind of assuming minor injury. Yeah, maybe that. That's probably what it is. It's just not. They said he had a little knock as well.

Yeah. Okay. We doubted it. We had our doubts. My only other thing I want to say about Pepe is in the holdup, I wish he were a little bit more confident. Like he comes back to the ball, he receives it, and he just looks like he wants to get it out of his feet as fast as possible

and as safely as possible. And I think they kind of need a little more from him in that role where maybe he tries to create something. Obviously there's a balance to be struck there, but I guess that's my one criticism. even though he did have two goals and they were both nice. I don't disagree with that though, and it feels like almost like he's playing tight or playing nervous.

And even when he makes his pass and executes it and gets it to a teammate, I still think it's a big difference in maintaining the rhythm that you see when Diyong is in and what you see when PEPP he's in. So he's got to, I feel like that hopefully all of those things will improve with getting a little more comfortable and hopefully that will come with getting more time and opportunities in bigger doses. So I'm really hoping that this is the end of a boss cowering to Luke Diyong and actually every once in a while being like, nope, peppy's going to start. We've got a midweek match and we've got, so Luke, you get the Champions League game against the, you know,

that really good team and we'll give Pepe 75 minutes against whoever it is that you're playing domestically. Yeah. Hopefully he gets more domestic. minutes. I mean, that's the perfect situation for him. And, you know, I love bringing it back to U6 soccer, but they say, you're not supposed to sub, you know,

a lot at that age group. And you give kids like a 10 minute, give them a 10 minute spate of time so that they can get comfortable out there. And I think it's the same. It's the same in the pros, you know, except, you know, multiply it by 6 or 7.

So one other thing One other thing on Pepe, I want to play a clip. He was asked after the game, you know, how hard it is to play behind a striker like Luke DeYoung. And I noticed in the whole interview he doesn't, he never gives DeYoung any respect. He never says, yeah, he is a great player. But here's one thing he says. Yeah, of course, it's difficult, you know, but at the same time, you know, I know my opportunity is going to come. And like I say, you know, I have to take advantage and I have to help the team.

I think it's striking that he doesn't ever mention DeYoung so maybe there is maybe he knows that DeYoung is lobbying against him and then it was just like real confidence in the way he looked at the interviewer when he said I have to help the team

yeah there's bad there's bad blood it's we can just say it's total bad blood between those two we can just say it with certainty and that is the situation they despise each other I hope not to think about to

to young he's just like he wouldn't even give you the satisfaction of it of having bad blood with him he just won't even probably doesn't even look at him yeah they're not speaking as what we're reporting Tillman subbed off at the half

I think maybe to be saved for Champions League they play tomorrow who do they play again you guys remember It's one of the ones that's hard to spell and pronounce. Oh, no, they're not the hard one. No, it's the plane. It's a very easy one.

Sporting. I think I was thinking of whoever Huydenheim's playing in the conference. He wasn't playing badly, so I don't think this was a yanking, as he can tend to get everyone once in a while. Yeah, they will need him tomorrow against sporting. notoriously hard to spell Portuguese club. And also, Dest is one more thing from PSV. Dest is doing some media now. Still months out from the playing field.

He was asked to respond to Pachitino's hiring, and he called it, quote, decent, and then smiled widely for the camera. That's cool. He thinks he's the best player in the Air Divisi, too. I believe he was using decent in a way that British people use it. Which is to me really good.

Yeah. The long interview with him and the athletic is Yeah, it's the athletic, right, via the New York Times. I just love him. He basically just reinforces all of the things that we say we enjoy about him. Like that is also what he enjoys about him. Yeah. Yeah.

My favorite part of the article is he's talking about, one of the reasons he likes skinning a guy, beating badly on the dribble, is he likes the idea of his teammate, of the player's teammates being, losing respect for them. It's one of the more savage things I've ever heard of professional athletes say. Yeah, like that's incredible, right?

Like, I literally want to undermine the faith that the people you care about have in you. Yes. Yeah, that seems uncharacteristically savage, almost, from him. He also, I think, makes the valid point that he's not, you know, he gets criticized for his defending a lot, but he's basically like, yeah, I have to work on it, but it's not as bad as some people say.

And I, you know, I basically agree with him. I think it's a way over, way overstated thing. But the thing he was saying he's actually pretty good at is one-on-one. I guess it's true. He's not getting eaten alive. and where he's like focused on the guy right in front of him. It's more other times. Staying with the back line and, you know,

sort of being aware, he acknowledges he needs some improvement there. Balligan scored again. Monaco beats Montpellier, a professional side foot finish with the left foot, also smashed the post with his left foot, did some nice link up stuff with Breil and Bolo, up top and a 4-4-2. I feel like he's heating up,

and people were worried about him at the beginning of the season, including me to some extent, but he's going to be fine. This was the 100-year anniversary of their club celebration game, so he got to meet the prince before game. Arson Blanger was there, a bunch of other famous people. Was Tieri on hand? He wasn't there.

But they did win. Oh, no, go ahead. Wachke, you finish. No, if you were going to ask a question about the prince. I was going to ask. I was going to ask, so how prestigious is the prince? Like, what's the prince's role in the current hierarchy? Is it, do they just send the prince to all the, like, throwaway stuff?

Or is it like, no, you see the prince? Like, that's the guy. Prince is kind of a big deal in Monaco. And he is a big sportsman. He was a bobsledder. He did five Olympics. Oh, goodness. Wow.

Never finished above like 22nd? Were they just throwing the Prince of Bone and just being like, if you want a bobsled, you get to be our bobsledder? I don't doubt that he was probably one of the better bobsleders in Monaco. But he was never competitive. They were never competitive. team never finished above I think 22nd or so

wait a second does it ever even snow in Monaco nobody could have built I think they probably built some weird snow thing under the stadium even he's a prince he probably just chop it over to the Alps

right if he wants snow he can get snow they have a snow guy they want one he's worth around a billion apparently he looks like he was born in America citizen. He had to renounce it, or he chose to. Went to Amherst. Went to a bunch of summer camps in New Hampshire.

Oh, is he Grace Kelly's son? Oh, my. Waki, do you have any sense of where he would rank amongst current American bobsleders? I mean, our bobsled scene, I know we're not really competitive with the serious, basically alpine. places. We have a couple good drivers, and we normally get some track athletes to come in and train. I don't know. I'm kind of just making up everything I'm saying past the initial where he finished in

bobsledding. I have no idea. If I know I were going to go more into the prince, I would have done more research. I just wasn't sure if we kind of let this one get away and maybe could have given him a better pitch than Prince of Monaco to keep him with our bobsled. program? I just... Or if he was always going to end up

being the Prince of Monaco and announcing American... I think if he were anything that we should have been worried about losing, he would have, in one of those five Olympics, would have performed... He would have had one breakout thing

where he showed a little bit of talent or not talent, but an ability to perform at a higher level that he just didn't... That makes sense. It's like any other duel. Like, you're happy. I'm happy to see him, you know,

succeed as a prince. I don't know if he would have had that opportunity here. And, you know, we'll just keep making the right choices for the next duel. Yeah. He is, in fact, Grace Kelly's son. I don't know if that means anything to you guys,

but she, you know, very beautiful American actress who quit acting to become the princess of Monaco by marrying the previous prince. Yeah, because they just keep changing them, right? It's just like you get a new prince every once in a while. There's more princes. Yeah, that's how it works. Yeah.

I believe there's maybe an hereditary system involved as well. Sure seems to be an hereditary system. Okay, so yeah, Ballo, doing well. I think he's doing really well, actually. Sergeant also doing well. Got two assists and a three-two win over Darby County, went 90.

First one was kind of an effort play where his shot from a tight angle is blocked towards the sideline, he just slides to sweep it off the line across the face of goal. Borja signs. Croix touches it in. This guy had a hat trick on the game.

So that ball did go out of bounds. Yes. It was a very illegal assist. But if you look at the replay and this is something the Derby fans won't mention, his initial shot went off the defender's hand and that's what sent it out of bounds. So I think those wash out.

Evens out, yeah. Yeah, because, I mean, effort play is right to get to that, to get to that ball, even as it's getting out of bounds. But to lead up to that, it was really good movement from him. Kind of a bad turnover, I think, in the attacking third that Norwich create, and then they're off and running. And he just burst through a seam off the ball, like just a straight vertical run to split defenders. And he doesn't have like the – he's not like right on the defender's shoulder. then he goes. He's starting like three yards where the defender's got three yards of

positioning on him and he still just outruns him. So this is this is Sergeant showing a little bit of that burst that I'm really happy to see to get in and get that initial shot off. Appreciate the way he opens, he stays wide to open up the passing angle too as opposed to running too, you know, making it too narrow. The second one, second assist was on the counterattack,

just a teasing outside of the boot pass. Beautiful. It curls into Sain's path. On the break, he kind of bundles it home. Three, two. Darby County's coach. Go ahead. The third Norwich goal, which he did not technically assist on,

he made a run that drag, But basically drug dragged two defenders away from signs that they just left him dribbling the ball and he shot it. So I give him three assists. Okay. Agreed. So now we just wait to see if Norwich will let us have him and let him play in October. They're going to give us the nonsense about, you know, precautionary injuries again. Are they going to say no to Potch?

Championship Club Hope not I did think it was interesting I looked up the coach of Darby County because he was kind of frankly just a striking looking man and one of his former clubs is called Diss Town FC

like D-I-S-D-I-S never heard of that before their nickname is the Tangerines and they've been around since 1888. Concept of what country this team would be in. In England, yeah. Oh.

Yeah. Okay. Diss Town. It's a real thing. Paxton, Aronson, scored a really nice goal. He hadn't even played for a couple weeks. Like, was just glued to the bench,

and here he comes on at halftime. Listen to this. Don't too much of that. Kept him really well. by El Karoani. The Disha pass as well. That's a super goal. Aronson takes it.

Superbly set up by El Karoani. And Utrecht have turned this one around. All smiles for Ron Yans. That is a super goal. So a super goal, also a huge goal for Utrecht. I mean, it's the game winner at Alkmar. They're behind Alkmar in the table, third.

Alkmar's second. Now they're second. Alkimer's third. And, I don't know, it looked, I mean, it was a side foot finish, a really nice cutback, kind of skipping on the ground, not that easy to handle. Takes it on the short hop, essentially, with the inside of his right foot, and just arrows it in to the bottom right corner. So, Paxton didn't play in a couple of games, but he did play for their youth team,

I think started for them during the mid-year. week, I think, last week. So I'm really curious if he was maybe battling like an injury too, because, you know, he's on loan, right? So if he's out of favor, they're not going to like, I feel like they're not going to toss him into the use game like that. They'd use those minutes for somebody else. So I wonder if he was maybe dealing with something and they were trying to get him back up to speed for big moments like this. Maybe so. They've only dropped, what, they've dropped two points in the league so far. They have one draw, but they've been, otherwise they've been cruising to wins, cruising, but they've been winning. They, yeah, they really hung on for dear life at the end of this one against Oz-Ed. But, yeah, PSV-1, Utrecht 2. Starting to really regret that we're not going on this low country's trip. Just added to the list of regrets. Who's got into the game? So we do technically have multiple Americans on, I don't know if they were both on the field together.

Not anything about that. Paxton came off, so. No, did Paxton come off? I thought he was on the whole second one. Okay, you're probably right. He came on at the beginning of that, in the 46th minute. Okay, yeah. But Taylor Booth did come on at the very end, so he's still around.

Did he, anything of note from young TB Rocca? No, it was very late. It was very late. Which is happy he's playing. There was a sequence in this game where first Utrecht, they had a guy. I don't remember who it was. He headed the ball, it went off the crossbar. The ball came back to him.

He headed it. It went off the crossbar again. And a few minutes later, maybe five minutes. Alkmar did the same thing. One guy. No. He headed it in the crossbar. Came back to him.

Yeah. The announcer was loving it. They couldn't stop. They kept showing different replays and different angles. Just be astronomical odds against that happening. Like, I've never seen one person do this. that to have it repeat. That's, that's something, there's something glitch in there.

We're lucky to be alive to have witnessed it. Oh yeah. Maybe, maybe that's telling us we're not, we're not really alive. Would we have been at that game to tell me we wouldn't have been there? No, but we would have gone to an Alkmaa PSV game at that stadium. So you would have been, you would have been close to those crossbars is what you're saying. You would have, even though you wouldn't have seen that. happened. You would have been in the same place that that cosmic miracle took place.

Yeah. We would have been able to witness the crossbars. Probably leave, probably leave like, uh, the ones and zeros that they are made up of. Yeah. Leave something symbolic at the site, uh, a candle or a picture. Yeah. I do have one gripe with the commentator. When he, he mentioned that Paxton is the younger brother of Brendan. who plays at Union Berlin, is what the man said. Obviously, he's not there anymore. Let's keep track where all the there brothers are.

Yeah. We're going to be calling that. That's a podcast that never makes mistakes. We have no patience for that. Yeah. I don't make mistakes. Maybe you've made a mistake. I've never made one.

Yeah. I don't think I have, actually. When would I make a mistake? I don't know that you have. I'm joking. I'm doing a joke. I've made mistakes. Aronson, yeah, we all have.

Eranson, except for maybe Greg. Eranson has, was played in the midfield in this game. I think this is also pretty noteworthy. Up until now he's been playing on the wing. Their wingers have, I think, been pretty good. So he got to play in the midfield. And I thought he was solid, but it's really all about the goal. that he scored. Let's take a break, come back and talk about Tessman, a couple other things,

and a little bit about the roster that's probably going to come out later this week. All right, we're back. Tanner Tessman, got a start for Leon. They beat to lose, 2-1. Mark McKenzie also started, went 90. Le Kippe. The sports newspaper in Paris had some harsh words for Tessman, said he was, quote, miserable and a quote flop. But I don't think that was fair at all. So this sounds like some bias against, I don't know, against Testament at least. Do you think we're still going to be dealing with that, like anti-American sentiment?

Is it at this point now just like in France that our guy, in the early 2000s, this was the life of a U.S. soccer fan was that everyone hated the American players. and there may have been some truth to it, but I feel like now that's definitely, no one feels that way about, almost no one feels that way about our guys in Europe, except maybe, maybe it's just in France that they've got this still. Some bespectacled Frenchmen in the newsroom at LeChip. I don't know. I don't really believe in the anti-American bias. I was kind of joking around, but I was just afraid to say it out loud. I do think that that would be the last place that it would be. So if it needs to be finally defeated, we know where it is.

Miazga had to sneak out of there in the dead of night. I mean, he was, that wasn't that long ago. Yeah. And, you know, his career only went upward from there. I think it's just, honestly, I think it's just people can interpret performances in different ways. To me, he seemed like a solid metronome and a formidable presence against the ball. He missed a diagonal or two, which is pretty, cinematic, you know, when you kick the ball straight out of bounds from deep as the six.

But he also connected on a few of them and came off in the 67th minute. I think he'll continue to play. And then Toulouse did go on. I mean, Leon went on to win, scored in like that really late. McKenzie started, like I said, went 90. He stuck his foot out on a cross and it carammed off a teammate in for an own goal. so he doesn't get credited with the own goal, but it's really kind of mostly on him. But it's unlucky.

He keeps starting for Toulouse. Toulouse was actually pretty good in this game. They were the better team. Tessman is interesting, I think. I think that that terrible review he got was he had a couple moments early where he hadn't quite adjusted to the intensity of it. Yeah. And the reviewer was probably watching all the different players,

and they weren't as invested in Testman as we were, so they weren't going to revisit their initial impression. There you go. That is, I mean, for real, probably what happened. Is it one person rating 22 players on the field, or do they have a team? In either case, even if you're doing four or five players. It's hard.

Yeah, Testin would have needed to have some real, spectacular positives to overcome that initial. And it's his first start, so that really is like very first impression stuff. Really, there was just one moment where he just had a miscommunication with his teammate, and they passed it a little behind him, and he let it go and went out of bounds. And then they never got the ball out of that zone, and then a goal happened, where he was partially, it wasn't his fault, but a guy moved. through where his his area that led to a goal.

He did get kind of, did the pass go through his legs or right past him? It was a, I don't remember exactly what I was, he did not have a robust cover shadow in that moment. That's a good way to put it. Bells, you're kind of inching towards anti-American sentiment here. I just want to, just want to kind of caution you to be careful. Classic Bells. Um, let's, uh, let's, let's sneak, let's sneak in a little women's national team stuff here, Greg. Why don't we?

Oh, yeah, we got, we got Macario back. So she'd played for the U.S. and the friendlies leading up to the Olympics, but then it was the online Olympic roster, and then they had to scratch her for not quite being 100%. Hadn't played for Chelsea in their opening couple of games, but came in off the bench over the weekend, immediate assist, and then a goal to cap it off. So her counting stats per 90 are off charts. And then we also had to Lily Ohana's screamer in league play, which was, it's very pleasing to watch.

Yeah. Still rising as it hits the net meets every definition of the Waki banger, I think. Yeah, a little teaser for what's coming for WOSO Wednesday. Yeah, and I want to say I thought the first, so. I didn't watch the IACs game against Was it, did they play PEC's wool? I think they did. I just noticed that the first goal

that the IAC's opponent scored was really nice. You know, and we always, like, a lot of people always talk about how these teams are terrible and the Dutch Bruin Aere da Vizzi. But, uh, I don't know. I'm not totally convinced. Um, also Chelsea, like you said,

Macario scored. She scored a pretty nice goal. She also got an assist on a corner kick. And Chelsea beat Crystal Palace like 7 to 0. That does not feel like a serious... Serious thing going on there. No, they'll have... I think they have Arsenal next,

so that'll be more of a battle of peers. Yeah. Okay, let's talk about... We've got a listener, Wayne Warner. Back to the men's national team who says, what about a 4-4-2 under Potch? I guess his idea is, well, there's a lot of different ways to do it, but I guess Balagan up front, and he thinks maybe Weston should be up there with him, as like the second striker.

Pulisick on one side, Rayna slash way out as like the half-space guys, and then you have the fullbacks bombing forward, and then you have two defensive midfielders. Thoughts? I don't, I don't, I certainly won't object to a four-four-two. I feel like you could absolutely do a 4-4-2 with our personnel and not put anyone woefully out of position. It's all just going to come down to who are you including in the 11 at whose expense, and is that math worth it?

So, you know, especially if you're running McKinney as one of your forwards. Are you really doing a 4-4-2, or are you playing three center-mids with McKinney as just a more advanced center-mate? Yeah. But if you really want to go strikers and get Bolligan and Sargent on the field together, then you just figure out which midfielder you're dropping for. But I totally think you can do that. The Balligan Sargent pairing up top is the one that makes the most sense to me. Because then you get like sort of the big target guy with the big booty in sergeant.

And then you have the guy who runs off him in Baligan. West needs to play probably in the midfield. for us because of the math you reference. I don't know. What would the knock on effects of it be like in how we play and stuff? Like would it make? You'd have real knock on effects of just like McKinney and then name your other midfield or playing in it too.

And is that going to work for us? And again, I absolutely think it can, whether it's Wes and Musa or when Adams is back healthy. We got Johnny Cardoso in the mix. So I think you can run a midfield too with the right, like, instruction and sort of incentive. Like you just have to make clear what the roles are for those two players and how much work they'll have to do and how the team's going to. Because, again, you can defend in a four.

We often defend in a four-four-two. So there wouldn't be too much different there. Then it would just be, all right, how are we going to actually play? It's probably not going to resemble the, the deliberate 325 or 2-35 buildouts that we've seen for the last four years. But I absolutely think a coach could implement that to some success with the U.S. personnel. Is that the main thing that would change is the way the build-out happens? Maybe, but even that, you could, you know, if you're running,

Sargent is sort of the real hold-up man, then in Bolligan kind of dropping and running off of him, that wouldn't be, that could structurally look very similar to what we've done with, you know, a target forward and then whether it's Pool Sick racing behind or Tim Waya trying to be the vertical threat it could still look really similar it'd just be saying

you know tendencies of the two strikers are going to be more strikerish than if it's you know one strike up there with Pulisick and Wayas the other attacking threats you do like instead of McKinney you could do

Sergeant and Raina if you wanted to get Raina on the field. And again, you're just really blurring the line between, is it really a 4-4-2, or is this basically just rain as a 10? Yeah, a 4-2-3-1, essentially. Yeah. It put a lot of stress on, a lot of defensive emphasis on Pool Sick and whoever that other winger is most likely, winger wide midfielder. It would be like the old Donovan Dempsey days where they had a ton of two-way work. That would be a downside having Pulisick do that. One, because he probably does one.

No, he's not actually very good at it either. It's not his thing. Some people would say he should be one of the two strikers, right? Sure. Like, he should be up there with a sergeant or a balligan or even a peppy. So then you're getting into, we're talking about a winger crisis we're having. Then you're getting into like, all right, who's, if you put Pulisic up in a 4-42, who are our two wide midfielers going into this camp, especially where Wayas hurt, Raina could be hurt,

What are we doing here? Jamo smooth. Come on down. Well, Mouique has been playing winger. Yeah. And was doing some pretty hard running this last game. He did a 60-yard pressing run on the keeper. Couldn't believe what I was looking at.

He glides real nice. Yeah, he glides real nice once he's hitting top speed. Let's do, before we get out of here, Let's do surprise inclusions and surprise omissions, just one each. Well, I have one more club thing just because I think it's... Okay. It just quickly, Gladback got their first home win in 217 days. Goodness.

Apparently, they hadn't won at home in a very long time. That's it. Okay. I mean, remember, it's a leap year, so that's going to throw, like, the calendar off a little bit, but that's still a lot of days. even if it was 216 days, that's a lot of days. Yeah. Thank you for bringing up the leap year.

Yeah. I mean, when you're comparing spans like that. It's like apples to oranges kind of. It kind of makes it sound longer than it is, though, really, to say how many days it's been, because there's a summer in between. It was just last, the end of last, it was February or something. I mean, I'm the one who said the stat,

but the man said it on TV. Now that I think about it, it's not that. Did you? Were there any opta tweets that caught your attention this weekend? I didn't write any down. I think Balligan had one that was good. Charting? Was that what it was?

Charting, yeah. Charting? Oh, because they said he was the fourth or fifth American to score 30 goals in a top five league. Oh, yeah. Charting a new course. Or charting a course that four other people have already charted. I think they were saying he was working his way off the chart. Ah, okay.

I was thinking more of more nautical terms. I think they did, they had something about Pepe that said Express. I don't know that we need to, you know, interpret that too much. So let's start with Greg. Who's your surprise inclusion? Okay, because it's winger season, thanks for letting me go first so you don't steal it. It's Colio Show. Coelio Show's coming.

he he was the last window he went to the italian youth team uh set up didn't even be he wasn't even on the bench for the actual games they played which i don't think it's because they don't rate him i feel like there's a lot going on uh you know with the politics uh so i think part of those politics are that he's he's coming over to play for us and maybe we can build out this intrigue a little bit jesus Perez was in london this weekend maybe they got that whole staff over there, you know, finalizing it with them. Yep, they're using Jedi and Folham as a smokescreen, but what they're really doing is they're leaning on Colio Show, and that's, that's going to be our big, it's going to be our big, big bombshell.

Because why do you need to go see, why do you need to go watch Jedi play left back? You know what I mean? You know what I mean? You did have a, according to Fat Mob, Man of the Match performance, to be honest,

didn't watch it. Love you, Jedi. Trust you completely. You know, Pocitino and Coliocho, both Italian-Americans, too. You know, if you use the word America as broadly, which is what we're kind of supposed to do, right? Waki, who's yours? Surprise inclusion. Well, I'm going to say Jordan Morris then. He's had 14 goals this season.

He's only 29. Maybe Potch wants to bring in some MLS folks. then I have another possible surprise. He brings no European-based goalkeepers. He says, you know what, guys, if you're not playing, I'm going to look at all the domestic options. Okay. The bars of the kids hurt.

Turner's not playing. Horvath, I think, has been bench, so he'd have to be going, you'd have to go league one. He'd be dipping into league one. I don't even know who the options, all the, I don't know if we have three.

We must have three, though, right? Gavin Beaver's. People are saying it. People are talking about it. All right. I was like Gavin Beaver. You're going to call Gavin Beaver's. Patrick Schulte. Played pretty well at the Olympics, I thought. Yeah, you call up Schulte, call up Freece. You call up, uh...

I don't think he's calling up Zach Stephan. I know people just talk about that. Like, Zach Stephan's going to get called up. I don't see it happening. Did we? Somebody was criticizing us in the Discord for suggesting that this was possible or likely. Did we say that Stefan was going to get called? called up in my review? It'd be so... Get out of here. Get lost.

Kid me? Unlike us. There's not been anyone more vicious toward... Zach Stephan, on the entire internet than us. Yeah, somebody was saying we said he was going to get called up. I don't remember that. Who you got, Bells?

Who's your surprise inclusion? Surprise inclusion, Diego Luna. Oh, okay, there we go. Not as productive as Jordan Morris this season, but... You know, he had a goal a couple games ago. He has, I think, six on the season. He is a good player. Why he didn't go to the Olympics is beyond me.

Still kind of mad about it. Let's bring him in. If we don't. Do you think of... I'm not going to be furious or anything. I'll go first on omissions because, well, that's only fair, right? Yeah, that's fair. I'm going to take mine.

Well, I kind of already stole it. But my surprise omission was going to be Matt Turner. I know when I stole it, I went up to it because I said he's I omitted all of them. Yeah, you just didn't follow the procedures, you know? That's what happened. It's true. I can see it. I mean, I can totally see it.

It's very, like, who knows what his sort of, if he, if he'll have any of those kind of dogmatic manager beliefs about somebody not playing, not being able to break into the first team. Clemsman seemed to have one. I don't think it was ever stated, but he seemed to have one about if you weren't. weren't in the first division. So, like, once a, once a guy went from the Bundesliga to the second, the double Bundesliga, it was like they were, they were out of the running, the Danny Williams curve, Eric Lehigh in the championship could just not get a game for Cleansman. So you were like, like, Will Pach have that kind of a, that kind of a blanket rule where,

nope, we got to go to, well, we can go to Belgium and take guys in the first division from Belgium, but we can't dip into the, like, Christopher Lund can't come. I mean, that's a silly rule. Oh, yeah. Yeah, you should never really, like, impose any kind of a selection criteria on yourself that could prevent you from taking a better player than one that you're going to take instead. Hopefully, he doesn't follow that. Because we have enough methodology.

Do you think he would bring all three of our striker players because they could play other places on the field? I'm talking about Balagan, Sergeant, and Peppy. Is he going to leave one of them off? You just, you're on my, you're on mine. You got to mine. You're talking out loud, but you're getting to my, you're getting to my omission. Well, go ahead. You mean, you got to, no, you got to follow it.

You got to follow it through. Which one is he leaving off? You got, you have to pick one. Pepe. Ah. Just because he's not playing as much. Yeah, and his goals, his goals could have come, his big two-goal game. and start might have come and like after they would already send out the notices to the players who's coming and might not I think we would have yeah I almost put peppy as my surprise omission I think he I think he's that was going to be mine but I think he will go and it's because I mean unless it's Jordan Morris has the striker option uh which would just be an amazing swing uh like I still think you lean on the the the

Really young striker who's got a ton of promise and potential, even if it hasn't manifested or materialized over the last year in a way that we wish it would have. He's still scoring loads of goals when he does play. Yeah. You got Damien Downs knocking on the door, though. So do you have a backup omission, Greg? That wasn't officially my omission because I already omitted all the keepers. I was actually just, I didn't even, I jumped in and took it.

curious without even meaning to by just the thought occurred to me is, are they going to take all the strikers? I'll go with Tim Rink. I'm going to go with Tim Rame. I don't actually think he'll do that. I think he'll want to have that that wise old guy in a sort of

it's not a throwaway camp, is it? Because this is going to be, it's kind of a cool matchup of opponents for the opening game. The Panama team that knocked us out of Copa and then Mexico and Mexico City. This is a totally different window than Uzbekistan and Oman.

These are games I think the guys will care about. The fan base will certainly really care about these two games, these two opponents. Yeah. But that's just to say, like... I mean, hopefully. Hopefully Pashtino can get the players

to care about these games. I mean, he said friendlies are World Cups. There's no difference. So you got to, if he can communicate that and implement that kind of mindset, then... Yeah, the man said what he said. So I really don't think he'll omit Tim Reem, but man, like, we got to start finding people.

Richards might be hurt, so another reason that Ream could be definitely still included. But I'm just going to have to say that for my surprise omission because you guys, I had to go last on this one. Yeah. It is a tough spot to be in. Yeah. Yeah. Life's not always fair. All right.

Well, you know, the roster will come out on probably Thursday or Friday, I would assume, and maybe we'll record something about it. Waki, we're going to do a show Thursday night, right? Wednesday night, we're doing it, and it will come out on Thursday. Wednesday night, us and a couple of friends are going to do a show about the Champions League midweek action. So brace yourselves for that. Anything else, guys?

Again, keep sending positive thoughts to Daniel Smith, With everyone else who's been affected by the hurricane, there are a lot of good ways you can try to, if you have the means, to try to help support the recovery. So we're thinking of you, Daniel. Yeah. It feels silly to say thoughts and prayers. But, you know, it is, I mean, it's really bad. I got my dad, my mom and dad live in Swanoa, which is just outside of Asheville. My sister lives in Brevard.

We got some list, another key listener, Aaron Baker, and Brevard. and all over the area. I mean, just pretty much total devastation is probably an exaggeration, but a lot of devastation. One thing I wanted to mention, maybe I'll cut this, depending on y'all's reaction, but I love this podcast, the rest is history. I listen to a lot of it all the time.

They have a new series on Evita, which gives you a little window into Argentina in that country. And I love everything. they, almost everything they put out. I could not finish this. It is silly. The whole story is ridiculous. Like, what is she even about?

There's nothing. There's nothing there. And, like, people are dying for her. They can't stop. Like, she becomes like this religious figure with no content. There's no content to it. I'm like, this is not a serious nation. I got a quick question.

What's going on? What created the leap, the connection in your brain bells from, like in the last 90 seconds, to get to? Well, there wasn't, there wasn't, I've been wanting to bring it up. That's what I was wondering. Like, have you actually, like, ended every conversation you've had in the past day and a half? Like, you're talking to people and you're like, hey, one other thing. I just got to share. Well, we have a new Argentina.

We have been talking a lot about how great Argentina is as a soccer. country in the last six months. I've been talking about it. I'm thinking about it. Oh, yeah. So the siren is actually just going to be, the siren segment now is, the bells goes off on.

No, whatever, whatever we were talking about, like whoever we were talking about, you have to go now deep into a adjacent historical cultural fact about that person. So since it was Pachitino, now we've got to get into,

anything from Argentina that you want and you've picked Ava Peron. Her whole thing is that they should be like, like, Peron is the answer to all the, like, to all the questions. I can't believe that this transition happened from the flood. I'm outraged by it. I'm like, this is what they, this is what they are so excited about. And you're talking about they, you're still talking about. Like, from the past, you're not talking about, there's not a current movement in Argentina back to, like, the... Maybe not, maybe not.

Yeah, I know Jorge Luis Borges was a big critic of the whole of Pharon thing. So, you know, she had her critics then and probably does now, but... So you're... This riled up about people from 40 years ago and there... 70 years ago. 70 years ago. and their, I guess, adoration of Ava Brone. The melodrama is incredible, considering how little was actually going on.

It was neither left nor right. It was just, anyway. I don't. Yeah, no, perfect first siren segment, I think. There's good things about being really, really serious. serious about soccer, makes your national team really good. I got to say that country went down a peg in my estimation. After listening to that, what are you going to about?

I don't know about this whole thing. Right. Yeah. Totally. I'm delighted that that happened. Potch is different. I'm sure. You're delighted that what?

Whatever that, I'm glad that all happened. Okay. Yeah. And I'm just, I agree with Bells. Like, no serious country could just have, like, uh, like, just raise one person to like a level of worship where a significant portion of their population would do a bunch of crazy stuff. Yeah.

Yeah. There's some looking in the mirror necessary here. This is a little different, though. All right. Thanks everybody for listening. We'll see you.