Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #679: USA v Portgual recap

Episode Date: April 1, 2026

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Welcome to the scuff podcast when we talk about U.S. soccer. Hey, everybody, the U.S. face two high-quality European opponents in the March window and were beaten soundly both times, city of Atlanta, which seems so ready to embrace this team. Kind of had to suffer through these two games, as did I think the rest of us. Here to recap the 2-0 loss to Portugal on Tuesday is Greg Velasquez. Greg, how are you doing? Bells, I think I'm doing better than most. I feel like there was plenty of suffering,

but I think there's good and bad suffering, and I feel like this was, I think this was fine suffering. I think this was like, the reason you schedule these teams is to find out where you will get beat by these teams in June. And I feel like we found that out.

There's always a question of like, is it anything we can get better at or we just at our limits? And I think, I think it's a little bit of both where maybe we can get better at some things. Maybe we do find out like, look, we aren't a top 8, 12, 16 team in the world probably. But can we do enough that maybe on a day where the brakes break a little bit better? Yeah. We don't, we don't, we don't, we don't go down in flames. So we're looking at a classic Velasquez, uh, contrarian sunshine episode, aren't we? I, it probably is.

Yeah. Like, again, I'm always coming in late. So I see the chatter in real time. And yeah, like, what? It wasn't that long ago that we were being like, hey, this Uruguay game was fun, but don't get too crazy about it. Like, this is not what a real game against the real top. Right.

And the eight team is going to look like. Uruguay, for whatever reason, aren't in this game, despite being present on the field. But you go back four other games. And Japan and Ecuador and Paraguay, those really were. good opponents playing our Australia. And those performances that we had in those games don't disappear, right? Like those teams that are right at about our level, maybe a little bit below, we can play really well.

And that's a big part of a World Cup experience as a US men's national team fan. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, you were a big wet blanket on the Uruguay game for sure. It's super positive. Yeah, super positive, though, on those other four games around that. stretch. Right. Okay, I got my sort of feeling about this game is it was I mean we had a flurry of sort of

I don't know if you'd call him chances, half chances in the first five, six minutes. Portugal had a little trouble dealing with our pressure at the beginning, specifically Anasio, like he had the two giveaways that led to maybe our two biggest chances. And then to me, Portugal just said, okay, no more of this. We're going to just dominate this game from now on. And they basically did. And so I don't know, I mean, I have a timeline here, but I don't, for me, it's more like,

they can rondo in a phone booth and we can't, and that's like basically the story of the game. Like, they did eventually deal with our pressure. we could not really deal with their pressure such as it was. I mean, what's your sort of big picture take on the game, this game, this specific one? Because I do want to talk about the Belgium game a little bit with you. Yeah, it'll bleed in. It'll bleed in. You know, totally.

I think everyone five minutes in was like, we are winning the World Cup. You know, we just played Uruguay. We have Portugal just on the ropes. They are floundering here. Belgium was just a blip in the narrative. just a bulletin the minute. You know, we got our, we got Christian Poolsick playing Stryker, and this was a genius movie. No one was saying that at the time, and I think people were pretty reluctant to say that even when we were five minutes in.

And things were all falling in our direction other than the last touch and a half of any attack we had. But I think, I don't think it was as much as like they figured it out five minutes in. We're like, whoa, guys, wake up. This team is like going to do something if we keep screwing this up. I feel like at least 35 minutes in all the way to the goal, it was even, if not the U.S. shading better, despite not necessarily having the ball as much, you know, Portugal weren't carving us up. It wasn't like, that's true. It wasn't Turkey from the summer where every time they got the ball, they would advance it up into the box and have like a moment of danger.

It was very little danger from them. And maybe they were sleepwalking too, I don't know. but it wasn't like that. That wasn't the game. It was just kind of an even battle where you could see we seem to lack that last touch and a half quality, certainly on the day. Certainly from the guy we lean on to always be able to deliver that quality when it counts in Christian Pulisic. And so then again, the hope is like, okay, he didn't do it in that game. Let's hope that come June it happens.

Right. Yeah, not a great... Get him the same looks, get him the ball in the same areas. Like, again, I know he's playing striker, and it's like, why is he there? But we got him the ball in some good moments, good areas, good number situations, and it was all just kind of a fizzle. Yeah. Yeah, I felt like he had a rough window, and I feel like just watching our front four,

and I'm probably overreacting, but our front four, so I would say, Wayos, in this game, Wayo Wes, Pulis, and Tillman. in the attack. I like all these players, but like relative to the way Bruno Fernandez, you know, the way Vitina passes, just knocks that ball in behind.

Like it's just a, the first big Portugal chance, it's just a nothing, it's, there's nothing happening, right? It's like a kind of a, I think it was like a giveaway or something, but Vitina just like backboards with somebody

and then knocks it in behind and the way Bruno Fernandez swivels and like puts just a venomous shot on target. It just goes from like, nothing to something so fast, so such a concrete amount of danger created. That's not us. That's not our front floor the way we play. Oh, 100%.

Like we are a little bit more ponderous. Even when we create those like turnovers, because it came off of a turnover. We tried to hit an entry pass from our own box, you know, that ball up straight up the gut on the floor into a poolstick checking back. And, you know, he didn't win that. And I think people would very be very ready to say, well, of course he didn't. He's not a big Holking target striker. Right. Like, Ballow wins that probably.

Yeah, it puts up more of a challenge. So you can lean on, you know, the coaching decision there. But either way, the fact, it's like we turn them over too, even whatever the talent it was, their positions do. We turn them over in similar situations. For sure. And we don't have that just ruthless efficiency. And I don't know if you want to call it an urge. to like get this thing into a shooting situation.

Get off of the ball, get yourself into a shooting situation. Get into the most dangerous space you can as soon as you can. And again, we'll see it on your time when we get to Portugal's goal. Very similar ability to just take a turnover in a nothing situation. Identify the like half a beat that one of our players is kind of like not quite covering the most dangerous area. And they're like, we will take that dangerous area and we will score. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's.

That, I mean, it kind of sounds like a cliche as it comes out of my mouth, but that is kind of the difference, I feel like, or at least one of the key differences between us and these sort of top-level teams. One other question for you, which goes back to the Belgium game, why is, you know, you talk about the wedding cake. And let me just explain the wedding cake to the people who haven't listened to all 677 of our public feed episodes so far. This is a Greg Velazquezism about when it's a dangerous situation. You wedding cake in front of the goal. You got like you got the fattest part of the wedding cake at the bottom. And then you just kind of the next level is a little bit narrower. And then it's a little bit narrow until you're at the, you know, the bride and groom at the top of the, well, you know,

the two people who are getting married at the top of the cake. And that's like one person. This is how you, this is how you get back into position when it's time to play. play defense in a dangerous situation. Why is our wedding cake in this past window so often a sheet cake? It's, I actually, again, I'm calling it an improvement. I'm calling this window a huge improvement, to be honest. The wedding cake failures of the past have been, you know, the opposing attack gets into

our, into the wide zones, kind of deep into our third. And you've got to have that sort of protection in front of goal, you know, protect the most dangerous space. That's the space directly in front of goal. That's where you need your numbers. Your centerbacks are prioritizing that area. And then your midfield, center midfielder's probably protect and stack up right in front of your center backs. And that has been a huge weakness of ours where they're just at sea, not paying attention, not alert.

They don't get there soon enough. And we saw it. I mean, it was our downfall against the Netherlands in the World Cup. It's been, it's hurt us in like numerous games since then. But in this window, like, that wasn't the case. We got bodies back over and over again. There were times where, like you said, we had, it was a sheetcake where actually everyone flattened out to the first layer. Right.

That's what I mean. So like we overrecovered, which I'm not going to say it was like, well, we really emphasized it. So guys were really working as hard as they could to get back. And then in the process, like overran their target. But there were times, yeah, where we actually got our midfield, that second layer, too far deep. into our own goal line and now they're coming back out. But I still think that's an improvement. What you're trying to do is just, again, bodies between the ball and the goal.

And what we're going to come to on all seven of the goals we conceded in this window, we had good numbers. Like, we have good numbers back at the time of the shot to really make this difficult for the shooter to score. It probably doesn't feel like that in real time as another one goes into the net. But it was like, oh, there's the guy there. I mean, the first few, everyone's going to know right away against Belgium. Everyone was like, yeah, definitely. Like, they went right to our players.

But I was like, this is, I mean, this is, this is fine closing out as far as the number of people we have in the block to defend against this shot. The close out sophistication, like the awareness and, yeah, basically I really do just think it's sophistication. And execution was off at times, almost every time. Okay, so she cake better than no cake at all. Yeah, it's better than just one later that it's been swiped off by the rowdy eight-year-old running around the wedding. Right. Okay. Yeah, and I guess it comes to mind for me on Joao Felix's goal because that's on a corner kick.

And, you know, as they said on the broadcast, as everybody noticed in real time, you know, Joaquin takes a touch that pops way up on him. It's like, it's in the air for like 12 seconds. not really 12 seconds, but it's in the air for a while, and then it comes down and he volleys it. And at the time when the ball arrives to him, there's no one within 10 yards because they're all flat in the six, basically. And I think it's Aiden Morris who gets closest,

but it's too late by that point. Well, it is. Even on a corner kick. This is where I'm saying, it's not necessarily too late. Like if I'm the manager here looking at this tape, even as a goalkeeper, you know, where my priorities always, was like, whichever guys are available, do whatever you can to maximize how much of my goal you take away.

I think Aiden Morris was totally fine here. The reason that Felix looks so open as soon as they start the corner kick is because he's not a priority. No team defending corners prioritizes defending that guy because the ball takes forever to get to him. And it's insanely difficult to reliably get that ball to him where he will then control it and execute anything close to what he ends up executing. So it's not a priority.

It's like, okay, if they can hit it and he can hit it first time and score, you just clap your hands and say, good on you. You want to be able to deny the touch and shot. And what I'd say is Aiden Morris basically does that. He's maybe a little late. It's a well-designed play where they, should we just break it down now or should we wait? Yeah, let's break it down now. I mean, that was easily the most frustrating goal of the day, you know,

I thought. So go ahead. Okay. So they've got, we have a couple of guys at the penalty area, at the penalty spot. And those guys, you'd think on the kick would recognize, okay, this ball's going way over everyone's head. And now we'll essentially zone it. So it's my job to go out and meet it. But before the kick is taken, both the guys nearest our defenders who are around the penalty spot break hard towards the ball.

And so our guys chase with them. And now there is no one, again, now there's no one outside of the. the six yard box for us. We have all of our defenders inside the six yard box. And even then, we can still get a guy there. Aidan Morris picks up like the tiniest bit of a body block on his way out. And that slows him down a little. But he still gets there. So as the touch comes in, by the time the shot has taken, Aidan Morris is in what I would call like a perfect blocking position. And we're going to talk about this a lot as we break down all the goals we conceded. And we've talked about it in the past. Like, this comes up all the time. That blocking defense.

defender and what they need to do to be doing this correctly to take away as much of the goal and the right part of the goal that they can. So Morris is like right on top of the ball. There's almost no room for Felix to hit this ball past him. And there is zero room to hit this ball at the near post. He cannot take a near post shot. And in my brain, that means Aiden Morris is basically doing his job. Okay.

You don't think he should take away. I mean, this is way, this is a lot to ask of Aiden Morris for me, but you don't think he should take away the far post? He shouldn't take away the far post for me because he's coming from the near post. Okay. And you never want to cross over like at the last second because the goalkeeper is reading your, your close out, and he sees that you're taking away the near post. And so now he knows I have that, it changes where the near post is.

My near post that the guy can score in is now four feet closer to the center of the goal. So I don't have to cover that as much. I can cheat a step or half a step towards my far post. And that's a huge, it's a huge deal for a goalkeeper to not have to worry about, you know, two yards of the goal. So he shouldn't cross over the last second. He's got the near post taken away. And it is completely taken away here. And that's big.

And that's where we failed on so many of these other shots throughout this window. The issue is, are other defenders, right? So the other thing about these shots is they're always going to have to go through a bunch of bodies. So we have all these bodies inside the six who are now, you know, rushing to get between the ball and the goal. And they all work hard to do that. The problem is they do not coordinate themselves at all. And you have this hilarious line of three defenders who should be able to combine and take away like the entire far post. But they end up directly stacked behind each other in a conga line.

And Felix's shot goes like right outside all three of their shoulders into the far post with like no room to spare. Right. If any of them takes a quarter of a step towards the far post because they realize I'm not blocking anything because I'm Chris Richards and I'm directly behind Sebastian Burhalter and Austin trustee is directly behind Chris Richards. Any of them recognize like our job here is to stagger ourselves to block as much of the goal as possible. Then he cannot score. Like the ball either goes straight into Aidan Morris's body into one of our other defenders or into the arms of Matt Fries. And it sees these little things But I swear to God

Like the best defenders like have this in their heads Whether it's you can coach it This can be coached I don't know how much of a training session You dedicate to this kind of thing Especially for an international squad But it certainly bit us seven times In this window

Okay that's great That's incredible That's incredible that kind of that it happened on every single goal And even with that quarter step, I mean, that quarter step not taken by trustee or Burrhalter or, or, uh, Richards. It still had to be like. Inch perfect. Yeah, basically. But yeah, that's the principle.

The principle is you don't make your body bigger by shifting side to side. You just change which portion of the goal your full body can take away. So you always want to take away some portion all the way to the post, whatever that portion is. The closer you get to the ball, the bigger the portion is, just from the way the angles of the triangle work. But that way, Fries can just be there. He's going to be stationed at the middle of the goal. He can take away, you're just shrinking his entire goal. If you take away a portion that leaves a gap between you and the post, then Fries, there's no way Fries can reach that shot.

He could have reached a shot that goes to the inside of your shoulder if you've cheated father out, but he can't get to one that goes outside your shoulder that's still within the frame of the goal. Yeah. I just know that when I play goalkeeper in like some pickup game or whatever, it's really hard for me to keep track of where the goal is behind me. And so I imagine for defenders, it's also very hard in the heat of the moment to like know. I mean, that's probably something you learn with reps. And who knows?

Like my expectations might just be too high because I am a goalkeeper. So when I do, like you're saying, in our grown-up games, when I am playing in the field in these scramble situations, I am, you know, even if I'm the third cover defender, like, I'm, like, trying to immediately get my body to the far post to act as a wall. And you're calling it out. You're calling out so your keeper knows, like, hey, I'm on your, I've got the far post. Like, uh, they hear that. And then they will cheat a step, whichever way they can read in the situation to, again,

just as efficiently as possible, cover that freaking goal up. It's such a high leverage moment. Yeah. I mean, I need to take your webinar on how to teach communication to youth soccer players. For any coaches out there, any coaches out there for kids, it's such a fun game. You just play games where you do shooting drills sometimes, but without a goalkeeper in there, you put two outfield players in. And they have to combine, and the shots just need to come so rapidly that they got to scramble

constantly to know where the next shot's coming from. And then they'll work to protect, like to combine to like get to cover as much of the angles as Awesome. And they got to talk to each other while they're doing it. Yep. Yeah. And you got guys, they'll be going to ground. They'll be doing all the stuff and then having to work really hard to get back up for the next scrambled shot.

It's like, where do we need to combine to go? So they'll learn that working together. How do you key the shot? Like, how does the shot, how is the shot initiated? Is it a. So you can have, you can have like a five or six shooters out, station around the outside of the arc or the box. And you can be color coding their, like, their stations with like cones. So then you got someone behind the goal just holding up, like, which color is going next.

And they'll, like, maybe do a little, little passing combination before they shoot. So you hold up your cone and then it's like they've got these two passes to execute. And then the shot comes. So the shot feels more like a live shot and not just a station. Anyway. Yeah, yeah, I love it. I love it. It's a blast.

It's a fun one to do on a fun day. Yeah. Let's do the lineups. I'm going to read ours in the 4-4-2 that was our defensive shape since we spent 60% of the game in that shape chasing the ball. It was freezing goal. Freeman, Richards, trusty, and Robinson across the back line. Wea, Berthelter, Morris, and Tillman, although it was sometimes Pulisic in that left, I think,

in that left midfield position. And then Wes and Pulisic as the two. Any additions to that or subtractions? Well, it was pretty wild to see. it, right? I mean, when you understand we're rotating, because we played really, really recently, so it's a short turnaround, but seeing that Bolligan was rested and not using PEPI, basically PEPI, were you kind of blown away that PEPI wasn't starting in this game with bolligan on the bench?

I was not blown away, but I mean, you know, yeah, I would have, I don't know what I want to see out of POTCH on that question, you know? I don't feel strongly that, like, Pepe or Ajamong, like, deserves the start or something. So it's kind of, I'm kind of like, whatever. But, yeah, I think it is a bit non-traditional. I'm totally with you, but, like, I don't know that they necessarily deserve. We talk a lot about how there's Bologan,

and then there's everyone else really, really far below that. I just never expected that Pachitino would be like, well, then I'll just not use one of any of the other strikers. Yeah, yeah. And I don't know how much he's going to like stick with that. I don't know where Haji Wright lands for him. But again, when you actually look at the, the FIFA rating, so to speak, of whatever your mental FIFA rating is for these guys. Like, you kind of get it, right?

Like, okay, Baligan's not there. Which of Malik, Pulisic, Wea, McKenny am I going to take off to get Ricardo Pepe or Patrick Adjimang on the field? And at some point, you're like, and nuts to that. we're just going to play our, play our best players. Right. And I know there are a lot of listeners who are, like, going to be mad about that.

Matt, mad that that's our, you know, that we would sort of, you know, air quotes, disrespect, Pepe that way. But, I don't know, he came on,

he came on on Saturday and, like, he just can't take the ball under pressure, you know? And I don't know, I don't know how much that's in Potch's mind, but, uh,

he's a, he's a, he's a, He's a poacher. He's a goal scorer. But in the run of play, man, he has a rough time contributing, I think, at this level. And that seems to, I mean, that's kind of where I've landed on him watching him at PSV. And it's my, at least my theory on what, where PSV have landed on him, especially in these games that, you know, are going to dominate their possession.

They want a more fluid player, a more rounded player to be their 80-minute striker. And then it's like, then Pebb can come in and score a goal and he'll score a goal basically every time he steps on the field in that last 10 minutes for PSV in the league, which is nice to have. It's brilliant. But, yeah, I feel like it's the kind of same thing. If he's on, it might be as a late game substitute. And I think it's, you know, no different in that sense from Large Patrick, where it's like he wouldn't be the guy we would put in for 80 minutes because it totally changes how we would want to play the game of soccer. Yeah. Large Patrick, as you just called him,

had a wonderful moment in the second half, probably like the one bright spot of the second half from us. But yeah, I agree. So that's our lineup. Portugal was Jose Sa in goal at Wolves, Diogo Dolo, Tomas Aarajo, Gonzalo, Enacio, and Joao Cancelo across the back line. Samu and Vitina,

who was just a wonderful player in the midfield. And then Trincao with his around the world in 80 days mustache, Bruno Fernandez and Pedro Neto across the band of three. And then Gonzalo Ramos at Stryker. I mean, a lot of good players on the bench for them. They're not including Cristiano Ronaldo, he who shall not be named. And then, like, they're just really good.

Really good at soccer. They are. And again, this is why it, for me, this isn't a negative. This match certainly is not a negative thing because we went up against them with Aiden Morris and Sebastian Burrhalter. And we weren't, we simply weren't played off the park. Like, we've, we've seen this, this American team get played off to the park. And that's just not always happening.

It's frustrating and you want to, you know, like, especially after getting rinsed on the scoreboard three days ago. You just want better outcomes. So everything is going to be frustrating. And some of the lineup decisions might make you frustrated going into the game. But the actual performance on the field is like, all right, like,

if Aiden Morris and Sebastian Berthelter can play on the same field as these Portugal players the way they did at that level and not be total like clown shoes, that buys you something for the World Cup itself. I don't think anyone was like they should be starting anywhere. But it's nice to know that that's at least possible. I don't even know if they'll make the roster.

Right, right. But they weren't terrible. That's true. I mean, we didn't have Cardoso for this game. That's kind of a lineup note. He was recalled by Atleti. Yeah, obviously Tyler Adams didn't play this window. Let's take a break and then we'll do the timeline.

All right, we're back to the timeline. Right at the one minute mark, Tillman gets a shot after intercepting an Anasio pass in the press and combining with McKenny, McKinney kind of backheels it into his, they do something right in the D above the box, and McKinney just backheels it to him, and he takes a touch and shoots. It's deflected and kind of safely lands in Saas' arms. Yeah, you see how Portia will close that shot down? Yeah.

Makes a big difference. And then our press is, you know, it's a nice little revenue stream in the early part of the game. Pulisic gets a shot off of it. Trustee wins it at midfield. Like a nice, decisive centerback stepping into the path of a pass win from him. And then he just goes, he wins it to Tillman. Trustee goes charging all the way into the box. and Tillman

Dribles a little pushes it out wide to Pulisic Pulisic has some of the goal to shoot at I mean does he have some of the goal to shoot at I don't know but he's in a good shooting position A little bit of a tight angle His shot Is cut out by Vitina I think who's right there to

Block it he's blocking the far post Yes he is like he has the entire far Pulisik is trying to just pass it into that post And Portugal's smart enough to just be like, well, I have my jobs to take that away. And again, I do think this like matters. And I know the single game underlying numbers are going to be really noisy.

But like this is how like poor closing down and poor blocking shots might be contributing to why Portugal and Belgium both have very low expected goals numbers and very high expected goals on target numbers. Because so many of the shots that they were taking do usually get blocked and never even make it to the goal based. based on where the defender is positioned, which those models now take into account. So their models would be like, yeah, guys are going to block this. This is going to get blocked. And we're just like, no, no, it is not. This is going to go.

It's going in the goal. Yeah. Ah, yeah, interesting. Yeah, because the Belgium, the Belgium XG was. Four. Oh, the XG, sorry. Yeah, I mean, XG before XGOT was basically even if you take the penalty kick out. And then the XG for this one was what.

0.7 for the U.S. till about 1 for Portugal. But yeah, so many other, so many of there normally are often off to block shots. We just aren't blocking. And we got to be, this is something like, this was a hallmark of U.S. teams past. It was like blocking, blocking shots. Last ditch defending.

But that was a really big chance for Poulosik. You know, on another day, maybe he roofs at Near Post or something. Who knows? The ensuing corner gets us a free header for Wes, and he misses the Near Post kind of tamely, I think, just wide. Maybe he should go back to the Far Post on this. I don't know. I mean, he had a lot of space.

He had time to sort of think about it. So, for the first, as we've talked about, for the first six minutes, We look like we're going to take it to one of the World Cup favorites. I mean, no question. That's what was happening for six minutes. But there were 84 minutes yet to go. And at the 7.30 mark, Freeman tries a line breaking pass to Pulisic who is coming back to the ball. We discussed this one, actually, but CP gets blown up, and Vitina exchanges with Trincao,

and then taps it into the box like over the back line sort of through a big gap for Fernandez who swivels and just hits a really nice shot, venomous shot at the far post. It's going in the goal. And Freeze makes a good save on this one. I mean, this is a nice save, isn't it?

Yeah, this is a good save. And it's a nice save. It's also like just not that dangerous a situation. So even while Portugal did really well to make this a dangerous moment, the shot we end up allowing again these aren't like they're getting whatever shot they want

whenever they want. This is a tough shot from a tough angle that requires a difficult technique and he did really well to get it on frame. But this is one of those like warning shots usually that you're not they're not going to convert this that often. I want to talk about trusty but we'll get to that in a little bit.

22nd minute, we just managed to work it out of our half thanks to Burrhalter and Tillman and Tillman sends it down the line for Wea in space. This was another big dangerous moment. Wea's got a full head of steam. He whips it across. Pulisic swings and misses, basically, on it. I think maybe he expected a deflection and there wasn't a deflection.

And then it flies past McKinney too, and then we recycled back to the top of the box. Burhalter has a hit from distance. That is goalbound, I believe, but saved fairly comfortable. by Saa. I mean, it's just, I guess probably all the, all the, uh, inviting portions of the goal were taken away by Portuguese defenders. No, this one, this one's just, this is just a, good shot, comfortable safe situation from that distance. Burlter's got it to kind of swerving over to the far post. It's well hit. It's just, it's good goalkeeping. But yes, pool sick, pool sick again, like, sort of it's, it's just, there's no other way of saying, like,

he doesn't deliver here. Like, we, we put the, ball towards our nominal best player. And he just sort of, I mean, he fails in this moment. Yeah. And it goes, we talk about this a lot four years ago, three and a half years ago. If they don't, it's not like everyone, everyone, anyone is going to just score all their chances. But if they don't, we will lose to these teams. We aren't going to, you aren't going to like.

Yeah. Get 12 of these chances. It's like when we get these chances. in the World Cup against a round of 16 or around a 32, potentially, certainly a quarterfinal opponent. We either convert or we're just not going to win that game. No, yeah. All right, not happening.

And you're looking for that alternate luck on the other team's chances. Yeah, we're going to get probably two or three big chances in one of these games. And it's all going to hinge on that. It's a really good point. And it's going to hinge on whether they convert their chances, like you just said. So I'm just going to, for the rest of the episode, I'm just going to repeat what you say in different words. No, but it is. It's interesting.

Yeah. So 35 minute mark, Freeman gets the ball on the left side after a short corner we try. And that's why he's over on the left side because we had just done a short corner and the ball kind of ends up over there. He turns Dalo and drives at the box. This is really nice from Antonio. Not Antonio. Alex. Really nice from Alex.

Something he's pretty good at, carrying the ball, because the defender just can't get around him to make a play on it. He then invites attention at the top of the box, plays a clever little outside of the boot pass, a little bit backward to pull a sick at the top of the box. He takes a shot from 22 yards, fires and pulls it wide. But good stuff from Freeman.

And I don't know. I mean, does Poulosik go for the far post here? Because it seemed like Saw had this covered as well, even if he had put it in. Put it off. Yeah, I mean, I'm just on team. Get your shot off here and let the chips fall where they may. Sure, sure. Okay.

He hit it with some pace. Yeah. And then Portugal scores. 36th minute. We're trying to build through them from the back. And Freeman kind of gets the ball caught under him a little bit, cutting in just inside our half, but manages to knock it over to McKinney just ahead of him.

The pass is like waist high and kind of hit a little hot. So McKenny's in a tough spot and he doesn't handle it well. He just like hits a one-touch volley that splits Burrhalter and Freeman going back toward our goal. And it falls to the absolute wrong person on the field, Vitina. and he turns and plays Bruno Fernandez in. Fernando is, Bruno is like, you know, going into the goal,

draws the attention of trustee and Richards. I think Richards has like the shot covered here. So maybe trustee should have like paid a little more attention to Trincao. But anyway, Bruno back heels for Trincao, who has time to settle his feet and then pass it into the bottom corner, pass freeze with his left foot.

Maybe some, Yeah, so maybe something to say about trustee here, not being more attentive to the second layer of danger. But you can't cut yourself open like West does here. And it's one zero Portugal. So it's tough, right? Like the turnover from Wes isn't great. And Portugal are very efficient. But it's hard to say, like, you can't have this turnover.

Like if we can't try attempt to combine in these areas Then we're basically just saying like you have to give up playing playing this kind of soccer Which which maybe we are But these turnovers are going to happen like I think there's a there's an element of Trusty here on the first ball the first ball trustee and Morris sort of just getting it wrong in subtle ways That again Portugal are just so ruthless about exploiting so as that ball turns over and Vitina has it.

Is that who fell to right away from? Yeah, it fell to Vitina. Yeah. As he looks up, again, he's actually looking vertically at two of his players that he could split to, but he has this little pause and realizes that like, well, the somewhat naive American player, Aidan Morris, because again, these players at this level don't just know exactly what a defender should do. They know, like, a slightly lower level player will do instead of that.

is how I kind of read the game. He's going to jump this when he shouldn't. So Aid Morse jumps to try to take that away. And Vitina, like almost before Morris has even made this move to take away that pass, like hits it to the other space, which is a better space to hit it into. Like it's a more dangerous area because it's farther away from Chris Richards. So Morris denies a pass that would have gone in towards Chris Richards and leaves open a pass between Richards and trustee in like the maximum open space.

And part of the reason that space is so big is because trustee's late to recognize that that's the most dangerous area to cover. He actually, on the turnover, moves forward a little bit to take a man who is nowhere near as dangerous immediately as the two guys Vitini is looking at. So trustee gets his body wrong just a tiny bit, his movement. Morris gets his arguably wrong a tiny bit. And again, it's just that level of understanding from Portugal in that moment that's impressive and fun to watch, even while it's like, your team getting carved up. Hmm. What did you think of trustee overall?

I mean, it sounds like he, some, his recognition was a little, uh, what's the word drowsy in this moment, but overall? I mean, I would say, well, the recognition is great to point out on film.

It is not something that at any point I would say, that's why he shouldn't play. And this other American centerback should be the guy in the game. Like, it's not that magnitude of a mistake. relative to the pool. But I will also point out on the back heel, he is in perfect position to come in and block the shot.

And he actually like steps up and goes into a proper form of a genuflect block, like what a goalkeeper would do. Right in the line of the goalkeeper. But yeah, he just, he takes away the center of the goal because that's everyone's instinct, right? Like there's a goal. It's the same with like early young kids shooting. They always shoot at the center of the goal because like there's a goal.

And your mind is just like, it towards the middle of the thing. thing you're hitting it at. And people blocking shots will often do the same thing. Get to the middle the thing you're blocking. But it just doesn't work because you're not the, you're not the middle blocking guy. There's already somebody there doing that in a different color shirt than you. You go block the middle of the remaining part of the goal. So yeah. So yeah, so trustee gets like there. He's genuflecting, but he genuflex and leaves that bar post open when you should kind of be focused entirely on that. And it still pretty much had to be an inch perfect finish.

Exactly. Yep. That's how it works at this level. But overall, trusty, is he better than McKenzie? Is he more of a business handler, as Vince would say? I don't know that I would say that trusty handles business any better than McKenzie. So, I mean, we'll get to it. But I think RIM might be like out of the business.

business handling business altogether. I don't know how much longer Pachitino is going to keep sending his business towards Ream. So if that's the case, then I guess since I'm not sure that's the case, then it wouldn't surprise me any more or less if Austin Trustee is starting a World Cup game or left off the World Cup roster altogether. Yeah. It's a crap shoot, isn't it?

Hat stays the hat. 40 minute mark, Jedi tries from distance after we collect a pass from deep from Portugal at midfield. I think win it in the press, essentially, and he flashes it wide. I call this a quarter chance. 43 minute mark. Tillman tries from distance off across. It's cleared to him at the top of the box. I think it's off a short corner, and he volleys it over the goal.

But I do want to point out about both those chances. Like, they aren't great chances, right? but they're exactly the goals that were scored against us in this window. Right. That's kind of the rub. It's like we think, you know, we're talking about how are we so bad? How is our defense so bad at all this? It's like it kind of is, but it's kind of like those chances are just really, really unlikely.

And it's just like this was a window where they all went in. Yeah. Which is a combination of bad luck and bad blocking, which I hope we can somehow improve on. And poor concentration from us, at least I'm thinking of the Tillman chance, because that's like, That's a ball that's sitting up really nicely for him. 21 yards from goal. You know, I think the man with the mustache, Trincao, or, you know, Bruno or Bettina, they're going to put that more times than not.

They're going to put that on frame. And we got to, like, if we're going to win these games, we got to put that on frame and at least test the goalkeeper. Which for Tillman, like, he is that. technical player. Right. And you could tell he just, I think Martino even caught it. He kind of, I don't mean to say even Martino caught it.

That's, that's disrespectful. You know, you said what you said, my brother. I was furious that Martino kept calling Timway a wing back. Furious about that. I know. This really hurting everyone's understanding of what else. Yeah, everybody, everybody, like Vince said on Twitter the other day, you know, in versus out of possession shape and beaten this fan base his ass for.

a couple years now. But Malik, like, kind of snatched that a little early. Like, he went early on it, and that's how it's a couple yards over the goal. Yeah. Just got to let it drop another three inches. I mean, and then other than a tame effort from Aden Morris off the press, which was kind of, I mean, almost laughable, how it just kind of dribbled towards the goalkeeper. And Tim and Tim Wea taking a shot that got that blocked.

off his foot and then off his shin out for a goal kick. We didn't put anything on frame for the next half hour. And I would say this stretch of the game from the Portugal goal, basically to the end of the game, we were out there chasing shadows. You know, I mean, they were possessing. We couldn't really, when we would win the ball, it was really difficult for us to connect any passes.

What chances we did get were generally earlier in the game off the press, which is fine, which is fine. I'm not saying that's bad, but like the rest of this game after the Portugal goal and this Tillman Miss, I guess, if we're calling this like a shining moment, uh, was not that fun to watch for a U.S. fan.

Yeah, a bit perfunctory, right? Yeah. Like we were just really, again, it, for some of these guys that audition, their auditioned actually might be, the bar to clear might be like, don't have big screw ups. It might not be go out and win the game for.

us. Yeah. If you're if you're if you're, even even Tanner Testman, Aiden Morris, uh, all the center mid options we have kind of like, that's kind of their role. That's how we're going to use you because we, we know you're not going to come out and win the game for us. So, uh,

so in that sense like as a manager, you might still be getting useful data from watching 25 more minutes of, of Aiden Morris being boring because it's like, all right, if I can count on this guy to be boring, at least I know I can use that, uh, to plug some holes. But, yeah, it's not, it's not edgy your seat stuff for fans. No.

Okay, so the half comes and Tasman goes off for McKenny, Arson goes off for Jedi, and what was the other sub? Big Pat, Large Patrick's in? Large Patrick comes on for Christian Pulisic. And, I mean, you know, like we just discussed, they really, really not a lot happened for us for the rest of the game. But we'll talk about a couple. Don't sell Big Pat short because he's got that, he's got that electrifying moment. Yeah, that was awesome. That was awesome.

I will admit that. But we'll get to it. So 55 minute mark, Conce Sao, isolated versus Arfston after Big Switch. You know the little man from Yuvay, if you watch West there. And Arfson walks him back, goes back to a centerback, and then immediately back into Mateos Nunes, who gets in a big pocket of space, kind of Burhalter loses track of him. He dribbles horizontal across the top of the box, pushes it over to Gonzalo Ramos, the starting striker,

and he curls one that just goes wide of the far post. But another pretty good chance for Portugal. And, you know, he's frustrated with himself that he didn't score here. Yeah, and this was a bad moment for Burrhalter. Arston drives his man back up field really well. And Burrhalter, as Arston starts moving up, slides into that left back spot. and then as the ball gets dropped,

he just shuts off completely while still, I mean, he is the closest guy to the sideline, which is a big no-no when you're playing defense. Like obviously you should be goalside of whoever, whoever is on that area for you. So as soon as that ball is moving away from that area, he needs to be working hard to get goal-side

to rejoin the shape. I mean, he's part of the cake at this point. He's a deep player of the cake. Or he should be. So, you know, you could say Aidan Morris needs to be aware that Burholter fell asleep, but it's not really on him for me. Morris is like moving up.

feel like he's supposed to start stacking up again. And because we've got the numbers, he shouldn't have to be covering that area. That's Berhalter's job. Yeah. And then a goal for also, sorry, also just on the shot itself too. The way the, the games are going, it feels like that shot's going to go in against us. Totally. As soon as it leaves his feet again, and even though it doesn't, you're still just like,

we just keep getting giving up these terrible shots when it's not that high percentage of a shot. Like, we don't want to be giving them constantly, but we haven't. been giving up constantly. And again, the psychological wear and terror is just accumulating. Yeah, that's fair. It's not, it's just like when you, I guess it feels like when you're playing against a really good team and somebody gets a chance to curl it from just inside the box, that does feel like a really good chance.

Like, that's a shot that I can hit sometimes, you know? But anyway, 59th minute, go Portugal. we actually already talked about this right at the top of the show, so let's not do it again. But this is that corner from Bruno to Joao Felix and the Big Touch. And then as you explained, Aidan Morris does a pretty good job of, does a good job of closing down the Near Post. And we had a conga line, as you put it, of Richards.

What was it? Burrhalter, Richards, trustee. Yeah, who all could have stepped a quarter of a step. step to the right to take away the far post and didn't. Tiny little details are the difference between, you know, 1-0 and 2-0. Round of 16 in quarterfinals, right? Yeah. Yeah.

And then I thought we were just getting toyed with the rest of the game, except for, except for, Thank you. Arfston playing Big Pat down into the corner, and he rinses Antonio Silva. with a lightning fast touch along the end line, and then a good cutback for Balligan, who had come on as a late sub, and his first-time shot is blocked off his foot. But this is our best moment of the second half, I think, in the attack.

And this move for sure puts a waygoal score in the lead for the World Cup draft that we did, because Large Patrick is an effective player against Portugal. I think he's good. No, we've seen him do this kind of thing. Like this isn't a new thing. He has often beat that first guy, especially on the sideline. Like the way he can sort of use the sideline as some kind of leverage amplifier to, to like edge someone around there.

We've seen him do that in the Gold Cup. We've seen him do it for Darby. And now we're seeing him do it against Portugal. It's a lot. And for a team that has a ton of trouble manufacturing goals through really intricate play, because we can get the first three or four steps, right? but then, you know, those, the fifth and six steps are always really tricky, it turns out. And so having a player like, this is going to be the best comparison we've ever made,

a player like a doku, where you don't have to do any of that stuff. Like, you can just pass him the ball and he can be faced up against two people, like holding hands next to him, and he can still just somehow blow by them. and now you've completely thrown off a defensive shape. Having anyone who can throw off a defensive shape on their own that way is just massive, even more so in international soccer. Christian Pool Sick, we really need him to be that guy for us throughout this upcoming tournament. But the reason Big Pat is so interesting, I think, to managers is because he can do that in his own large way.

Yeah. He basically is doku. Going back to that draft we did, all the, you know, you really did me dirty by taking Josh Sergeant even though you didn't need him. But it turns out it didn't even matter. Saved you. Yeah, that actually saved you. He hurt me in the long run.

Josh Sergeant, like, you know, he's still, like, moving into his house in Toronto. He can't even play for the FC Toronto. Toronto FC, whatever it is. All right. So that's the game, 2-0. what do you think So sort of maybe What do you think is going to

Happen at the World Cup? We're just We're going to get out of the group And then we're just going to have to Have some balls Bounce our way, basically I mean pretty much yeah Like I don't think there was anything there

That that Pachitino Will overreact to? I know like, you know, The Sergenio Death's question is still out there Will he even be back? If he's not back is it is it going to be do you go freeman and put waya potentially on the bench because you're out of spaces with malik and west and pulick and bullsick and balagan um or do you go no let's get way on the field and while a lot of people were discouraged about way of getting rinsed against belgium again it's like Australia doesn't have doku right uh i'm not i wasn't discouraged about how he played against doku defensively i'm a little discouraged at how little he has I mean, he's crossing the ball well, but like, I guess that's just who he is.

He's good at whipping a ball in, but he's not, he's afraid to go at people one v one. He doesn't want to do it. He doesn't, I don't think. I think he wants to combine. I think he would love nothing more than to get involved in some of those McKenny, Malik, flicks. Yeah. That cute stuff that they love to do. And we see it do it when Serge is healthy and gets to be his buddy on that right side.

but he wants to combine around people and yeah and then he wants to fire a ball in and he hit a few in that were you know he got one to pool six head against Belgium early on he got the one to pool six leg Pulcc just kind of whiffed on so he's he can kind of show up there

yeah that oh that was the volley the one of Pulisick's head against Belgium was so sexy but yeah I don't know if if you really think he's a strong enough defender and good enough in the attack that you're going to be like whale just be our right back if search can't be there. But I don't think he played himself out of it.

No. No. No. No. Uh, danger. Yeah. So I, I think Pachitino has plenty of things in his bag, uh, to reach into for

this World Cup. And again, get our blocking right. And that'll, that'll help a little. Yeah. I guess it is kind of just, we are where we thought we were, you know, a long time ago. It's like it doesn't, there aren't any, there are, there aren't going to any big like accelerations and development before the World Cup.

I mean, it's too late for that. Obviously, there's no, there's going to be no big changes in like the outlook. It just is what it is. And we got to hope for kind of a magical run. I mean, that's, that would, that's probably what we would have said three years ago. And it's what we're saying three months out from the World Cup. Yeah. And I think, you know, we were hoping after that Netherlands lost in 2022, it was like,

okay, the next step is Giorina, right? The next step is can Gio Raina come in and change things? We didn't get to use them much in the World Cup. Can he sort of be that big jump in quality? You know, we were hoping Malik Tillman and Johnny Cardoso could maybe do a job. I mean, at the time, I think we were hoping Taylor Booth and step up and give us something 2026. But I feel like there are still improvements and there is room for that magic to happen. Adding Boligan gives you a lot of magic possibility.

Christian Poulosick, regardless of how he's done over the past 18 months, can do something to atone for that dance, and then he can deliver something in 2026. We've got, Malik looked good, man. Malik and Wes are looking good. And again, they might not be the guys to do the magic to actually score the goal every time,

but they're going to give Pulisic and Balo a little bit of that dust and give those guys a chance. I agree about, I especially agree about Malik. I thought he was really good in this window. Is Gio going to make the roster? I would bet, yes. Yeah, I think so too. He's also, I noticed half-time, the players are coming off.

Or it might have been the second half hydration break. The players are coming off. He's out on the field greeting them as they're coming in. He's clearly gotten the message that if you want to go to the World Cup, You do not sulk when you're not playing because he's not doing that. So that's good. No, like I'd be more, I have more questions about, like, Brenda, Ricardo Pepey, maybe Joe Scali, but I feel like Scali's in, especially with Desk's question marks.

Yeah. But I'm surprised that, I'm a little surprised that Brenda didn't, I'm a little surprised, that Brenda didn't get more run out. We talked about it. You and Vince talked about all the time. His numbers have dropped with leads from the beginning of the season when he was kind of on a tear. And he wasn't particularly impressive in the Paraguay-Urigoi window, even as the team had success. So, Posh just might not be there on Brenda.

He's always a nice guy to have laying around. But I was surprised he didn't get more run out. Yeah, he did get, he did kind of get the ball. in an AVP. I've actually forgotten what that acronym stands for, so it's kind of silly for me to use it, but like in an advanced position and dribbled out a guy late

and then lost it and kind of recovered it and shot from the top of the box when he could have tapped it over to geo for maybe a little bit higher percentage chance. Geo gives him the geo hands, you know, like... Those are some hard geo-hant. He gave him.

Yeah, he was not. It was not pleased. Hopefully he... The face matched the hands in a big way there. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, lots to think about over the next couple months.

Go ahead, Greg. I still think there's lots to look forward to. Again, there have been a lot of positive performance minutes that this team has racked up over the last seven games they've played, even going to the second half of South Korea. And there's nothing that says that, like, they can't deliver those kinds of minutes at the World Cup, put it together. Yeah. Plus, the women play Japan three times like the next month. It's going to be dope. Yeah, yeah.

And Lill Johanna scored a goal over the weekend, I believe. See? Yes. Okay. Hey, thanks, Greg. Thanks, everybody for listening. If you want to skip the ads, join the Patreon. Link is in the show notes.

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