Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - Episode 104: Canada 2, USA 0, and Berhalter takes the USMNT to a new low

Episode Date: October 16, 2019

Horrible night in Toronto. Failure on every level. Once again the citizens of the United States of America are encouraged to forget about the U.S. men's national team entirely, and they may yet do so. Time to rant and rave (but also to be fair), and to discuss the possibility of firing Gregg Berhalter. (This is a totally unedited episode recorded late at night. Certainly best to listen at 1.5x.) 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 scuffed podcast. I'm Adam Bells in Minneapolis. With me is Greg Velasquez in Des Moines. We talk about U.S. men's soccer. Holy smokes. Greg, what's going on, man? Bells, I'm actually still in the eighth minute of this game. Mark Anthony Kay just got subbed off.

Terrible blow for Canada. Surely, though, smooth sailing for the U.S. men's national team from here. Yep, hold on. Hold on. I'm seeing on Twitter that, I'm seeing on Twitter that, seen on Twitter this was not smooth sailing. It appears this did not go well. No, it did not. It did look like, oh, you know, this is going to be not a great game,

but Canada's best midfielder is down. Surely we can figure out how to get a result here. And the answer is no, we could not figure out how to get a result there. The U.S. men's national team is bad. I think it's inescapably bad. There may have been some doubt heading. into this game. Can I just, can I just interrupt you to say the group, the group TM, the group trademark? Yeah, the group trademark. Lost two zero to Canada in case anybody listening to this

didn't watch the game or didn't know about it. The group lost and it was pathetic. It really was pathetic. Say what you want about Canada being improved and having some special attacking talent. They didn't do anything special in this game. Did you think they did? No, they did as much special in this game as Kira Sao has done against us in the Gold Cup, which is to play comfortably against our very comfortable defense. They exploited some mistakes

that we made and took clear easy advantage of them because they are a competent side and being a competent side is enough to give you a pretty good chance at beating the U.S. men's national soccer team. Yep. That's what it comes down to. We're going to,

we're going to try to get into some of the big questions and have some of the big rants, but why don't we follow our normal procedure here? It's all about the process. Trust the process. Lineups first. Canada came out with Borhan, is that how you say it, in goal? Laria, Miller, Vittoria, and Cornelius across the back line.

Not a first choice centerback pairing, by the way. Yeah. Mark Anthony Kay, the aforementioned eighth-minute substitute. and Piet in the midfield, and then Scott Rfield, Jonathan Osorio, and Alfonso Davies kind of across the three-man line with Jonathan David as the striker.

I'll object slightly to that because it feels like it quickly turned into Davies up top with David and sort of a two, and sort of a striker pair. Okay. And Osorio was kind of on the left side, more or less? Or like into a 4-4-2 diamond. and sort of how sort of how it shaped out.

I mean, at times, it was, it was, they defended in a 4-4-2 similar dollars for, for large stretches is what I thought. Right. So like I said, Liam, Liam Fraser came on for, like you said, Kay went down with an injury, I think it was a hamstring, and then Liam Fraser came on a young midfielder, had a terrible, by the way, like never, never want that. I don't care if we're playing or like, hated rivals like it just sucks and canada's not our hated rival at least not they aren't

no i'd gladly invite all of canada to a dinner party yes dinner parties all around uh let's do the u s striker i mean the u.s. lineup lineup so that was a nice thing to see in the in the lineup card on twitter right was happy to see that correct pulisic at left wing morris at right wing mckenny Roaldon and Bradley in the midfield not a huge surprise there Roll don't surprise me I'm gonna be honest Roll don surprised me did he I thought Roll Don is a second choice guy for Burrhalter If he had his preferred 11 even in this camp

I kind of expected to see Poussick shuffled into the middle and ariola Starting or something that we've been Somewhat clamoring for is Sebastian Leggett starting in the attacking mid McKinney in the roll down spot with Bradley, I guess, holding. And Pulis is staying out wide. But again, Burrhalter seems very reluctant to start Sebastian Leget. Yeah.

And he's very comfortable starting rolled on. He is. He is comfortable with him. I believe that was the terminology he used when he discussed leaving Dwayne Holmes out of the roster. He said he's comfortable with his midfielders. Oh, brother. You can just see the seeds I'm planting here, Bells. I'm not subtle.

Well, and then across the back line, Daniel Lovitz, who is only left back in this camp, it appears. Tim Ream, Aaron Long as the centerbacks, and DeAndre Yedlin, a little bit surprising that he got the start, just given his recent return from injury over Cannon at right back and then Zach Steffin and goal. Now, I'm not saying that Yedlin shouldn't have started. over Cannon because I really do think it's hard to tell where those two are at. What do you think Cannon's thought process is when he sees the team sheet? Given that, again, I know that Cuba is a stat padding game, but given the performance that Cannon just had four days ago and the fact that Cannon seemed to be for his choice

at the end of the Gold Cup, what do you think Cannon is sinking when he's dropped for Yedlin? I think he's a good soldier. He seems like that kind of person who just like, you know, is all about. the team, I think probably after the game, maybe Cannon's a little more frustrated, wouldn't you say? I mean, I honestly don't know. I really just brought it up to wonder.

And I'm not trying to stir the pot with this one, because again... Oh, stir the pot. Stir that pot. As though we need to be doing any pot stirring, as though the pot isn't already being stirred in a lot more corners than it had been stirred in prior to tonight. Yeah, Tudel Rahman called for Burrho. Halter to be fired on Twitter right away. That's a, that's a guy who's pretty careful with his words, you know? Yeah, I think, well, it's, it's one of those things where I think a lot of people, and

I kind of include myself in this camp, a lot of people are very even keeled until it's clear that that's not the way to go anymore, and then it makes sense to not be even keeled anymore. So, uh, I, I wouldn't say my keel is terribly even at this point. Okay. Okay. Well, let's, let's save that for a little while. Do you see Doyle? Did you see Doyle's response? You mean the video he did? Yeah, right.

He seemed mad. What was his, I didn't watch the whole thing. What was his like takeaway? I mean, essentially he put it on Burrhalter. And again, Matt Doyle's keel is just about as even as anyone's can be. And it sure seemed like he had had enough. I shouldn't say. I don't want to put words into his mouth.

And you should watch his response. because I think it's all very fair, but he definitely has grown considerably less even keeled in the past six hours. Yeah, I mean, I saw the rant about midfield, you know, winning the ball in midfield. And if you can't win the ball in midfield, I mean, like he was screaming and pounding the desk. If you can't win the ball in midfield and start moments of transition, you can't win soccer games in the modern game. I think there's a lot of truth to that. I don't know that he was Tudel said he needs to be fired

said Burrhalter needs to be fired and I don't know that I don't know that Doyle said that did he? I don't think he ever said that I'd have to rewatch he probably wouldn't have I'm guessing but do you want to give your do you want to give your

uh sort of I'd be okay I'd be okay with him getting fired I mean I'm definitely not opposed to it am I like saying he must be fired now. I don't know. It's late. I'm drinking whiskey. I just drank some chamomile tea.

Before the whiskey. I'm really, really tired. I don't know if I'm ready to demand it. Are you ready to demand it? I'm not ready to demand it. I wouldn't be upset at all if it happened. We talked about this hypothetical going into both these games. It was like, all right, well, what performance during this window would actually cause Burhalter to be fired? And it was like, well, what if he loses to Cuba? And I think the general thought was he literally cannot. I mean, it's impossible to lose to Cuba. And then 30 seconds in the Cuba game, that proved to be the case.

You can't lose to Cuba. No one can. Right. Then we were talking about this Canada game. It's like, okay, well, if he loses to Canada and it looks bad, so this is exactly what happened. Yes, he could be fired. And I think it would be, I think it would be fair. I don't think it would be an overreaction to fire him at this point, given what we've seen over the

time that he's been in charge. I sort of mentioned this when the rosters came out. Burralter chose his group essentially in January and has rarely deviated from it other than adding in very obvious deviations. He's going to clearly add in Christian Pulisick.

He's going to add in West McKinney. It took him nine months, but he added in Josh Sargent. Those were obvious players that he was going to bring in. But otherwise, there's almost a nice parallel between the search for Greg Burhalter and the head coach the U.S.

men's national team and Burrhalter sort of search for his player pool because in effect there wasn't one he he picked it based on his initial thoughts and he's just stuck with it from then until now so those choices are are on him and we haven't seen a lot of success with that with the players he's chosen we've beaten some really poor Conca Calf teams and we've We've lost to middling Conca Calf teams, and we've obviously lost to Mexico twice, and we've just lost to Canada for the first time in roughly our lifetime. Since I was three, since I was three, and I'm 37 years old now. So it's on him. I mean, like, that's him.

People can say the pool is shallow, but Burrhalter made the pool even shallower since he's been in charge. So there was no real audition process. one of the things we defended him like I was defending burralter basically right up until the gold cup roster was announced and at that point I was like oh man suddenly this isn't actually the process that I could get behind like this doesn't make sense to me yeah and and since then I feel like a lot of the fears that we've had a lot of those red flags that we were worried about uh have been borne out so I know we take a lot of criticism for being overly negative but it's like we it's I'm just we've just been sort of

noting things that are worrisome and like that bill has come due yeah I'm on one hand I agree with you I mean there's no way we can how can you watch that horse shit that we just watched and not be negative it was so bad it was really really bad but on the other hand like what could he what could he have done differently um in terms of player selection he could have he could have brought in sergeant and played him a lot more instead of Zardis that's a big thing for you right yeah my my whole thing was sergeant could have had five extra weeks of experience in the Burrhalter system. Like if the system is something and it's and it takes time to implement, which everyone always says, like, oh, but you got to give them, it takes time to install this.

Well, we wasted five weeks with Sergeant Notten Camp in the Gold Cup. We, like in this camp, we called in Christian Roldon and we left Dwayne Holmes at home. Even though in the one camp Dwayne Holmes has been in, he came into the game for Christian Raldon and was instantly much, much better than Christian Roldon, but Burrhalter felt more comfortable with Roldon. So that's who he went with. It's the safe choice, I guess. But the safe choice isn't always safe.

Like, that's a gamble too. You've gambled that Roldon is good enough. Roldon very clearly was not good enough. Yeah, he's not good enough. Had a shocker. Had a shocker tonight. Daniel Lovitz. I don't think Lovitz, well, he did get beat.

He held the guys on side that put Canada in on goal in the first half. Canada didn't capitalize on that chance. But Lovitz isn't necessarily like some stop everything defender and Lovett's adds next to nothing going forward. And we have a 22-year-old Anthony Robinson playing every week for Wiggin in the championship, who admittedly has been burned several times for the U.S. against top-top competition against Colombia, against Brazil. But he also has like three assists to his name. And in that year that he was playing for Dave Sarekin, he adds something to the attack. never really got a shot for the national team under Berhalter.

Yeah, that's the thing. There seems like a lack of curiosity from Burrhalter about those guys. I mean, you know, he says he's monitoring them. He's aware of them. They're on the radar. But just this belief that Lovitz is the guy and like Lovitz is the one we're going to build with right now. It doesn't make any sense. It feels like it feels like beating a dead horse because people, you know, a million people say it on Twitter.

throughout the game. But here we are. And I, you know, I mean, there's no reason to believe that Burrhalter will call up anybody else, but Lovett's in November, you know, if he's still the coach, which he probably will be. He probably will still be the coach. And that's where I land on it is I'm not demanding that Burrhalter go right now. That's not, I'm not, I think I said in the conversation before these games, all right, if we lose badly, what I'll do is I'll draft a bunch of Burrhalter out tweets,

and then I'll wait to hit send until, we see who he calls up in November. Because if he calls up the same guys in November, and it's just like, nope, just got to iron out a few kinks after 16 months of trying, or after, I'm sorry, after 16 games and 10 months of trying to iron out the kinks. Like, now, man, these kings ain't being ironed out. Like, you've got to introduce some new links to the chain, buddy. Like, that's been what we've been saying for six months.

So that's where I'll hit send on the tweet. It's as if he doesn't add to the group. If the group remains the group, that's where it's like, nope, this is essentially irredeemable. This group is not good enough. This group is not good enough. No. Right. And it was okay to not be good enough against Mexico.

Like, and that's the thing. That was house money. It was, when we lose to Mexico, it's like, okay, well, we're just not good enough to beat Mexico. Everyone just kind of gets that. We're realistic. But the thing was, the red flags were there because we were barely good enough against Kurosau. You know what I mean?

We lost to Jamaica underfriendly going into the gold cup. Like, these are, those red flags were there. And I think this Canada game and the result and the performance, more importantly, is where everyone has now been like, okay, this is no longer just red flags. Like, this is, this is now a smoking gun. Well, just to be a little bit of a devil's advocate. Go on. The red flag that was raised by the loss to Jamaica in the friendly before the Gold Cup was pretty much

lowered when we beat them in the semifinals of the Gold Cup, because, at least in my opinion, because it was, I think, the best game of the Burrhalter era, wouldn't you say? It was the best 25 minutes. Yeah, and I've said that before. We had 25 really good minutes against Jamaica in the semifinal of the Gold Cup. Then we hit the weather delay. Jamaica got to go to their whiteboard and sort of make some changes,

and we didn't look terribly good for the next 50 minutes. That's true. That's right. We did end up scoring a second goal off like a bad rebound from normally sure-handed Andre Blake. We immediately took Josie Altruard of the game for Giazzi Zardez and conceded and looked really dicey for the remainder of the game until we scored a late insurance tally. So I would basically say the Jamaica game was a solid 20 minutes where we did look like the well-oiled machine that Canada coach John Hurdman described us as. So charitably. Such a charitable description. Man, I saw that same thing. I was just like, all right, are we really saying this is a well-oiled machine?

Like, you can think back to the gold cup. And again, the wins paper over it and the fact that we get to the final paper it over it. But we didn't have really any great gold cup performances. We were up one zero at halftime against Guyana. We're up one-zero at halftime against Trinidad. It's just we had the really good 20 minutes against Jamaica. We had 20 good minutes in the second half against Trinidad, but we have never looked like a well-oiled machine at any point for 90 minutes. Oh man, now you're talking me into like further towards the fire him side of things. Well, again, I think he's made his own bed because I think the fan base would be extremely patient with him. I mean, even the people advocating be patient, like, or I should say even the impact. patient people like myself,

I would be super patient with him if he were actually integrating players who were not clearly not, like not good enough to play a part in 2022 qualifying. If we were actually integrating the players who, the young players who have very high ceilings and potentially are as good right now as a Christian Raldon, then we could stomach some of these hiccups. We could stomach some of these speed bumps.

But when we're playing Roldon and love, it since Zardas for 10 months like no like there's this is this is wasted time uh we wasted a full year hiring you and now you've managed to waste 10 months where there has been zero progress incremental or otherwise uh and that's where that's where it's like okay if there isn't a drastic shift in either call up philosophy in november uh or tactics in november then no like i don't see why we would continue giving this coach uh extra extra wiggle room extra leash. Fair enough. Fair enough. I mean, really. Worth mentioning that the U-23s played simultaneous to the men's national team tonight in a friendly with El Salvador, who they'll be facing in Olympic

qualifying, and they won six to one. And the goal scores were Brooks Lennon, Richie Ledesma, Jonathan Lewis, Sebastian Soto, Mason Toy, and Manny Perez. Ledzma also had two assists. So did Georgie Mihailovich Alex Mendes had an assist How many minutes did Richard Ledesma play? 45. Notable. Yeah.

Just for his goals assist per 90, per 96. I'm just just pointing that out first per 96 stats. Well, you know, a good U23 performance gets you a chance to come to a camp and not dress and get sent back home. As Brendan Aronson learned. It's funny. It's funny. Like I pointed this out in the Canada preview, or in this window preview, Alfonso Davies has spent two-thirds of his time on the field this season for the three Bundesliga side that Chris Richards plays for. Chris Richards never in contention for a call-up for this window for the senior team.

And then Alfonso Davies scores the game winner tonight. He didn't. And it's clearly the best player on the field. Would you say that? Clearly the best player on the field? I think I have to, yeah. I think so. I guess there wasn't anybody who was good for the U.S.

Right, yeah, there was only Canadian players in the discussion, unless you want to call some of our fire extinguishers in the back the best players on the field. I don't know, Scott Rfield was pretty good for Canada. I mean, their whole midfield was pretty good. Osorio was pretty good. God, you know, it's telling that we can always talk about our opponent's midfield being dynamite. Like, oh, man, these guys have tons of class, even when it's three USL players playing for Jamaica dominating our midfield. They always look more vibrant and vivacious. I'm using adjectives usually reserved for flowers to describe opposing midfields.

But yeah, they always look so good against us. They look like they get to the ball fast. And then things just kind of spring into the attack. And we're just kind of rolled on. McKinney and Bradley are just kind of passed through repeatedly. And not in a creative way either. It's just kind of, it's so easy. Yeah.

It goes back to the Chile game where Vidal could just stand between our holding mids and our back line, and they could just pass the ball to him 25 yards from the goal. Should this have been a testimonial for Michael Bradley? I mean, not necessarily. He didn't look terrible. I mean, I don't think Bradley was the problem. He was part of the problem. I know we're having some debate about this on the Slack channel,

but I come down on like he was, he is. so easy to play through. And he gives, he concedes like five yards of space all the way up until like the six yard box. Yes. Yeah. No. Okay.

So, so, so I'm with you. That's not going to work. It's just not going to work. That won't work when he is your most like, when he is literally your defensive midfielder. You're right. That won't work. And I've said this before.

Bradley shouldn't be playing in that spot or even really on the depth chart for that spot. If Bradley's going to play, it should basically be in the role, Don role, where he has defensive cover. from a Tyler Adams or Tyler Adams type because there are so many of those laying around. But no, it can't be Bradley's your defensive guy and then Raldon's your secondary defensive guy

and then McKenny also exists. Like that's not a workable central midfield. No. And we've done some variation on that midfield, basically every game of the Burrhalter era. Yeah, it's a slight improvement over midfielders, midfields that included Christian Pulisic, but it's not a viable midfield against, again, competent teams.

Well, we've sort of jumped straight to the big picture stuff, but let's do do a scoring summary here. Yes, yes, yes. We'll try to go fast through it. I would say the first opening five minutes, jittery, very unclean from the U.S. I mean, people couldn't take a clean touch. Like there were so many wayward touches from the U.S. all over the field. Everybody, Sergeant McKenny.

Pulisic didn't take any bad touches that I know of, but Rolled on, Bradley, definitely Lovitz and Yedlin. And then so that was true of basically the whole game. But the first five minutes, it was very notable. You're like, oh, man, we look really nervous and not like we're going to play good soccer today. Kay went down with that hamstring injury and there was like a three minute pause and we started to possess a little bit and then it just went right back to being jittery and unclean again and it never changed. Yeah and I go back to the Mexico friendly where when everyone's first touches off for me, I mean these are these are decent players like I mean not not even decent. These are we have good players who are capable of like controlling the ball on their first touch when that's gone horribly wrong that's the same. sign that

they're thinking about what their instruction is rather than just playing the game around them and being like, here's where the pressure is coming from, here's where I can take my first touch to control it and playing that way. Because for me,

that's the only explanation for why no one can take a clean first touch is that they're essentially overthinking it and almost like acting against their own nature with their first touch. Yeah. Yeah, you've made that point before

and I had forgotten it. So that's an encouraging note. about the players. The first big chance came in the 15th minute, and it was a Roldon giveaway. We won the ball, I think, on our right side of our defense, and Roldon tried to pass it backward. I guess he was passing to Stefan.

I don't know. And it was a lovely through ball for Jonathan David. Jonathan David miles offside, but Roldon managed to break the offside trap. It's one of those things where, like, for all of the heat Michael Bradley has taken in his career about just playing backwards safely. At least Michael Bradley was very good at playing backwards safely. This is, Raldon tends to lack incisiveness anyway.

He's at least got to get his backward passes right. And this one he did not get right. And it was only Stefan coming up big to save the first shot. And then David missing, just missing the goal on the second chance that prevented it from being one to zero inside 15 minutes. Showed it. Roll Dom, to his credit, worked his socks off on the giveaway and actually got back on to the goal line with Tim Ream. So David did have to beat two outfield players standing on the goal line to score.

Very doable. He did not do it. Yeah. Okay. Good point. Good point. 17th minute chance for the USA. A little bit of a lucky bounce lands the ball at Poulsick's feet in zone 14.

And he does well to tap it wide to Morris to his left. I've criticized Poulosik for not having. a great passing vision and this is a good pass. Morris took a touch around a defender and has a hit, but it's blocked by a sliding challenge and then nothing happened for the next 30 minutes, basically. It was, again, so many of these games feel like the Kurosau game where we don't create anything in the attack. We never trouble the team when we're defending and the clock just ticks away.

Yeah, that's what this was. this was not fun game to watch, not a fun game to watch. Big chance for Canada after the break came in the 50th minute, David from close range, just why. This was one of those examples I mentioned of Bradley not being very good at closing people down. They just sort of passed it casually up the left wing, our left flank, their right wing. And it was La Rhea to Rfield, I think. then our field back to La Rhea with Bradley just kind of observing.

And then Laria passed it, like sort of slid it inside to Jonathan David, and he missed the goal by a foot maybe. I think he had, he had Stefan beat if he put it on frame. That was the tough one that almost looked like it hit the outside of the post, but probably just hit the side netting from the outside. Yeah, I don't think it's hit the post. But Stefan was rooted to the spot because it was like kind of a clever little, pass rather than, you know, winding up and taking a, shooting a rocket at him.

Right. What definitely should have been another warning shot across the bow. Yeah. And we, to our credit, we got our biggest chance came right going back down the other side of the field. It was off a Stefan goal kick. This Juego de position. That's, this is kind of a trend. This is kind of a trend.

Like I highlighted this after the Mexico Golds Cup final. So many of our chances actually, despite the Burrhalter emphasis on playing through the lines and building out of the back, so many of our chances actually come from direct long balls. Positional play, Greg. It's positional play. Yeah, so that's a term that's kind of annoying to me. But anyway, we didn't create any chances with it in this game. this was a goal kick from Stefan Sergeant ran onto it

I mean ran up to it and flicked it on one the header flicked it on to Very very Christian Ramirez-esque If I can say Speaking of players Who would have not really gotten a much of a chance Yeah he flicked it on Morris beat Piet to it I think it was

And looped it over him Settled himself kind of clumsily but did settle Really well done for Morris I'm sorry to keep interrupting you but No please do That was like a really impressive play for Morris. It sucks that he sort of didn't have a lot of chances to show what he could do because he's been hot for club and country. And that was really well done.

So again, credit to credit to Jordan Morris for being dangerous in a dangerous situation. Yeah. I mean, I saw somebody tweeted that he's the best player for the national team. I think it was you three, wasn't it? That's right. Rob, Rob, Rob did.

And it's, it's, it's kind of hard to disagree at this moment that he's, that he is the best player for the national team

right now. Anyway, side note. He passed it, Morris passed it, squared it simply to Pulisic who had the whole goal mouth to shoot out.

To our actual most dangerous player. Yeah. Presumably. Presumably. And then Pulisic just passed it right to Borhan's chest. It was an easy save. And it was,

you know, Pool six got to do better there, in my opinion. Amazing that that was our best chance of the game and really our only chance, unless you count that earlier one I mentioned where Morris took a shot that was blocked. Hey, you know how I usually say, like, finishing's finishing, and don't ever play the he should have done better game? Yeah. Yeah, Pulisick should have done better.

Yeah. He could have shot it to either side of the goalkeeper. Shot it to either side. again, like he picked the wrong trajectory. Like this wasn't just like an unlucky great save from the goalkeeper. Like he sort of just fluffed it right at the goalkeeper's chest height or waist height almost worse. So the goalkeeper could just sort of fall down and play it with the sand. It's like, again, he basically picked all the wrong ways to finish it.

And that's what I care about. How did you pick to finish it? And it just felt like Poulsick didn't actually pick a finish. He just sort of put it through his foot at it and got what you'd expect. to happen. It was an Adam Bell's finish in Maine's let's be honest. It was horrible. So nothing really of note happened after that in the game from the U.S. perspective, from the U.S. attacking perspective.

And then Pulisic came off in the 60th minute for Paul Ariola, which was a little surprising to me. Were you surprised? Yes, I was surprised and... Dismayed? Yes, I'm very dismayed. even though we just talked about the fact that he wasted the best scoring chance we had, you don't make punitive substitutions. You don't punish him by taking him off.

If he's your best player, he's your best player. And Pulisic very much is our best player. If Christian Pulisic is really struggling in a game, you should probably put the mirror on yourself as a manager and say, why is Christian Pulisic struggling in this game and solve that question? question rather than being like I must take him off. Do you really think it was a punitive substitution? No, it's not.

But I mean, if you're like, well, he's playing poorly, so I'm going to take, like, why is he playing poorly? Like, at least run through your flow chart there and say, all right, what's causing Christian Pulisic to play poorly? No, I don't think he was subbed off because he missed that chance. Well, he said, Burrell just said afterward that Pulisic had the flu. He was battling the flu the last few days. That's why he came off.

I mean, CP did not look happy. to be coming off, though. I don't know if you noticed that. We all noticed that. If you didn't notice it when you're watching, you've seen all of the still shots, the screenshots. We all know CP was not happy about coming off. Right.

And then Ariola didn't, I don't know that he really did anything or helped anything. Did he? Did anyone? No. I mean, again, I'm not putting it out on Ariola either. I'm just saying, Kristen Raldon was still in the game when Pulitzer came off.

So nobody was helping our cause. Leave your best player in, even if nobody's helping our cause. All right. Well, 63rd minute, the game winner from Canada. And it kind of nutshells the evening defensively for us. Long clearance from Canada from way back. Nothing super special. It's headed down by Aaron Long to Bradley.

Bradley Dallies a little bit on the ball and he's dispossessed. and Canada is attacking 3 v4. I think it was David, Rfield, and Davies. David, David, who had like, I would say a pretty bad night. He did not look that good to me.

Took a horrible touch. And it just went straight to Tim Ream. Tim Ream very generously passed it straight to Liam Fraser, who was arriving, a Canadian player, by the way, arriving, you know, 25 yards away from goal. And Fraser just tapped it.

to Arfield, who played a ball, you know, sort of fizzed a ball across the mouth of the goal for Davies to bundle in at the back post. It was not the prettiest goal, but it was a good ball from Arfield. Long just missed the ball. You know, he made a play on it, but just missed. And Yedlin was kind of casually jogging behind Davies on the play. It felt the replay. I watched the replay a few times it just felt shambolic all around yes yes it felt like a it felt like a youth soccer goal where you're just like oh any of you all you have to do is solve it and no one solved it uh yeah bradley obviously it's the first chance to solve it uh with even making a simple back pass to any of his centerbacks or to stephen or doesn't do so play it why do love it's yeah yep flick it out wide

at the outside of your foot and and we're fine just the only thing you can't do is hold it and have it taken off your foot. Ream attempts, from what I can tell from the video, Ream is attempting to just, on the short hop in his defense, is to play a ball out to Paul Ariola, almost like chop it at a tight angle from the way his hips are facing, and just gets it all wrong. So instead of chopping it out to Ariola,

he basically hits it directly back up the vertical center of the field to Canada. So that's Reams issue. I don't really put any of this on. Long had been putting fires out all day. I'm not going to hold it against him that he couldn't get this one. It was whack a mole for long and this mole did not get whacked. I don't even know if I really put it on Yedlin. I get that he's maybe let his guard down.

I don't know. What do you think? I don't know. It just feels like a pattern with Yedlin. Yeah, yeah. His guard is often down. It goes back to like, I mean it goes back a ways, You think you're thinking like even like the Peru game, right?

Didn't we have a long back and forth in Peru? I can't remember. But yeah, one of those games. And I didn't think as a weak side defender. It's a weak side defender pattern is what we're saying, though, right? Right. It's the responsibility to track that man and then try to intervene. I feel like Canon is not, doesn't have the pedigree of Yedlin, but I feel like Canon is on it when that stuff is going down, you know?

He wants to be there and stop that ball somehow or do something. And Yedlin was disinterested, it seemed like. Well, while we're on it, did Yetland add anything to the attack? No. Okay. Does Cannon add to the attack? Yes. I think that was a mistake that Bertholder made tonight starting Yedlin.

It's a hindsight insight for me. I wouldn't have said it before the game that it was a mistake. No, he wouldn't have? Because I feel like you're on. record a lot going back almost to 2018 saying that in your mind canon's probably ahead of yedlin yes and i would have preferred i'm just trying to give you your full credit right no i and i would have preferred to see cannon start today but i wasn't like oh this is a horrible idea to start yetlin in this game i guess is what i'm saying sure and see i was i was hedging when we were talking about

the lineup about yedlin starting over canon because i don't particularly have that view but you have very strongly sort of had that view in the past you've taken a lot of heat for it from people who are like ah but he plays for the ePL yetlin clearly is better um and i don't know bells like you might you might sort of come out ahead on this one well i don't i don't think there's any doubt canon on the evidence of the most recent games canon is a better right back right this second than yedlin uh maybe that's a forever truth who knows but it's certainly true right now do you disagree with that uh i i i still don't know is is my it's my terrible answer like i'm still not sure because I'm still not sure that Cannon's great, but on the form, if you're going to use

the sort of form evidence, then yes, Cannon's been ahead. I mean, he's been contributing a lot to the attack. And even if you rule out the Cuba, whatever he had, like seven assists against Cuba, did he assist every single goal? I think he had two, two assists. Seven assists against Cuba. Even if you discount those, he got hockey assists on goals that he also got the real assist on. even if you discount those goals or those assists he's been he's been contributing to the attack and yetlin didn't have a lot of decent service didn't have a lot of threatening service

didn't have a lot of like there weren't a lot of times yetlin was in the box with the ball so yeah I'd say on very recent form canon probably probably is outperformed yetlin okay glad we agree on that And then after that, after that goal, which made it 1-0 with still a half-hour to play, did you ever get the sense that we were going to score? Like, did you ever get the sense that the U.S. was pressing for a goal? No, it's Burr-Alter system, man. Like, it's not just the defense either.

Like, the offense works the same way. The defense is very passive, and the offense is very passive. Like, we are slow. We play slow. You can talk about possession to disorganize the opponent. But at this point, that is just a code for slowly work the ball to non-dangerous positions. Like we got the ball to pool sick a couple of times in honest to God dangerous areas. But not very often.

In my mind, the entire attack should be based around how often can we get Pulisic into dangerous positions, whether that's building to get him one of you one in the flanks or whether that's putting him an open space on the run on the counter or transition. and we don't do it. We don't do that. Yeah. Part of that was McKenny. McKenny had a really bad game. And he was real rough.

And so did Sergeant. I mean, I hate saying that, but Sergeant looked a step behind everything and didn't, you know, didn't certainly didn't like lock down the starting striker job for the national team tonight. So, man, I just couldn't see where we were going to score goals. I don't know how it was going to happen. And of course it didn't happen. And they, in the 91st minute when it, when the game was kind of already over, uh, another Canadian goal happened. Borhan kicked it long.

Their goalkeeper, Ream won the header, but it hit it right to Jonathan Osorio. Like we never, did we win any second balls in this game? I don't know, man. We'll have to look at the chalkboard, but it didn't feel like it. And he, Osorio just kind of gathered it, tapped it over. over Ream as Cavalini ran in behind, as simple as you like. Cavalini let it bounce two or three or four or five or six times. That actually surprised me two, bells, because watching in real time, I was like,

you watch that ball bounce the first time. You're like, oh, he's going to smash this on the volley. And then he didn't. He actually let it bounce, and it was bouncing away from the goal. Like, I don't know. This doesn't matter because it's not like that changed what our defenders should have done. But it was just strange to see that the ball actually, it was almost like rubbing it in. Like the angle got worse.

The volley opportunity got worse and he still smashed in at the near post. Yeah, it was so slow. The whole thing unfolded so slowly. I mean, I don't know. That's the metaphor. Everything is so slow. We fail slowly even. Yeah.

All right. Well, two zero. Games over. We're not ready. We're not quite ready to fire. We're not ready to. demand that Burrhalter be fired, but neither of us would be sad if he were. Is that fair to say? Yeah. I mean, yes. Just because I think he's, again, like tied these anchors to himself.

The Lovitz anchor, the Roldon anchor, Zardaz and trap he's finally like parted ways with, but not before all of their minutes that could have gone to other players, failed to do so. And here we are. We are. We are. a year away from qualifying. We have the November camp, and then we've got March where the full pool will be available. And then we're sort of going to patch together a qualifying squad. Yeah.

10 and a half months away. It's 10 and a half months away, guys. Right. We might, what happens if we, I don't even know the answer to this because it hadn't really been something I processed. If we don't win our Nation's League group, what do we do in June? Are there games for the second place team in the nation's league? Or do we just have to schedule some friendlies?

No, we just have to schedule some friendlies, yeah. All right. Well, hopefully we don't even do that, and we just try to send all of the kids to the Olympics if we qualify for that. Yeah. Which, you know, seems like we have a decent shot at. I don't know, Bells. Just to be specific about what Burrhalter did wrong, in your opinion, should have given Anthony Robinson more of a shot. right should have played sergeant instead of zardis at the gold cup and i just want to i even want to

add more to the uh robinson bit lovitz has almost hasn't played very much of the holding left back that ream plays so when you say oh well robinson doesn't fit the system most of lovitz's minutes have come in like more of a conventional left back role who's who's semi-assed to get forward and we've seen anthony robinson be very effective getting forward so so when the question is lovitz or robinson Like that for me should have been an open question and it never really was a lot of those Euro guys Robinson included got like the one tryout against Jamaica prior to the Gold Cup in a 352 Where it almost like felt like that part of the youth soccer club tryouts where the coaches was kind of stopped watching because they already know who their team is Uh And nothing really matters

So anyway, yes, yes, Robin's for Lovitz could have been an open question. Dwayne Holmes for Roldon could have been more of an open question. Paxton Pomacol was never really given his due. I don't know. It just has felt like Burrhalter settled on his group early for better or worse, and it has been much worse. Yeah, but those are two positions where I think it's very clear,

or three positions where it's very clear, something else could have been tried. I mean, and it's not 100% sure that Robinson would have been, a better option than Lovitz. I mean, I think he probably would have been, but who knows? I feel like Holmes. I have all of Robinson's offensive contributions to 2018 queued up. So they're obviously going to get posted tomorrow.

Well, Holmes, I think, is a really, that's when I don't understand why he was not in this roster, why he doesn't get favored over Roldon. I mean, there's the point is made. sometimes on Twitter, he's an attacking midfielder who's only scored three goals and had five assists in, you know, in his championship career. Well, the, so that's a, you know, that doesn't look good on paper, but he's, his championship career basically started in November, 2018, you know, um, 2018. Did I say 20,018? Do people even say that? Yeah, people. Okay. Everyone says that. It just started. His career just started. He's a, he's a late bloomer. Uh, and he, he, he, he's a late bloomer. and he hasn't always played attacking midfield.

And what's the most important thing about Holmes, the thing that you always say? Is that all of our eyeballs saw him play for the U.S. men's national team, and he was instantly much, much better than lots of players who are in the group, including even Weston McKenney. Weston McKinney was not terribly good in the Jamaica-friendly in the summer. and Duane Holmes came on and was better than, better than him. He added more than him and he added more than Roldon. Now, I'm not saying Duane Holmes is necessarily better than those players, but he absolutely warranted another look.

And the time to do that unless you're cool just wasting camp times and international windows would have been in this window. We had Cuba at home where it would have been easy to give West, or Dwayne Holmes those minutes that Roldon got or watched them in camp and say who is better, but we didn't do that. We didn't actually even give that opportunity up. Yeah. And that's, and that's, it's, again,

Dwayne Holmes is sort of just a symbol of the problem because that just seems to be the case on so many positions. But, but that's, I guess that's what I'm getting at. Is it, is it at, is it the case at so many positions? Pomacall, I'm going to push back on a little bit. He's been hurt. Yeah, he, he's, he's dealing with like a nagging injury that, probably going to be an off-season deal for him.

So there may be an out on that one. All right. And let's even hope that that's the reason. I mean, this sounds ridiculous to say. But let's even hope that's the reason he only got a five-minute cameo in the last camp. Because, again, otherwise, that to me is sort of an indefensible coaching decision to be like, okay, well, we'll just throw this guy out there for five minutes. So that's essentially what I cling to is that our hands are tied on all of these.

uh, fringe decisions. But at some point, I feel like the math doesn't work out. And Burhalter just feels more comfortable with the guys he's had for longer. Yeah. And I think on, on the sergeant's artist thing, um, some people will say, well, Sergeant, I, I admit that Sergeant was not good tonight. I don't know, you haven't really stated your opinion on it. Did, what did you think of Sergeant tonight?

Uh, I thought he was not great. And, but no better. I mean, that's Westman. wasn't great. Like nobody was very good today. Some players were really bad. Actually, West McKinney might have been really bad tonight. But, uh,

so, so, Sergeant was somewhere between Pulisik and McKinney. All three of them were not great. Yeah. Well, so, so,

yes, that's, that's probably about right. Uh, I guess what I, the point I want to make is, even though he wasn't bad, even though he wasn't good,

anybody who says, well, Zardis, you put Zardis in there, he would have been better than Sergeant. It's crazy. It's crazy. Oh, yeah.

That makes no sense to me either. I don't know that anybody's even saying it. I'm just nipping it in the bud out there, all you, Zardis lovers. I mean, for what it's the worst, Sergeant set up one of our best chances with his header on the goal kick, which is not necessarily something a skill you attribute to Josh Sergeant. Right. Where is the combination play? Where are the patterns? What's up with the system?

Well, West McKinney has sort of just shifted out to that left, number 10. I mean, man, we can go so many different ways with all of this stuff, but he looked lost. There was nothing really smooth between him and Pulisic, and it's like the pendulum had swung so far from the during the Cuba game, which blows my mind. Because we were playing like not even an amateur. Like that was that was a bad 90 minutes for actually helping our team out because the game situations were so unrealistic. Like their back their defensive line was so staggered that we couldn't even work on timings of runs or any so anyway. It's true. That's a true statement.

Yeah. Yes. So even like our pattern play was was not improved against Cuba. But anyway, McKenny, that was his first game playing out at that left attacking player, right? I guess. Was it? Yeah. I feel like it was.

So that's the first time, tonight was the first time he did it against an actual. team. And that's what it looked like. And it was certainly the first night that Sergeant was involved with them. And that's what it looked like. And, you know, could we have been doing that sooner? Probably. Yeah.

Okay. Well, I don't have... What are the upsides? What are the positive spells? There are no positives from this. And like I said on Twitter, uh, looks like it's going to be my best tweet of all time for retweets and likes. I mean, seriously, I've never, I never had any.

but people react to something like this. This is what I said. The sad result of this pathetic display is that a nation that already doesn't care about the U.S. men's national team is given more reason not to care. We are in a deep, deep hole. I really think that's true.

We, this is, it's bad times for the program. I don't know, I don't watch SportsCenter, so I don't know what the conversation with Taylor Twelman is on the, you know, premier sports TV show in the country. But I hope it's good, you know. I hope it's vigorous.

Burrall, or I'm sorry, 12 in dark, we're not mincing words about the outcome tonight. I don't know if you caught it. They basically called it to the lowest point since Coova, which I think is a pretty strong condemnation. I mean, it's fair. It's fair. Right.

I mean, it is our lowest point, then the question is like have we actually have we actually moved any higher than that at any at any time in the last two years uh so for me the the positive if there's going to be one there definitely isn't a positive tonight like there's no positive from the game but if there's going to be one it's that we have this sort of renewed permission to burn down a lot of the a lot of the bad of a lot of the bad and like i don't know man like this is your chance to start over a We had that chance after Kuva, and we actually did it in 2018. That was like the one positive thing from the Kuva disaster was that we brought in all these kids and cast a net on all the youth.

And then in 2019, we immediately cast out some of our most positive performers bafflingly. But this sort of gives us another chance. And I know everyone's mocked the U.S. soccer Twitter for being like reactionary and negative. And it's like, well, right, but you guys kind of see what we're coming from now, right? So the calls to move on to the kids, I feel like have more, more evidence in their corner at this point. Like, you guys, some of these kids might, might, might be better than Christian Raldon. Like, that's got to at least enter your mind. I feel like it still doesn't.

I think you're very optimistic if you think that this is going to cause, like, Ridgisma and Chris Richards and Chris Gloucester to get called up. the next camp. Right. Like people just double down and like, no, the pool's just that shallow and like bury the hands, heads in the sand. Like maybe there are untapped areas of the pool that we could at least explore, but probably not. I would love to be wrong, but I just, it's so hard to imagine that happening. I mean, so, so if, so there is one way it could happen that I can, that I think I could tell you. You want to hear it? Yeah, give me yours and then I'll give you mine. If Burrhalter is fired. Okay. There's, I think there are not the pool of available coaches who would want this job,

who are also good at coaching soccer. Because I think Berhalter generally understood it to be like a good MLS soccer coach, right? I mean, he's not a, he's not a dumb ass. Right. So like to find somebody at least on that level is going to be kind of hard, I think. but there is one guy who I think would would take the job if offered it and he this is getting very fun bells and that's suspense is actually killing me tabramos i think tabramos would take the job i don't i don't think he i don't think he will be offered the job by by ernie steward and

j burrhalter and you know in in this you're saying in the hypothetical that burrhalter is fired you still don't think Tab Ramos would be the guy tabbed to take the job? I don't think it's 12.30 in the morning. I'm allowed to make that pun. Yeah, that's a great pun. No, it's not. It's an okay pun.

I don't think it's super likely. He doesn't seem like he wasn't the guy, he wasn't the guy that they wanted back then, back in 2017 or 18, whenever that was, when they were kind of searching for a coach. But, you know, I'm just saying if it were to happen, he would be the coach who might come in and say, look, I know these young guys. I've been watching these games. I think Richel Le Desmond needs to be in the next camp.

I think Chris Gloucester, Chris Richards, who else? I mean, bring in Giovanni Raina, hell, you know, after the U-17 World Cup. the other thing is we're not even asking for the full u20 team to be to be here it's literally like two or three guys yeah i mean it's really mostly le desma in my mind richards to get a shot maybe uh gloucester because lovitz doesn't have anything but again i think anthony robinson is a perfectly serviceable left back so here's my i'm with you i can see tab remos if he if he were to somehow magically uh get the full-time job because i don't think tab's interested in an interim position.

I could see him go in that route. I could actually even see Burrhalter doing this. I think he's sort of given himself like cover with the way he's brought in Pomacall in the last camp after a good U23 showing. And Aronson in this camp after a U23 showing. Like he's given himself enough cover to be consistent and not have to like give up like to save face. He could be like, okay, well, after the last G203 camp,

we were really impressed with Chris Gloucester and Richel dezma. You know what I mean? Like, he could do that Mason toy, like, and bring these guys in. And without having to essentially concede that he's wrong, because I do think, like, that plays into it. Like, these guys don't like to concede they're wrong. That's why I don't think Burrhalter's going to get fired. Ernie Stewart's not going to take, like, his one actual accomplishment

in the time he's been GM. All he's done is hired somebody. That's the only thing he's accomplished. Well, he's hired Kate Mark Graff, too, right? Okay. I don't know that he did because he got promoted. He wouldn't have been in that position if we can criminal knowledge. Greg, everything at U.S. soccer is done by consensus.

But anyway. The group makes the decision. They can't fire Burhalter because the guy whose only accomplishment is hiring him has been promoted to even more important role with U.S. soccer. So I don't know, man, this is this is getting into the, into the administrative weeds. Yeah. But, but, but I also think pulling up, calling up Richie La Desma and Chris Gloucester or whoever, you know, Mason Toy, you know, just being a little bit more, I'm not saying we should call up Mason Toy, but just being a little more adventurous. And I don't know that that's going to fix it.

I don't know that that's going to fix it, you know? Do you think that's going to fix it? I don't know. Bring in Anthony Robinson, Dwayne Holmes, and Richie Ledesma in the next camp, and Paxson Palmacall, and give Sergeant every start from here on out until like World Cup qualifying starts. Are we going to be able to play better than we did last night? Probably. Like central midfield is a pretty big deal in 2019 in the game of soccer.

locker. So when, if you can improve, go ahead, sorry. If you can improve from Bradley, Rod McKinney to making McKinney like your third most important center midfielder instead of your most important center midfielder, like that probably would be a big deal. Yeah. So how much of it just has to do with getting Tyler Adams back and healthy? I don't think it should depend on that. Like I don't think, I mean, that will go a long way. I honestly do think that goes a long way. But I think there are things we could, again, we've gone over it.

There are players, we've been begging for an all-action midfield for how long now. And we keep getting one-third of an all-action midfield, which has been, you know, at this point, disastrous. Yeah, I mean, to get one out of three guys has been disastrous. Maybe we're wrong, and you get Holmes, McKinney, Pomacall, midfield, and it's equally disastrous. but it's hard to imagine how it could be worse. It's hard to imagine how we could lose to the teams that we've beaten. Like the teams we've beaten, we would not lose to regardless. So at least we'd have a chance to have improved our record over the last 12 months.

Yeah, and I think McKenney is of the all-action midfielder. If you consider him an all-action midfielder, he is the least all-actionee of the all-action midfield. It's actionable. You know, Holmes is quicker and more mobile. So is Palmacall. So is Tyler Adams. I think they're all better defensive midfielders than McKinney is. Even though McKinney, you know, he's known for covering a lot of ground and working hard and everything.

He's not great at defense. It's just not. Right. Yeah, he's not great at defense. And he's not terribly, he's not terribly shifty moving like side to side, like his changes in direction. But I do think, I mean, he has a lot of other qualities. But yes, no, I would agree with you. So we could add so much action to our midfield.

And it's like we haven't tried it. We've never tried anything even remotely like that. So it becomes, again, after 10 months of Burrhalter ball, it's still very hard to say whether or not we are, as a program, completely reliant on Tyler Adams or not. I would say we are not. I don't think we are. You were saying we're not totally relying on him?

Right. I think he makes us much, much better. but I think we would have a, I think we would be decent, even without him, if we would choose three all-action midfielders. And you don't think Roldon is an all-action midfielder? I mean, if he is, he's like seventh on the list.

I'd take Keaton Parks over him. Keaton Parks, can I tap on the microphone and say, I know Keaton Parks is also out with injury, so it's not he's available, but, he's been good for NYCFC. Jackson, You will like again, players who are incisive.

Like I want, if you're not going to be extremely actiony, then I want you at least be incisive. And Rod doesn't check either of those boxes. Okay. You got any other thoughts here? Do you want to get even more meta? Have I, have I, like, have I, have I, like, have I, have I apologized just for how negative I've gotten over the last eight months, six months, probably since the Gold Cup

roster? Because I've felt it. Like, I felt the negativity. Yeah. I've noticed it. you, especially the last couple weeks. It's really gotten, it's gotten pretty negative. I mean, I'm, I'm sensitive to it in myself, too, you know?

Like the tone changes in like Slack channels and I'm like, oh man, no one wants to be around me. I'm just like my Twitter, like my tweets about the team. But it's like, again, it's because we, I've just, I feel like we've seen these things materializing and we've seen that there are at least some, like escape. And we're just not interested in trying to take those escape routes and instead we're just we just keep doubling down on on the red flags and Yeah, again we're shouting we're shouting into the void we've been it feels like we've been shouting into the void for the last few months

A couple of this stuff a couple of Cassandra's over here on the podcast and you know you get tired of that you know I start I get tired of hearing myself say the same stuff over and over again. And it doesn't, I don't, I think I could speak for both of us, correct me if I'm wrong, I don't feel good about, you know, being quote unquote vindicated, you know. I don't. I did not enjoy it a night. I would have liked to see the Burrhalter system and the players that he selected come out

and like be the actual well-oiled machine that John Hurdman said we were. that filthy lying bastard just oil everywhere yeah no i'm i'm with you like that's what i want i want it to be there i feel like we have enough players that we could be semi-lubricated i think we've done we've gone to lubricated well more than once on this podcast but i i do want us to be semi-lubricated at the very least and i think we have those players i think we're choosing players who are bone dry. Yeah, this is a pro lubrication podcast. And if there are any lubrication sponsors out there, you know, hit us up.

Lubricants. Yeah, lubricant sponsors. Yeah, it could be better. It could be better with the current players, I feel like, too. But boy, tonight was bad. You all know that. You all know that already. All right.

The sun comes up on the U-23-6-1 win against El Salvador. Yeah, and the U-17s, they flew to Brazil. There we go, bells. That's how you turn things around. That's some experienced podcasting. Brazil. Yeah. All right, Greg.

Have a good sleep. Thanks everybody for listening. We'll see ya.