Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - Episode 110: Roster and XIs for Canada and Cuba, and a whole bunch of listener questions

Episode Date: November 6, 2019

We talk about who should start against Canada and Cuba, without tailoring our preferences to Berhalter’s tendencies, and then we read and try to answer several listener questions.0:30 opening thoughts and extended discussion of the roster and lineups for the upcoming games against Canada and Cuba.41:30 listener questions segment (IT’S REALLY GOOD)1:10:00 quick thoughts from Greg on the USWNT game against Sweden this weekToday’s sponsor is Humble Nut Butter, a company in Minnesota that makes premium, all natural nut butters with a savory flavor profile. You can find them on Amazon, and if you happen to live in the Twin Cities, you can find it at select stores. For more info, follow them on Instagram: @humblenutbutter or check out their website, www.humblenutbutter.com 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. Hey, everyone. The U.S. men's national team faces Canada on Friday, November 15th. That is next week. And coach Greg Burhalter is set to announce the roster any day now. Greg Velazquez is back with me after a U-17 World Cup induced hiatus. Thank you to Chris, Joe, and Matt for helping me through that difficult time. Greg, how are you? Good, Bells. It's been nice over the past three weeks to see some of our senior team boys actually and enjoying themselves on the soccer field. Yes, yeah. So really bad news on the U-17 front, but the best news that's come out since we last recorded is Sergenio Dest's commitment to play for the U.S. men's national team, right? Yeah, that was a big one. That was definitely a big one in the U.S. men's national team development corner. Yeah, huge, huge news for us. And I'd say the second best news is Christian Pulisic's ascend.

inset Chelsea four goals and an assist in the past two weeks and then uh he drew a penalty earlier today that game is ongoing yeah he had the assist against iax in the champions league uh last match day so he he seems to be clicking in the game before that against newcastle sort of in his return from international duty uh he didn't notch an actual goal or assist but he was very uh very much involved in several chances and then the big the big hat trick versus Burnley and a nice goal against who was that against Watford. I like Watford. So yeah, so it's definitely, I think, eased the sort of the hysteria surrounding Pool Six demise.

I believe it's safe to say rumors of his demise have been exaggerated. Yes, yeah, as they say. West and McKinney's back to full health at Shalka. John Brooks is back to full health at Wolfsburg. Richel dezma made the bench for PSV but didn't play, partly because of PSV. player got a red card. So yeah, there are positive developments out there. Despite the fact our U-17s whimpered out in the group at the World Cup, we have no youth national team coaches, and Burrhalter has so far been a low-grade tire fire as a national team coach.

I don't, yeah, I don't know, I don't have any positive rejoinders for the, for the last bit. We'll just have to see if the pendulum just randomly swings the other way in Orlando. Yep. That's what it feels like. Looking for some random pendulum swings. Because I don't have a ton of faith. I'm hoping, but I don't have a ton of faith that we're going to make a lot of deliberate changes. I think we're just going to hope that it works differently this time.

Yeah. I think that's the best we can hope for realistically. We'll run through some listener questions later in the show. But first, why don't you tell us what we're talking about today, Greg? Well, we're going to kind of go project. It's actually not a projection at all. we're going to wish for a for some of those exact deliberate changes that we'd like to see going into the uh nations league window against Canada and Orlando and Cuba in the Cayman Islands I believe so let's just get out of the way who's not available because of injury Josie Altador almost certainly Miles Robinson I believe is still out the centerback from Atlanta packs of Pomacal just had surgery and we'll be out for another five weeks I believe Tyler Adams may never return from injury.

He's slated to. He hasn't actually sat out longer than what the last update was for. So a couple of weeks ago, we got the standard two weeks update, but we haven't gone past that two-week window yet. So it's possible that he's still on track for a turn shortly after the international break. I'll trust you and you are whiteboard full of equations. Timmy Wea, I think you said it best in the weekend review. No return date reported.

far. Yeah, they got us all excited because they showed a video clip of him juggling a soccer ball. But I think that's just at this point, social media 101. Get people excited. No real definitive timetable. Right. And then Chris Gloucester, who is way, way, way on the outside of the national team picture, he's also hurt. So if you had any fantasies about Chris Gloucester getting a call up, put those to rest. So we got two games. You want to do it like a lineup against Canada and then a lineup against Cuba. I think that's what you told me. Yeah, and we're going to preface this by saying that we are, and I believe we are really

doing it this time, we are divorcing ourselves from any Greg Burrhalter influence. So this is not a lineup that we think like, oh, well, Berhalter will probably do this, or if he's going to continue with the system he's been running, then this player wouldn't fit this role because there at least is a chance that he doesn't do that. And so we're going to kind of give what we want to see to see if the ship starts turning around. Yeah, I'd say at least a chance that he doesn't make big changes is a is a understatement. He's not going to. He's not going to. He's not going to. He's not going to make big changes. I mean, we could we already have a taste of that in the 20 man roster. He called him for the

pre-camp. I think what are there like three new names on it? It's yes. I kind of I kind of want to disagree there. Okay. Disagree away. So I mean, I mean, none of the new names would necessarily inspire a lot of a lot of like rejoicing but at least it seems like he's he's checking so i mean we've got daniel lovitz that left back and he's brought in a new left back in uh is it chase gasper yes chase gasper so again no one's no one's been like banging the door down for a chase gasper call up but he's at least throwing something at the wall there to check right and so so that's where uh that's where i'm like at least hopeful that that he's willing to take another look uh jonathan lewis the wing.

I know he was called up for the Gold Cup, but he didn't really feature that much. If you're just looking for somebody who could change things up late in the game, I think Jonathan Lewis might be that player more than Corey Baird as that player. Yeah. Corey Baird has sort of been the default mode. And then the last one I think that I'm somewhat, somewhat optimistic about is Jeremy Aboubibu, say. So, you know, we've long been concerned that Jazzy's Arda is actually rated as Burhalter's

top striker. Maybe this is Burrhalter attempting to sort of widen the scope of his search and see if a younger player could outperform him now and potentially then be able to outperform him through the cycle. Yeah. Okay. I mean, I'll grant some of that. I guess the problem is I see, I can just sort of see in the future, say Gasper gets included on this roster and Lovitz. And then it's going to be, we're going to be back kind of where we started where Anthony Robinson's not going to get a call up and it's just going to be well chase gasper a you know a promising i guess young performer from minnesota united gets to be on the national team and again anthony robinson doesn't get a call up seems like better than 50% chance that's what happens here so so so the left

backs would be desk lovitz and gasper gasper doesn't replace lovitz he actually adds on to sort of what you'd consider like the existing dead weight maybe i mean do you think it's likely that lovitz is left off of this actual roster? So what I'm sort of going to try to read into, because honestly, it seems like Burrhalter is like too gentle to cut some of these guys loose entirely. Like that's how I sort of feel about like the Will Trapp continued. I mean, Will Trapp has been in every camp.

He didn't feature. He played one game in the Gold Cup. He got into another game. He got into two games. He basically played the dead rubber game in the Gold Cup. He started against Mexico in the game. He got demolished. and then he didn't play it all in the last window in October.

Am I right there? I think you're right, yeah. It seems like he's being sort of faded out, but, you know, like how long of a process does it take to phase somebody out? Like, it's Burrhalter just seems to lack that ruthlessness. So, yeah, I could see Gaspur and Lovitz on. I could see Ewell and Trap on this roster again. Soft, soft with our roster selections, soft in the midfield.

Everything's too sentimental. Yeah, okay. Well, why don't you give your... Oh, no, no, one more. One more. Mark McKenzie's in this lineup. And I honestly believe that the fifth centerback spot after what I'd call the sort of established four of Brooks, Ream, Miasga, Long. Not necessarily in that order, but I feel like those four are sort of the four. And I think Zimmerman might be the fifth. And I think Zimmerman's fifth man spot might be up for grabs.

And it's very likely John Brooks is going to injure himself at like doing whatever he's doing this after. noon and and we're going to need that fifth centerback so so mark mackenzie getting his chance to try to be the new fifth centerback okay all right that's cool yeah i'm i'm a mark mackenzie fan he didn't have a he didn't have a great u20 world cup and that's because he was basically not fit and he didn't and he didn't play his proper position he played right back but before you know last year and into the concoft qualifying he was he was a really exciting prospect and i and to see him come get back into form and then get a national team call up. That's cool.

I'm glad to see that. Yeah, he captained that U20 side. So he was the captain of the team despite clearly not being at full fitness. So, yeah, so hopefully there are just a lot of different qualities to Mark McKenzie. And hopefully that comes through in that pre-camp and he maybe gets rewarded with a look and run out against, say, Cuba. Yeah, let's hope. Okay, let's give us your lineup for the Canada game. Okay, so we're starting with Canada.

And again, I'm going to say what I think would be like our best, like best 11 available players. And I'm going to say John Brooks will stay healthy. I know it's a big gamble. So I want Zach Steffin and goal, which I think will be the unanimous decision. I want I want Brooks at the left. I want to play it back for with Brooks at left centerback. And then I'll hedge here. I don't really care either Miazka or Long at the other centerback.

And I really don't care that much. Okay. I think Long did a really good job. helping to cover for a lot of things against Canada. So I kind of would probably actually give the edge to Aaron Long. Just because he's a little more mobile than Miaska. Yeah. And I think that matters.

Even if we don't play a soft, chewy central midfield, I still think that against Alfonso Davies and Jonathan David, am I saying it right, David? David. It might be David. I don't know. I do want a little bit of that extra pace because I don't want to. We got caught out a bunch of times last.

game and Canada didn't capitalize, but they just literally got behind us and we were chasing them down into our own box. So if we're going to find ourselves in that situation, let's get Aaron Long in there. I'm already, I'm already grimacing. Well, the other thing is if we can get some of these other players that we picked, it's less likely that Canada is going to be able to just pick out a ball over the top because we will have some pressure on the ball in midfield, which I think would be a crucial difference from our last outing. Yeah. So who do you have a fullback? Fullbacks. Out of position, Serginio Desti. at left back.

Yeah, I think that's a no-brainer at this point. I'm actually torn on it. So we're not going to spend this long on every position I don't think, but I'm a little torn since we're divorcing ourselves from Burr-alter's sort of trajectory thus far. Like, I wouldn't hate to see Dest get a run out at right back and Anthony Robinson at left back. And I know Anthony Robinson isn't somehow the savior of everything and the backup quarterback syndrome could be rearing its head here in full effect.

But if you think of Robinson's ability to burst forward and then desk's ability to burst forward on the right, that becomes, in my mind, like a very threatening fullback duo. Okay, I can see that. I guess I am a little worried about Robinson's defending. And I think that's continued to be somewhat of a problem in the championship this year. Still young. He can fix that. But, you know, people are concerned about desks defending. I think Robinson's, I think Desk's a better defender than Robinson is.

Either way, maybe having both of those guys on as our two corner or two defenders on the edges might really be exploited. Yeah, I mean, that would be the concern. And at least, you know, Reggie Cannon or Nick Lima is a little bit more reliable defensively. Just leaving DeAndre Edlinoff. All right. So despite my own hedging there, Sergenio Dest at left back, and I'm still going to start Reggie Cannon right back. I appreciate that D'Andre Yedlin is doing things at a competent level for Newcastle in the Premier League. Cannon has looked very effective and contributed a lot to the attack for the national team,

and I tend to weight national team performances pretty heavily. So for me, Cannon doing that well means you leave Cannon in. If Yedlin eventually overtakes him with some good national team performances, great. For now, though, give me Reggie Cannon. Yeah, I agree there. I guess I have Miazga as my just to sort of give my my my take on it I have Miazga as my right centerback That's the only difference between my lineup and yours and we did not consult with each other before this But I do see the argument for long I'm like you I could kind of go either way

Yeah, it really seems like with the Miazga or long that's been the case forever right like either one of them both of them if they both start fine It I mean it does seem unlikely that Tim Riem won't play based on Berhalter's sort of preferences, but this is not a Burrhalter preferred lineup. Right. And I got Ream in reserve for the as a veteran president presence against Cuba. Veteran president. Okay.

The veteran president. Yes, where we're less likely to have to worry about players getting in behind us. No, I do too. I have Ream in it, the left centerback, and whichever of a longer miasca in is the right centerback. And McKenzie deputizing behind them. And you have Robinson called up as a... I do, yeah. I want Robinson to get a run out against Cuba where there will be...

It won't be a test. I know we're going to... Maybe we'll get dinged for taking teams for granted after the Cuba disaster, but I'm sorry. Like Cuba just won't be a test. Yeah, we could have scored 15 goals on them. Why don't you do the midfield? All right. This is the fun stuff.

So I've got a midfield three and I want to make clear that I'm not necessarily scratch. wrapping Burrhalter's like possession, I think we can play a possession game. I don't think it's mutually exclusive that you have to, like you have to have a deep lying playmaker to play possession soccer. I want Weston McKinney to sit in the Tyler Adams holding mid role, the designated holding mid role. I don't think Weston McKinney is a true six, but if you partner him up with, say, another player who can do a decent job as a holding mid, then you might be able to say give West and McKinney the freedom to go forward at times and have built-in coverage for his spot.

Essentially a double pivot, right? Yeah, which is not what, well, I mean, I guess there's been a game or two where Burrhalter has allowed the midfield to slide into that setup, right? In the Gold Cup is what I'm thinking of. Is that what you're thinking of? Yeah, there was that one game, I think it was against Jamaica, actually, where Bradley and McKinney essentially functioned as a double pivot. Right.

But in that game, we still had the Tim Ream stay-at-home left-back. So we ended up with like a staggered three backs, two holding mids in possession. And I think since the Gold Cup, we've looked much more like a two centerbacks, one deep, like sitting midfielder. And then like a Roldon having a Roldon played that role against Canada being more of like he could come back. But he was definitely ahead of Bradley. and he was definitely behind McKinney. So I don't even think we necessarily have to abandon that. I just want to have McKinney in the Bradley spot

where he actually is a threat to go forward that Bradley just never is. Well, who do you have sitting next to him then? Darlington Nagby. Now, this is unrealistic both in terms of Burrhalter's selections and in terms of Darlington's. It doesn't have to be. We don't know that Darlington has sworn off all call-ups.

I basically am just like, whatever you need to do, Greg Burrhalter, make peace with Darlington Nagby, sell him on your vision for the team and how he could fit into it because it seems like what Burhalter wants to be able to do. And what I think the U.S. can do a little bit better than what we're showing is play possession soccer. And I think Darlington Nagby could be a key piece of a team trying to do that. Okay. Okay. So, I mean, Nagby played really well this season. And he does things that I think maybe nobody else in our midfield does, except for maybe Richie Lerner.

His cleanness and precision on the ball, his ability to receive the ball and maintain possession and fine feet, matched only by the 19-year-old at young PSV. So, yes, like for me, Nagby, it would be like it would be a dream for me to see Nagby's name on the call-up sheet. And it doesn't have to be impossible. Like, he's not, he's not banished officially. So, you know, hoping against hope that that's the major change. And then my third center midfielder would be the one and only Dwayne Holmes. Yeah. Who, again, not necessarily going to come in and save U.S. soccer, but at least provides a ton of just energy.

He can be all over the place. He can play in a lot of different center midfield roles. He's versatile. And he's not like some terrible passer. So it's not like you just can't play possession soccer because you have Holmes and McKinney as two of your three center mids. Yeah, right. So I'll just go ahead with mine. I want to see McKenny and Morales in a double pivot, Alfredo Morales, and then Dwayne Holmes ahead of them. So again, we're not so different here. I guess I just sort of rode off Nagley because he hasn't been accepting call-ups. Now, like you said, there may be some way for Burrhalter to rebuild that bridge. But I like Morales, McKinney, and Holmes together, not because it can do the things. necessarily that Burrhalter is asking of his midfield, I don't care about that anymore. We don't have to build out in any specific way. We just need to have competent players there

who can win battles in the midfield. And I think Morales, McKinney, and Holmes would win a lot of battles in the midfield. They'd be tough to play through the three of them together. Morales showed that against Mexico, even though we got trounced in that game. He was a force to be reckoned with defensively. He's a little messy. He's a little messy on the ball. So we're not going to, I don't know that we're going to, it's going to be beautiful flowing, disorganizing the opponent with the ball moves with Morales McKinney midfield. As opposed to what it's been so far. Right.

Which, like, like, obviously it has not been that. But we're going to, but we're going to be able to force turnovers and we're going to be hard to play through. And I think that's, that's what I would like to see prioritized at the moment. Yeah. And, and if Nagby can't be. like wooed, if we can't woo Nagby back. Morales is a guy I want in the starting lineup. There's a nice clip.

Maybe we'll find a way to post it where in the first like 15 seconds of their game in Fortuna's game against Cologne over the weekend. He just flies, you know, 18, 19 yards forward to challenge somebody. It reads the play, arrives at the same time as the ball and like wins a real rugged tackle. And again, that's just exactly what we do not see. we haven't seen in the Burrhalter era is that kind of play from our central midfield. So that's what I want. And I want both Morales and McKinney, if those are sort of our two nominal holding midfielders,

to have the freedom to do that one at a time. And the other one then reads and balances things out. Yeah. I mean, taking some risks, asking that of Weston McKinney, not his strong suit up to this point in his career, to read the movements of somebody else and then, you know, cover for them. But I think Morales can do that. I think Morales is very well equipped to do that at 27 years old Bundesliga veteran and two Bundesliga veteran. The other thing you're doing is you're building in this easy swap when some other guys get healthy.

When Tyler Adams gets healthy, he's an easy insertion into that lineup where he's not hamstrung into having to sit deep the way the Bradley trap role has. And he has that freedom next to whoever ends up sort of being that player. And it could be McKinney, it could be Paxton and Pomacall. It could be Morales. Morales refuses to give it up. And so you sort of are already building for the next obvious step, which is Tyler Adams' return. Right. Sometime in summer of 2020.

All right, let's go to the front three. Hold on. Hold on. Do we need to go through the midfield sort of reserves for the Cuba game? Sure. Sure, sure, sure. Because I want to hear who you have sort of backing up since we're going, since we're kind of going to assume wholesale changes. between games.

Yeah, well, I don't, so I don't really care that much who else is in the, who else is backing anybody up in the midfield, except I do think it will come as no surprise to anybody. I think Richie Ledesma should be called up. I don't know, do I need to make the case for that? I see a lot of, you know, a lot of people arguing with me on Twitter about it lately. It's kind of the same argument, but it's so telling when, when even the sort of first team or bust crowd, like, weighs in.

like, oh, if Ledesma gets in this game, he's going to skyrocket up the depth chart. And that's sort of the whole, the whole, like, you're giving the whole game away right there. Like, as though, you know, Ledesma moving up one rung from key starter on their reserve team to fringe sub for the starting team, the word skyrocket shouldn't be used. Like, it's a very modest step up for Ledzma in terms of his sort of status with the club. why would that skyrocket him? So you're either wrong about moving him as high as you are or you're wrong in where you're holding him right now. Young PSV's roster, there has been some back and forth

between the young PSV roster and the PSV roster. It's built as, it's like literally a reserve team. It's right below the PSV team. And not everybody on the young PSV team is a big prospect, but Ledesma clearly is one of those players. And we're not that good. The US men's national team is not that good. It has not been that good in the midfield.

So I really want to see him against Cuba, and I think he should be one of the backups in this game against Canada. No need to throw him right into a must-win game in a historic competition like the Nation's League. That's the big downside for me of treating the Nations League sort of as this huge competition. One, we should be fighting in every single game. But we have to leave room for experimentation, especially given where we are in our program of massive transition from the 18 failed cycle to the 2022 cycle. And if you focus, if you do entirely win now things and you're picking the wrong players to win now. But if that's your entire focus on the Nations League, then you've eliminated a ton of chances to work new guys in ahead of actual World Cup qualifying, at which point we get to qualifying. And we can't bring in new players then either because now it's do or die.

And you've essentially been locked in this player pool that you started with in January of 2019 for the duration. and that just seems that really seems like a bad idea a bad corner to back yourself into yeah one last thing i'll say about it is we we have we have a wise scout account uh we have the bare minimum one and that's that's a program where you can look up every involvement that a player made in in a game they have all the young PSV games they have all the airs-de-visi games a lot of leagues across the world and i i hate it when people talk about secret knowledge that i don't have and then don't tell me about it, but I've tried to, you know, I've made All-T videos of Lodesma. I think USMNT videos has put some on there.

I haven't done it in every game, but I'm telling you, I've watched all of these involvements, and he only has two goals and one assist, but he is consistently excellent at the job of a 10, a 10-ish-8. He's so good. He's so good at receiving the ball between the lines, turning. He's got such quick feet. He gets rid of the ball. He makes, by and large, he makes good decisions.

He's not perfect in the attacking third. He's not insanely goal dangerous, which is reflected in his stats, two goals and one assist, both, you know, which all came in one game. But he's been really good. He's been really good. And I think there's a good chance. I'm not saying it's a guarantee, but I think there's a good chance when he gets onto a field with a bunch of other $20 million attackers like he will at PSV at some point, maybe as early

as this weekend. Who knows? We're going to see that he's even more dangerous than he is with, you know, with a bunch of other 18-year-old. some of them who don't necessarily have a future in elite soccer. So I guess I just say he is good. You can trust me or you can trust me or you cannot, you know, but. Right.

But we're definitely not just saying these things because he plays for such and such club. Right. More to it than that. We're not actually like going crazy demanding an Alex Mendez call up at the moment. I'm not because he hasn't, he hasn't really, he's not a, he's not the, the guy that Iax are building around, you know, and that's clear the way he plays. it's clear when you watch him. So there is that distinction.

And this also kind of goes for a bunch of those other guys that get talked about and their names thrown around, like a Julian Green or an Auntie Robinson or Dwayne Holmes. Like we are pulling those up and watching Julian Green. And it's like, ah, Julian Green isn't really doing anything terribly impressive. He doesn't really push the game forward. He doesn't really do a lot of these things. He'd be a very safe call and we have plenty of safe players.

So we're not like, oh, we got to get Julian Green in this camp. Yeah. I would say like Mendez hasn't played nearly as much as Ledez. And, you know, he has, he needs a little time to cook at IACs. And I'm not calling for him to be called up. Who else? Chris Richards, I would like to see him in this camp, actually. But I don't feel nearly as strongly about him as I do about Ledesma.

Partly because we have more centerbacks, but partly because he hasn't been quite as much of a standout at the level that he's playing at. So, yeah. Yeah. We're just repeating what each other is saying, I guess. But all that context goes into it. Like our centerbacks are not costing us games for the senior team right now. Our inability to create any kind of chances on any kind of a consistent level, absolutely costing us games at the senior team level.

So that's why our big emphasis is on guys like Dwayne Holmes, on guys like winning the ball in midfield, which can lead to chances. So like an Alfredo Morales on that velvet touch of Richel dezma. Right. Yeah. So I want to. I want, to make a long story short, I want Ladesma as the backup in this game, and I want him starting against Cuba. And I don't really care who the other midfielder are on the roster.

Like Jackson Ewell is fine. If Bradley has to be there, Bradley has to be there, I guess. Who else? Georgie Mahalovich? Maybe he tears it up. Well, so the Mahalovich, Brandon Aronson, sort of trajectory is how I'm going to say that Ladezma isn't so far. far-fetched because the U.S. now has sort of that plausible cover to maintain the locker room culture to bring Ledzma in under the guise of he really showed out at the U-23 camp and so

now's the proper time to bring him in almost as though we need this cover just to call in a guy who might already be better than our existing players. Yeah. So that could be that could be sort of the rationale for the Desma call-up. Yeah, that's a hopeful thought. I would say and one other thing I would say is like what we, one thing we saw in the U-17 World Cup is that a player with MLS minutes, Matt Hartman and I talked about this on Sunday, a player, just because a player is getting MLS minutes doesn't doesn't mean he's good or doesn't mean he can make an impact at the international level, not even at the U-17 level. Geo and Lucille, Lucille, Leucoeo had a rough tournament.

Like, like if you break down his discrete moments on the field in the U-17 World Cup, he was not good enough. and he's a player who got 1,000 Major League Soccer Minutes. So anyway, just another data point in the first team minutes, the eternal first team minutes debate. All right. I appreciate your apathy towards everyone but La Desmond in the midfield. I still, for whatever reason, can't get over how Sebastian Leggett

does not get playing time for Greg Berhalter. Every time he comes on, he makes the team better. And Berlter, who talks about collecting data, just seems to ignore that data. and chooses other people. So I'm hoping with Jets there, and I hope he actually gets a runout if we need attacking impetus against Canada. I don't really care if he plays against Cuba,

because, again, that's not even really a competitive game. I really hope we don't struggle against Cuba and just have to wipe all this egg off of our face. Yeah, it won't be the last time or the first time. And then Keaton Parks, which I kind of just want to throw a random Keaton Parks shout in there. Wouldn't mind seeing him get a call it, but that seems unlikely since he's not in the 20-man pre-camp, despite New York City not being in action this week or less. Just to bring a little bit of Burrhalter realism into this, I would imagine it's going to be a Bradley Morales-McKennie midfield.

Because we don't even know if Dwayne Holmes is going to get called up. I'm talking about against Canada. Yes, I get you. And I would say, oh, no, we haven't finished the roster. We haven't finished the lineup yet. My bad. Hold off on that. All right.

So who do you got up front? All right, so I have Pulisick wide left, Jordan Morris wide right, Josh Sargent up top. Does that need any explanation? I feel like that's pretty obvious at this point. I mean, you could make a case that Burrhalter just rates Ariola over Christian Pulisik. Yeah, well, you have to wait national team performance more highly than club team performance. Oh, I really, yeah, that won't be the case. That won't be the case.

Poolstick will be starting. The only question will be whether Burrhalter moves him to the central. center of the park in an attempt to in attempt to sort of change things up if he decides that's the solution and he could make that that that's a decision that I feel like uh you could justify when you're trying to solve a lot of our offensive uh shortcomings yeah I wouldn't agree with it but I think you could I think I think I think you could justify that decision I guess so I I feel like it would be a brazen attempt to further soften our midfield well yeah I have the same front three I guess so back

to the sort of realism discussion. I think it's going to probably be Bradley, Morales, and McKinney, you know, assuming Bradley gets through the MLS Cup game healthy in the midfield and then I feel like there's still a good chance we'll see Zardis over Sargent up top. Sergeant didn't cover himself in glory against Canada in Toronto and Burhalter loves him some Jaze's artists. Yeah, I'll say one, that decision would be pretty disappointing. Two, playing Weston McKinney as the most advanced midfielder in the central midfield would be as disappointing for me. Like I would be just as upset to see that in the starting lineup as Jazi's Hard as starting up top. And I think the result, the outcome would be pretty predictable.

What about that 10 minute hat trick against Cuba though? You're right. Ten for life, Weston McKinney. West McKinney playing centerback first club over the weekend for 85 minutes. Did all right too, as I understand it. emergency center back, right? Yes, yeah. Getting back to the Bradley sort of choices that I think we should run through. Yes, I think that's a pretty reasonable expectation. I would really dislike it.

I'm hoping that McKenny and Morales are sort of in the same position in Bradley's mind, and just one of them plays, and we actually play an attacking midfielder in the attacking midfield role. Whether that's Legit or Dwayne Holmes or Richie Ledzma, pick one. Okay. All right. Yeah, I mean, it'll be, as always, it'll be interesting to see what happens when the roster may come out tomorrow. I guess we don't really know. That's coming out soon.

That's the report. The report is tomorrow. Okay. Wednesday, if you're not sure what day we're talking about. Yeah, we're talking on Tuesday afternoon. All right, so let's get into some more fun stuff. What's the, who would you start against Cuba? And let's go through this one more quickly because we have referenced some of it.

already. Okay. So against Cuba, rotate your goalkeeper and put Sean Johnson back there. I actually think you should send a lot of guys back to Europe as cocky as that might seem in between games. I worry a little bit about that. And replace them with

or just have a big group to begin with. But I'd want Anthony Robinson to get his feet wet left back. Give me Tim Riem and Aaron Long or Mark McKenzie getting some minutes at centerback. Give me the opposite of Cannon or Yed Lennett right back. Send Desk home. Send Brooks home. Okay. Yeah, I definitely want

Brooks to go home. I have Desk starting again just because I want him to continue to get reps. I guess part of me doesn't believe that Anthony Robinson is going to get called up. I know we're supposed to divorce ourselves completely from Burrhalter with this, but I'd be okay with Robinson at left back. And then I would say Canon again, canon again just for continuity at right back. I rate canon higher than Yedlin. I know I'm going to get crucified for that. All right. Who's your midfield three then in this non-Bradley or this non-Burhalter world,

which coincidentally is probably non-Bradley world? I'm going Morales, Holmes, and Ledesma. So drop Holmes in next to Morales. Because he's versatile. Yeah, yeah. Send McKinney home. Send Brooks home. You know, McKinney's had an injury struggles, basically.

since he became a professional, and I think he, he's put in some shifts for the U.S. he can go home. And then Ladesma as the attacking mid. I'd love it. I would love that very much. One other point on Morales and Holmes, because I know they get kind of pigeonholed,

I think, from people who don't get to watch them as often as we do. Morales is not a sort of true six for his club team. He's not just like a lone six. He definitely plays with some freedom to burst forward to tackle, burst forward to attack. At times he actually sets up as like, a higher as one of the farther forward midfielder. So he's not just a pure six.

And Dwayne Holmes is not a pure 10. He often plays at the base of a double pivot in a 4-2-3-1. So he is right at home checking back to receive balls from defenders. Yeah, you're right. He's been a deep-lying midfielder a lot of the time for Darby. And that helps explain why he doesn't score that many goals or get that many assists because he's played that and right back. Who do you have up top in your front three?

So I've got Ariola taking over for Pool Six and Poollick home. I've got Jordan Morris playing on the right wing because Morris is devastating in games like this where there's a ton of open field. And he has nothing to do after this game ends. And then I've got Obelby Say up top. Okay. Because you don't need to go to your safety valve against Cuba. Like this would be a perfect opportunity to blood someone new and start introducing. other players into the pool.

The pool's been very narrow. Yeah, and I, do I want to say this? Do I want to, do I want to bring Uliana into this camp? Do I want to call for him to be called up? Especially after Brian Shreda put out that, like, devastating spreadsheet showing that U-19 goals do not translate to professional success. Did you see that? Well, yeah, I saw that, but we've had that exact conversation on Slack,

and it played out similarly to a response from someone to Shoretta, and that the guys who are the best U-19 players don't stick around all year to accumulate the most goals to lead the league. Because come winter break, those guys are going to get moved up to the, often will get moved up to the senior team or go out on loan. That's true. So it can be sort of the best of the remaining guys who end up leading the league in goals. Yeah, that's true. That's true. I'm still going to back off of calling up Ullianas just because it's totally not going to happen.

Hopefully he'll be with the U-23s instead of the U-20s. Do we even have a U-20 team anymore? Who knows? Who knows? I feel like we have one the day after the U-17 World Cup ends. I feel like we should now have a U-20 team. Yeah. They might not have a coach.

Well, we don't have a coach, that's for sure. So anyway, I like the idea of Morris, since he has nothing to do after this game, getting another full run out. He'll probably score four goals, hopefully, three of them assisted by Richel Ledesma. And I have Sergeant starting again because I think I want to see him get more reps, get more comfortable, both in the system and with his teammates. I also have Pulisic starting against Cuba just to kind of throw the full house at him and continue to build chemistry with Dest and, you know, hopefully Ledesma and Sergeant.

So that's where I stand. All right. I appreciate your discipline and not picking Ullianas for this game. Yeah, it was close. Close. It was close. Real conservative bells. Even with that, even leaving Yana's off, I'm pissing in the wind here. No chance we see Ledesma, I would think. I mean, no chance is too strong.

As you pointed out, there's some cover for Berhalter to call him up. I also have Chris Richards at centerback, which I feel less strong about. In this Cuba game, you're saying? Yeah, yeah. I mean, again, wouldn't hate it. McKenzie seems to be the more natural choice. which again begs the question. Like we saw Richards and McKenzie play,

and I know McKenzie was injured, but even in Conca Calf qualifying with D20s, Richards was sort of clearly the better player of the two, but no one would bat an eye if McKenzie gets a call up, whereas if Richards gets a call up, there'd be this, or if you even, like, suggest Richard should get a call up. There's the immediate response of like,

oh, he's doing it in the three Bundesliga. How could we possibly call that player up? Yeah, I get it. And I really don't enjoy subjecting myself to that. So I'm fine with McKenzie. I mean, McKenzie would be great. I'd love to see McKenzie start that game against Cuba. And I don't think Richards is going to get called up.

I will say the three league, those stadiums attract fans on a level with the lower tier of major league soccer, playing against desperate professional adults who want to make an impact and move up. I think it's way underrated by the typical American fan, that league, three league. but anyhow, I digress. We're going to convince people. There have to be people who listen every week who go into the podcast thinking that we definitely shouldn't call up reserve and youth team players and exit the podcast being like, I think I'm convinced. I think I think this time they got me. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, one day we should do the whole like, hey, MLS is not as good as it thinks it is episode. But today is not that day. Should we Get to some questions? Do it. Fire some questions off. All right. First,

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sponsor we've ever had on the program. All right, let's get to some questions from Patreon supporters. We'll start with Ian Shank. How many changes to, quote unquote, the group, do you need to see to feel encouraged that Greg Burrhalter could be moving in the right direction? one or two, the full Ledesma? All right. I have five that I think should instantly be not called up for this camp.

And I think it would actually be like, again, not so outlandish. And that'd be Lovitz trap, Roldon, Baird, and Zardez. I also think we can drop Michael Bradley, but I think that doesn't have to happen. And I really don't think it will happen. Right. I mean, moving in the right direction is just a really, really, really. high bar right now. It's a low bar, isn't it?

If Will Trapp is dropped, we're like, oh, he's actually making some changes. Yeah, I suppose. Trap or Lovitz. If he drops one of his guys who's been there for every camp, that would like signal something. Yeah, that's true. I guess I feel my feelings on the full Ladezma are well known, but I would feel encouraged with less than the full Ladezma, but probably more than one or two changes. I mean the real proof of whether I should be encouraged or not

will be at the end of the night on Friday night the 15th are we did we play a good game of soccer and beat Canada soundly and we don't even have to beat them soundly we just have to we just have to play well look good look like the better team that's where I'm at Michael pizza with our second question are there any players in the player pool either at the full USM&T level or with the youth teams that you believe need a full-time position change I have always thought because of his height and limited mobility, Chris Durkin might be better suited to play centerback than

defensive midfielder. That's an interesting question. I like that one. Hmm. Pomacall holding mid. That's actually a great shout, yeah. I think that I think Pomacall is sliding further back in the field in his future. That's my prediction.

We don't have to go through like give full descriptions, but I think we could run through a list of some interesting position changes. Well, why don't you start? All right. I think Sir Gino Dest to a winger. I don't like it. I hate it. All right.

No, that's fair. I just kind of want to see him have complete freedom to do cool things on a soccer field. We finally have a guy who can play Champions League level left back. He doesn't play left back. He does. Oh, no, he plays right back. But he could do. He could do it. He could.

I'm just saying once we get Anthony Robinson up to speed, then we're free to put Deaths up in the attack. Yeah, I don't know. I don't. Give me another one. You give me one then. I'll shoot down instantly. Giovanni Raina to the number nine.

Didn't they just do that? Didn't that actually happen? He needs a few more. He needs a few more reps, though. He needs a few more reps at the position. Give him six months at Dortmund playing the nine. He's already six two. He's a gigantic for a wing.

He's a large man, and he is a man. I think he's 17 now, but he is a grown man. Yep. Yep. I think Raina to the 9 is something that may happen. All right, I'll stay with the U-17s. Kobe to actual left back. Oh, yeah.

Click that right into place, please. That would have probably been good for the U-17s, and I think it'll be great for the future of the national team in a couple of years. I think we should move on to the next question, unless you got any other off the top of the other. No, that's a good list. That gets the juices going. Steve Copera asks, assuming few personnel changes, do you expect Burrhalter to alter his style of play, or is he dying on this hill?

I expect him to die on this hill. I think he will too. I think we could see, if we see a drastic shift, I think it would come on the defensive side. Like, we'll press more? Yeah, like we'll get away from the 4-4-2 and get more into a less passive shape and less passive stance, set up some pressing triggers and cues and see if we can't disrupt some things. I hope we see some of that. That would be good. Paul Richie, two questions.

I just don't get a tactical philosophy that allows us to be so vulnerable in the center of the field. What is Burrhalter hoping to gain by trading off and accepting that vulnerability? So I think Burrhalter would would disagree that we're vulnerable. You could say that we are not, again, we're passive, but we don't get carved up routinely. You know what I mean? We're not as much as Bradley's limited, and whether it's trap or even McKinney in that spot, in those center midspots, we don't get like just waltzed by and the other teams in our box necessarily. It's more just over the course of a game where we give the other team so much of the ball with so little stress to have to deal with. They eventually find an opening and beat us.

Yeah, it's like to prevent defense, right? I mean, you've talked about that. So while we're not necessarily vulnerable, what we absolutely do not do is create our own opportunities going the other way in transition by winning the ball. So it's more about we it's an opportunity cost where we lose attacking chances by turning the other team over. And that's, I don't see, I don't expect Burrhalter to sort of change that. I really do expect to see Bradley as his rock in the central midfield, which means we really, maybe we could still play a higher pressing game, but I just don't know how it's going to look. Just with like a coach on the field instead of a player.

Dylan Tilbury, a major issue that the USMNT has had since 2017 has been that opposing teams have shut down Pulisic and we have had no second option. Should Burhalter spend more time game planning to deal with that? I'm sure he's game planned to deal with it, but the game plan doesn't work. I mean, you know, the pattern of play we've been working on is, you know, a quick, quick combinations down the wing to release more. or Pulisic or there's that like diagonal switch to an overlapping fullback right right reggie cannon uh and then he plays it back across the middle i don't i i i i didn't watch carefully enough to figure out why we couldn't get those things done against can't well it's because we could we can't pass in rhythm like uh when the play has to

build through christian rle don and to some extent d'andre edlin in the buildup uh you lose a lot of that speed of play that has to be on point to exploit the openings once you've created them. And we just, we just aren't there. And it's not just those two. That's, that's a, that's not fair either. West McKinney, you know, looked rough when he'd get the ball to him. He's not, he didn't pick out the right pass early. Sometimes he didn't pick out any pass early.

He just, you know, we were just turning over. So, as far as game planning for it, I still think one of the big issues is not putting a player in the attacking midspot who's comfortable attacking. I think that needs to be solved pretty quickly. So I don't know. What do you think? Do you think there's a specific game plan other than, you know, like we've kind of been harping on, win the ball in midfield and trust the Christian Poussoc and Jordan Morris could be devastating in the open field? Yeah, I mean, that would be my game plan.

I'm no, I'm the first to admit I'm not like some tactical expert. But I think that would help a lot. Just win some battles and then spray the ball. spray the ball wide and jump into the attack with alacrity. Second time I've used that word this month. Next question, if you're good with that. Let's do it. Rob Biondolillo, given what we know of Berhalter,

when would you realistically expect a substantial change in, quote, the group? If you had to speculate what uncapped young player would establish himself next or at that time? Oh, man. It seems like the group is, this is a really, really good one because if we don't start if we're not willing to experiment in the nation's league uh you know we have january but that's going to be the m l the the sort of different slightly different crop of mls guys uh march is olympic qualifying and that's a real wild card to throw in there and then june uh if we if we advance is the nation's league semis and final so this gets tough man like basically

a guy has to break into a top five league as a impact player, I feel like, to force Burhalter's hand, whether that's Tim Wea or, I know it's not top five, but Ledesma getting into PSV, Mendez getting into IACs, Yanez. Equivalent to top five. Yeah. So I think that's the only way it really happens is they have to actually force his hand. And some people could say that's a good thing. It's just you're putting the burden of proof on these guys in the top five leagues rather than putting any kind of, you're always giving the benefit of the doubt to the status quo.

And the status quo at the moment hasn't really earned their way in. They were defaulted in. Right. Max Archiletta asks, I am no Burrhalter apologist, but is it possible his teams would look significantly better with a healthy John Brooks and Tyler Adams? Yes. Yeah, it's very possible. Again, I think Tyler Adams will create some new kinds of chances for us in transition.

and whether that's the quote unquote game plan or not when they present themselves, as they did against Canada a couple of times, I think our two real chances as you posted clips after the game were in transition getting the ball out to Pulisick and Morris. Right. Yeah, I think there's no doubt they would make us better

and they would make the Burrhalter system look better even if Adams was played as an eight or which I think is probably what Burrhalter would do at this point. Oh, that'd be shocking. No, I don't. I don't think so. I think when Adams is healthy, he's taking over that deepest lying midter.

fielder. What about Brooks, so? Let's talk about, I mean, Adams, I think, does change it because there is no equivalent to Adams. What about Brooks? Does Brooks materially change our quality? Yeah, I do. I do think he does.

I think he's an even better passer than Ream. He's really good in the air. Like, defensively, for Wolfsburg, he's looked pretty good in his time when he's been healthy, which is about half of the games this season. So, yeah, I think he makes us a better team. He allows us to build out of the back better. A lot of stuff. All right.

I've said it before. I think Brooks will actually be a marginal improvement just because centerback hasn't really been a problem. Ream is a good passer when he's in there. He's limited in some other ways, but so far we don't play a lot of teams that are excellent at exploiting his limitations. So it's been a matter of if they can take away his passing, it's likely that they could also take away Brooks's passing.

Yeah, that's true. It's only recently that Burrhalter has settled on Ream as a centerback, too. Yeah. Since Sergenio Death's emergence. Yeah. Patrick Keeler, great friend of the pod, asks, is there any actual pressure from his bosses on Greg to win the game against Canada? That is an excellent question.

And I would say we have not heard that there is pressure. I haven't. There's been no public statement that there's pressure. There hasn't necessarily been a statement about pressure, and those statements never work anyway, the dreaded vote of confidence that almost guarantees the managers getting fired imminently. But we have seen some, I don't know if I'd say drastic measures taken in the PR department, but Ernie and Greg are out posing for photographs in their European travels. Burrhalter penned or some intern penned and basically an apology to the fans for the Canada performance. performance and loss. That's true. So they're feeling some of this pinch and they're, you know, they're definitely sensing that they're not on the safest ground.

Right. I would just be surprised if Stewart was pressuring Berhalter in any way like you got to beat Canada or you're going to be fired. That would be really surprising. Maybe he gets, maybe if we lose a Canada, he gets fired. I mean, who knows? What do I know? Great question. I don't have a good answer. Greg's answer is much better than mine. Miles Wright asks a more personal question for both of you. I consider you both to be incredibly knowledgeable and pretty rational with your views on U.S. soccer as a whole. Have you ever considered or have you ever been approached about doing this full time for a larger publication? Uh, not really. No. Have you, Greg? Uh, no, I definitely have not. Um, uh, no one's, no one's coming. No one's been ringing my phone.

Well, but then I, I, if you need his number, give me, You let me know. I'm not necessarily pursuing that, though. This is about the exact amount of time that I'm able to commit to this. I really enjoy doing it. So suddenly when you start doing things for money, they can become less enjoyable. Yeah. We do make some money.

We do say make some money on the Patreon, as you know. And that helps. And that's really appreciated. Yeah. Because we do. We invest in outrageous amount of time for, I don't know. I don't want to say minimal return. But, you know, as far as the pay, the pay.

the reimbursement goes, it's minor. The return is just because we're really passionate about U.S. soccer and might be doing some of this anyway. Yeah, we would be doing definitely some of it anyway. Tim Saviello asks, assuming that the players aren't satisfied with the current state of things, three questions. Do you see them affirmatively expressing their dissatisfaction and then engaging Burrhalter on what they think the issues are?

And if so, who do you think would lead that charge and what form do you think it might take. Finally, how do you think Burrhalta would react? These are outstanding questions. That's a really fun one. So, because you could run the range of like Argentina-style mutiny or what France had a mutiny in the World Cup. Argentina's had a World Cup mutiny. Right. So it's not unprecedented. I mean, so Bradley kind of mutinied against Klinsman, right? Or at least there was certainly unrest expressed. I mean, you could say the entire team packed it in in that Costa Rica away match that more or less ended Cleansman's reign.

It did end Cleansman's reign. Yeah, okay. But I mean, I don't know. Who would lead it on the men's national team? I would like to say it would be like the Tyler Adams, Wesen-McKinney, Christian Pulisic Trinity. But I don't know if I see that with them, at least not yet in their careers. Yeah, it would have to be something where like maybe two of them suffered sort of the same indignity that Pulisic did in the Canada game where they get benched despite other players maybe clearly performing worse or being more of the issue.

Yeah. And for that to change. It won't be any of the veterans, right? Because veterans have to kind of think that a new regime might not keep them in the picture. Yeah, it's a good question. I don't even have a clear sense of who the leaders are. And anybody who has a, like, the reputation as a leader is kind of, you kind of get that from U.S. soccer or from Burrhalter. So then you imagine that their alliance with Burrhalter is pretty strong.

Or you just literally equate age to being to leadership, which I think is a huge mistake that people make all the time. It's really, we don't examine what it means when we're like, oh, well, you got to have the right mixture for leadership, right mixture of veterans. On my leadership rant again, like at this point, the leadership quality is working against us. because one of the huge criticisms of the team is that they don't play with any bite. There's no spirit. So then you double back and say, all right, well, then who's supposed to be providing that?

The leaders are supposed to be showing us how to do that. Who's on the team for their leadership, allegedly? And then you look at those guys and you say, maybe they're not the best leaders. Maybe they can provide other soccer abilities, but if you're counting on them for leadership, it seems to be a neutral or negative. And for that reason,

I'm really excited to have Morales. back in the fold, presumably. He was yelling at people who was getting mad in that Mexico game. Yeah, Ralph McKinney gave you that, right? Yeah. Miazga? Miazga, too, yeah. More so than Aaron Long, even though Long does provide more pace.

All right, Scott Jorick says, hypothetical. This is a funny one. The U.S. ties Canada in the game is ho-hum. Ernie tells Greg, Greg Burhalter, that is, that as punishment, he has to go do a pod with the scuffed crew. What do Greg and Bells ask Burrhalter? My question would be how long of a runway were you promised to implement this style of play and get results? That's Scott speaking there.

So what would you at what would be your first question to, to, uh, Greg? Describe the hiring process. Oh, yeah. Do you really want to, you really want to go back over that ground? I mean, we've had this debate somewhat offline. Like, is that the, is that the key thing right now? Maybe it is. Maybe it is.

Probably not. I mean, it's just, it's, there are, there are a hundred key things. There have to be when, when, when, when we have a failure like you had in the, in the qualifying for 2018, there are a hundred things that are done poorly. And then since then, it seems like we just kind of keep adding on to the, to the number of things done poorly. Yeah. Well, I'll, I'll say I, when I, whenever I interview somebody, I spend quite a while coming up

with questions and soliciting all my friends and Facebook. family to help me come up with questions. So it takes, takes me a while to come up with them. I, yeah, I would, I think yours is a good question, Scott. What would I ask?

I would actually want to drill down. And I'm not, I wouldn't just like try to, you know, have it be a hatchet job. But I, I am genuinely curious about, uh,

when he talks about player profiles. Like I would want to basically like run through his 23 man roster and what he thinks are the necessary player profiles to have on that roster. Mm-hmm. Yeah, the player profiles, especially to the extent that they extend downward into these national teams, I would love to know more about that. That's just a total black box, you know? I would probably, and again, I don't want this to sound like it would be a hatchet job. But when things are going the way they're going, like a lot of the questions are going to focus on what would be sort of the negative things.

And I would ask him, like, what is it about players coming into the national team setup where they seem to perform below the standard that they're performing for their club team? And it's not necessarily against, you know, the top teams in the world. Yeah, that's a great question. Everybody's getting a good taste of where the brains of the podcast lie, as Greg continues to come up with good questions. For any interview, Bells has an incredible list of like 30 questions, and I add maybe one or two after hours of reading over him. So Bells is the interviewing expert here.

Yeah, but you think it on your feet, you got me beat by Miles. So one of the things, one thing I would ask is, do you think it's possible to have a possession-based system that does not, that does not press, that does not pressure the opposing team? And just to sort of continue my point from earlier, that's a question I stole from somebody else too. So that's from the dummy run on Twitter. I don't know his actual name. Nobody does. Austin asks, what is the likelihoodness that one of Richie Ledesma Olianas or Chris Richards is actually called up for the November fixtures? I would say low, very low.

Yeah, for me, Ladesma's the only legitimate candidate and it would have to come via the press conference where they say he just really impressed us at the U23s and we think now is the time to give him a look. And then I'd expect him to go the Aronson route where he's there as a ceremonial pick and doesn't actually get a, maybe not even get a cap.

Yep. Thomas Phillips asks, do you think Jermaine Jones and Clint Dempsey, maybe also Kyle Beckerman, have any interest in joining the next qualification, cycle as player coaches to help inspire some competitive spirit and physical aggression. I don't have a direct line into any of those guys' lives, but I don't think so. They don't seem like they do.

Do they do you? Have any interest in continuing with the national team? Yeah, but I guess I take it more as like coaching. Jermaine Jones would. Jermaine Jones is messy. Yeah. He'd be up for whatever. Yeah.

I think Dempsey just wants to go fishing at this point. Yeah, he's not messy at all. But those three guys are sort of great sort of standards for the bite that we're lacking right now. And again, like we're lacking in the players we pick, not necessarily in the overall pool. Right. Man. What I wouldn't give for somebody with Dempsey's spirit right now or Jermaine Jones, to be honest. Ben Harold, half-spaces.

on Twitter asks. I think Burrhalter originally designed his system thinking the player pool was strong at central midfield and centerback while being weak at fullback. Do you think this is accurate? How should the system change to accommodate suddenly competent fullbacks? Hmm. It's kind of hard to even remember what the player pool looked like back when Burrhalter took over. Did it, were we weak at fullback?

Yes, I'd say we were. It was Yedlin and then left back was, I mean, Anthony Robinson was almost penciled in by a lot of people after 2018. And that was it. I mean, like Greg Garza was on people's minds. There was questions about whether Jorge Villafania would continue. And I think that speaks to a weak pool to be picking from. And it's not necessarily a ton better.

It's still Anthony Robinson. But then you add in Sergenio Dest and Reggie Cannon has come along pretty well and shown that at a regional level, he's capable. So I do think that we've added a little bit of a little bit of depth. and top end talent to the depth to the fullback pool. Yeah, that makes sense. I guess I don't see how the system needs to change to accommodate that, even if it is, even if it was designed with weak fullbacks in mind.

I mean, we still need good play from our fullbacks. We didn't get it against Canada. Everybody talks about how bad the midfield was, but I thought Lovitz and Yedlin were horrible in that game and makes it difficult for us to build up for us to do those patterns of play. you know, such as they are. So I think improved fullbacks probably improve this system quite a bit. Yeah, I think to the point of the system, it'd be being able to abandon fully the holding

left back and being able to say, all right, our left back now gets to behave like most leftbacks do, which is to actually create some real issues in attack where Yedlin was doing that up from the right side against Canada, very little in the way of end product or quality once we got him into those positions, Lovitz's non-existent in the attack and has been basically since he's been playing for the national team. Yeah. One last question from Scott Jorick, again, since he asked a good one earlier, we'll let him have another one. Canada will probably come out with the same 4-4-2 on defense and the same 4-2-2-ish on offense

since it seemed to work last match. You know they will have an adjustment ready to whatever extent. The magic question is, will Burhalter make any tactical changes to start? and will he make any tactical changes in match? The second part of that question is really good. I mean, Susie had a mutual friend of ours, also on Twitter, whose name we don't know, he makes the point that Burrhalter doesn't do a good job of making changes in match tactically.

Do you agree with that? Yes, I definitely do. I feel like one of the only examples we've seen of successfully changing the shape came in January. in the second game of a January friendlies where, and he didn't really change the shape, he just put a little emphasis on one different area, which was to beat Costa Rica's pressure trying to find that long,

weak side diagonal ball early, and we did that pretty successfully. We haven't done a lot. Other shape changes we've made haven't been entirely successful. I know we changed shape against Chile into sort of that 532, as Chile had just been completely, had actually been carving us up,

finding, I don't know if people are sort of remembering this or if this is a blur, but they'd been finding Vidal in between our center mids and our centerbacks and no one really knew who to account for them. Right. And so we changed to a 532 set. One centerback could essentially always account for him. And that did improve our ability to mark to solve that problem. But it sort of had knock on effects elsewhere where we were then ineffective doing a lot of

other things. But that'd be, for me, that'd be the most effective change Burrhalter's made was probably that Chile game and made. and maybe a little bit of the Costa Rica game. And other than that, we've seen the opposite. We've seen like changes that, lack of changes that have really put us in tough spots. Well, this will be an interesting test of Burhalter. I guess I don't know whether he's going to make any tactical changes to start.

Here he's got a game that we lost a month ago. How's he going to respond to that? The only time he's had that situation was the Gold Cup final with Mexico and then the friendly against Mexico. And the way he responded to that game was to, you know, he sort of didn't approve of how often we kicked the ball long, which is how we got all our scoring chances, by the way. And so he asked, he asked the players to really focus on playing out of the back. That was, I think, the main tactical change. And of course, it had disastrous consequences. So I guess we'll see. I'll dove-tail it a little bit with half-spaces question,

and that putting Sergenio Dest in results in a different game plan from the start because there's no chance Sergenio Desk plays left back in a holding left back, centerback, when we're in possession. So that's immediately going to, should add some pressure to the wide spaces that Canada's going to have to deal with, that their 4-2-2-2 might not handle. So that should, that should open up some things that will have forced Canada to change at least a little bit right off the bat. Yeah, that's true.

he'll be he'll be piercing into the canadian uh defensive third if you know if he plays anything like he has we really do talk about him as though he's he's he's Danny alves and carnate like he's he's a pretty he's a good attacker he's better than our other attacking fullbacks of have really ever been but he's not like uh i mean we haven't seen yet that he is going to no take over a conca even a concaf game and uh turn us into the best attack in the region No, definitely not. But I mean, even against Uruguay, he was he was tap, tap, tap in his way through their right flank and, you know, making stuff happen. Yeah, making some stuff happen, but not a lot.

Compared to Daniel Levitts, he is Danny Alves. Yes, that is also true. That's the thing. And so he should definitely play. But to think that he's going to come in and suddenly we're going to be scoring, you know, four or five goals. That's sort of what I'm saying is even in that Uruguay game against, he, he, played against Mexico, it's not like he was just a complete menace. He was, he was threatening and there were some good flashes. Occasionally menacing, I think. But that's, I'm still very appreciative that he's chosen

the United States and I'm excited to see him playing. I just don't want us to think that suddenly our attack has become unstoppable. Right. Fair enough. All right. Well, I got to get going. You, you good? Anything else? I'm good. Oh, well, quick, quick note, the women's team plays Thursday, and it's Vlatko's first game in charge, first selections, and it's really interesting.

Do I have time to go on a little women's... Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The women have this really bizarre bit where because they're so good and win World Cups, and because the Olympics are a full-blown tournament on the women's side and always follow a World Cup year, they sort of squander a good portion of their preparation time for the Olympics, celebrating the World Cup victory, which is a good problem to have, all told.

But we're just now in November now getting to see sort of the first real steps that we're going to see the team preparing for the World Cup. Or for the Olympics, I'm sorry. So new manager, some new faces in the call-up list because of some injuries from the World Cup group. And then again, the Olympics is an 18-player roster instead of the 20th. three-player roster, so. Competition gets even more fierce. Okay. Watch that game tomorrow.

They're playing. Where are they playing? Sweden tomorrow, and then I think Costa Rica the following week. Do they have to qualify for the World Cup? I mean, for the Olympics? Yes, they do. And I believe that tournament qualification is also in March. And it is more or less a formality.

I don't know if you remember their World Cup qualifying, but it was like they were, they were plus. It was like facing Thailand over and over again. Yeah, they were plus. 30 and goal difference. I mean, our team's really good. And Conca Calfa Caff needs some development. They, like a lot of the Conca Caff nations, need some resources that they aren't getting. So at the moment, the gap is wide. Okay. All right, watch the women on Thursday night. And I guess we'll be back with some roster reaction and, you know, whatever else we come up with early next week. Thanks everybody for

listening. We'll see you.