Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - Episode 112: USA 4, Canada 1, and a new defensive shape

Episode Date: November 17, 2019

The USMNT defeated Canada 4-1 on Friday. The big news is Berhalter dramatically adjusted his defensive tactics. Meanwhile, the boys still can't play out of the back. Dest is cap-tied. Lots to cover and we didn't get to it until a day late. 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. The USB Canada 4-1 in Orlando on Friday night. Goals from Jordan Morris, Aaron Long, and a jazzy's artist's brace were more than enough to get a commanding win in a spirited effort from the American men. Greg, are we cooking? We're definitely, I mean, we're definitely preparing better dishes than Canada are at the moment.

Canada known for their cuisine. No, we were cooking in Orlando. To me, it felt like the first game of a coach's era. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. It makes a lot of sense to me because you said it to me earlier today. The more I think about it, the more it makes sense for sure. Can you expound on it anyways?

It looked like that looked to me like what a first game of a coach who had just taken over the U.S. men's national team would have looked like. It didn't look like we had built on anything or it had sort of a it didn't look like the end of a long process. It looked like if you just took a group of guys and said, hey, here's how we can beat this team we're playing tonight. Like go out and do it. We went out and did it. It was kind of rough around the edges. It was very scrappy at times.

It was opportunistic at times. None of the things I'm saying, I think, are bad things. It just it didn't feel like sort of the end point. or midpoint of any kind of a process. It felt like Burrhalter hit the reset button kind of. Right, which again, I'm not trying to say that as a criticism. I welcome the reset button at this point. And we can get, we can definitely get more into that.

Yeah, we will. Well, I'll come back. I'll come back and sort of reference the reset, I think, as we go through this. Why don't we hear from Burrhalter in the press conference? He said, he said a few things. He praised the players in general terms, several of them, Sergenio Des, John Brooks. Interestingly, he said he asked John Brooks for more leadership. He said Sergenio Dest is a gamer.

But I think this was the most interesting quote. We haven't done anything yet, right? We had an objective is to go to the next round. We're not in the next round yet. You know, it was a good result. The effort was amazing. We could have played better. There's a lot to work on, man.

You know, so I don't think, I think the guys, it's one of those games that galvanizes the group because of how much you need to put into it. And then when you get a victory, it's nice. But we're nowhere near where we need to be or where we're going to be. So there you have it from Burr-Halter. I thought that was a decent summary. And it kind of sounds a little bit like what you're saying, Greg, about it being sort of the beginning of the era again. Yeah, I mean, it definitely feels that way, doesn't it? Like, there's nothing that happened in that game against Canada Friday night that required any, like, long-term preparation.

Like, that was very much a game plan that was defensively. I'm really focused on the defensive game plan because the possession side of things that Burholter sort of been really hammering on for 11 months was, I don't want to say non-existent, but it was not like, it was not in any way what was successful in that soccer game. No. We did try. We did try to do it. We tried to play out of the back some. for like the first 30 minutes. Maybe.

I'm still going to, I'm going to not necessarily go along with that. But, uh, but the defensive side was a drastic shift in our, in our posture, in our setup, uh,

in our shape. So that was completely different. And that's where I feel like that's where it's, there, there was nothing about the first 10 months of Burhalter's can't, uh, rain that was in any way like translated to tonight. No,

it was, no, it was a, it was a complete shift, which is what we wanted, right? Yes, for sure. So we wanted the 4-42 shape to go away and give us something else.

And I would love to hear you sort of explain. It looked very different to me on Friday night in several ways, but I would love to hear your take on it. What did we do differently with our defensive shape? And why did it work better? So there were a couple of different shapes throughout the night, but what I thought was really striking and kind of unique, I don't think I've seen this too often before.

we actually like from a topographical standpoint we almost like kept our four two two two uh but it but it bent and shifted in some really weird ways in the in the weirdest way and what i thought was really cool to see happen in real time was uh the the two up front like the uh sergeant i'm sorry the zardes and lejet two uh actually sort of got out flanked by morris and ariola and they became like the high two and got really narrow pressing up high. I noticed. So it was like this weird four two two two where instead of our winger sort of holding either on the line with our forwards or slightly behind it, they actually raced past them and pinched

way into the middle. So we almost, we almost like duplicated Canada's box, but in defense and with our midfielders racing ahead of the forwards. Yeah, I didn't keep track of, I didn't keep track with my stopwatch of how much we were pressing and how much we were, you know, in a low block. But of the times when we were pressing, it did seem like it was totally fluid. And it could be, it could have been any of the front five who were leading the line throughout that game when we were pressing. And it seemed that like that was a little bit confusing for Canada. Oh, very much. And it was, it was, it was, it was

organized from us. It was coherent. It was not like, there was no ad living. I don't think going on, Like this is what was supposed to happen. And the effect, can we talk about what the effect was? Please, please do. I mean, the effect was clear. We, like, we no longer looked like a team that was going to be dominated by an inferior talented side, a side with a talent, like a deficit, which is what we've seen in a lot of games, even going into the Gold Cup.

Like, the game I always go back to is Curacao, where we made it very easy for Curacao to play against. You could go to the Jamaica friendly, but that you can. he'd argue wasn't really our full strength team. Whereas in Curisal, that was the best team we had available. That was our healthiest players. We're trying to win an elimination game. That was our best team. And side of like Dutch, second and third division players with a couple of eridivisi

players sprinkled in. Like, we didn't trouble them at all. It's the Eristivisi All-Stars, man. Right. So they looked very comfortable against us. And that's been the theme, you know, like everybody looks comfortable against us. And so then the running. sort of commentary on the U.S. is, well, we just aren't very good.

Well, Friday against Canada, we were like, all right, Canada, prove that you're actually good, and we put some pressure on them in the back, and they couldn't, they weren't good at all. They looked abysmal. Yeah. This is what we've been asking for, right? Put some amount of pressure on teams, make them show that they're actually good at playing soccer, and if they're not, like, punish them for it, and I think that's exactly what we saw happen.

And it's really too bad that nobody asked Burhalter about the defensive shape. in the post-game press conference, so he never had to talk about it. Because I bet he would have. I bet he would have loved to talk about it, right? Yeah, maybe he would have loved to talk about it. But he, so we haven't heard what he said about it, but it did seem, it's safe to say that.

This was a complete departure, right? I mean, this is totally new, a coordinated system. Like, this is a positive thing, right? Yes, this, that facet of the game Friday is what I would consider, like, the unqualified success. Like, there's no qualification necessary. we tried to make things really difficult for Canada to play, and they could not do it.

Like Canada failed on almost everything they tried to do. Which, you know, maybe Canada is not any good at all. I don't think they are that very good. I don't think they are very good. I think we made them look a lot better in the first game. And then there was, you know, something in the defensive shape that you haven't talked about yet was we did drop into a pretty low block sometimes,

especially after we scored. Maybe it looked kind of like a four or five one. So what I noticed was, and you tell me if you saw something different, for sure when Morales came in the game, which is kind of late. I mean, he was what it's... Even before that. Like the time that, third minute, the first chance we, the first goal we created, the chance that we created for the first goal. I mean, Zardis was a good five yards behind the half line, right? And Ariola was 10 yards behind the half line.

He's one v. one. I mean, is that not a low block? Is that too high for a low block? It was very compact. Yeah, no, you're right. It's a low block. It's sort of where we establish line of conversation. And then once Canada sort of moves the ball beyond that, then we drop as a unit to where the ball has sort of moved.

But yes, yes, in that case, like everyone, we had a lot of numbers behind the ball. I know. I thought there was a, I thought there was something also good about the way we got compact and deep. And then, you know, Zardis was looking to nick something and, and, and, and, you know, get going, you know, with the help of obviously Sebastian Leggett and Polariola. Not pretty soccer, but it was, I don't know if it was well drilled, but it was effective and it looked like we weren't going to get broken down, unless Alfonso Davies did something majestic, which it did feel like he might do throughout the night.

So anyway, that's my, there was some low block stuff going on, I thought, throughout the game, but you think it was only after Morales came on. No, no, no, no. I wouldn't say that. There was definitely some low block stuff. But it was sort of dictated by where Canada could put the ball. So when Canada had the ball at their goalkeeper's feet or in the back line, like there were routinely like organized, like designed five to six American players beyond midfield.

Sometimes it'd be like the be Zardez plus Leget plus one other winger, whether it's Morris or Ariel, like up in a line of three with three midfielders behind them. Sometimes it would be that weird four two two two shape. with ariola and Morris High and Zardis and Legette as a narrow two beyond them. But it was the fact that there would be two distinct lines of defense above midfield, that's where I think the big departure is. You're right, there were times where Canada would like break through that initial pressure and we would drop into a low block and then we would kind of stay in that low block and sag

and sort of just maintain our 442 shape or Leggett might sag back even more into that 4-5-1. but yes there would be elements of like that phase of the game of defending in that low block but the big turning point for me again was the fact that we were willing to put two lines of defense above the midfield line

okay how much do you think as a coach you're a coach I'm not how much do you think time Berhalter spent on that over the last couple weeks does that take a lot of time to to drill or pretty simple

My guess is that was the majority of that pre-camp that we held because there wasn't either that or set pieces, which we capitalized on pretty well. And I think that that first corner kick was like a designed set piece where we're looking to find dust in that space. I don't think it was like a mishit ball from the corner. But no, I think there were definitely different looks, different like sort of pressing looks. Like I said, sometimes it would be the two-wingeres going high. Sometimes it would be Zardez and Leget. Like that to me says that the group knew different ways of sort of attacking as a defensive unit. Defending in the attacking third, I think, is sort of what the phase would be.

And I want to acknowledge Zardis was pretty intelligent in that whole scheme. I thought he was flexible. He was willing to drop back. I mean, willing's probably not the right word. but he dropped back effectively when the others were pressing. He pressed when he needed to. I appreciated that from Jaze Zardis. And given that we're a podcast that has not been, you know, overly praising of Zardis over the last six months,

got to give credit where credits do. We for sure should. I'll say we're fair in our Zardas criticism in that we are not just like blindly anti-Zardaz. The Zardos criticism is always sort of within the context of he was, he is and was, a bad fit for what Burrhalter was trying to accomplish. When he's trying to play a very deliberate possession game that utilizes your target forward as this combination player with two number tens, like Zardez is argued like in my mind, one of the worst fits you could choose.

Yeah. But we went to bat for Zardez ahead of the Mexico friendly when we were like, oh, well, if we're going to play a more direct style or if we're going to press them a little bit higher, then it might make sense to start Giazzi Zardez. That's true. You did. You said that. And well, and that's really what this game was.

There weren't a lot of times where we were building up with 15, 20 passes. Almost all of our chances came from three passes. Boom, boom, boom. We're trying to attack forward. And in that scenario where Giazzi Zardaz's job is to sort of apply the finishing touch, work really hard and make intelligent runs, like, okay, fine, Zardez, do that work. Yeah, he was a good fit for this game, as much as a lot of you won't want to hear that. And that's what Beralder essentially said in the press conference.

He says we wanted some, we wanted his physicality, his pace, and his, basically talked about physicality and pace, to be honest. I'm just, I'm just reporting what he said. Yeah, let's talk about, I want to talk about a couple other things I liked in the game before we get to the lineups, if you're okay with that. Yes, definitely both. A couple, three, four, to be honest. We played hard.

I think that's important. We did play hard. And maybe it had everything to do with the defensive shape. Everything to do with it. Everything to do with it. You really think that's all it was? Yes. We were an aggressive defensive side instead of a passive defensive side.

And we basically let people loose to do those things and they did them. Okay. All right. So it's all in the tactics. I 100% believe that that is in the tactics. I don't think that we have a bunch of guys who suddenly decided to try hard and who weren't trying hard in the last game. I think we put players who were in,

who were a little bit better suited to their roles for one, but two, if you if you, if you, again, if you design the team and the, in the tactics to get up and get after them, of course they're going to,

they're going to be more aggressive. It all comes through in the body language, the posture, uh, everything about it was the, was the design. Hmm. Okay.

I mean, Burhalter's not talking about. it that way, right? He's saying we brought the intensity. We gave the collective effort in a way that we didn't essentially last month in Toronto. But anyway, I mean, I guess I'm not going to try to mediate between you and Greg, between the Greg with two Gs and Greg with one. Ariele and Morris defended really well on the wings. I mean, Legett, McKinney, Ewell, especially in the first half, we're flying all over the field. Zard has put in his shift that we, discussed already and I thought the entire backline had a good game defensively.

I know you disagree with me partly on that. It was definitely not Joga Bonito, but we... I won't disagree with you on that. The fact that they had a good game defensively, I think is 100% true. I think that also goes back to the fact that we never put them in the positions we put them in in the first game. In the first game, when we applied no pressure to the ball almost anywhere on the field, you're letting Canada pick out passes to try to let guys run in behind our back four.

And so you're putting immense pressure on the back four. When you're putting a ton of pressure on Canada everywhere on the field, then those passes start that Canada's hitting from their back line up at our sort of top of the 18, become sort of hopeful searching balls, and those are much easier to deal with. Yeah, no, that makes sense. The second thing I like is the backline selection. It was surprising that Burrhalter put Desd at right back and Reem at left back. And, I mean, I think most people would have expected either Yedlin or Cannon at right back and then Desk at left back.

And I think this worked out just fine, you know? I mean, even well. It worked out even well. I thought Reem and Des were two of the USA's best players on the night. And I was pleased with the back for as a whole. Yeah, no disagreements here. Third thing is Zardis over Sergeant turned out okay. We've already discussed that.

It was, you know, there's always weeping and gnashing of teeth on the internet about Zardis starting a game over Josh Sergeant. But Sergeant does look, did look like he was sleepwalking a little bit last month. I suppose you'll probably attribute that to the defensive shape as well. Yes. All the sleepwalking for me is tactics. Okay. All right. Nobody was out there like, ah, it doesn't matter if we win or lose.

Like some of our worst performers were actually trying really hard. Rolled on and Pulisic were two with, like, the worst performers. They were trying their guts off. They were just putting some really bad situations. Okay. Well, in any case, Zardis got a brace and it turned out okay. Okay, Zardust did very well. And his goals were well taken and, like, he performed.

Yeah, the first goal in particular was impressive to me. I didn't think the second goal was particularly well taken. It benefit from a deflection, but we'll get into that. And then my fourth thing very quickly is Legette overruled on was, you know, we've been calling for this, hoping that Legat would get a start in one of these games. This is his second start, second start. Okay. In the Burr-Halter era.

And it had the two-fold effect of giving us a little more bite and drive in Central Midfield, a topic we have covered a lot on this podcast. And number two, it allowed Wes McKinney to move back and sit next to Ewell more often than he was operating as like a 10 in zone 14, which actually nobody was doing for the U.S. in this game, for most of the game. But anyway, McKinney's more comfortable, I think, further back, legit being in there in front of him allowed McKinney to be further back. And McKinney came under a lot of criticism after the game because he did have several rough moments. That is kind of how Wes McKinney plays, it seems. but almost all of those aside from the really bad pass

early in the first half that forced John Brooks to commit a foul all of his bad moments came after the hour mark 3.0 up yeah 3.0 if we're going to sort of make excuses 3.0 a lot of his other bad moments came when he'd been pushed into like the attacking center mid-roll

right after maraniles came in and we were in like a 4-2-3-1 right I mean that's not a that's not a 100% an excuse, it's just a mitigating factor. And it speaks to why it's so important to have started legit because McKinney's not very good in a pure attacking mid role or even like the most attacking mid role. He's much better in that sort of in between mid-center midfield role. I mean, what he's really good at is getting the ball in transition and bursting forward and finding a good or sometimes even clever pass to spring an attack.

And then also, and then also. continuing his moving into the attack to arrive late. Yep, yeah. And he did do that a couple times tonight. Nothing quite came of it, but he definitely was involved in some XG creation. Let's do the lineups unless you have, do you want to say anything you liked?

Because we will talk about things we didn't like, I'm sure. No, I think you've hit them. The legit start was huge because that was my big thing. My big thing was don't have Weston McKinney and the attacking mid role. So we moved him and we've wanted to see LaJette for a long time. Very happy to have actually had that finally happen. Yeah, totally.

And he was great. Within 40 seconds, LeJet had an incredible, like, not incredible. He had an immediate legit moment where he pushed the ball forward very quickly and we earned a corner that we then scored from. Yeah. Yeah, it was immediate. He's, he's not a, you know, he's not a world-class player and he's never going to be, but he does, he is definitely an improved.

on Christian Roldon. Canada's lineup. Canada's lineup. Davies, the notable thing here is that Alfonso Davies played left back, started left back. I know John Hurdman, the Canadian national team coach, came under some fire for that and has come under some fire since the game. Doniel Henry at left centerback, Stephen Vittoria at right centerback,

Richie Laria at right back. And then the midfield was Mark Anthony Kay, Scott Rfield. Samuel Piet, Piet and K would be the deeper line guys, Jonathan Osorio, and then up top, Lucas Cappellini and Jonathan David. I don't know, did you have any reaction to the lineup other than like, hey, Davies is playing left back, which is a position he plays for Bayern Munich anyway. Yeah, my reaction wasn't necessarily the lineup, but when people kept saying Canada should just sit in because all they need is a draw, like I was kind of surprised by that. I didn't expect Canada to do that, but I also wasn't expecting the U.S. to change everything. that they had sort of done from the other game. But here's my question for you, Bell,

who out of that Canada lineup? Because, again, Canada felt like they were in complete control of the friendly in Toronto, or not the friendly, the first tie in Toronto. Who from this Canada lineup had a good game yesterday, Friday? I mean, nobody, really? I still think Osorio. I still think Osorio and Kay are pretty decent players. And obviously, Davies is good.

Yeah, Davies had a couple of moments where, like, Jesus, we like, we can't play with this guy. But, but it was, it was one or two isolated moments and they, they came to very little. It came to not. Yeah, compared to the Toronto leg, like, this was no one, they didn't look good at all. So you'd be like, oh, yeah, typical Canada. Like, that's, that's what that Friday game felt like was, oh, yeah, they have, they have, they have some talent on the, on paper, but they don't look like anything special. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that's a fair, I would say a fair assessment.

Jonathan David had a horrible game. He did not look like a 10 goals through the first three months of the season striker in Belgium at all. Yeah. And I want to be clear. We were the better side. It was a dominant performance. And I'm not saying that, I'm not saying this to like sort of take away the fact that we won 4-1 to say it didn't mean anything because Canada were poor. I'm saying it to say, what was happening in the other game against Canada where we made them look like world beaters?

Like we're a road game. It's really tough on the road. So that's where I keep going with all this is that the performance tonight, which again felt to me like what a first game performance for a manager could have looked like, just puts in such stark relief what the last 10 to 12 games for the U.S. have sort of looked like. What we did on Friday night, what Burhalter did on Friday night, allowed us to stop underperforming our talent.

I think. I think that's a very succinct way. of putting it, Bills. Thank you. A correct, correct and succinct. The U.S. lineup, a little surprising that we went with Reem at left back and dust it right back, as I already alluded to. Ewell was the Bradley, Michael Bradley replacement, Bloomington, Minnesota native Jackson Ewell, was the number six, the Bradley replacement. And then McKenny Leggett.

Let's see. Zardis up top, of course, Long and Brooks at centerback. Ariel and Morris on the wings and Brad goes on in goal. How did you decide what orders to do that lineup introduction? Based on my notes, which were a little confusing. I was playing hopscotch. I liked it. I want to do all of them that way from now on.

So yeah, I mean, everybody knows the lineup, right? Yeah, those are definitely the 11 that took the field for the U.S. Serginio Death cap tied at the whistle. Yeah, that's a big deal. And he played really well, too, in my opinion. Scoring summary. Let's start with the third minute goal. Do you want to go for it?

You want to roll the dice here? All right. So Davies has our top defender, Paul Ariola, in a 1-V-1 battle, right around, not basically around midfield. Ariola managed to actually sort of poke it away from him. It kind of gets to Zard. who wins the race to it. And Zardes has a nice little,

in a fairly tight space, lay off to La Jette, who hits a really nice early ball to Ariola and puts him into space. And then Ariola tries to hit an early ball to Morris, who is streaking in on the, maybe right down the middle. Yes, he was.

And it's cut out for a corner. LeJet takes the corner, and it's low, toward the top of the box, Dest attacks it, it kind of ricochets off of the defender and then back off of Dest, if I saw the replay correctly. I'm still not sure what happened on that, to be honest. In any case, Dest is credited with the assist

because it loops over the back line. Alfonso Davies had been marking Jordan Morris on this play. He lost him. Jordan Morris stroked it on the volley from six yards out. I thought it was interesting on the TUD. broadcast. They did a whole graphic novel on Alfonso Davies losing losing Morris on this play. They had like the red funnel coming out of his eyes pointed at his field of vision. Yeah, exactly. They like cut out his outline and it like

it's sort of palpitated out of the screen as he was doing that. So yeah, Davies was culpable in two ways on that on that goal. The giveaway obviously and then lost Morris. But nice finished by Morris. Excellent finish by Morris. Yes, but the definition of opportunistic, just a little side note, I always think it's funny because when we get to the goal that Canada scored on the English broadcast of that, Twelman's quick to sort of point out the weaknesses of zonal marking on corner kicks, which people, I swear, will do any time a goal is conceded by a team that marks zonally on corner kicks. But no one ever calls out the weaknesses of man marking on corner kicks where people will routinely lose their marks. People lose marks all the time in manmarking systems.

You don't always give up goals on those because for that to happen the ball has to scuff off of several people to get to the wide open Jordan Morris But it's never manmarking's fault when that happens But in the reverse case it is zonal marking fault when Canada scores on the US Boy sounds like you have an ax to grind have you been getting have you been getting emails from parents about your zonal marking scheme I know I actually man mark on all corner kicks And it's like, I don't care, never leave your man for the ball. Like, I don't care if the ball goes three yards away from you. Like, you just wrap your player up arms around their shoulders and stay with them until the ball goes out of bounds or ends up in the goal.

All right. All right. There's no, there's no, there's no, there's no, it's going to bring us up on on tugging people down in the box on set pieces. All right, eighth minute. I want to note something in the eighth minute, not a goal, but McKinney plays something of a hospital. hospital ball to Ewell in our defensive third. This is, we were trying to build out of the back at this point in the game. I think it is fair to say.

And Ewell gets crunched by Kavillini. It was maybe retaliation for Ewell fouling Mark Anthony K. Or maybe it's just a play that happened quickly and Cavalini got him. Just a forwards foul, right? Could be. Strike or tackle. Yellow card foul. What's notable to me is that John Brooks comes in stage right, body checks Cavalini in the

post-file negotiation period and just lets him know yo yo I'm here you shouldn't do that to my boy jackson and I and I'm that's not something we've seen a ton from this group and I wouldn't I wouldn't characterize John Brooks as a hot-headed fellow but it was good to see that from him eighth minute all right 10 all right I'm glad we clock that 10th minute 10th minute chance for the USA uh this is only really a half chance but it allows me to get on what I've decided is going to be my soapbox. Yours is man marking, zonal marking discussion.

And my soapbox is quality in the fullback position is absolutely critical. It's something we've seen with the U-17s. They didn't really have it at the World Cup. And we've seen it with Lovitz and Yedlin in the last game. I know the defensive scheme was the main thing, but we also didn't get much quality from them

in the last Canada game. Having Dest out there is just, It just makes everything so different, I think. This is kind of a half chance of a Zarda's header that gets blocked right off his head. But it started with a Canada clearance that Desk receives and wins and kind of turns cleanly with. And he gets a little tricky on the ball and he finds Aureola's feet. Ariel is a poor one. But we're in Canada's attacking third.

And then it's just like a series of Canada not being able to play out of their own defensive third. It comes down the left side again and Legette hits that sort of wicked outside of. of the boot cross to Zardis's head. Really surprising ball. But it all kind of starts with a little bit of problem solving from the fullback. That level of problem solving is huge. And don't get me wrong, when I say that the major thing in this game was the defensive scheme, it's because that's what sort of created the majority of our chances was creating

those transition moments. But if we're going to pair that defensive scheme, because there's nothing about that defense that won't work as a compliment to a possession. offense. It's not like, oh, well, we have to give up possession to try to defend up high and press. Like, it's the opposite. We should be able to do both those things. We're trying to open up this new revenue stream for creating goals, and we got those chances through that. We should also be able to build towards creating goals from good possession and attacking positional play.

Those two things are the opposite of mutually exclusive. Big picture. So what we saw from Burhalter is a big shift on the defensive scheme. He didn't sound happy with the way we possessed the ball. And, you know, it's now, he shouldn't. He shouldn't be. No, yeah, definitely shouldn't be. It's now the now famous phrase, disorganizing the opponent with the ball and creating goal scoring opportunities. We didn't, we didn't really do that outside of our transition moments or set pieces. Is it okay? Here's the question. Is it okay to just to just start back from scratch, have a, have a better defensive shape, let those chances come as they may and then just sort of layer in the sort of disorganizing

the opponent with the ball stuff as time goes by and as the player pool improves, et cetera, et cetera. So I kind of think it's a misleading question because it's where I go back to this whole this whole Burrhalter process thus far, like to date had been just a missed opportunity. Like it's lost time because we could have always been defending this way. There's nothing about defending this way that somehow prohibits trying to play a very progressive possession game of soccer. So we should have already been doing this. And we should have already been trying to work in our possession principles.

And I'm not one who thinks we should abandon possession altogether because, again, I don't think that that is a requirement. Like, I don't think you have to choose to be a transition team or a possession team. Like you try to create transition moments, but you also have, Warshall actually in his TSS appearance really kind of just brushed on this when he was talking about like the nine phases of the game. And if TSS guys, Daryl and Taylor, if you guys are listening, please, please, in your soccer 101, do like a whole bit on the phases of play because it would be huge for people to understand because we keep talking about like U.S. teams lacking grit and trying to switch to this possession style. But tons of possession teams have that grit. Like they're not, they're not sort of like opposite ends of a spectrum. They're very much related.

And you've kind of been digging into that with your, with your research on Barcelona's defense and Javi and Iniesta and how well they defend and how often they commit tactical fouls. And that's, and that's all of a piece. And so, and sort of that's a long way. The thing about the phases, the thing about the phases is everybody has to participate in all the phases, whether it's five phases or nine phases, however you break it down. you can't just say well we don't do that phase like you have to have a transition phase plan right right right and you have to have a possession of the ball like at some point you're going to be in possession of the ball and you shouldn't just surrender the ball immediately like oh as soon as we get the ball all right well we don't want it let's just give it back to them so we can set up our press or anything like you're going to try to create goals through your possession just like you're going to try to look for opportunities to disrupt the opponent's possession to create chances right and warshaw warshod did that he was critical of burrhalter for that even as he said he gave him a longer leash than most of us, he said, yeah, we're not doing anything to create goal scoring opportunities in transition. That's what he said, right? I think it's what he said. I bet so. Well, we'll check back and make sure we credit him in the show notes.

So, so you think it's a misleading question because, of course, like, it's a stupid question because of course you can do both, right? Yeah, yeah, we have to be doing both. And it's, and you especially do both when you're better. Like when you're the better team, when you're better than Canada, talent-wise, when you're better than Curacao, talent-wise, Jamaica, like, it's silly to sit back and let them pretend like they're a good team. I know that sounds harsh, but like don't let them be a good team, make them prove that they are, and they're not going to be able to because they aren't just like we have our talent deficits, like they have massive talent deficits that they're dealing with as well.

So Canada, you know, Canada pressed us quite a bit on Friday night, and we, ended up just lumping the ball forward a lot. I guess you and I disagree to what extent we did that. I mean, I thought we did a lot of lumping, to be honest. Yeah. I mean,

definitely after midway through the first half and beyond, it was lump city for sure. Yeah. Like I actually, I think I'm going to have to do like the same way I did with the Mexico Gold Cup final. Just cut U.S. possessions because it's easy to sort of lose track what's going on when we have

it and then Canada has it and we sort of forget what we've looked like in attack. But when you see all of our possessions sort of stacked up on top of each other, I think we're going to see we really didn't have a lot of good ideas starting from the back. Well, it's just, it's frankly terrifying when West McKinney receives the ball in Canada's zone 14. I think you will had a solid game. He played pretty well, but he's not, he wasn't transcendent on the half turn. I think it's a midfield, a little bit of a midfield talent deficit, or at least not the right kind of talent for that job.

Anyways, you're talking, you'll specifically? Well, McKinney and Yule. Sure. Can we, can we be a team, A, can you be a team that disorganizes the opponent with the ball and creates goal-scoring opportunities if you have four people on the field who can't do that? Can you do that as a team if you don't have 10 field players and, frankly, a goalkeeper who's good with the ball at his feet?

And then, like, can we do it with Jordan Morris, Paul Areola, West McKinney? Jazzy's artists. Jazzy's artists. I mean, Aaron Long, Burhalter was very clear that Aaron Long is still trying to learn how to play out of the back. Like, that's not his game in New York. Right, right. So you name the players you just named, and then you say, all right, now we're going to see what they look like in a free-flowing, positional, interchanging game of soccer. Yeah, I just don't see it.

I don't see McKinney. And McKenny is kind of the key one, because I thought for a time that maybe he could be that guy, you know. He could, like, find the ball and command the ball and, you know, deceive people on the half turn and find clever passes that broke things open. It doesn't look like he's going to be that guy. I think what the case I'd always made was you could pull it off if McKenney is sort of your worst. one of those kinds of players. Like if you've got a bunch of fluid players, then McKenny can sort of filter in with that group.

But when you have five or six of those types where it's not a natural thing for any of them, then no, you're probably barking up the wrong tree. So I kind of even forgot where we were going with that, but probably a good signal we should get back to the scoring summary. Let's do. 23rd minute, goal USA. This one starts with guess who? Serginio Dest again.

Borjaan, the Canadian goalkeeper, lumps it, and Dest gets to it, heads it sharply to spring Ariola. Ariola drives forward and plays a ball across the field of Morris at the top of the box. Now, to be fair, Stephen Victoria probably should have cut this out. Yes, so this is two horror shows from Canada. Alfonso Davies, I feel like, has completely misplayed the initial long ball from the goalkeeper, where he's in this no man's land where a simple header from like the shortest U.S. defender is able to just put Paul Areola into almost like a mini breakaway. Dave's in a rough game.

Yeah. That's real bad. So you can't, you have to read that you can't go beat death to the ball, but you also have somehow let Paul Areola just completely in free behind you. Yeah. And then, yeah,

and then like Victoria misses the header and just kind of like cancels himself, eliminates himself from the play. Morris takes a touch. The touch is a bit heavy. into the area but he gets to it before Borgon and clips it over the keeper across the face of goal for Zardis

who's making a good near post Ronald kind of drags this guy towards the far post and then comes near post and nods at home so 2.0 USA inside 25 minutes I will say I'm not sure Josh Sargent moves the way Zardis does on that goal maybe he does maybe he doesn't I'm not I'm not ready to say he does not

But in any event The second goal is, I think, what, three passes? Deaths to Areola, Ariola to Morris, Morris to Zardis. Blitz Creek. Yes. And it's something that we should be able to score goals like that. I'm not saying that as a criticism in saying,

I thought we were trying to pass. I still think we should try to pass. But when we can get there in three passes, we should get there in three passes. Yeah, totally. Canada created chances on a Zardis giveaway and just about everyone except Brooks and Dest had some kind of slap.

to answer for in the first half. So even though we're up to zero USA, 2.0, this was not a extremely sharp performance, even at this point in the game. Unpolished. Can we call it unpolished? And this is going to be my first first like Brooks caveat. Brooks got away with a little bit of a foul. I mean, he committed several fouls in semi-dangerous areas,

but then he definitely got away with one right at the top of the box. That would have been extremely dangerous. Would it have been a penalty? I can't remember. No, it was, but it was like a yard outside the box. Yeah. It would, if it had been called, it for sure would have been that old school referee compromise where whether it was in the box or not, the referee would have put it right at the edge of the box.

Right. It was probably a foul, in my opinion. So that's where I'm calling that a little bit of Brooks sloppiness. Yeah. But I guess you're correct in that we didn't have to answer for it because it wasn't called. Why don't you just go ahead and pull out your brooky, polemic right now it's not even a polemic like I think Brooks is great and I'm very glad to have him back and he was solid he was fine but it was weird because I feel like the Brooks narrative was already written in that

it was like Brooks to the rescue and we finally have John Brooks back and he's like this very smooth passer on the ball and he is this physically dominant player I didn't I didn't think Brooks gave us much I don't mean he hurt us he didn't do anything poorly but I didn't think he gave us like a single thing that we haven't already been getting from our centerbacks. Yeah, I mean, I see where you're coming from. But I do think, I've already expressed this to you, I do think there's a certain calmness and confidence on the ball that almost has a mystical quality. I know you love it when I bring on mystical stuff.

But it just, it just sort of, it just sort of signals to the rest of the team. Like, it's going to be okay when he has the ball at his feet. I don't get that feeling when Aaron Long has a ball. And I don't get that feeling when Walker Zimmerman has the ball. I kind of get it with Tim Ream, but not as much as I do with Brooks. All right. And that's all well and good. But in this particular game, Brooks didn't have any passes that led anybody into better positions to make passes.

Like his passes tended to, the recipient tended to lose possession almost immediately. And it wasn't because, like, they did anything poor because Brooks was sort of. He was, yeah, he was floating balls into forwards who may be. elite like world class four players would be able to hold on to the ball but when you're just sort of hit driving a ball at Jordan Morris's chest with a guy directly on his back like Jordan Morris is going to lose that ball a lot and that's what happened so we didn't see the sort of John Brooks line splitting passes he basically was made his only passes that were that maintained possession for the team were the very safe

passes around the back or passes to the outside back so so so Just in this game, I just mean, like the narrative seemed to be, yes, Brooks was huge. It was great to finally have the talent of John Brooks back. But that didn't actually contribute in any way to the performance we saw in the field. Yeah, you're saying it was all in the defensive shape. And Brooks was just kind of fine. Brooks, yeah, Brooks was very much a passenger. And I know half spaces evaluations aren't like super analytical as far as like statistical models go.

I like them. I like half spaces. I do too. I just think there are better. I think there are at least, he's at least saying, all right, all of his actions that I watched rather than just saying these two stood out in my mind. So he had a good game or he had a bad game. It was borne out in his sort of analysis of it as well.

And that Brooks, again, just didn't really do anything. Right. I'm not saying that's bad. I just mean it sort of goes against what the narrative was of, we looked this good part of us because we got some really good players back in Sergino Dest and John Brooks. Yeah. I mean, I didn't think of it that way until you started hammering on me all day about it.

But yeah, you've won me over. It's fine. Brooks was fine. Not excellent. I'll actually say real quick. I actually think that's a good thing because it means when we get like the things that Brooks actually does really well, because we've seen them do these things. We're not imagining that Brooks does these.

things well. He can do them. We've seen it. He hits a line-breaking pass. Yeah. So when we start getting that as well, when we start finding ways to add that to the game, then it becomes a positive. It's not like we've topped out what John Brooks can bring to our team. That's kind of how I see it. So I'm actually kind of glad that that wasn't the peak John Brooks. We got a long ways to go before we get, before we're maximizing our Brooks play. So much to be encouraged about. right after the second goal Alfonso Davies moved to the right side of the field and started going at Morris and Ream

so that's just something worth noting I thought Morris's defending was good I thought Ariolas was too I think I already said that 32nd minute goal USA again starts with us working the ball around the back from Dest Brooks to Ream ream's under pressure and his pass is deflected and falls fortunately to Morris Morris turns his man at the half line

and drives forward clips it wide to LeJet, who draws a foul on Davies. Boy, Davies, Davies, Davies, he's everywhere in this scoring summary. Who's playing on that side now, and that fouls just off the corner of Canada's box. With the ensuing free kick, Ream ropes it at the penalty marker, and Aaron Long comes up with a fine header, a fine header, in my opinion, leaps slightly away from goal and snaps it back at the near post. Totally unstoppable. 3-0 USA. And John Hurdman said after the game, the Canadian coach, that was the goal where it was kind of like, yeah, this is, this game is over. Not happening, yeah.

That goal combined with what the play it looked like up into that point where, again, Canada had just sort of been suffocated out of doing anything. How many goals is that for Aaron Long now? Can I just put you on the spot stats, man? You can. I'm going to say three. Two in one game in the gold cup and then this one. Yeah. Did he also?

Yeah. I think that's what it is. Three. Well, that's plenty for me to say he's now a prolific score between him, Walker Zimmerman, John Brooks, and the World Cup. Like, we've got some goal scoring centerbacks. Yeah, not a bad thing. Not a bad thing. Any thoughts on that whole sequence before we move on to the next?

Set piece goal scoring is an excellent source of goal revenue. It's not necessarily sustainable to score two set pieces goals a game, but it's good that we did it. Yeah. I mean, yeah, good to see us defending well and scoring on set pieces. Those are things you need to do in soccer. But not defending set pieces well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll get to that.

37th minute chance USA after a Canada corner kick. McKenney dispossesses Richie Laria at the top of our box and then drives forward. It's basically he and Dest in a two-on-one against I can't remember who from Canada. and he just plays it ahead for Dest and Dest dribbles all the way down, tries a shot from a tough angle and sprays it wide.

Should have probably squared it to McKinney. But good chance. Everybody would have been really excited if Dest had scored on his cap tying appearance. 45th minute plus one, another chance. Can we discuss the trickery indirect? Yeah, Canada.

You got to know the rules. I didn't know this. rule. I have to admit, I'm not, you know, I didn't know the rule at all. I was on it immediately, Bells. Were you screaming at your television? Oh, I was screaming my television. I think I, I think I jumped immediately into the Slack, into the Slack channel with an incredible, all caps. Trickery indirect kick. Yes, you are not allowed to, by trickery, work to head the ball back to your goalkeeper. So it seems like a dumb rule. It's, I think I've seen it called like three times, but it was like a high pro.

profile call like a year ago where they then like flashed back to the other high profile time it was called like two years before that hilariousness and the one issue I have here is that the line that the referee drew for Canada's wall was like an angled line like you'd normally see for a wall situation when in fact like all of Canada's players should have had to have been standing on the goal line itself because you still have to be 10 yards from the ball or at the out of bounds line. Oh, man, we got robbed. Nerdy rule stuff. We got robbed. Well, we took that indirect kick, and McKinney took a shot, and Zardis blocked it on the goal line. It wasn't a Canadian. It was Zardis. Okay.

So Zardes, who was too close to the ball. It might have been going wider off the post, who can say, who can say for sure. The halftime came and went. Fifty-fifth-minute chance USA. I'm going to try to get through these quickly. Okay. All right. All right.

I won't distract you. Lovely crossfield switch from Tim Ream to Sergenio Dest. Again, I thought Tim Ream was excellent. Dest to McKenny. McKenney, clever, a little quick pass to Ariola. Ariola cuts in and tries to play a through ball to Legette on the other side, but they're not on the same page. It falls to Zardis, and there's a scramble as his shot is blocked right off his foot,

and then he pokes it back to Leggett, just past the penalty marker. Leggett has the whole goal to shoot at, and he hits his shot over the crossbar. Big smile from him. He knew he should have made it 4-0. Bels, he did not have the whole goal to shoot at. He had like the third of the goal that he was aiming for, and he just missed it away. Two-thirds of the goal to shoot at. Five-twilths.

Wait, you don't think he had the whole goal to shoot at? No, there were bodies between him and the goal, so he definitely did not have the whole goal to shoot at. He was trying to, he was hitting it to the open portion of the goal, and he should have done better. But he was trying to punch it into that open portion. My apologies, Sebastian. 71st minute goal Canada. This is the set piece problem that you were referring to earlier. Why don't you take it?

Take this one. So the set piece or the situation that led to it? Because the situation that led to it is actually a little bit of a John Brooks ding. Tell me. It was like a ball that got played long in into our box. So Brooks and our defense obviously drops back to clear it. and we do clear it. And then who did it get up to for Canada?

I think it was K, Mark Anthony K. All right, so Kay puts it back into the box, and Brooks is three yards behind everybody else, which maybe he was supposed to be like the deep man on the initial ball in, but he didn't get up fast enough to get online with the rest of the player. So he was holding on Hoyette,

who had the shot that Gazan made a, made a solid save on. You think you would have been on? You think, I felt like there were like tons of people holding him on. He was just sort of. Oh, no, it was Brooks. It's not true.

Okay. By the time, by the time Hoylet got to the ball, he was online with everybody else. But when the actual header came in, it was one of those weird ones where like the header gets played to people who look like they're going to play it,

but then nobody plays it. So it goes past everybody. But if you go back to the actual ball that got played in, Brooks is definitely holding Hoylett on. Okay. Two or three. Brooks dings. I'm just saying.

Send them to Jan Regensburg. That's a pretty tough one. That'd be a pretty tough one. And then on the goal happens on the ensuing corner kick after a nice, what did you say, a solid save by Guzahn? I thought it was a solid save from Guzahn, yeah, did everything right. Hoylett's corner is attacked at the near post by Osorio. He gets there first and he glances it off his own head and then off of Zardis's head.

and it kind of trips over to the backpost for Victoria to thump it in. And I think Ream lost Victoria, right? Not sure, but yeah. Zonal marking lost Vittoria. Zonal marking. Never zonal mark. You'll always get scored on. 3.1 USA.

73rd minute chance for the USA. Long ball from deep. Morales flicks it to Areola, who plays a nice pass in behind for Zardis, who kind of just bundles. his way into the box and it squirts out to Morales, who absolutely skies his shot from 18 yards. If Zardis had taken that shot, there would be Jips everywhere. They probably still should be like Morales really did a number there. I think you're underselling what Zardas accomplished there too because he didn't just sort of bundle his way in.

I mean, he was, it might have lacked sort of the elegance of sort of Chelsea-era Christian Pulisic. but Zardos was was mostly in control taking on I think two Canadian defenders working it towards the goal and then sort of only at the time of his shot did he get either sort of outmuscled or his shot deflected so gives Ardusts more credit we got to give him his credit he was dispossessed Greg he was I thought it was a shot attempt that sort of got deflected back out maybe it was maybe it was. Okay, a little more credit for Zardis on that one. And then finally, 89th minute goal USA. You will quick restart at midfield and a sort of patented, blooped

Yule diagonal ball to the corner for D'Andre Yedlin, who crosses it for McKenney. McKinney attempts a scissors kick, I believe, but I'll defer to you on that technical detail. It is a scissors kick attempt, yes. Yeah. I don't. not sure he even made contact with it. He made contact with either the ball or someone or the player by it um in any case it it uh ricochets to zardis and he thrashes it in off of Derek cornelius's shin i believe 4-1 USA and that is it for the scoring summary. I'm such an obstacle to these scoring summary's brevity bells like I'm never going to let you get away just a quick rundown. Okay let's assume that

Berhalter has had a change of heart, has had a Damascus Road moment about defensive shape, and we're going to see the U.S. play in this way from now on defensively. Some variation of pressuring to disrupt what teams are doing rather than just sort of passively sitting back. Is that what you're kind of saying? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Not necessarily like an exact replica of this pressure model. That is the, I mean, just to go back to our last podcast, that's the number,

that's the number one thing we asked for. Really, I mean, it's really the number one thing you asked for, and I just sort of agreed with you. And we got it, right? So that's a positive thing to take from this game. But how are we going to disorganize the opponent with the ball? Do we have the players? Is there a way that it can be trained in these national team camps

with the players that we have? Will getting Tyler Adams back help? I'm not sure I think it will, maybe a little bit. bit, Christian Pulisick will help. Tim Ware, Josie Altador, Richie LaDesma, Alex Mendez. What do you think? I think the big one becomes, I think the immediate one, because for a lot of these other guys that you're talking about, they seem to be viewed as sort of longer-term projects,

but the big ones would be Adams and Pulisick, right? Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah. So I think even a, I'm saying even, like, I actually, I mean, I'm on record saying i think tyler adams is the best player in the pool at the moment like i think adding tyler adams can help you can get you to that point where you can uh disorganize and it's because of his ability to sort of move quickly off of the ball so uh we we got glimpses of it i don't know how many

people were were avidly watching the u23s on espn 3 uh friday afternoon thursday thursday afternoon yeah uh but i was uh and and and you got to see sort of the the the change that can happen when from the first half of the U23 game to the second half where the first half was pretty dismal and there was very little movement and it looked very much like what we've been seeing from our senior team

and then in the second half you replaced like four of the five midfielders and suddenly like there was these just fluid movement moving and passing that was sort of against Brazil like that was nothing that we'd seen in the first 45 minutes right so I think that like adding a tyler adams uh into the equation can help give you that because he can

just move so fluidly he can make short passes and then sort of beat the player who had just been pressuring him and that's really what it comes down to the guy who's i thought was doing the best job of it in the u23 game was sebastian salcedo like he just make these deceptive little passes and then quickly move to receive it again uh after six steps and that's that's we need we need we need we need a midfield of guys who do that uh so i think I think we could move in that direction. I don't know that this lineup that we just played against Canada can sort of transition into a fluid possession, disorganize the opponent team.

Is that a long way of saying it? No, that's a, I mean, I think, I guess I just see it as like, let's just keep trying, you know. Yes, I do think we should keep trying. I don't think we should abandon possession as a method of creating chances. Do you still? Tell me what you see. Tell me what you see, like, what happens in. in March or in June

now that we've assuming we can take care of Cuba how do we do it what's the what's the next step what we did on Friday night is what we're going to have to do against Mexico and probably even more more of the low block stuff

because Mexico's going to have the ball and they're going to be more threatening and then we just you know break out in transition and when we get the ball we try to possess hopefully we can get better at that but

How? I don't know how we get better at that. Is it going to be refining the movements of Ewell and McKinney? Does Ewell have a place in this? I'm going to make you answer this. I don't, I am not optimistic that we're going to be able to do it even with the addition of Tyler Adams. I think we need a different kind of player.

And I think it's that like, I know people think I'm an insane person, but it's like the Ledesma type. Maybe it's not Ledesma. Maybe he never, maybe he never makes it. But like that, but that kind of player with that sort of elegance is what we need. And I don't, I don't, as, as important a player as Tyler Adams is, I don't think he's that kind of player. Well, sort of full U-23 disclosure, the first half to second half changed involved Ledesma dropping off the field from the first half. I know.

And the midfield switched to Brendan Harrison, Christian Cappy, and then Salcedo coming in, sort of joining from the wing. and then Georgie Mihailovich. So not names you'd necessarily be like, oh, those are the guys because you would have been like, oh, well, Ledesma is the guy to make it flow. And in the U-23s, we sort of got the opposite. I don't want to say the opposite, because Ledema certainly wasn't like the issue necessarily in the first half. But when he came off and it's a whole group, you need a whole group to be able to do it.

You really do. And Saucato was the best, and he was a winger. But he had a huge impact on the game. And Aronson was very busy. Do you know what I mean? Aronson was constantly moving into those little spaces to help create targets for Sauceto to play off of. And that's where I feel like Adams's movement can be that plus, you know, plus he's Tyler Adams. Right.

I'm saying he's better at it than Brendan Aronson. Yeah. I mean, Aronson is very busy. It's like he doesn't, I'm not sure he does that much with it once he gets it, but he does, he does stay active. Yeah, I don't know. I don't have a good answer. I don't have a good answer for how we do it. My answer is pretty simple.

Let's just, let's keep forcing the opponent to work harder with the ball and then, and then continue to work on disorganizing them with the ball. How exactly we do that is a mystery to me. I'm just a layman. I mean, seriously, I don't know how you do that. I don't have a great answer either. It's going to be fascinating to see what happens when it's Adams. In the midfield, again, I'm adamant that McKinney not be the attacking mid,

which only leaves one more spot for McKinney to play in in a three-man midfield. So then you're going to run into questions about whether it has to be McKinney in that spot or if there are other players who might be able to do that job better. Anyway. Yeah, no, I mean, yeah, I think Pomacall, you know, if Pomacall continues to improve and gets the call-ups. I think he's going to be good competition, hopefully, for Weston McKinney in that eight role. I don't see, I don't see, like, Ewell, McKinney, and Leget as a midfield that's going to be

able to disorganize the opponent with the ball. I feel that I've said that seven different times this podcast, but it's just hard to see it. It's hard to see it. And then you need, you know, that South Souss-Ado example is. actually quite interesting because you need you need wingers who can do it too um and and jordan morris is not that guy and neither and neither is paula right because what i was going to say is uh morris i thought was actually much better with the ball than i thought i thought i thought ariola kind of struggled with the ball actually his his big pass to morris notwithstanding uh i didn't

think ariola gave us much at all he did dime that was a dime uh ariola i thought actually kind of ran into a lot of situations that he should have been able to solve and couldn't come up with anything. No. Yeah, it's true. And then, you know, Zardis is obviously his issues with that kind of game are well documented. So I don't know. So what we're saying is we can do it. We would just have to replace everybody who just had a good game against Canada. Yeah, I don't want to hate on them. I think they are who they are. And I'd also say Burhalter didn't sacrifice anybody who would have done, who would have been possessing. Do you know what I mean?

From his roster that he had here, it's not like dropping Roldon as like giving up on possession because Roldon also wouldn't be able to give us possession. Yeah, I mean, Roldon would be able to pass it back to the goalkeeper, which is what a lot of...

Would he be able to, Fels? I mean, nine times out of ten. Occasionally, he would also pass it directly to a forward for Canada. Nine times out of ten. Do you have any other... Do you have anything else you want to say? No, what are we expecting for Cuba?

I'm kidding. We're not going to do a Cuba preview. Yeah, no, let's not do that. I mean, it'd be nice to see Sergeant start so he can score six goals and gain confidence. The only thing that would have been useful would have been integrating new faces into the group for this sort of three days of preparation. Yeah, speaking of things that don't matter at all, the U23s play the Canary Islands select team. They have to be very careful not to say that they play the Canary Islands. They play a select team from the Canary Islands.

Yeah, the Canary Islands are not a country. They don't want to get in trouble with Madrid the way Barcelona is. You know, there are no separatists in Tenerife and Las Palmas. So that's too bad. Chile's political situation prevented them from coming to the tournament. It was going to be four, you know, three strong, teams and then the USA, which, you know, hopefully we're strong to. But Chile couldn't come.

So we lost Brazil. Argentina beat this Canary Island select team 14 to zero, I believe. And that means we play them in the third place game, which is going to be, it's on ESPN3 and ESPN de Portes, but there's not going to be a lot to draw from it, which is frustrating for me because I'm really interested in that age group. Right. We love that. We love those kids.

We are banking on them and it's not just because like we're Hopelessly optimistic. It's because we understand that They have to hit or we won't or we won't have any success in 2022. Kind of. That's sort of what started this whole this whole enterprise to begin with, Bels. My only U23 thing is to not read too closely into starting lineup selections, especially in that Brazil game. There was a lot of frustration with who was picked to start.

Yeah. But that doesn't necessarily indicate that those plays. are rated ahead of the players who were left on the bench. Sort of an example would be at left back, Sam Vine, starting ahead of Anthony Robinson. Maybe Vines is rated ahead of Robinson, or maybe everyone knows that Wigan are not going to let Anthony Robinson go for four weeks during the month of March. So it might not be useful for the U.S. coaches to evaluate Robinson when they need to identify players that they can use in the qualifying tournament.

Yeah, they're not going to let him go for. four weeks in March. No way. He's an every week starter for them. And it's possible a lot of these guys won't, you know, Mendez and Ledesma, their clubs won't have to release them. Yeah, Northland, I think, has been notoriously. Northland's put a freeze on Jonathan Amon.

Right. Yeah. The other thing that can go into those is, is we kind of saw the curtain pulled back a little bit after Miles Robinson was injured, where Atlanta United were, we're sort of talking about how they'd agreed to let him go to the U-23s, but. had sort of said, but take it easy on him. So again, those kinds of things are always going on. So even if players were there, they might not have really been available.

Right. I'm not too exercised about that, one-zero loss. I'm a little disappointed Lendezma didn't show better for himself, but I liked what I saw from Sauseta, Salcedo. Like you said, Erinson brought a lot of energy. Mendez had a great 15-minute cameo. It's just too bad. They won't get to play Chile tomorrow by the time you listen to this.

It'll be today, 11.15 a.m. Central time. We got to go. We got to go. Thanks, everybody for listening. Thanks, thanks, Greg. Bon voyage.