Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - Episode 117: January Camp! A new roster and a fresh batch of patron questions

Episode Date: December 31, 2019

We discuss the January Camp roster from bottom to top and try to answer several questions from patrons on Patreon. Not a bad episode! Happy New Year and thanks for listening. 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. Hello, everyone, and happy new year. Greg, how are you? I'm good, Bells. How are you doing, sir?

I'm good. Lots of new toys in the house down in West Des Moines. Yes, there's bright plastic everywhere. Same here. They're actually getting some run. The toys are actually getting some run, which I'm pleased to see. Okay, let's get to the show. Later, we're going to burn through some questions from patrons.

A lot of good questions after I solicited questions earlier today. But first, the roster, the January 10th. January roster. Yeah, Greg Burhalter on Monday announced a 25-player group for Camp Cupcake, which will be 20 days of training and closed-door scrimmages in Qatar from January 5th to January 25th, followed by a friendly in Los Angeles against Costa Rica on February 1st. And don't try to correct my pronunciation of Qatar. I won't.

I just watched a YouTube video about it last night. It was long. It's not an easy word to pronounce. Fair enough. I won't even say the word out loud this entire time. Okay. So the roster is interesting, right? It's very interesting.

It is not a typical United States senior team roster. No, it's not at all. It's more or less a U23 group, isn't it? That's exactly how I would describe it, and that's kind of how I'm interpreting it. It's, for me, it's the kind of selection we want from a January camp roster, especially the second one for Greg Burrhalter. Experimental, young, chance to look at some players who wouldn't likely get a call-up in a do-or-die international window. Here's what, let me just read a quote from Berhalter, which I think is worthwhile. He said, quote, at the start of an exciting year, this is a great opportunity to continue our process and build on the foundation established in the last 12 months.

Some of that could be debatable. The second half of the quote is, at the same time, there are a number of players getting their first exposure to the senior national team who will be provided the platform to make a positive impression. Cool. I think that's cool. I'm not against that. We'll see how much of it pans out. Yeah. Or how much of even can pan out, which I think we'll kind of get into later. Okay.

So should we just go ahead and, well, first let's talk about, before we get into what we're happy about, the headlines for me are obviously Ullianez being there. I think that's the biggest surprise of all. Julian Arauj, another personal favorite of mine. Yeah, a lot of these headlines are going to be part of the. reason that we're both pretty happy about it. Right, right. I mean, Yonaz, we've been calling for Janus to be involved at least at the U-23 level and even at the senior level for a few months. And this seems like a great chance for him to get in front of Greg Burhalter's eyeballs. Yeah, it kind of, it doesn't it kind of help or feel like it helps that it's a zero-stakes

situation? Yes, it does. I mean, really, really zero-stakes. I don't we don't even know if yonaz will come back to Carson to play in the game I'm not sure I'm not sure what the you know there's not been an explanation on that has there for the European guys no I guess I guess he would assume that he'd come back until told otherwise but right it's a fair it's a fair question and then I you know Haisus Ferreira is going to get his first senior national team call up he's he had a pretty good pretty good season for FC Dallas And then Brian Keo, which is a really unusual one. He's a U-17 who didn't even start for the U-17s in the World Cup. But this will be his second visit to a senior national team camp. And it's got to give the context on its first visit because it wasn't a typical inclusion. Yeah, he just trained with them in, I think it was in Maryland or D.C. At some point.

So some people are asking like why would a player like this who doesn't even start for the 17s get a senior national team called. Do you have an answer to that question? I don't have the answer, but it goes back to my stance on these camps to begin with, which is why not? When people are like, oh, you're just going to call in everybody, it's like, yes, do that. Cast a very wide net. And in this particular camp, if KO is one of the extremely speculative picks, I'm totally fine with it. Yeah, I guess that's sort of the beginning and the end of the discussion in a lot of ways. I will say that my sense is, Keo is viewed within U.S. soccer as an extremely high upside player.

So he's still pretty raw. He was raw enough that he couldn't start over Adam Saldanya or Danny Lava or Gianluca Bousio at the U-17 World Cup. And I think he only played about a half hour in that tournament, maybe 45 minutes, like that. But he's got a lot of upside. He's technical. He's very athletic. He, you know, he can do a lot of different things. And I think, I think, so I think that may play into it, too. They're not calling up every U-17 who is available, but they are calling up him. That's my thought. And then, of course, glad to see Paxon and Palmacall is healthy, Mark McKenzie and Brendan Aronson, the Philadelphia duo, getting another look from Burrhalter. So a lot to be very pleased

with and mildly pleased with just in terms of young players getting a chance. Yeah, there's, I mean, I don't think, I don't think there's any question that this roster announcement brought with it a lot of excitement. There were people who had essentially already written off this camp as something to, you know, just sort of ignore or forget about. And then when the roster was announced, brought a lot of people back in with some enthusiasm. Yeah, it was like dancing, dancing videos on Twitter and stuff. All right.

Let's start with who's not included and try to figure out why. Obviously, the European players are not included. I mean, the high-level European players, because they have business to attend to in January and their clubs don't have to release them. That excludes, of course, Pulisic, McKinney, Brooks, Dest, Adams, Yedlin, and several others. Of those in MLS who are available,

we know that the three from Atlanta were not released for this camp. So MLS doesn't have to release the players either, although customarily they do. Miles Robinson, Brad Guzan, and Brooks Lennon were not released. That may have something to do with how angry Frank DeBore was with Greg Berhalter over Miles Robinson's injury ahead of the playoffs. And let's see. And that might not be necessarily just pure salt where they're just like, no, you did this. So now we're going to, it might have just been sort of a learning experience because people will point out they also, Atlanta also didn't release Barco to Argentina in this window.

That's true. And it just might be the organization being like, no, with the Miles situation, we've learned that it's not worth the risk. We're keeping them. We're going to prepare for our stuff, and that's where we're going to keep the players focused. And they have Concaf Champions League coming up. I think their camp opens, like, on the 11th of January or something like that. So that's five days into January camp. That's a lot of time that Robinson would miss.

And they're already behind the eight ball, as all MLS teams are going into Concordshire Champions League to get ready to face. the Mexican clubs who are a little bit more in full swing. And then of those in MLS who are available, you know, who may have, we don't know that they weren't released, but we can assume they probably weren't called up. I didn't say that very well,

but I think you get the picture. Who are the interesting omissions? So it's Bradley, Altador, and then the other guys from sort of Burrhalter's core would be Will Trap, Nick Lima, and Daniel Lovitz. and I think it's probably about right to separate them that way, where Bradley and Altador feel like they're different caliber of players

than Trap, Lima, and Lovitz. So maybe they were omitted Bradley and Altador for this reason over here and the other three omitted for some other reason. I mean, it's going to be a lot of speculation, but it's at least possible that Trap, Lima, and Lovitz have sort of fallen off the roster, the depth chart. It's possible. Uh-huh.

So should we kind of get into a little bit of how this entire camp is just one caveat after another? Yeah. Hit me with all the caveats you got. So, you know, going into, as we were anticipating this roster announcement, I was under the impressioner just sort of assuming that there would be a concurrent, not necessarily the same place, but a U-23 camp also going on. and there was a lot of sort of debate within the U.S. soccer community about the best way to use sort of these camps and try to figure out who would go to which ones. Because you got guys in the full team picture, Reggie Cannon, Jackson, Yule now, arguably, Pomacall, Miles Robinson. These guys who are U23s, well, would they go to the full team camp or would they go to the U23 camp were already shorthanded because the Eurocalf? guys are not available. So I feel like it got to the point where a senior team camp without the

Euro guys and without the U-23s would basically be pointless. I mean, unless you're going to be bringing in back like Markey Delgado and Calana Costa and like all these guys who Burholter's already judged and found wanting, you know, there just aren't enough guys to even fill out a senior team camp if you've already taken out the 23s. Timmy Chandler. What about Timmy Chandler? Call him up. Call him up just to say that you did. Let's see if he makes a move in January. So an MLS move come January. So what you've got is, in my mind, I think this was the best way to use this camp, which is this is, in my mind, the U-23 camp.

And then you just bring in a cut. You sprinkle in some of our veterans who are not injury prone, Michael Bradley and Josie Altador, and sort of give some veterans in each position group to play with the U-23s. Yeah, here's, here's my request I'm going to put out to Sebastian Leggett, Giazzi, Jackson Ewell, even, Jordan Morris, Paul Ariola, Walker Zimmerman, Aaron Long, and Sean Johnson and Bill Hamid. Leak us the email that Burr Harper sent to you telling you, hey, guys, I'm going to need you to be leaders in this group and help me get these.

other guys ready. I just want to see the verbiage. I want to see the language. I want to see how it's framed. Scuffed pod at gmail.com. Jazi, we know we can count on you. And Michael Bradley and Josie and Josie Altador leak us email you got saying, listen, fellows, I'm not calling you into this camp, but you're still on standby for March. Right. And then Will and uh, leak number three would be from Will, Nick, uh, and Daniel, uh, send us the email. I know it's going to be hard. to share it with others, but send us the email that you guys got. That one just says, hey, Merry Christmas Fellows. Hope you have a great new year.

All right. Should we work through the roster here? Yeah, let's do it. All right, let's start at the back. Goalkeeper. You have, in your wonderful way, come up with categories for this roster. Not very many categories, but categories nonetheless. We've got the kids and we've got the chaperones.

So the kids for the goalkeeper, it's just Marsenkowski. Am I saying that right? Yeah, I think so. So, Marsankowski is the only U-23 eligible goalkeeper, the other three guys in camp. Sean Johnson's sort of the only other Burrhalter veteran. I mean, Turner went to the last camp, didn't he? I believe so. I believe so, yes.

So he's done enough that Burr-Hulter's going to give him another runout. But then the most interesting one for me is Bill Amid, by far. Yeah, because he was talking SH-I-T. about the other goalkeepers earlier in the year. And that was... In a wonderful way. Yeah, no, I love it. I feel like that is the best way if you're going to talk a little bit.

That is the best way to talk a little bit. Basically just say, I'm really good at goalkeeper, you guys. Yeah, we need so much more of that in both Major League Soccer and in U.S. soccer. He said he was better than all the other guys in the camp. I love it. Right. And that's the thing is Bill Hamid doesn't think that he's fighting for... He should be fighting for, like, the backup spot.

You know, Bill Amid's like, I'm the best goalkeeper that there is. doesn't don't the um the metrics kind of bear that out too didn't uh doesn't the dummy doesn't the dummy run keep saying that he's the best that hamita's the best goalkeeper in mLS best goalkeeper in the pool yeah i think so but i but i could be wrong he's in the discussion so it's certainly good to see him actually uh getting this this chance to get in front of burr alters he's in the room now uh i hope i hope he just plays lights out i think it you a great development. Yeah, and I don't have that much, much else to say about the goalkeepers.

Do you? No, no, no, no. Let's get to the kids in the field positions. Okay, left back. They're both kids, Sam Vines and Chase Gasper. Yeah, Gaspers, what, one season into his MLS career, straight out of college? Yeah, he's a rookie. He's not U-23 eligible, so he's not technically in that group, but he's pretty close,

and he's no more experienced than any of the U-23s outside of, you know, the form. mentioned yanez Arauj and uh... Keo so well i'd even kind of push back on that but in any event uh vines is the true u23 uh so it looks like our left back's gonna be a kid so lovitz has to camp off and vines and uh gasper are competing yeah i i'm interested to see more of gasper i think uh you know he's a good his the the read on him is he's a good defender okay at getting forward. And I actually, I think Vines isn't all that different. Vines is probably not quite as good getting forward as Gaspers,

but he's also a pretty good defender. Neither of them is like, you know, lighten me on fire with excitement, but I'm, you know, I'm fine. But it's left back and somebody has to at least be competent. We're just looking for anyone competent. Right. All right. And Chris Gloucester likely is going to be with,

the PSV first team in January. We have not gotten confirmation of that. But he's, even if Burrhalter did want to call him up, which there is no evidence that he did, he's likely not available. Well, and they, I mean, the Dutch leagues have just a tiny little holiday break. I think they're back in action like second week of January. Okay. I feel like it's the 13th, Bels. I want to say that young PSV are playing young IACs January 13.

That could be. That could be. I was looking at the PSV first team. which would be the one that determines the January camp for them. Okay. But yeah. Regardless, it's a short break. Short break.

But they are going to be in Qatar for about a week from the war. Okay. Something like that. All right. So they'll be able to wave at each other. All right, right. Right back. It's both U23 eligible guys.

It's Julian O'Rahoe, who is actually U20 eligible for the next U20 World Cup. and then grizzled U-23 veteran Reggie Cannon Yeah, I like both of these guys Araujo's season kind of fell off After I don't know June, late June, early July He didn't play that much

But he's still super young Incredible athlete and incredible competitor I think he's got a bright future And I'm glad to see him here And then we've talked about Canon a lot on this podcast I think he's probably our best right back not named Serginio Dest. Yeah, at the very least, he sets a nice floor for where our right back is going to be playing.

Yeah. As a 21, a 21-year-old. Is he 21-22? 21-22. Yeah, I think 22. Center back. A couple of kids here, Mark McKenzie, Justin Glad, and then Miles Robinson was invited and couldn't be, it wasn't released by Atlanta. But still, two kids, so we're keeping the all-U-23 starting lineup alive.

Yep. I think McKenzie Glad kind of fell off at the end of the season McKenzie kind of came on strong at the end of the season after having a not great start to it. He had appendicitis and then he was at the U-20 World Cup but he did kind of win his starting job back and Philadelphia sold Austin Trustee

the other young centerback they have which is sort of a vote of confidence in McKenzie so looking for a big camp from him, big 2020 at the Philadelphia Philadelphia Union. Yeah, those guys will be mentored in this camp by Aaron Long and Walker Zimmerman, who've been sort of mainstays in the Burrhalter era.

Long appears to be sort of a locked-in starter for Burrhalter next to John Brooks or whoever's playing for an injured John Brooks. Right. The Austin trustee, omission, does that surprise you at all? No, not really. He lost his job. He lost his job in Philadelphia. And I don't think he, was he in the January camp last year?

I don't believe so. I'm just trying to think he was in the last U-23 camp in, in, was it in Spain? Was it in Portugal? Where were they just at? I'm really down on the job, but I can't remember. Yes, he was. Was he? Yeah, he was.

So anyway, it was just, I'm kind of using that camp as sort of the jumping off point for what I'm considering this January, U-23 camp. So trustee, not called up while McKenzie and Glad were. A note to Greg Burrhalter, please leak. us the spreadsheet that you're using to determine which U23s get called up to the USMNT scuffed pot at gmail.com we're here all we're here 24-7 uh center midfield why don't you take uh faxin pomacalls the packs and pomacall is the is the one I'm most excited about um even though jackson ewell seems to be the U23 kid that has uh established himself within the full senior pool um then we've also got errant uh Brendan errantson from philly

Christian Cappy, who's been playing at Hobro in the Danish Super League. It's been a regular starter, more or less since he moved there last season. No small accomplishment, really. Yeah, I mean, to just be the engine for that side, they did not get relegated this year. They were in a relegation scrap, but they stayed alive. They stay up. And then, Keo, who talked about already, is sort of the extra center made in the group. Very high on Pomacall.

somewhat high on Ewell, somewhat less high on Aronson. I'm giving my own opinion here. And then Capus is one I hadn't really seen that much of. I did a little bit of a dive last night on him. You know what he reminds me of is a Chris Durkin, but slightly better across the board. Slightly quicker of thought, slightly quicker of body, slightly more physical.

Still not an incredibly fluid athlete, but a little better on all those fronts than Durkin. So I think that's the comp that I would make. Does he hit the same cross-field switch that Durkan hits? Just out of curiosity, I haven't seen a ton of Kappa either. Well, I would say both of them hit of cross-field switch that kind of hangs in the air a little longer than you would like, similar to Jackson-Ewell.

But maybe Durkins is a little better than Kappas is. All right, fair enough. Thanks for the Christian Cappy deep dive. Again, I'm going to pronounce his name the way that I pronounce. I've never heard it said out loud before. Yeah. Spice of life. The chaperones, the chaperones for the center mids, Sebastian Leggett and Christian

Roldon. No Michael Bradley, no will trap. Yeah, I think you're optimistic. Going back to what you said earlier, I think you're optimistic when you perhaps assume that trap will not be in the next camp, but definitely Bradley will be. and I have a feeling we've talked about Legette and rolled on so much on this podcast that we don't need to do it today. Well, let me just say quick on the on the wheel trap optimism because I think there's a lot of, there's a large crowd of people who are like, oh, thank God this like that means will trap's done. I don't particularly think that, to be honest. I do think this is just sort of the U23 pool and so you just had to cut off at some point.

And the other thing is I think it'll be indistinguishable even if he is sort of falling off because, the next window after this is simultaneous with Olympic qualifying. So even if some of these guys have pushed ahead of trap, they're going to be gone. They're going to be in Guadalajara trying to qualify for the Olympics. So I'm expecting trap to be called up even if he's been jumped because the guys who jumped him are going to be doing something else. And then in the summer, the next window, probably the same thing where we're going to have U20 qualifying the Olympics proper in Tokyo and the Nations League for the last.

the senior team. So we're cannibalizing ourselves all over the place. And I don't know how many guys are going to play in multiple camps. So it's where I'm kind of thinking even if even if Burrhalter does want to sort of fade these guys out, he might not be able to do it until all the way up to September and World Cup qualifying. Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. A lot of juggling to be done by the administrators with the men's national team and the age group national teams. Wingers. Let's talk about wingers. Who are the kids? So the kids in play here are, I mean, the most exciting one, I think, is Uli on us.

And it's just the excitement surrounding Uli isn't necessarily that he's some complete player. And he's going to come in and be full international team ready. It's sort of that thing where he gives us the one dimension that he can provide, potentially, is something that outside of pools like no one else can. Even Jordan Morris, who I think is. sort of at the moment, the locked on starter on opposite Pulisic doesn't provide that sort of one v.1 threat. He's always a danger to get him behind in space, but he's not necessarily a danger to just skin people on the dribble. And that is in Yuliaz's skill set in every competition

he's played in to date. Hasn't played a lot of grown-ups yet. But that's just how he plays. That's how he plays. Right. So that's what we're going to hope to see, is we're going to hope to see it translate against some Costa Rican grownups. Right. Assuming Costa Rica calls him the grownups. I want to do a little side note on this too. I think with Uli and Julian, but especially Uli, this call-up is important because it sends a positive message to all the Mexican-American players and the youth national teams. And I know there are some people that don't like when I talk about that or we talk about that, but look, we're going to be in a dual national war with Altree for some time.

and when an exciting young player like Uli gets a look in January camp, you can bet that is noticed by other dual nationals in the pipeline. People like Alex Mendez, Richie Ledesma, even younger players like Kobe Hernandez. And, well, I'm not sure Kobe Hernandez is a dual national. But in any case, Johnny Perez, Efra Alvarez probably even notices. You know, I mean, he's buddies with Ulianas. And, you know, I haven't seen that Gary Cliven has had anything to say since the call-up.

so that he's been silenced for the moment. Silenced with elation. Yeah. He's just an ecstasy right now. No, I doubt that's the case. But at least there's not a ton to complain about at the moment. And I just think, you know, it's good. Our perspective is limited.

My perspective is limited. I'm just like a guy who is on Twitter and on Slack and stuff like that. But it seems like from my vantage point, it just has a positive effect. And even if, even if, doesn't get to play in the Costa Rica game. He gets essentially a month with Burrhalter to sort of learn the system and feel like he belongs. And I could not be more happy about that.

Yeah. I'm thrilled to have him in there. And again, going for all of these kids, you know, you and me especially have been sort of banging this drum for a while, get these kids in. I feel like we've been begging for it for so long. And a lot of sort of the, you know, the Twitter scene has been. begging for this, that when it doesn't go super smoothly against Costa Rica, that's going to be like weaponized against these kids and, and, you know, the people who've been asking for them.

But I just want to, like, sort of urge people some caution here that it probably is going to be messy. But keep in mind, even when we call in all of grownups and all all these veterans, it's also been really messy. So that's the key point, yeah. So what I'm hoping for is that at least now, uh, as, as, as, as, you know, as, you know, as the players on the field do learn some of these lessons and maybe get schooled a little bit at times, it's actually going to pay off at some point down the road, whereas currently we have a lot of players who are learning lessons who are going to not factor in in the future anyway.

So those lessons are a bit wasted. Yeah, they go down the road a little ways and then they take a side road off in a perpendicular direction. Which a lot of these youngsters that we've been clamoring for are also going to do that, are not all going to become impactful players for the senior team, but a few of them might. And that's really, like, that's really all you can hope for is just that a few of them do. They just don't already have their turning signals on. Should we move on to, oh, so the chaperones on the wing are Morris and Ariola.

Did we mention Jonathan Lewis yet? Oh, no, we did. We went on the, so Jonathan Lewis is the other, the other winger. Brooks Lennon was invited to camp. presumably as a winger because that's what he's been playing for the U-23s. And honestly, the fact that Brooks Lennon was invited at all is sort of what cements in my mind that this is a U-23 camp because I just don't feel like Brooks Lennon is a guy who would be, you know.

He's not very good. Yeah, that's kind of what I wanted to tiptoe around. But for the senior team, it seems like he doesn't have necessarily the high ceiling that you'd hope for to project out. So it seems like he's a helps the U-203. 23s right now kind of guy if he even does that helps the 23s qualify right yeah all right and louis you know louis is louis is a big fan in matt doyle and he he plays in colorado he hopefully he has a good season um i'm not as high on him as doyle is i don't think you are either i don't actually

don't know don't want to put words in your mouth well it seems like burralter has been a pretty big fan of lewis since his uh that's true cameos in january last year chaperone Chaperones for the wingers are Jordan Morris and Paul Areola. I think that's a good role for them. Yep. Ariel, I want Ariel as a chaperone for myself. Seems like a wonderful chaperone. I will shadow Paul Areola for weeks?

Actually, to be honest, I have been shadowing Areola for a few weeks? Are you in Silver Spring, Maryland right now? No Corey Baird in this group. So again, it just shows how much emphasis being placed on the younger guys because Baird has been a bit of a right on the edge of Burtr alters camps. And so with so many guys missing, the fact that Baird isn't sort of called in as filler does suggest that this is, this is mostly intended for the youths.

Yeah. Also, wouldn't you put Baird in the same category as like Trap and Lovice? Yes, definitely. He's just been even fringier than those guys. That's true. All right. And at Forward, we have. the kid, Jesus Ferreira, who just got his citizenship.

So that's kind of cool. Born in Columbia, but has spent most of his life in the U.S. And then the chaperone is none other than Jazi's artists. And I'm fine with that. You know, I see a lot of people on Twitter say, I love this roster until I got to Jazi's artists. And I'm like, I don't know, man. I'm fine with this artist at this point.

Yeah, totally fine. This is the role that Zardos should play. I was fine with it until I got to roll down. And then I was like, What? No Cervagna? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, the rolled on is a little, I'm a little less fine with. Let's see.

Anything else to say about the roster? Just to reiterate, the game is, the only game we'll get to see, which is kind of disappointing, is February 1st at Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, California, against Costa Rica. There will be some closed-door scrimmages in Qatar. And I doubt that it would be. will be broadcast, but you never know. Maybe one of these, if they play like against Byron Munich or something, maybe Byron

Munich will stream it on YouTube or something. Right. Somebody will show up with a phone and periscope it. I'm kind of hoping bells and I feel like it'd be a bold choice, but if this is to try to help us prepare for U23 qualifying, I would love to see against Costa Rica the true U23 lineup trotted out there. That would be awesome. Yeah.

That would be very, very great. just have the chaperones there to get the boys ready for the game essentially exactly jump have them jump in at the 75th minute or whatever just because we've learned all we're going to learn from the from that first 75 minutes but yes from the go ahead no I just it'd be I'd be very interested in seeing it I feel like it would actually serve a useful purpose because we do have to learn how these guys do as we go into concaf qualifying for the Olympics and even for the Olympics sort of proper to be like, all right, well, we thought this, we know this guy, we're going to have to rely on for qualifying because we're going to be missing so many of the

guys who aren't released. But we might also learn, hey, this guy could actually potentially do the job in Tokyo. Yeah. And I think from the older players perspective, it would, it probably makes sense for them to, you know, to not risk injury and a friendly. Instead, they get, you know, they get a month in the Middle East to prepare for the season, the MLS season, which is kind of coming up fast by the end of January. Maybe it works for them too, just to not play in the game and just to use the training camp

to prepare for the season. Everybody wins if we go that row. Play the kids. Everyone wins. Play the kids, Greg Burhalter. We're going to come back in a minute and answer a bunch of questions. We'll burn through as many as we can before we get tired. Okay, question number one from Adam France.

Is Keough with a club right now? I thought he was at Orange County, but Doyle says he's unattached and rumored to be going to Wolfsburg. The short answer is, I don't know. He's listed as unattached by U.S. soccer, but Orange County tweeted about him to congratulate him for his call-up. I messaged my contacts in Orange County, but didn't hear anything back. So I think my sense is he's not with Orange County anymore. That's my guess. How difficult is it to get on like month-long contracts with USL sides?

I don't know. I don't know. All right. Okay. Question number two, Ian Shank. Great to see Uli, Ferreira, Arahu, and Pomacol. Which position does the U.S. men's national team most need someone who didn't impact 2019 to break in for 2020?

So I think he's asking which position needs a breakthrough from a young player who hasn't been playing for the U.S. men's national team. Well, what do you? Sure, I'll give my two. I think we need, I'll just say we need a forward, we need another center mid, and we need a left back.

Yeah. So we got a couple of those names on here. Yeah, I mean, I guess Ferreira is a forward, right? I think so. I think he will be for this camp. Yeah, he's got to be a striker. He'd be the only other potential striker in the roster. Yeah, I think Pomacall and Ledesma in the middle are the ones I'm most hopeful about

Really having a breakthrough for the national team Would love to see Chris Gloucester come on strong at left back, but we You know Try not to get ahead of ourselves That's actually the one I'm a little bit ahead of myself on I'm like, oh, this he would at least fill the hole for now Gloucester, I'm talking about Cluster Yeah, let's let let him get some reps with young PSV and see what happens in

January camp, winter camp for PSV. Question number three from Richard Glass. Is there any possible explanation for having no U.S. youth national team coaches? Why would they not be desperately trying to fill the open positions? Having to live in Chicago land cannot be the whole explanation. Even incompetence does not seem like it could be the whole explanation. That's a really good point.

Greg? I mean, I think it still boils down to incompetence, but it's sort of like organizational level. It's not necessarily just on Ernie. If you want to give like Ernie the most charitable interpretation, it'd be he's frozen too because his choices still have to be approved by a board or a CEO that doesn't exist yet or that isn't that isn't in a position yet. So he might be sort of frozen. He might have a full like plan of what he wants to do and simply can't execute it because a lot of us who've worked in soccer know, especially with like a nonprofit and you've got this board that. has to make the decisions, things can move extremely slowly with boards of directors who

aren't always as fully interested in the job as you wish they were. Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, I'm making, it's a bit of an excuse, but that's the most charitable way to read it. Yeah, another somewhat charitable way to read it is, is they wanted to wait until Taber Amos was gone and sort of fill all the positions with their own guys. Right. And they were going to try to be deliberate about that. But I do think it's mostly incompetence.

I think I think Bernie Stewart, I think Ernie Stewart incompetence slash like not really having a sense of urgency about it, which is too bad. But I mean, I don't know how you could argue based on the evidence, the evidence being zero jobs filled that there has been any sense of urgency about it. I think it's just kind of, they're just kind of sleepy over there. They don't really care what we say on Twitter. Oh, they definitely don't. But it also kind of, I think, goes into, so what you're saying, they waited for Tab to be gone, which I think is true. And that, that I think is sort of the whole thing is that in their minds, they're sort of restructuring everything. So they're trying to overhaul the entire thing.

So, you know, they don't see the need to just plug holes one at a time, even if it means having a couple of cycles that are awash, I feel like, they're like, oh, it'll be like, okay, well, let's just get it done right. even if it takes a lot longer, and then have this setup, you know, for the rest of the existence of U.S. soccer. I think that's a bit of a false dilemma because I feel like if you know what you want to do, you could still be plugging these holes, kind of how they did with Rafael Vicky. So you could still plug holes with guys who you think accomplish what you want to accomplish in that framework or with the philosophy you want to have. I don't think it necessarily has to be wait until you do everything at once. but that's the kind of feel I get from it. Well, another charitable way to look at it is that things are still in flux over there. Like, we don't know how much longer Jay Burrhalter is going to be the chief marketing officer

and they still don't have a CEO. So maybe there's some stasis imposed by the continued organizational chaos at U.S. soccer. Elijah Bates asks, are there any January camp games this year or is the Costa Rica game the next one? The answer is there are closed door games, which we don't know if they will be visible to the public, but probably not. Scott Jorick, let me ride the positivity surrounding the U.S. men's national team, encouraging January camp roster call up and ask scuffed headquarters for an obnoxious, sanguine yet arrogant prediction for the USMNT World Cup 22 Qatar starting 11. Not for me. I'm not going to give a guitar starting 11. Oh, I said it.

I said I wasn't going to say it, but I said it. No, you did. It's okay. So I'm going to, I'll do it just because Scott has given us a lot of good questions over the last few months. After you give yours, I'll give my rationale, but you give yours. Okay. I'm going to say starting 11 for 2022, I'm going to say, and this is just bear in mind, this is obnoxious, right? That's in the question.

It's obnoxious. so here's what I'm going to say John Brooks and Chris Richards are the centerbacks All right okay Zach Stephan at goalkeeper

Kobe Hernandez Foster at left back Even the way you're giving it is obnoxious You're going to start with the centerbacks And then go to the goalkeeper Now let me jump to the forwards No That was a mistake on my part I apologize

Left back is Kobe Hernandez Foster Right back is Sergenio Dest Tyler Adams is the six Paxon Pommacall is the eight Richel Ledesma is the 10 Christian Pulisic and Ullianas are the wingers and

Josh Sergeant is the forward Okay all right Let's let's have you drawn that up and posted on the bulletin board for Revisiting three years from now No I don't even I don't even want to revisit it tomorrow So, Scott, the reason I don't want to give this answer is because, you have done this before, but the World Cup is still just under three years away, November of 2022. And so if you look back three years from today, so many of the guys that we are now talking about,

so many of the guys that Bell's just put in his lineup didn't even sort of exist in the conscience as far as, you know, You know, senior national team goes. So, you know, the fact that Bells has pomacoled, you know, having the ability to jump over a Weston McKinney means that somewhere there's another pomacall we haven't been found yet who's going to jump over this pomacall. So that's my, that's my, that's the way I look at it. And I look at it as a positive thing that we had, we have so many players who have emerged over the last 36 months that over the next 36 months, we are going to. add a lot more even more quality to the pool. So I think what I'll say is I think the starting 11 in November 22 will surprise us all. It'll say.

No, what I what I'll say is the quality in that lineup will be much higher than the quality we've had in in any previous World Cup starting 11. That's my that's my big bold prediction. Well, yeah, that's a little obnoxious in Seguin, sanguine. but I like your jumping Pomacol theorem so I think we should continue to revisit that. Next question, Paul Ritchie, nice to see some fresh blood and some deserved drops

in this, presumably in the January camp roster. I don't know much about any of these guys beyond Uli and Arajo. Who of the rest are potential men's national team regulars? And I think he's talking about the young guys. I'd say Pomacol and that's it. that's what it feels like it feels like right yeah erins I mean some people will argue for arson but I I don't quite see it um but the hope again is that erinson has a

comic all like breakout and uh suddenly he's a guy that we're all excited to see and again the big hope is that we end up with a half dozen pomacalls that we're super excited to see and have to leave three of them out for every window because we just have too much quality yeah yep Mark Helmer asks, in your U20 predictions, you had KO at like 6, 7 in the center mid-depth chart. Do you have any idea why he was the speculative call-up as opposed to say Danny Laevil, who was actual first team minutes? Well, first of all, objection, Mr. Helmer. He was not 6-7 in the CM depth chart.

He was just, you know, two or three at one of the positions. I so maybe that is 6 or 7. I don't know. Objection withdrawn. Do you have so I think I think it goes back to what I said earlier. I think he's a he's much has much higher upside than a lot of the players on that team Because of his you know his technical ability and his athleticism. I think the you know sort of tactical Savvy of his game is what needs a lot of work. So hopefully he learns a lot this month. He's also super available Yeah, so available. I mean he's just kind of laying around so it's you're not taking him away from anything. He's like final third. He's like final final

third on Twitter. It's totally available. Christopher Smith asks, is there anything more to the seemingly constant injuries to our guys in Europe than bad luck? I can't imagine there is, but it just seems odds-defying. I doubt it's even odds-defying. I feel like if you were to run through any other country in the world, they're constantly missing players who are top 23 worthy.

It's just that they are able to replace them with other, like, Champions League, starters, whereas we have very few of those laying around. Yeah, I won't ask you to prove it because I think you're probably right. And it's just bad luck. I mean, pretty run-of-the-mill bad luck, probably. Miles Wright asks, with Ledesma and Richards not called in, do you think that means PSV and Byron have first team plans for them? I asked because I think we all expected Uli to potentially have a shot with the first team

after winter break, but him going to the USMNT instead suggests he may be further away than we all thought. Agreed, Mr. Wright. Yes, I agree. Uli. With the Ooli part, right? Yeah, with the Oolie part. I think he's probably a little further from that Walsberg first team than we had hoped. As for Ledesma and Richards, I do think PSV has first team plans for Ledesma.

I don't know if Byron has first team plans for Richards. The hope is that they'll both be with their first teams in January for this week or so long camp that's coming up. I thought I saw that Richards was confirmed to be with the Byron first team. Well, there was a picture of him training with Levindowski. Yeah. But sometimes, like, even that, like, we've got to be careful not to get ahead of ourselves because first team plans at times can just mean the first team needs bodies. It's been a long season, a long half season.

A lot of attrition guys get road. They need someone to step into train. And so here's who we have in our reserve team. They show up and train. It doesn't necessarily mean it's, that doesn't always mean he is, he is, we project that he's going to be in the first team at some point in the future. So wet blanket, I know, but, you know, that can always be the case. For Ledesma, I don't think even if he, even if there's zero first team possibility for

him, there's a chance he just still wouldn't be released because, you know, PSV might not feel like they gain anything from it and they want him to be around for young PSV games starting up in a couple weeks. Right. Yeah, I think he's, I think there's their hope, very strong hope, is that he, makes his first team debut this spring. Ira Jersey asks, are there any dual nationals you'd be excited to see cap tied during World Cup qualifying later this year? Yes, there are, Ira. Yes, there are. Richie Ledesma and Ullianas are the first two to come to mind. Alex Mendez would be great at some point if he could be cap tied. Any else? Any others you can think of?

Well, I even want to qualify this. I'm not particularly worried that those guys are going to bolt or that they're going to be. sort of stolen away. I'm just excited to see them cap tied because it means that we've actually called them up for a World Cup qualifier and played them. That's what I'm excited about.

Well, that's the beauty of this Uli call up. It does. It just sort of, it's a soothing balm to the dual national panic. You know? It makes it seem like,

yeah, he's in the plans and there's not so much reason to be worried about it. Ira has another question. Do you think the Nation's League or Olympic qualifying is the more important tournament this year? Greg

qualifying qualifying the Olympic the Olympic okay I think the Olympics themselves are the tournament I'm most looking forward to Nation's League at this point now like making sure we got the semifinals lined up was important I thought I thought was important but I still don't think it's something that you should sacrifice

some some experimentation for like I think you still with so few other windows now because of Nations League like you still have to try to integrate new pieces, which means, you know, a little bit of experimentation. But now that we have those two games locked in, I would definitely be wanting to win them with some experimentation. But the Olympics, I want to be like a full, full strength U23 team. I know that won't happen.

There's no way Chelsea's going to be like, sure, Pools like show up to our camp the first day of our season. But it'd be amazing to have the full. strength U23 is playing. Yeah, which means I think you've answered the question there, even though you don't know it, that Olympic qualifying is more important than Nations League, because in order to have a full strength Olympics roster, we need to qualify for that tournament. Yeah, they just, they don't overlap. So unless we're saying that we have to have our March friendly window be all about preparing for the Nations League in June, there's no, there's no reason

we have to prioritize one over the other for Nations League and Olympic Qualimals. I mean, you're assuming that Ira is asking a logistics question and I think you might just be asking, which is more important. Christopher Smith, are there any out-of-the-box formations that you think would allow us to better get our talent on the field, a two-striker system with Altador and Sergeant together? Something that maximizes McKinney's strengths and minimizes his weaknesses. Not trying to solve a problem, just a fun exercise. I'll take a crack at this. I think, you know, given our short, the shortage of wing talent that we have, dangerous wingers, I mean, a 352 would be kind of interesting to see once again.

So then you'd have a three-man back line and then I guess you'd have Dest and maybe you could bring in to Anthony Robinson to be the left wing back. And then you have, you know, sort of a similar three-man midfield to what we have played with of late. and then you have two strikers, Altador and Zardis most likely. I don't care for a three, five, two. I wouldn't hate if we tried it, but I actually think we need to get farther into the box for our formation and run a very standard

three center mid formation. Okay, yeah. I mean, I agree with you. I think that actually puts McKenny in a much better position than what we've used him as so far. Okay. Nancy Pierce asks, is there a scuffed wish list for youth national team coaches? I'm going to caveat and say, you know, I don't know any of these people really personally, and I'm not like a coach hiring expert, but just like the sort of the obvious names that come to mind are Brian Clibbon for one of the U, one of the U-17 U-20 teams. and then Matt Pilkington, who squared off against Cliven in the championship of the DA

of the DA playoffs last summer, summer of 2018, and bettered him, bettered Clifton. Pilkington was at New York City. Is that where he was? Yeah, NYCFC, yep. I'm with you on Clive, and I think I actually really want Clibbon into the U.S. coaching staff because, one, fireworks, and two, I mean, he, he, he, He has a proven record of identifying players and developing players. So I would call it a proven record. I don't know.

Maybe people will disagree and say. Yeah, people will say, well, he just had the, you know, he had the best talent pool in the country. So, of course. But I think that's, I think that's Bologna and it's sour grapes. He still had to pick him, right? Like, he still has to pick the right ones because so many people are operating in talent-rich areas who don't pick the right teams.

they identify the wrong traits or they overvalue certain things or or whatever else. And so, you know, what Clyburn has done, I think, is enough of a rationale to put him on the staff. And again, I just love it for the, he's the exact opposite of sort of a company man. Right, right, right. Well, you know, I mean, and Brian, people get him confused with his brother. Brian is not nearly as vociferous as his. his brother Gary. But the other thing is, I mean, just look at the, just think about it.

Uli, Efra, and Alex were identified by Cliveman when they were like 10, or maybe even younger than that. How many coaches have done that have identified three players at such a young age who are all, I mean, we're not sure that any of them is going to be a world beater or an international caliber player. It's not totally clear yet. but, you know, one's at Wolfsburg on the fast track, one's at IACs on a fast track,

and one is, you know, at the LA Galaxy getting MLS minutes. That is, I don't know, I think you'd be hard pressed to find another example like that in the world. Those are, that's a good return. And that's why, I mean, that's really what we're after here is, who can get us a good return on our youth prospects. I think Pokington is widely respected and, you know, understands what's going on.

U.S. soccer as well. I can't think of anybody else, but I'm sure if I spent more time thinking about it, I could. Can you? No, Cliven was just at the top of my list. And again, I just, I want all of that, I want all of that drama embedded in the U.S. soccer. Yeah, that would be. It wouldn't be boring. And again, not necessarily Brian himself, but sort of what comes along with him.

Right. Michael Pizza asks, I love that Uli was called in, Uli was called in, but is there any element of concern that his club would release him for this. Yeah, a little bit of concern. But I think it's out. I think it's outweighed by the positive of him getting called up by Berhalter. That's my opinion. Yeah, disagree.

Yes, I agree with that. I don't know. It's always hard to sort of roll that curtain back and figure out, you know, what was going on in the discussions between U.S. soccer and Wolfsburg. But even if it was Wolfsburg saying, sure, you can have them, we have no, we have no plans. to use him. Like, I'm still fine with that. It's, uh, he's got a, he's 18, 19 now.

No, he's still only 18. Yeah. So, uh, I'm, I'm fine with him sort of taking a slower track. It's, it's fine. Right. Michael Simonella sent a few questions. First one is, which currently uncapped youngster does the U.S. Men's National team need a breakout 2020 from the most?

Go bells. Uh, I would say Ledzma. You? Kobe Hernandez Foster. Okay. I like that answer. I like that answer. That's, I mean, I don't disagree.

His breakout year could include, could just be signs of contract with somebody and moves to play with their club. Because he's, is he currently unattached? He's currently unattached. Yeah. Yeah. So just take one, take the next step is what I'm interested in from him. Right. Semenlla also asked, what was your favorite scuffed interview from 2019?

I'll let you answer this first, Greg. Joy of the people. Really? Yes. As soon as I heard it, I was like, this is amazing. This is what I want for my children. We don't have one in Des Moines. So I can only do it when I come visit you up in the cities.

All right. Come on up. We have a very small house that you can sleep in. Yeah, I really enjoyed that one too. I loved the desk interview too, but I'm going to, and I love to love to lot of them. I'm sounding like a total waffler here, but I'm going to have to say Cliven. I just think he's, I just think he's so, he's so candid and so detailed. He's so fun to talk to and listen to. And he just clearly just loves the game of soccer. I really enjoyed that

conversation. Simonella asks, how are your poor broken ankles doing after that loss to Sanjeev? I'll just go aside, thanks so much for all that you guys do. It wasn't, it wasn't your ankles. I was worried about the health. It was my entire body was broken. And if any of you didn't know about this, Sanjeev and I, that's at USM&T videos, played one-on-one basketball against each other in his hometown of Carmel, Indiana, a few days before Christmas, and he defeated me, 21 to 15, I think it was. It was epic.

It was a blood match. Yeah, it was a game of runs. He went up, I think he went up 4-0. then I went up 8-4, then he made it 10-8, and then I made it 15-10, and then he just, the bottom fell out at that point. You can't hide in one-on-one basketball, can you both? No, I couldn't play defense anymore. I'm ashamed that I gave up, so I did give up playing defense, probably because I could no longer do it. Anyway, enough about that.

Seminella, on a similar note to my first question, regardless of who the U.S. men's national team needs, a breakout 2024, from which uncapped youngster do each of you think is most likely to have a 2020 breakout? Uncapped, huh? All right. Give your first one again, Bells. Most likely to have a breakout? I'm going to say it's either Raina or Ledesma. Oh, I like the, yeah, that's a good call with Raina.

I'm going to say Brandon Sarvanya. Wow. I don't know why I'm on that. feel like he's going to have an essentially like a pommacall path you know i mean like we know sirvanya's going to get chances to play yeah we just we just don't know about le desma or reina don't forget about ricardo peppy either he's he had a rough 2017 or 20 2019 u17 world cup but i think he's the real deal i'm still very high on him and he's going to get just like serenia he's going to get chances right and and again i don't think servania is necessarily going to like

cement a place in the U.S. men's national team 23. I just think he's going to be a guy that we will be excited to see say next January because he's had a good 2020. Yeah, totally. It's a low bar. All right. Steve Copera

asks, for those of us who don't closely follow Major League Soccer, anything you can tell us about Hases Ferreira? He's versatile. Versatile. Not really a 9, not really a 10. not really a winger. So his versatility bleeds over into sort of what is he a little bit. Well, he's a productive question mark, though, isn't he?

Yeah. I think eight goals, five assists. Don't quote me on those numbers, but it's something in the ballpark there. That's, yeah, that's who he is. He's good, he's technical. He makes, I think he makes fast decisions in the box, makes smart decisions, and moves well off the ball, but not extremely athletic. or sized perfectly for any of this sort of prototypical positions.

So in this case, I feel like he benefits from Berhalter's sort of hybrid positions because he could easily find himself playing as sort of like a half advanced midfielder, half forward kind of a thing that we've tried out guys, even like Weston McKenney in, and it doesn't suit them at all. But Jesus Ferreira might sort of thrive in that kind of position. Yeah, that's a good point. Last question we have here is from Justin Davies, what name should we be on the lookout for in the upcoming MLS season?

Who should we be on the lookout for? I'm going to say Moses Nyman, be interested to see if he gets a breakthrough at D.C. United. Travis Clark is listening to this and cackling out of the side of his mouth because he would say, you know, no young player is going to get a chance from Ben Olson. But, um, Gideon Zela Lenn. Seriously. I'm going to say that probably isn't the case. You know, I'm already, I'm already on for Servania.

I will stick with New York City, though, and say, James Sands is another guy I want to track carefully. Yeah. Yeah, who else is there? There's Nyman. Arraho. Rao. Yeah, I mean, Mariso Kuevas, keep an eye on.

him for the galaxy. The whole, you know, the whole Texas contingent. Exactly. We got to see what Tab does in Houston. Yeah. But, you know, don't expect much from most of the league. That's the answer to this question is most of the league is not going to provide anything on this front, which is part of the reason why so many kids are going to Europe.

And that's despite the MLS having its best season on that front ever, you know. So there's definitely been progress, but not at every club. Anything else, Greg? No, everyone, countdown, enjoy your countdowns, enjoy your new year. We'll see you in 2020. Yeah. We'll try to get some interviews booked. If you have ideas for interviews, we should book, if you think you should be interviewed, Josh Sergeant.

Jonathan Amon. Jonathan Amon, yeah. You know, drop us a note, scuffpot at gmail.com. Thanks everybody for listening. Happy New Year. Take care of yourself. We'll see you.