Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - Episode 160: The Olympic Qualifying Roster

Episode Date: March 3, 2021

Lengthy discussion of who's in, who's out, how it compares to Jason Kreis's roster a year ago, and what a banger a true first-choice U23 roster would be. Also some discussion of the Jordan Morris's injury and the winger depth chart behind him. 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 Scufft podcast. I'm Adam Bells in Georgia. With me is Greg Velasquez in Iowa. We talk about U.S. men's soccer. Thanks for downloading this episode of Scuffed. We are here to discuss the Olympic roster in something like three parts. First, on a granular level. Who's there? Who's not? Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Second, how does this list of call-ups compare to what the list would have been a year ago when the pandemic hit? And third, what does a true first choice U-23 roster look like for the United States of America men's national team? And how does it stack up historically? Long-time listeners will know what we're going to say about that, but it never gets old for us. Greg, how are you? I'm all right, Bells.

I feel like we've gotten a lot of news for the U.S. men's national team in the last few weeks. So it's good to have something to look forward to. February kind of felt like a dry month national team-wise. Yeah, it did. and now we're on a very wet month. Oh, my days. The newest news is we're going to be playing Jamaica in Vienna Newstadt in Austria on March 25th, which was, did you know that already?

Was that, like, reported widely? Because you, like, you went into the lab and came up with, like, a whole Jamaica roster. Now, as soon as they announced the Northern Ireland friendly for March 28th, I mean, just a bunch of people kind of just dug around and I say dug around. Like we did full cross-referenced logic puzzles about which teams were available on which dates. And essentially everyone landed on the same thing. Jamaica was about the only team available, like quite literally in the world to play a friendly against. And they're a decent outfit.

So I think it just made sense to try to get them on the schedule. And U.S. soccer was apparently thinking the same thing. Cool. Plus they just had a high profile defection. It's not a defection. It's a Jamaican eligible player who's decided to represent Jamaica instead of England. He never represented England before, never made the grade. Right.

But that's going to be fun. That's going to be a fun addition to Concafath. Michael Antonio is his name, right? Yeah, West Hamstriker. Yeah. I don't know. What's the opposite of a defection? A refection?

A refection. Right. He's refecting for Jamaica. Yeah, so that's cool. A good, sounds, it seems like it's going to be a good, solid window in Europe. Yeah, I'm sure we'll do some projections maybe next week, but the one thing that I really like about it is that that game is before the Northern Ireland game rather than putting it

after because I'm really hopeful that we put our first choice players against Jamaica because they'll be able to play their first choice players. Northern Ireland, remember, is playing us in the middle of two, it's sandwiched in between two World Cup qualifiers that they're going to be totally focused on, mostly focused on, I guess, with the exception of this little field. trip to play us. So we for sure are not going to be seeing their first choice. They're going to throw like backups, backups out of side guess. They're doing us a favor as a fellow Protestant nation.

Just kidding. Just kidding. So yeah, so hopefully we get to see Jamaica's first choice against our first choice. And then we rotate everyone because the game's like three days removed the second game to play our backups against Northern Ireland's backups. backups. Yep. It all makes sense. That cross-reference logic puzzle makes a lot of sense to me. So let's get into the Olympic roster. You have some stuff to say. So yeah, so yesterday U.S. Soccer released a list of 31 players who will travel to Guadalajara for an Olympic qualifying pre-camp.

Atlanta United quickly followed by releasing its own list of three players who will not travel to Guadalajara for an Olympic qualifying pre-camp or any other reason for that matter. And in a remarkable coincidence, all three players on Atlanta United's list were also on U.S. Soccer's list. So the implications of sort of this great travel list paradox have yet to be fully explored. For now, here's who we believe is going to be attending the 28-player 31-man camp in Guadalajara. And that is J.T. Marsenkowski, Matthew Fries, David Ochoa, and J.G.N. Jonathan Klinsman, as our goalkeeper. being contingent. Yep. Our fullbacks are going to be in this camp,

San Vines, Margo Farfan, Aaron Herrera. I always want to say Anders Herrera, and I feel like he plays for Columbia. Aaron Herrera and Julian Arajo. George Bello was one of the Atlanta United Players who is and is not going to this camp. They are not.

They are not attending. Let me take the center racks. Maricio Paneda, Henry Kessler, Justin Glad, and Austin Trustee. And then Miles Robinson is one of the aforementioned Atlanta United absences, I think it's fair to say. And then defensive midfield,

Jackson Ewell, Johnny, Johnny Soccer, Cardoso, Anders Perea, and then Hassani Dodson and Frankie Amaya, Center Mid, Tanner Testman, Eric Williamson, and Cole Bassett, on the wing, Ullianez,

Sebastian Salcedo, Jonathan Lewis, Georgie Mahalovich, and Benji Mikhail, Michael, Michael, what's the pronunciation key on that one? I'm actually not sure. I always have, I've been saying Michelle. Michelle, yeah, well, there we go. And then Brooks Lennon is the other Atlanta United player who probably won't be there.

Isn't going to be there. I mean, that's official right now, right? Right. And then the forwards are Jesus Ferreira, Ricardo, Pepey, and Sebastian Soto. So can we just touch on the Atlanta deal real quick then? Yeah, it's been a Carlos, Carlos Bocanagra and Greg Burrhalter have had an ongoing thing here, it seems. Yeah, so this whole roster was originally going to be released on Friday.

It was held up specifically to iron out these Atlanta United Issues. The issues seem to have been ironed out. And then it turns out that the issues were not ironed out. And Christ kind of left a flaming bag of dog on Atlanta's front step in the aftermath. This is the second now U.S. camp in a row where there's been some like, messy stuff back and forth between coaches and players and clubs. If I'm counting Josie Altador's devil working overtime tweet from Last Camp. Don't believe everything you read.

I love that tweet. Yeah, I think probably Christ has most reason to be upset about Miles Robinson. I guess that's my not very hot take on this. Yeah, and I'll just change it to this. I mean, for me, it's disappointed, not necessarily upset. Yeah. Well, it hurts a little bit. Right, right.

Because we don't, we got a pretty thin group of centerbacks anyway. Bellow, Bello is a high potential prospect in a pretty good MLS player right now, but I don't, you know, I'm not losing any sleep about him not being there. And Brooks Lennon, not losing any sleep about that either. just not an exciting player for me, although he can whip in a lovely ball from wide, no doubt. Right. And I think what the disappointment will be is, you know, Christ has to be thinking about too deep at every position, not necessarily just because of injury, but because the way the games are so congested, you probably have to rotate any, I mean, you're probably, you would like to

have the luxury, I guess you'd say, to rotate players even for the group stage anyway. So, you know, you can think, well, Bella wasn't going to start. Vines would have been the starter. But if Bellow's good enough to give Vines a break, that's a big deal. If you don't necessarily think that, say, Marco Farfhan is good enough to trust to give San Vines a break, then you're now obligated to play Vines and potentially four straight games because it's the group stage and then the semifinal that are, you know, kind of do or die. You can barely afford to drop points. So that's where that sort of urgency comes into, like, have the guys that you really want

available. And that's what would lead to the real disappointment. But crisis comments were borderline. Like he went way too far. Like he was bordering on unprofessional there, I feel like. Maybe that's me reading too much into it. I don't know. It's like public comments are supposed to be super anodyne.

The ones I'm referring to, referring to specifically are where he said that he might not pick those Atlanta guys for the. Olympics in Tokyo, if the U.S. qualifies, if they aren't at this camp, which seems like he's sort of trying to, to me, I read it as him like undermining the relationship between Atlanta United and the players. Like, look, if Atlanta is not going to play ball, then I'm not taking these guys to Tokyo, almost like as a way of putting pressure on them to play ball, which they're not doing. Yeah, and if I'm Bukenegro, my response to that, you know, I wouldn't say it publicly, but my response in my head would be, well, none of them is going to go to Tokyo anyway, you know?

We don't have to let them go or you don't think they're good enough too. I don't think, I mean, maybe Robinson. Robinson's the one with a decent shot at being in like a Tokyo roster. But, but Bellow's not going to make that final roster, I don't think. Christ said that they were basically automatic selections to go. I mean, that's what I just feels like he was really like bluffing a little too hard there. I don't know. It just felt messy to me.

Yeah. I don't know that I read it with exactly the same sort of acute messiness as you, but you're not usually wrong about stuff. I don't know. Let's see. The next thing we should talk about is the snubs from this roster, people who aren't going to be there. Who sticks out to you? So there are really only three in my mind, and I'll give the first two because they might just be my personal snubs. And it's Keaton Parks and James Sands.

I feel like those two guys, I have them rated a lot higher than I think, apparently, the coaching staff for U.S. soccer has them rated. And I think I'm just going to have to start to accept that. Yeah. Well, let's keep it. You know, we'll keep them in the hopper. We still cling. I still cling to that idea that maybe New York City just is like Atlanta, but quieter. Yeah.

Right. The more of the Manchester City way. So what about Eric Palmer Brown? we got any word on him? Was he just not released? I'm not sure, but he picked up an injury like last week or the week before, and he's listed out for like two to four weeks. So he, maybe he was on the list to go because he was on it last year. Yeah, he was on it last year. He was on the final 20-man roster last year. It seems like he would, he was needed this time, especially with Robinson not being able to go. And even back then, he was in every game starter for the club that

on loan at in Austria, Austria, Vienna. So I don't know if they would have been open to it or if he was, if he would have made the cut or what, but the injury adds just another variable. Yeah. And the other big one, the other big snub is Jeremy Abba Se, the Portland Timber Striker. And I, and I do think there's a decent argument that he deserves to be there more than Pepe or Soto. Certainly he's been more productive as a professional goal scorer than either of them by far.

well, not by far when we're talking about Soto, but I think we can agree that MLS is a higher level than the Erest Divisi. But you could argue. Soto racked up 20 goals in the U-19. I'm just kidding. No, I totally agree that it's definitely odd that he's not even in this camp. It's, you know, we brought, we had 31 guys that we were going to bring. And I would say apparently not rated to even do that.

So that means they are pretty firm, I think, on their, assessments of the striker pool because again Christ said specifically this is a coach's choice he didn't there was no like gray area about maybe Portland wanted to keep him for preseason Christ said we have two strikers that we consider ahead of him so so Matt Hartman was making the case earlier today in our chat room that it's because peppy and sodo have more potential and um I guess I could see that still seems a little weird though yeah and I don't I wouldn't I wouldn't want to go with potential at all for this kind of an event unless it's like you're worried about losing those players. Either they're just engagement or because they're dual nationals that they bolt.

Because this is like a regional tournament like this is the epitome of like you just win now. It's very much like a means to an end. You got to get the points. You got to get the big semi-final win. And then you never have to talk about it again. You can bring whoever you want to the next event. Yeah. It would hurt.

I know I'm playing very much to type here, but it would hurt a lot to lose Ricardo Pepepe, especially, to Mexico. And he's, I think, you know, he grew up in an L tree household, and I don't mind it. I know it's not, I know a lot of people don't like this kind of stuff, but I don't mind the, I don't mind the games. Yeah. So my take on it is a little, is a little different in that I rate Obesei, like, I think he's good and I think he's the right type of forward for the way. the U.S. plays. I think like, you know, out of all this, this ridiculous hydra of forwards that we have, all these in, uh, Olympic eligible guys that we're just starting to sort of see and, and test out for either the national team senior or, or just following them in their clubs,

um, there are a lot of them that are more Zardaz-ish, where it's like they don't have necessarily the complete package of skills. They're very good at certain elements or they, they have flashes of being very good and like that, you know, sort of, I'm calling it like the traditional striker way, the old school striker way of just like, you know, knows for, knows for scoring goals, but not necessarily involved in much else in the buildup. And I feel like Ababa says a little different in that I think he's, I still think he's tidier on the ball and has more like a well-rounded game to him, which in my mind makes him a better fit for what I still think.

I'm sorry? Than who? Tightier and more well-rounded than who? Then essentially, so I guess I have them almost grouped in like you have a sergeant who I'd consider like a well-rounded type striker. And then I feel like you have Zardez, Akhenola, Seabichu. Like, you know, I was watching Daryl D.K. play over the weekend, and he only attempted, like, four passes with his feet in the entire 70 minutes that he played.

Like, they just aren't guys who are doing a lot of, like, coming back to the ball, combining, being integral to the buildup, like that kind of stuff. So, Nico Giacini is another one who doesn't really do that. That's not really his game. So Ababa's say is one of the few guys who plays that way. So I'm surprised he's left out. I'm a little disappointed, but my big hope is that Ricardo Pepe has been sort of assessed by the staff and is simply like they just think he's better now, which would be not impossible.

You know, like he's a solid. What do you have? A thousand minutes for Dallas last year? Did he get that money? Yeah, a lot of it off the bench. But yeah, I mean, he's, I think he, I forget how old he is. He's a, he's an 03, so he's between 17 and 18, probably. And, you know, your life changes a lot.

So, right. So maybe he's really good now. That's what I'm hoping. And I'm hoping that they're just like, no, Pepi's, I think a lot of people are saying that it's going to be Ferreira and Soto and are kind of taking that for granted. But Soto is another one who I don't think is, seems like super well-rounded. In the games he's played for the senior team so far, like he's barely attempted a pass. I know he's gotten, there just been like late substitute appearances, but he doesn't sort of find the ball in the buildup for us so far.

Yeah, I mean, I guess I'd push back on that a little bit. Maybe it's just a matter of opportunity, you know, like Darrell D.K. is not getting a chance to be part of the bill because they don't play that way. They are not trying to play that way. Soto and Soto, you know, Soto's a good, Soto's pretty clean on the ball if he gets in a rhythm. I think D.K., I like to think he has a chance to be that kind of player. I mean, I wouldn't say I, Bobese is like way, way ahead of him at, like, tidiness on the ball. And then I would say the same for Joe Keeney. I know I'm kind of a Joe O'Kee stand, but I think he, you know, he does drop in for Khan, or he has.

I haven't watched him lately, but he has dropped in and, you know, played a one-two or, you know, sprayed the ball wide out on one touch. So I just, I'm just, you know, for all of you listeners, I'm just, pushing back slightly. Very slightly. Yeah. And I could be off there. I could sort of like have taken a couple of, you know, sequences from above say and like really had those stand out in my mind. But he just for me has seemed like in a different subset of striker. Again, not necessarily better striker or were striker, but just the strengths that I associate with him seem to me to be a better fit. Even well round, it's probably like a bad way to describe it. You know, shaped in the exact way

that a Greg Burrhalter striker in my mind should be shaped. So that's how I'll put it. But yeah, and I could be off on that. But that's what it seems like to me. So my hope is that to get back, to bring this all the way back to Ricardo Pepi's inclusion and Obaba says omission, is that they think Pepey already has the goods. Because again, I don't think this is something you bring a guy for the future. I think you're bringing guys for you know, two weeks, three weeks, and that's it.

Like get the job done to open up the doors for whatever group you're going to bring to Tokyo. Yeah. That would be awesome if Pepe, you know, kind of exploded onto the scene here. One of the thing about a boba say is, you know, Matt Doyle's big fan of his that's well-documented. And his point about a bobbet say is he's really good on set pieces. And I think that's a fair point. And I don't think Pepe and Soto have quite that ability to, you know, get up with their

heads and score goals. I mean, Soto scores scores with his head, no doubt. But, but I think. Ababa Se has done it against in like more like more situations and in traffic and yeah so that's that's something that you'd think could have been useful in this tournament but was not deemed to be useful enough to include Ababa Se. Do you want to quickly take a stab at a final 20 here? Yeah, I got no problem doing that. I think I have a lot I think I still have a lot more coin tosses maybe than than some other folks might.

But let's give it a shot. You need to have three goalkeepers, right? Yep, you have to have three. Three goalkeepers, 17 outfielers. That's easy. We cut Cleansman. Yep. I think.

So it's Marcinkowski, Fries, and Ochoa. Yeah. And then at fullback, I think you'd say it'd be Vines, Herrera, and O'Raho, and Farfans stays home. Yep. Then you have one and a half at each. spot. So that's where Lenin would have been interesting because if you took Bello over, say, O'raho, then you'd have two left backs and then Herrera who can do both. But then if you bring Brooks Lenin, he gives you a little bit of cover, even though he's listed as a winger, he gives you a little

bit of cover at right back as well. Since you don't have those guys, I think it's pretty easy to go, Vines, Herrera, Arajo. And then at centerback, I think you can only take, you're probably only going to take three, right? Yep. And I'm going to drop trustee. Same. Same. It's Paneda Kessler and Glad, and then Arajo could deputize at centerback if needed. Yep. And then defensive midfield, what are we talking to? Yeah, I think so, and this is where it gets a little interesting. I'm going to say Yul and Cardoso, I guess. I don't feel particularly strong about it. Yeah, this is where we get into the coin toss zone, because I'm assuming that's the case as well.

Like my real hope here is actually that Cardoso gets dropped from this camp and just fly straight to Austria to join up with the senior team to spend a week with them and we run out Ewell and Pereja. But I don't really think that's going to happen. So I'm just not sure who will partner Ewell. But we're pretty sure Ewell gets in, right? I would think so, yeah, unless something really, there's been a real sea change at soccer house. center mid I think we take all three of Tesman Williamson and Bassett

Yeah and this is where I don't know if Amaya I don't know where Amaya or Dotson will Really be considered I don't know if one of them will be considered along with the center mids Or if they're all battling for one of the holding mid spots So I think Testament and Williamson get in But Williamson didn't make the final roster In January so it's one where

You know I'm pretty uncertain here I think Tasman's in. Yeah, and I'm kind of ambivalent about Bassett myself. Maya would be fine there. So we have six spots left between the wingers and the forwards. I'll take Janice Sosato and Lewis, and then Ferreira, Pepey, and Soto. You're just going to take all three forwards?

I wondered, because Ferreira can play a couple of those spots. And even Pepe is played on the right wing for Essie Dallas. So you're versatile. there and yeah there's again this gets into how many toss-ups there are georgie is versatile enough to play as like an inverted left winger or he could play as one of your center mids so does he add some value i don't know and again frankly i don't really care i don't know how you feel about it but we're we're at the point where you know pick any 20 of any 20 of these guys and and give me a uniform and let's do it yeah yep yep um um um

Okay. Let's talk about the absences here because it has, you know, the landscape has changed quite a bit in the last 12 months. Do you want to just go straight into saying who's traded out for who? Yeah, let's do it. I mean, we already talked about the snubs, sort of the big ones. But then we have some who are out for injury or because a year later. So we're talking about who's traded out from who from the group that was called to Guadalajara in 2020. And that we had the final. They just brought 20 down. They didn't bring this bigger extended camp.

They brought 20 guys. So we knew who it was going to be. And now we're going to kind of take a shot at who's replacing the ones who are gone. Is that what we're doing? Yeah. But before we do that, let's just mention quickly a couple of snubs that are three snubs, three or four snubs that were not on that roster. That would be, and I don't know if it's even fair to call him a snub.

But Iowacanola. So he's injured or he's still dealing with health issues. And I think we all, I'm sure we all remember that he was called up to the January camp for Canada, was then immediately ruled out of that camp. And it was the day after they announced that somebody had tested positive for COVID. So we weren't sure if he'd tested positive or if he had been exposed. Now it's sort of coming out that he is dealing with health issues, they're like described as lingering health issues.

So whatever like dots you want to connect there. he's not available and Toronto's doctors are saying they're waiting for like clearance to start him in get going in preseason. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, best wishes to him. And then Effra Alvarez, as was in the preliminary roster, he didn't, he didn't end up in the Mexico roster for this. I don't think they've announced theirs because again, final rosters aren't, aren't due until either later this week or early next week. So we won't actually know if they bring Ephra or if or if he files a switch in the dead of night.

And we named him to our final roster. Yeah. Not a lot of unknowns there. Conrad de la Fuente, not on this roster, though he was in the preliminary, the provisional one. And then Caden Clark, the youngster at New York Red Bulls, supposedly headed to Leipzig soon. And so those are ones that were not on the 2020 roster, just to be clear, who are also not on the 2021 roster. So they're on neither one. So the ins and the outs.

So somebody who was on the roster last year this time before the pandemic hit, who is not now, presumably because of injury, is Paxon Pommacall. And who's replacing him? So we're kind of assuming that Tannertesman is going to be the Paxton Pomacall replacement. And that's, you know, Pommackle is one of the guys that we were really excited about last year. I'm also excited about Tanner Tessman, but it seems like to a slightly lesser. degree. Not the Testman can't can't sort of blow up. I mean,

Pomacall going into that, into that sort of tournament last year, had had one outstanding MLS season, and Testaments had one pretty good MLS season. Yeah, I would say Testaments was not as outstanding as Pomacalls one season. So I think it's a downgrade. In some ways. Attacking ways, primarily is what I'm thinking of.

Well, yeah, in an absolute sense, correct? like a individual timeline sense. Tessman has not played his U-20 tournament yet. So Pomechal, the season of his U-20 tournament is where he really like blew up for Dallas, if you want to say he blew up. Tessman would have played his U-20 tournament this season. So he's kind of like one season ahead in that sense. Yeah.

Okay. All right. Pamacol kind of bossed that win over France. I mean, he bossed portions, features of that game in a way that I think really lifted him in everyone's estimation. Not everyone's, not everyone's, but in a lot of people's. So Brendan Aronson was on that roster and is not on this one because he is playing in Austria now. Yep, new zip code.

And again, technically they could surprise us and he could fly from Austria to Guadalajara, Salzburg have been eliminated from the Europa League. They are cruising to a league title. so Jesse Marsh could do us a favor here and say go ahead, Brendan, enjoy yourself for a couple weeks down to Mexico. Seems unlikely. It does. And Williams, we're saying Eric Williamson is kind of his replacement. And I think that's a downgrade.

Yeah, I don't know. I know it's tough. It's tough because I'm still not exactly sure what to make of Brendan Aronson, at least in a like central midfield engine role. Yeah. For all I know, Williamson is better suited to that particular role, so I'm not sure. Right. I mean, I'm kind of thinking the same thing. We haven't solved the Aronson problem for several months. We're not going to solve it today.

The Aronson dilemma. Reggie Cannon at right back was on that roster last year. His replacement is Julian O'Ralho. I think it's a slight downgrade. Yeah, I'm the same. Cannon was made out to be, would have been probably the captain of this. team last year. You know, Arajo seems like he's fine, but, but he doesn't have nearly the national team

experience that Cannon was bringing. Yeah. One thing about Arajo is probably, probably, is he maybe the best athlete in the whole pool? I don't know. I'm not sure. Yeah, he's a very good athlete. Mark McKenzie will not be on this roster, though he was last year. He's being replaced by Mauricio Paneda.

I think this is a pretty significant downgrade. And like we talked about earlier, a problem area for this roster is centerback. Yeah, I'm hoping that Paneda is going to be kind of like for like and that he's a good ball playing centerback. Because that's what McKenzie was going to bring to the group last year. So, yeah, I'm not sure. I'm not sure if Panetta can fill those shoes or if he'll even need to. I mean, I'm not sure what the competition is going to be like. So I'm a toss-up.

up on this one. Okay. Ledezma, Richie Ladezma, is not there because he is recuperating from pretty dramatic knee surgery and his replacement is Benji, Michelle. I think, I think, I mean, his replacement to be... This is kind of an apple, apples and oranges. Yeah, and I don't know who that other, I kind of assumed that Ladezmo was going to start on the wing. Remember, this roster came out right after our friendly against Costa Rica, where we kind of, uh, introduced Burrhalter's new style of playing with sort of tucked-in wingers. So I was kind of projecting that Ledesma would play out on the wing opposite Ulyanis. I'm not sure if Benji's going to be the starting right winger or who will be.

So I'm not even sure that that's whose replacement will be. Yeah. I will say, I think we lose a little bit at centerback this time around, and I think we lose some attacking creativity. And Ledesma and Palmacal are kind of the name. that spring most to mind. Yeah, I have real concerns about, like, this group's ability to sort of pick the lock and be extremely dangerous.

So, you know, I think... Ullianna's the only guy who kind of comes in mind, really. Yeah, and Ullianas hasn't played soccer competitively in 2021. Yeah. I don't even know what his training has been like. He's sort of just been listed as injured for a long time with hair and vein on loan, and then he flew back to California. It was they changed his reason for being out from injury to personal reasons.

So I really have no idea what his soccer has, what soccer he's been playing at all over the past three months. Right. But he was on last year's roster and he's on this one. I mean, he's a little bit of the sort of Jesus Ferreira thing going on where it's clear that Burrhalter and co see something in Yanaz. They really like him. They really like something about him. So do we. as it happens.

Ababa Se is out and he's replaced by Pepe in our equation. We kind of already covered this. Yeah, but Obaba Say was on the group. It was in the group last year. So we're replacing him. Pepe's the best striking prospect in the history of the country. It must be true. So this is one where we're dropping a little bit of shade here because all of the other guys we've

listed are not going to the camp. This is the first one who will be in the camp that we're projecting to be out. And that's Hassani Dotson. So we're not thinking that Dotson's going to make the final roster. Even though he was in the group last year, we're thinking that that spot goes to Johnny Cardoso this time around. Yeah. And then you've got another one that's got some caveats to it too here. So I had Sosato as being dropped because he had been injured.

He'd been injured for a long time with Pumas. And then he finally got back. And it was kind of like a Tim Wea situation where, the first game he subbed in to be back, he left that same game like 15 minutes later with another injury. And he hasn't played for Puma since. So I had assumed that he was going to be out for injury. I was kind of surprised that he was on this list to go to camp.

And I guess now we'll see if he makes, if he's healthy, I think he makes the final 20. But if they decide he's not ready to go, then I was hoping that he would be replaced by Ephra because we need some right wingers. We don't have any right wingers. we just have a long list of left wingers. But now I'm not, I'm guessing Soussato will actually make the roster.

Yeah. I guess it's still technically possible for effort to file that one-time switch and show up in Guadalajara late. At left back, Chris Gloucester was on the 2020 roster, the pre-pandemic roster, and Sam Vines is replacing him. I think this is an upgrade for this year's roster. Yeah, and last year, I think the consensus was that Colorado just hadn't released Sam Vines. That's right. Yeah. So this is probably what they'd hoped to have last year anyway. And then Eric Palmer Brown was on last year's roster, and he's replaced, so to speak, by Henry Kessler.

I don't know if it's an upgrade or a downgrade or what. I think Palmer Brown would be considered more of like the passing centerbacks. So last year we're going to have Palmer Brown and McKenzie as two sort of centerbacks who could pass the ball through lines. I'm not sure if Kessler has that reputation or ability, but I think he will be asked to do it. Again, I'm kind of worried about this group's lock-picking ability. And I think one of the ways we're going to pick that lock is that pattern we've seen a lot from the senior team, which is that centerback hitting through the lines to like the inverted winger coming back or to,

I'm calling it the Jesus Ferreira guy, yeah, coming back into that space to collect and combine. there. Yeah, a lot of weight falling on Jesus's shoulders. I think that's going to be, I think that's going to be it. Yeah, I think he's going to be the guy that's going to have to, like, create these, uh, these overloads and unbalanced things with his movement and his ability to, to play a guy running off him. Yeah. Anything else we should cover with this roster and the comparison to last year? No, because they're, again, they're going to, I don't want to do too much on it. And then everything, all the guys we talk about in

depth, more, more in depth than we've already talked about, get dropped on the final 20-man roster. So let's wait and see who makes a full cut. Yeah. Now, let's do the fun part where we list a true first choice U-23 roster. I made one. It's got to have three goalkeepers and it's got to be 20 names. Do you want to hear mine? Yes, let's hear it.

Okay, so it's the same three goalkeepers. Marsankowski, Choa, and Freeze. I don't think there's anybody else. Is there anybody else? Not the common. I mean, the usual suspects, like a Damien Loss or a Dunez. Yeah. So, you know, I don't feel strongly about it, but let's just go with the same three.

Sure. And then at fullback, you got Anthony Robinson, Sergenio Dest, and Reggie Cannon. Desk can play either. So he backs you up at left back, right? Canon can do it in a pinch as well. So you got one and a half of each. What is it? 1.75 of each.

And then at centerback, Chris Richards, Mark McKenzie, and Miles Robinson. At defensive midfield, Tyler Adams and Johnny Cardoso, at center midfield. And this gets kind of hard here. But I'm going to say Weston McKinney, Eunice Musa, and Paxton Pomacall. And then at wing, Pulisic, Raina, and Wea. And then I'm bringing three strikers, probably to my detriment. In Jesus Ferreira, Josh Sargent, and Daryl D.K. All right.

I don't think I really have too big of a issue. So I would probably at least mention that Camer Carter Vickers has like 10,000 minutes in the championship. So he could be your third centerback over miles. Or you could even make a case that, I mean, I don't think it's wide. to say that he could start over McKenzie, to be honest. Although if you want your emphasis on ball playing and passing, then I'm sure you're going to go with McKenzie, and I'm guessing you want that.

I'll throw Aronson on as a backup winger and drop and drop D.K. And just run with Sergeant and Ferreira. Yeah. But otherwise, yeah, otherwise I think that's a pretty solid 23-man group right, or a 20-man group right there. Yeah. Other people that I would like to have on this roster would be, Giannes and Ledesma.

I do feel still some pull towards Nico Joaquini. I know you don't share that. And then Soto and Salcedo, I think, are both players that I think are useful in the attack. Jackson Yule is probably always going to be in that conversation as a defensive midfielder right there with Cardoso. How does that first choice, whether you put it that way or, you know. Something similar. I don't think anyone's going to have a while. Like a wildly different 20.

How does that 20 compare with first choice 20s for the U23s in past cycles? So, I mean, I don't even think it's close, right? I think that's comfortably the best Olympic squad that the U.S. would have ever, on the men's side, would have ever produced. I feel like to make it interesting, you have to ask where that U23 side would rank among like the best U.S. senior teams. Yeah, yeah. That's what it comes down to.

It's the best Olympic, it'd be the best Olympic U-23 team by a factor of two, probably. Yeah, so just to sort of even do the quick breakdown. And I know, I know like pedigree, club pedigree isn't everything, but you can probably say a lot from it. Out of that group that you just listed from your starters, five of those guys have Champions League knockout experience in Pulisick, McKenny, Dest, Raina, and Adams. Wayout probably would have had Champions League experience,

but he missed out because of injury with, Leo last year. They're on pace to be in the Champions League next year. Of your four sort of remaining starters, or of your five remaining starters, four of them would be in the top five leagues in Chris Richards, Josh Sergeant, Anthony Robinson, and Eunice Musa. And then your one guy who's not in those top five leagues would be Mark McKenzie or CCV or Miles, whoever you have is your other centerback.

Yep, yeah. And then you've got, I mean, Goalkeeper is the one with no pedigree. behind it, but, you know, Canon in Portugal, DK, in the championship, or Aronson and Sosburg, depending on how you sliced the tomato. Yeah.

Cardoso just about won the Brazilian League two days ago. Oh, yeah, that's right. They came up just short. So, yeah, so, I mean, that's nuts. I mean, it's just is insane. And, you know, you can play sort of the make an 11 with badges game if you want to, but like these guys aren't just sort of,

filling uniforms at those clubs, like they're playing pretty key roles, whether starting or regular rotation. It's just crazy. I mean, I was doing a quick comparison to the 2010 World Cup team, the senior team. And if you think about just like in the 11 of that team, you had Jonathan Bornstein, who acquitted himself very well in the World Cup, but was not in any way like a super high performing player, I think it's fair to say. What was his club at the time?

So Bornstein was playing for Chivas USA, which was not a particularly strong MLS side. We'll leave some MLS historians to tell you whether Bornstein was like playing way above the level of the club or if it was like, no, this is just about who we have at left back. You know, and we tried to get out of using him there. We used Bokonegger at left back for a long time and started to Merit in Gucci-Nyev, centerback. But then when Nyewu did his Pateler tendon, I believe, was his. injury in the October qualifiers leading up to the World Cup. He never quite made it back to full strength. So it turned into demerit and Bocca in the middle.

And Johnny Bornstein is our left back. Again, didn't have any shockers of the World Cup. But, you know, it's, I think when you're just comparing the quality of the teams, I think it's fair to say that we have players who are at least as good as Jonathan Bornstein at left back now. Players who are better than the level of Chivas USA. 2010. Robbie Finley was another guy starting in the World Cup in 2010.

And he's, I mean, he was a very solid goal score for Rail Salt Lake. But it's also one of those things where he's one of the reasons I cringe when when people are quick to say like forwards have to be scoring for their clubs. Because we brought Robbie Finley to the World Cup. He was like leading MLS score going into it. And he just clearly was not at the level that he needed to play at. So I'm always like, would anyone really say that Robbie Finley should start over Josie Altador, who was barely playing ahead of the 2010 World Cup, definitely not scoring goals.

He was playing. He was starting for hole for that season, but certainly not scoring goals. Who else do you got in that 2010 roster that compares unfavorably with this U-23 first choice? So, I mean, Rico Clark was a starting center bid next to Michael Bradley. I mean, even Michael Bradley might not compare super favorably to Tyler Adams and Weston McKinney and what they're doing right now. but Rico Clark was a solid, you know, a solid, you know, placeholder guy who was a start, an every game starter for us. And again, if you play the badge game, like he was technically a Eintrack Frankfurt player,

but he never really broke through there. He was basically a, I mean, he was an MLS guy. And then I even put like Jada Merritt in there. Jada Merritt is a national hero as far as I'm concerned, love Jada Merritt. But he was like a career championship defender. He had one season. in the Premier League with Watford, where they finished dead last, like 10 points behind the best relegation team in the league.

And it's just like, that's just who we were. And we were well coached in 2010. And we had guys who just, you know, they worked their socks off. And, you know, we got a little bit of the of the bounces in the tournament until we didn't get the bounces in the tournament. But, you know, we think of those guys really well because of the results they had. but if you actually are just comparing the talent level, like if you were to assume that this U23 group we're talking about

came into a tournament as well coached as our 2010 group with Bob Bradley, like I don't even think it's close. Yeah. I don't know. Maybe that's going to be sacrilegious because we're also talking about a team with Landon Donovan, Clinton Dempsey, Josie Altadour. But we have a lot of good U23 players. Yeah, I mean, Clint Dempsey would have still caused his problems, I'm sure.

as would have Landon Donovan. But yeah, I think it's fair to say that this U-23, this 97, born in 97 or later group of American players would be the best national team of all time by just pure talent. And for what it's worth, I don't think you have any 97s in here. I think we, I think we're technically still a true U-23 team. Is Anthony Robinson a 97? Don't look it up. I don't even care. He is.

No, I did. I looked it up earlier. He is in 97. Okay. So he's the one 24-year-old in the group. Yeah, Canon's a 98. Yeah. All right, there's a little more news we got to get into.

We haven't discussed it yet, but Jordan Morris was, uh, had a knee injury at Swansea. Yeah, everyone's, everyone's seen this already by now. Uh, it sucks. Um, he really seemed to be like getting integrated into that side. He'd seen his minutes start to sort of escalate. Uh, he'd come on at halftime of that game. So that was going to be like his, his longest appearance there so far.

Uh, And it really sucks because, you know, odds are he's not going to play for the U.S. in 2021 now. Between the Nations League, Gold Cup and the Summer, Olympics, obviously, you know, if he'd been like an overage inclusion, and then the eight freaking World Cup qualifiers we have over three windows through November. Like, it's just really unlikely he makes it back. For a bit of, like, perspective, Paul Ariola did his ACL last year, and he did it in a preseason game on February 15th. and he made his first competitive appearance on November 8th of that year. It was the last day of the MLS regular season.

He came on as like a 20-minute sub in a game with zero stakes for DC United. Morris did his on February 20th for Swansea. And our World Cup qualifiers against Mexico and Jamaica are November 12th and November 16th, like the highest stakes games of the cycle. It just seems like an impossibility that he would be back and that we would be able to trust him to put him in that kind of situation. So it sure seems like, you know, at best he's going to be,

he's going to be working back for 2022. Yeah, that hurts. I mean, we're not, we're not bereft without him, but, but we, but yeah, it's a big loss. So we're hoping, I mean, first off, we're hoping he has, like, a full recovery and just generally has, like, strength and, like, peace through the process. This is the second time he's gone through this now after doing it a couple years ago. Yeah. And then after that, it's going to be, I mean, we got CP, Raina, and Wea for those two big fixtures in November. I mean, for the whole tournament, basically, right? We've got, for this year, assuming those guys stay healthy. I feel like those are sort of now the big three in the winger positions.

What do we have after those guys? If we assume they were already sort of in with Morris as the fourth, now without Morris or more somewhere in there. Let's not invite any firestorms by ranking them officially. No, yeah, let's not do that. I mean, I guess I think of Yonnas as a real option there, and it's clear that so do Burhalter and Christ. I mean, he's going to have to turn the same corner that Josh Sargent's been trying to turn for a while. But the corner could get turned, you know. Yeah, and I would have been fine with that certainly a few months ago.

again, I get a little nervous when a guy just is not in the game at all, and Ullianus has not been in the game at all. So I don't know what the rest of this fall will hold for, or this spring, I'm sorry, will hold for him. Like, I don't know what happens after the Olympic qualifiers if he goes back to Walsberg or if he goes back to Heronvane. So that just seems like a real question. It's certainly not one that I'd really be counting on. Yeah, okay. Well, you have, yeah, like you say, Ariola is the safe choice. He's set the floor on the wing since the days of Dave Saracan

He continues to do that Yeah, he's seen some limited action of Swansea I'm kind of worried about him like it was the opposite not worried that's the wrong word But it was sort of the opposite of what we were seeing with Morris whereas Morris's minutes were escalating Areola is not really being used that often He'll have games where he's not used at all He might see like 10 minutes as a late sub.

So that's not ideal. Did you see their game over the weekend? No, I didn't. So he came on... I saw the highlight that you posted. Yeah, and what worries me about the highlight is that when you have such so few opportunities to sort of prove yourself in a situation like he's in

where he just came into the squad that's, you know, competing where every point is going to matter to try to get, you know, promoted to the Premier League, that a coach could, that he had a, he basically had a bad miss. if he didn't see it. They were down by a goal. A ball sort of got nodded to him in the middle of the box, and he was all alone from 10 yards out,

and he just sort of sliced it way over the frame. I mean, to my eye, it's a difficult take, you know, like it was what, like belly button high? I mean, I'm not a professional soccer player. It's not. Like, yeah, I'm going to, it's difficult in a certain sense, but it's not difficult in the way of like it's it had him wrong footed or like it was coming in hot. Like it was a perfect looped like it looked like a ball.

It looked like a ball that Jesus Ferre set up for you like it was that perfect. And he just he just like did really poorly with it in this time. And what I worry about is like a coach who, you know, has to use guys he trusts will fixate on that moment and be like, I just can't trust him. He's not going to get the job done. And he'll see the limited opportunities he had like vanish. So hopefully that's not the case. If it is, whatever, he'll ride out the rest of the loan, come back to D.C., banging goals for D.C. And jump in, jump in, like, on a hot streak.

Yeah. I guess, yeah, so there's a lot of names here. Do you want to go through them all? Who else? We don't have to. I'll give you, my most, the ones that would interest me the most would actually be guys who I think where most people are considering center mids. And that would be Dwayne Holmes and Brendan Aronson to use these sort of winger options. I'd love to see Dwayne Holmes get a run there.

He's kind of been playing in that attacking line for Huddersfield. But he's so fluid and so comfortable going anywhere. The thing I really like about him is his movement and his recognition of just where the next empty space is going to be and how aggressively he fills the space. So he's a guy I'd like to see. He's certainly not a perfect player as much as I'm driving his height train. He's still pretty loose in possession. He has a tendency to like just kind of pretend when defending where he does a thing where he does a thing where he's,

he charges in as hard as he can, but very quickly just sort of gets allayed around and then just is out of the play now. Is that? But I'm a little, yeah, I'd say that. So he looks like he's really working, but you're like, no, you were only going into defend if the attacker did like exactly one thing, then you would have stolen it from him. But if the attacker does anything else, then you're running yourself out of the play.

So you see a lot of that. But I'm also hopeful that those are things that could just sort of be like coached out him by by like the other coach he plays for so burlder could just be like hey we don't we don't do that here you've got to go in under control and just contain this is how we play with our press whatever whatever uh and hopefully that would take yeah yeah i like that idea and i i like you know eventually ledesma's going to come back and hopefully stronger than ever win back a spot at PSV give me your give me your errand i'm not trying to take you off of oedema but i'm i think we're all hopeful that he does those things when he gets back from his long-term injury layoff.

Give me your immediate take on Aronson filling that role. I like it. I like it. Yeah. I like how he, I like the quickness of his decisions. I think I said that a couple weeks ago. I like the quickness of his decisions on the ball. He works hard.

He, you know, his big problem has been like the final ball that, the final ball slash scoring the ball. And he did it. a couple weeks ago, a few weeks ago, a really nice goal. So maybe he's turning that corner. I don't know. I like it. I like Aronson as a tucked-in winger. Makes a lot of sense to me.

I would definitely rather see him there, to be honest, the next time he plays for the U.S. than in that center-mid role where he's in charge of driving the entire game and like really dominating. I feel like we need those center mids to dominate. And Brendan Aronson is not like a dominant player physically on either side of the ball. So I'm hoping now, not that I'm happy that Morris is out, but now that Morris is out, I am hoping that that sort of opens door to test Aronson out on that wing spot.

What about your favorite player in Kyrgyzstan? He's in Poland, and he now has another fan favorite, and Aaron Johanson playing right next to him, next door, neighboring city. I don't know how close the cities are. Kenny Seth. I want to see Kenny Seth get a call up. As much as I like him, I do understand, and I've never really thought he's a top

four winger for the national team, or even, but I feel like he could be in the top seven. And again, I just think he has, like, an incredible skill set that would complement a lot of other players. He fits the profile of a tucked in right winger with a left foot. Dude, I'm always tempted, and I think I'll finally start doing it. Like every weekend, he just, he looks like a guy who's only, interested in just doing like highlight stuff like he's not interested whatsoever in scoring goals or setting up goals like he just wants to embarrass the defender right in front of him and i have so much time for that and uh and he does it pretty frequently uh i want i want to see him i just want to see

him get one run out with you think it's at all realistic that he will get uh called back up no i really don't i think we'll i think we'll lean on the younger guys uh for Gold Cup and Olympics, and I think he'd have to move to a different league. He's not included in U.S. soccer's in-house a weekend playbill where U.S. soccer stole our idea and produced their own. And I do read into that pretty deeply because Dwayne Holmes is in it and there is no Kenny Seff no matter what.

So, no, I don't think he gets in. Dwayne Holmes, I think we'll get a chance. I don't think Kenny Seff's going to get in. I the only other player who fits that left-footed profile the way Seth does is effra Alvarez you know prayers that he continues to develop as a player and eventually plays for the US the athletic said that they really liked him in the in the December camp so it wasn't like that he was just they got to look at him and we're like not for us they're saying the coaches are big on him okay

we're talking about FRA here yeah no I just think that's a He fits that role really well and, you know, still needs to develop as a player, but fits the role. And is, you know, he's a magic maker. Chris Mueller. It's not a real word, magic maker. Chris Mueller and Jonathan Lewis are the other guys who seem to be, have the inside track in like Burhalter land. Yeah, I see those names in my eyes just glaze over. Lewis is going to get a shot here.

If Mueller can sort of replicate what he did last year in MLS, then I think he becomes a guy to rotate in. If you're rotating large numbers through qualifying, he'll get his chance. That's what I'll say. Robbie Finley effect. It could be, though MLS has gotten a lot better since 2009. That's true. That's true.

The one guy I'm not really keen on still, and I still watch his involvement every week is Tyler Boyd, and he's just like having a real hard time in Turkey getting anything going for him. Like he gets on the field for 10, 20 minutes here and there. But like it's the opposite of Kenny Sef where like nothing he really tries to do on the field is coming off at the moment. So hopefully he can turn things around. But I wasn't super high on him for what he was doing with the national team. And I watch him with Savaspor and nothing really happening there either.

Thank you for your service, Greg. Well, people might want to know what's all with Kenny Seth. I don't think a lot of people are tracking the Super League. Who else? We already talked about Yanez and Conrad de la Fuente. What's the latest on him? Who knows? He's in and out of Barcelona's Game Day squad, but hasn't played.

I mean, we're eventually going to have this thing running bit where, like, who played most recently this guy or Jordan Morris? And at the moment, I think it's still Jordan Morris, if you're comparing him to Conrad. There you go. And then there's the Senora brothers. Have you been tracking them closely lately, too? Yeah, I check them out. They don't do anything eye-popping. They're just both very clean on the ball and seem to be versatile to play

sort of anywhere in the attacking band other than like a true striker. So I don't know if Burrhalter's got them on his radar at all. Joel Senora, who's not Olympic eligible, has moved into a starting role because of the departure of the prior central attacking midfielder from Ty Harris, who's Cordoba, who's now, I think, moved to Austin FC. Oh, really? Okay. Yeah. So there's an MLS connection. And then Saucedo and Caden Clark, I think Soussato, you know, if it comes down to like one of these three game windows and we need somebody to just fill in the middle game and play Winger and give Christian Pulisick a rest, I'd be more than happy if it. with Saucato for like a

against a less tough concaf opponent. He can he can create, he can score goals. I'd be happy with that, you know? So that's, I guess, that's what I was going to say earlier is I don't, it's, it's, we're not bereft

because we do have three guys, I mean, we have three guys presumably who can play winger in Pulisic, Raina and Waya are playing at a high level. We can kind of debate whether Raina is actually good at playing winger. But, you know, three from a high level.

And then we got a bunch of people who could, I think, do a job against a lower level opponent. Yeah. And we have, I think, quite a few of those guys who could do a job are really good, like, complimentary players, which, you know, going back to the days of our Marquis Delgado push, like, that's a big strength in my mind to jump into a team. that has a lot of talent already and to just be the guy who doesn't screw things up. Like that can that can be enough sometimes in a couple of places on the field.

Yeah. And I think, you know, in the case of, in my opinion, in the case of Aronson and Salcedo and Ledesma and Yanez, what you have is people who can do more than not screw it up. They can, you know, make something happen. And Caden Clark hopefully will be a player like that before too long, too. I mean, he's done, he's made some stuff happen in MLS already. ready. Yeah, Clark's going to be the one that we're watching for the, for the biggest glow up, I think. That's, that is direct Richie Ledesma slander. I'm just kidding. Let's get out of

here. All right, man, let's do it. Thanks for listening, everybody. Thank you, Greg. Oh, and thank you to our patrons. Today is, uh, today is collection day and it's always a nail bitter. So thanks for sticking with us. See ya.