Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - Some of the questions ahead of USMNT's next camp

Episode Date: January 24, 2024

The Gio transfer saga, which strikers will get the call in March for Nations League, centerback pool kinda unclear, roster projections.Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon! Patrons get a private feed with one or two episodes a week, including the Monday Review with Watke and Vince, and a Friday show usually with Greg and Watke. Patrons also get access to our private Discord server, live call-in shows, the full catalog of historic game recaps we've made: https://www.patreon.com/scuffed 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 SCuff podcast, where we talk about U.S. soccer. Hey, everybody, we spent the Monday review discussing the January camp game and other things less pertinent to the full strength U.S. men's national team. But here we are, and we're laser-focused on what really matters, the big questions ahead of Nations League in March when we faced Jamaica in the semifinals. And then either Mexico or Panama, hopefully, in the final, all in Dallas. Greg, how you doing? Good. Did I catch it hopefully, as in hopefully Panama, like just because you want to see Mexico fail that badly or because you want to avoid Mexico because you're a little bit afraid of them, which is about. Well, I actually meant hopefully we make it to the final. The U.S. beats Jamaica and makes it to the final, but I should, I could have been more clear.

I just thought you were sneaking in a Mexico bar, which I'm okay with, I'll allow, but I still want to be. I'd rather play Mexico. Yeah, just for the, just for that, just for the atmosphere. Yeah, for sure. And then because we definitely get to play Panama in Atlanta in June at the Copa America. Oh, good point. And how nice is Abel is to be able to shift our focus fully now to this March A team camp coming up? And also know that nothing that happened in the January camp needed to be relevant for it. Not a single thing.

It is kind of nice. It takes some of the weight off of it, which I guess is not news to anybody. I was excited by the way Esmer Asmere Barak-Tarovitch played and I thought Diego Luna was pretty good. Did you have any quick thoughts on January camp? Which doesn't matter? It was most...

I was mostly watching for Tillman. I was on the same train as Vince. And early on, I was like, okay, Tim Tillman looking like a grown-up here. Like, he's not going to single-handedly open up a defense or unlock a, you know, an attack move. But he did look like a grownup for a long time. And then suddenly just sort of like just seemed like he was,

I mean, he still looked like a grownup, but he was like the grown up who took his kids to the park and then just stared at his phone the whole time. So he didn't really stay as, as like in control as I was hoping he would. He never necessarily looked like out of it. But it just didn't look like he was fully into it. Yeah. Needed a little more from him.

That was my take on. Timmy. Yeah, and I think he needs to because, because this competition, as we'll get into, is going to be having a lot of showcases where I'm sure they're going to be pretty focused. Yeah. Notably, his brother, Malik, who is, I think, very, very clearly higher in the pecking order. But let's go through some of the big, other big questions ahead of this camp, which is probably going to be announced in about 40 days, something like that.

First of all, the Giorana saga. I know you always take a really strong position on where you want somebody to transfer to. Well, let me just sort of recap. It seems pretty clear he's leaving Dortmund, but at press time, we still don't know where he's going. At first, it was supposed to be a mid-table La Liga club, maybe Sevia or Real Sociedad. I mean, Aalteco Madrid was even floated. then we heard he was going to Nottingham Forest and that seemed to have legs

and I had to talk myself into that and now it's maybe Marseille but wait maybe Sevia is back in the running. No, no, no, it's probably going to be Nottingham Forest. We don't know for sure. Probably could be anywhere. Thoughts.

Did you mention in that long list, did you mention Benfica is one of the rumored spots? I did not, yeah, that's another. I saw that once and that was the one again all these transfers are like man you're really just throwing darts but Benfica was the one that just like Iax before it got me pretty excited Benfica still in European competition they'll have the Europa League knockouts coming up and they have a boatload of talent and they move a boatload of talent and for me I was just like that would be that would be the ideal spot all of the other ones I mean sure like like Like I'm not going to pretend to know how they will turn out. So it's just, I don't even put the energy into worrying about it or getting my hopes up. But I did get my hopes up for Ben Fika. Yeah.

I can see that a little bit more dominant and, you know, not asking as much of him when it comes to running around and playing defense. Yeah. And it's, it's alone. It's alone, right? So it's like, I just want to enjoy it. So we haven't been able to enjoy Gio doing his thing in a long time. So just like when we went through the Dest sagas at Barcelona and then A.C. Milan, I just missed it. You know, I miss watching him fool around and have fun. And so Des to PSV, I feel like it was sort of is sort of the taste of what Gio to Benfica could be.

Hmm. Yeah. I like that. You know, Marseille is also in Europa League still. and, you know, they got Obamayang at Stryker, Ismaila, Saar on the right wing. He, you know, he could do some damage with that team. I guess they started off pretty badly in the league, but now they're doing better. I mean, Harit is probably his main competition. Many of you will remember him from Shalka Days. Actually, kind of a nice player, but I think it has struggled for consistency. So I think Marseille could work out.

I'm Nottingham Forest. Like you said, we don't know that any of these will go well or when any of them won't go well, anything could happen. But in Nottingham Forest, I guess the argument for it would be he'd have to like really sort of man up and become a serious, you know, teammate slash professional because they're going to be in a relegation scrap. There's going to be competition there. as well. I mean,

Morgan Gibbs White is not the elegant player that Gio Raina is, but he is, you know, somewhat effective. And Callum Hudson Adoy would be the left winger he'd be up against if he were viewed as a winger there. Nico Dominguez is also pretty good.

You know, it's gotten a few caps for the Argentina national team. So everywhere he goes, there's going to be competition. Everywhere he goes, there's going to be opportunity. Anywhere he goes, there's going to be competition in anywhere he goes, there's going to be opportunity. So, yeah, I don't know.

And there will also always be like concerns. Like the concern with Forrest would be they're not good enough to have the ball all the time in their Premier League games. And that doesn't necessarily suit a G.O. Raina type, or at least it doesn't suit the Giorina. We have come to know and love. Again, like you're saying, that's the opportunity to prove that he's not just this one player who could mess around on the ball on a possession dominant team and create some

things. Like maybe he can be a double as a hustle guy when needed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I got to say there's something a little tempting about him coming into a struggling Premier League side and then maybe

becoming the guy and helping them, you know, move out of the relegation zone into the middle of the table. That would be really cool for him. But who knows? And I also, with all these transfers, I also like again, run through like the worst case scenario. And assuming there's no catastrophic injury, which could happen anywhere,

uh, the worst case scenarios here don't bother me that much. It's a, it's a half season loan, um, for any of these places. If he goes to forest and they get relegated, like,

uh, shrug your shoulders and he goes back to Dortmund and find, tries to find a different home. Uh, I mean, we just went through this with seven players at leads. So, uh,

Wes went from that to now starring for Juventus. Uh, Tyler Adams got an escape route to the Premier League when he gets healthy, we'll see how he does. Brendan Aronson is still playing and then Jesse Marsh has a podcast now. So there's...

Everybody landed on their feet. Everyone comes out of it a winner. Yeah. Yeah, it's going to be, it's going to be fine. But it is, it is, I would like to see him playing and healthy and that has been a lot to ask of him

for the past couple seasons. So let's root for that. Get him into camp in March with a full head of steam. So there it is, a conclusive segment on Giovanni Raina. Even in that scenario where we don't get to see him play, that just adds more fuel to like the Geo Raina mystique of like, what is the actual problem here? Because, you know, people keep posting his FBRF green bars for Dortmund, which are outstanding.

So in the small sample of minutes we have, he's doing very well from like an analytics perspective. So the question keeps coming up, like, why doesn't he actually play then? And so, like, we don't have the answer, right? We don't, I feel like no one wants to go too far on the speculation side and be like, well, we know there have been some issues with off the field things. Because I feel like we're trying to just keep that very much segregated to the U.S. soccer issues and drama. But, like, we don't know. And there sure is some, there's some reason that he's not playing. So, like, if he goes to Forrest on a loan and doesn't play again,

it'll just add more to the mystery, I think, which I also enjoy. You're right, though. He, not just from an analytics perspective, from an eye test perspective, anytime he comes on, he's making an impact. So why doesn't he play? You know, I guess the speculation I'll throw out there is something somebody said in the Discord server, which is that if he does leave the hit piece, from the Dortmund camp is going to be pretty heavy, you know.

Because they'll back him and say he's a perfect teammate while he's a player, but as soon as he leaves, there's going to be, you know, something in build, citing anonymous sources about, you know, all the bad stuff, all the dirty laundry. They can't do it when it's just alone because they still know they might have to sell them. So they can't tank his value straight away. Right.

They got to wait for that buy option to get exercised and then boom. No, I mean, and I think, I guess the last thing I'll say about him is I really do think, despite my misgivings about some parts of him as a soccer player, he is our best chance of actually being really good as a national team. And I know Malik Tillman is making a run at being that same kind of player for us, but I don't, for right now, I don't think he's on GEO's level. So things can be two things as the late Darrell Gris. would say.

He can be kind of a pain and also, you know, our most talented player. And I think he's probably both. Johnny Cardoso, Joao Lucas de Sousa Cardoso got his first start for Real Batisse last weekend. We talked about it on the Monday review, but what did you think? I thought it was great to see him step in and just look like a player who can anchor might not be the right word, but I mean, he was a stable piece of that Batisse midfield in that match where they were totally overmatched for much of the game. They're what, you know, they didn't have a lot of joy at least possession.

Overmatched can always be the wrong word when when obviously Batis weren't in there trying to knock the ball around for minutes at a time. But for the, for him to be able to hold his shape, maintain the you know within the shape of team defense against Barcelona who I know they've they have an underwhelming they're having an underwhelming season in the standings their underlines are destroying the league like in a walk like they're like half a half a goal better on goal difference per 90 uh than the next closest team so they are a formidable opponent as they showed when they you know hit for two goals in the last 10 minutes of the match uh and so johnny doing his thing in that kind of an environment speaks volumes.

It will speak even more volume if we see him do it, you know, for the next five weeks as well. Yeah. It's a big deal. Yeah. It's a big deal for him to jump into that spot. The only reason I'm like being as, you know, cautious as I'm being, because again, that's about as good as I could have hoped he would play to even like to find out he was starting. I was like, okay, here we go.

And then to see him play that well is great. I just keep going back to like a cycle go and watching Shaq Moore play against Barcelona in La Liga. So he had that. He had like a six game stretch and then he fell off the top division cliff and sort of, you know, existed in that Segunda limbo. So all just all this to say, like just because Johnny's done this in one game, even against Barcelona, you can't just be like, well, there it is. he's cemented himself in our roster. Well, you know, Shaq lost 10% of his speed by signing with an MLS franchise. So that's what happened.

And that won't happen to Johnny. Yeah. Noted speedster Johnny Sonder. Right. I thought he was, yeah, won a lot of duels. Looked pretty composed. Batiz fans seemed generally in favor of him as Waki showed. in his investigation on the Monday review.

I'll stop mentioning the Monday review now. And playing under manager Manuel Pellegrini, Batisse's ninth in the La Liga. They play Majorca on Saturday afternoon. We'll see if he's back in the lineup. But he's got to be your second number six in the next camp, right? I mean, second number six, and then, you know, Tyler Adams might not be back for March camp.

So he could be the first number six, doesn't mean that we would start him in that match if we just feel like starting, you know, another configuration just puts more talent on the field. But yeah, he could be, I mean, if it's,

if it's him or Maloney for a, for a true number six, if Adams isn't there and you want to play a true number six. I mean, Johnny's a totally different player than Leonard Maloney. Yeah. No, I think I'm taking Johnny over Leonard every time right now.

But I'm sort of operating under the assumption that Adams isn't going to be in this camp you think you think you might make it back i i have no idea he's he's he is literally the guy who uh you know we created the two weeks away bit in his uh like for him he's always two weeks away from being back um and he i feel like right now he's probably like a month away from being two weeks away so that's going to be it's going to be tight it's going to be tight yeah i don't see it i don't see it happening but um still think we probably do a musa mackenny reina midfields. and then Cardoso comes off the bench. Yeah, and we still got Malik, which is incredible.

We're sitting on Malik there as like, for me, the primary, the priority audition player in basically any attacking position. So if anyone in the front six other than Bolligan needs to come off, like Malik comes onto the field and then you shuffle around from there. But we can do that more in depth as we get closer to the actual games. One more thing on Johnny, because you mentioned this composure, I thought that that's what really stood out to me to the point where he had way more composure on the ball than I had for him when he had the ball. Because he held, he would get it and he would hold on to it for like a while.

And the whole time, like, oh, too long, like he's, he's surely going to lose it now. He's not used to this, you know, Barcelona level. But he always managed to find his way out a little solution. And occasionally that solution was like a nice forward pass. Not necessarily like the killer throughball, but like he was advancing things. Right. Yep. That's exactly how I saw it.

Let's move to Stryker. I guess the question here is, I mean, who are going to be the call-ups? Balligan for sure, I would think. And then I think it gets a little unclear. probably Ricardo Pepe as well but will we bring three strikers and bring sergeant or Hajie? Go ahead, go ahead. Well, I think I just don't see any way around

not bringing Ricardo Pepe here. Like he's, even though he's, I mean, you could say well, he just isn't playing enough for his club, but that strikes me as ridiculous because he wasn't playing a lot for his club when we brought him in the last camps and he was good. He was scoring goals that we needed. to score.

So I feel like dropping him would really feel strange just from a man management perspective from, you know, you're dropping a guy who's been delivering for you. And there's no need to, right? We can bring extra players in this camp. And the other wrinkle here for me is the winger abyss that we're kind of staring into where we're talking about like Paredes and we're talking about Brendan Aronson. and those guys aren't necessarily like bad choices to have. But like we said, they're not,

they're certainly not demanding call-ups right now. And if you have guys like Josh Sargent and Haji Wright, who are performing really well, and they're both very versatile, like Haji has been playing on the left wing, and Sergeant has spent a ton of time playing, like as sort of a wide right attacker. I think you just cheat.

If it's me, I just cheat and get Balo and Pepe and Sergeant and Haji all in camp and call Haji a backup left winger and you can call Sergeant a third striker or you can call them a right side of the attacker or you don't have to care about that at all and just say we've got between Gio Malik and Sergeant we've got a backup for Wea so we've got two guys at least two players

who can deputize behind Pool Sick and Wea and then maybe leave Brenda at home I mean in Berlin yeah I mean and Burrhalter has made those kinds of calls before Warren left, you know, key Burrhalter favorites behind. And, you know, again, what is Brenda really claiming to be doing here that would get him into a camp? Right.

That's interesting to have Sargent as a sort of a backup winger slash backup striker. I was totally prepared to have the haji as a winger discussion. Because you mentioned it a few weeks ago, and he had. has played mostly as a left wing for Coventry over the last couple months. He looks comfortable out there. He looks comfortable running the touchline, a little bit of combination happening. I think he's, I think I definitely have him as the first winger off the bench, unless Tillman is playing winger, you know, then he's the first man off the bench.

That's where I land. You still run Malik out there, run Malik onto the field first, and, you know, we can ignite to hold Geo Firestorm again, but Geo can easily slide out into a wide with quotes around it slot. Geo's still going to go wherever Geo wants to go, which is the beauty of Geo.

But you get them on the field with Malik and you can still cook out there. Yeah. Okay. Well, just to sort of brush up on how these guys are doing, Sergeant has two goals and five appearances since coming back from injury. He's starting in a game that starts

here in about 45 minutes. against leads. I'm playing pretty well, I think, but not getting on the ball much. In Wy Scout, you can look up how many times a player received a pass under the passing tab, for those of you who use it, which may not be perfectly accurate, but it is in the ballpark. I think the number they have is in the ballpark.

And for the last five games, Josh has received two, three, eight, five, and three passes. So Norwich is just not able to build through him in the way you'd think they'd like to. But he's still managing to have an impact and he scored two pretty nice goals. I'm just noting the receptions number because there's just crazy low to me. And it's not like Norwich is terrible in the championship either at the moment. No, they were terrible. They were terrible, still too strong. They were very good with Josh at the beginning of the season. they were flying, Josh went down and they fell pretty hard to mid-table.

And now that Josh is back, they're making another run at the playoff. Yeah. Love to see it. And then Haji, like I said, looks pretty comfortable out on the touchline. Got a hockey assistant scored a goal on six shots on New Year's Eve against Middlesbrough. He's a little bit loose with his passing. I think. And he has a little bit of that old Josh Sergeant Malady

where he has shots get blocked off his foot. It looks a little bit too easy to block his shots. But man, when he does get a little bit of space, he can really crack the ball with either foot. He does have some 1V1 juice. He has some decent ideas for passes and combinations. So, yeah, it would be fun to see him off the bench as a winger. And I've long thought that Haji has like,

weird narrative around him where a lot of people think of him as kind of like a tronco out there and he's got really tidy feet. Haji's always had, you know, at least since we really started watching him more closely when he was playing in Turkey. Yeah, like really tidy feet receiving the ball and he can kind of play in some intricate little combinations with layoffs. So I'm, I'd be totally fine. You know, if you're just looking for if it's between Haji out on the wing or some other

effectively placeholder, you know, anyone besides Pulisic, Wea, Raina, or Malik, everyone else in my mind right now is a placeholder. Yes, get Hadji out there. Yeah. He's injured right now.

We actually has to get back and start playing again, but... Yeah, we're going to go through the physio room, but yeah, his injury doesn't seem... I mean, it's a groin, and Fat Mobb's saying he's back mid-January. Now, that's not always the gospel truth, but let's hope he's back

in plenty of time to come into this camp. Assuming Burrhalter wants him. I do think he's kind of a big man who plays small for anybody who's, you know, who watched Northwestern basketball in the 1990s. So, yeah, kind of a, but he is also one other thing in his favor, he's a little bit of an aerial presence on set pieces. So that's another thing in his favor. Certainly have to account for him.

So yeah, Coventry is sitting in six at the moment in the championship. So they are in a playoff spot. And then just to round out strikers, we also have Pfok who's back scoring goals. And then Daryl Dicay, who's back, West Brom also in a playoff spot at the moment in the championship. So again, we got some options. That's why I want to really hit this March camp hard with bodies in the camp. Get four of them in there. Like during the week, evaluate them however you want.

But then you still have coverage. You can still call it a balance. roster four games that we have to win. And it still, you know, it works in the roster format for the U.S. soccer's releases because they just say forwards, you know, they put everybody in the same category. So if we can bring, yeah, if we can bring eight right backs to the World Cup, we can bring four strikers to this game.

All right. Now let's move to the centerback pool because it doesn't seem to have gotten any clearer in the last six months or something. So has it? No, I don't think it's necessarily clear, but I also don't think it's that big of a worry. It's more just like a curiosity because it's not settled. Like we know Pulisic and Wea, you know, like we know some of these players who are the core pieces. And for centerback, I just feel like we don't yet know where Burrhalter stands with even, I mean, I'd say maybe we could make a guess at his top three, but do you really even feel comfortable saying that?

No, I don't. I mean, my guess, okay, my guess that is top three would be, um, Reem, Richards, and Robinson. But, you know, Zimmerman's in there somewhere, and I don't know where Ream stands lately, so. And then CCV, right? Ccv started both matches against Trinidad,

and I think one of the two in the way. So I feel like, uh, I feel like, I would, I would say right now probably Ream Richard. CCV, but that could have just been Berhalter really feel uncomfortable against Trinidad, knowing that he could play whoever and giving CCV minutes over Miles Robinson, who was in camp but did not play in that window. Yeah. Yeah, that's right.

I don't know why I would put Robinson ahead of CCV in his pecking order. I wouldn't rule it out. I just... I don't even know who I think should be our centerbacks at this point. I mean, I want Richards to start. I think who should go next to him is I'm not sure I love Cameron Carter Vickers so I want I want Richards and CCV

Riem I'm probably about to steal what you're going to say Reem hasn't played yeah Rheem hasn't played soccer in two months so you know he had the injury he's now back but it's very possible that that his slot is

taken at Fulham and he is he might be considered now a veteran backup who's going to just transition into a mentor coach role the Timmy Chandler he's going to Timmy Chandler way yeah

and you know he just signed that I think he just signed a contract extension right so everyone's like oh they still clearly value them but European teams work differently than salary cap American sports teams they will do these sort of

almost like legacy like we're just going to take we like having a guy around the club we'll take care of him for another year or two, even if he's not necessarily in our plan. Huh. At least, again, I'm basically just giving the Timmy Chandler precedent. Because he would,

every year, like, sign these extensions despite, like, playing three or four games. And I don't think he's played this season at all. For anyone tracking Timmy Chandler. Yeah. It used to loom large in our consciousness

because we get some hate tweets from people for not respecting Timmy Chandler enough back in the late teens. I love Tim Chandler for it. He Ream hasn't played, as you mentioned, since that 4-3 lost Liverpool on December 3rd. You know, we'll see if it gets back on the field before March. Richards been playing a lot of defensive midfield and, you know, acquitting himself pretty well, I think.

for a position that he's not used to playing. Got beat on a couple set pieces against Arsenal over the weekend in ways that were not real fun to watch. Yeah, real bad optics. Bad optics. Yeah.

The market is a little bearish on him right now, I think. But for me, he's still one of our centerback starters. And then he's hurt. What's that? Oh, I was just saying that. The optics are, it's, it's mostly an illusion for our purposes. It's not great. People are going to, he got dunked on, which gives any, uh, people,

anybody who maybe feels inclined to, an opportunity to dunk on American fans. Uh, but come on. Like, clean your, clean your set piece defense up palace. Like, you got one guy's job is to just try to occupy Arsenal's best, best guy. And then other people are supposed to be cleaning up the actual cross. Yeah. Zone with blockers. Isn't that what everyone does now?

Who's just literally man-marking one-for-one? Ridiculous. Somebody should be rising up. Somebody else besides Chris should be rising up and nodding that ball away, is what you're saying. Yeah. Or at least in the vicinity. He was, I mean, he was in big spaces both times.

Yeah, like I said on Monday, I don't set peace goals. There's so much sort of feels like luck and circumstance that can happen for why a ball manages to land on an attacker's head and not on a defender's head. But anyway, we don't have to get into that. CCV should be back healthy in time. He's also out hurt for a little while. You feel good about him, though.

I like him a lot. Yeah, I don't know. I've had a soft spot for him because he seems like such a teddy bear. And like, I spent a ton of time watching his clips when he was in the championship looking for like some distribution, you know, because I felt like that was the knock on him. And he never really gave me those clips. But he was just such like a stable presence

at least playing in the championship. You know, obviously we've watched him now with Celtic step up a level in competition for the European side where, you know, he and Celtic both have been found wanting pretty badly. But, you know, which of our other options are going to hold up in that environment? Well, let's look at him real quick, some of the other options.

Austin trusty. He's still around, man. He's starting every game for bottom table Premier League club Sheffield United, playing some left back, mostly left center back, though. He's just kind of over there on a lot of the goals. Sheffield concedes, like not directly at fault. However, he could have, in the Man City game right at the end of the year, he could have closed down Rodry on his goal

with a little more alacrity and he got beat to a tapin by Alvarez in the same game on the back post. I mean, John Brooks would be pilloried for that and, you know, has been. Trust these distributions very average. That's not a new piece of information. But I think he probably gets into camp, does he?

Maybe not. Yeah, that's where we're really going to see where Burrhalter ranks. I'm going to say Miles Robinson because I feel like Berhalter will probably take Miles over trustee, and then it would just come down to whether anyone's hurt for trustee to get in. Because I feel like Ream Richard CCV and Miles would probably be, probably be Burrhalter's four. And you think Zimmerman's like out of the picture now? I missed it if he was, if he retired from national team sucker. No, he didn't.

Burrhalter said something about him being injured, right? And, but that's also something Burrhalter will do is just say a guy, oh, he's dealing with this, and then still just never call him up again. And the rationale for me would be Zimmerman's just asked it age-wise. We've talked about this. And his big leadership attributes are less necessary for a team that's not full of 19 and 20-year-olds. Yeah.

I guess I still wouldn't be shocked if he makes his way back into a roster. But yeah, okay. And then Mark McKenzie still starting a lot of games for Gink, including three of the last four in the league, just putting in shifts. Gank our fifth in the Belgian table. I didn't see any big oopsies in the last few games. So he's still in the picture.

Yeah, and I think he'll remain in the picture because he's also, a guy, you know, who at least might offer the distribution piece that we're not getting from Austin trustee. We're not really getting it from Cameron Carter Vickers. I don't really think we're getting it from Miles Robinson. So if Ream is is sort of fading out, and John Brooks is, you know, also not an option, Mark McKenzie becomes sort of the last passing centerback choice. Yeah. He strikes a clean ball with the other foot. That mark does.

Let's see. So the physio room recap is Adams. Last we heard, he's back in March, which I think probably doesn't give him a chance to make the Nations League roster. Congrats to him and his partner on the birth of their child, Mazel Tov. Got a brand new baby. Nice. So Adams, it would be kind of a nice echo to the 2021 Nations League where Adams had been out hurt forever ahead of that tournament and then came back, still not able to play, couldn't even play in the semifinal, but then got in like the 70th minute of the final against Mexico. So that's where he made his return from injury. So he could get a repeat of that. I suppose, but if I'm him, I want to like make my market Bournemouth and you know get a full head of steam heading into the summer so that I'm so that I'm ready for Copa America. I mean maybe maybe he thinks Nations League is really important but I'd like to get healthy and yeah and if he hasn't played yet Bournemouth are not going to let him go for this March window.

Last one was during the summer in 2021 so he could he leave his team and I think I don't know, exactly what the process is for them to hold him out of that. But there's no way bored them if they're going to be like, yeah, you're still too hurt to go this weekend, but sure, fly to the States. Go play in Dallas, yeah. Go play Mexico, yeah. Luca Colioho, his knee is hurt, and he's slated to come back in mid-March. Again, I think probably not joining us in Dallas.

If he ever joins us, we don't know. And now that Hajie Wright is going to play winger, I don't know that we need him, you know? No, I'm just kidding. We need everybody. All hands on deck. And then, yeah, CCV's hamstring should be back to full strength in early February. And Haji, like I said, his groin should be back.

He should be back from a groin injury in mid-February. So I think Adams and Koliash are the ones who are going to be missing out, thanks to injury. And other reasons. Yeah, so these are all the things we're keeping. keeping an eye on. Obviously, you should also just keep an eye on all of our key players who are doing really well for their teams. But these are sort of the, I don't know if I'd say periphery, but this is like the big question marks. Who's like just for me is not a question mark, you know? No, yeah, he's a, he's an exclamation point right now. So do you, do you want to

quickly talk about, and we've got to like five minutes left here, quickly talk about what your roster will look like for March? Oh yeah, we can give a taste. We can do it. Kind of covered it. So I'm still going to bring Matt Turner as my goalkeeper.

Okay. Understandable. Objections there. No, but who are your two other goalkeepers going to be? I think Horvath, because I love him and I just wanted him to have a smile on his face. And then I'll bring, I'll bring Gaga.

We'll bring those three. It doesn't really matter. I mean, Gaga seems like he's been a good camp guy, so I feel like he's a good, good show. Yeah. My centerbacks are Ream Richard CCV, and then another American centerback. I'm not going to pretend to care who the fourth one is.

Do you feel strongly about the ones, I mean, you might not feel strongly about everyone's official order, but do you feel strongly about who you want to see in the camp in March? I think I'm going to go I'll say McKenzie okay all right then I'll say trusty we'll this will battle

we'll battle we'll be mad at each other so Miles is the odd man out here yeah he's got plenty time we've seen a lot of miles that's true okay what about your right backs so I'm I'm bringing

the big thing here is I'm bringing Sergenio Dest and I don't know exactly how the rosters work but in the last one you had to have your roster couldn't change between the semi-final in the final. So I'm assuming that's still the case here. So I'm bringing desk even though he's serving a suspension and I'm bringing Scali who will presumably start and that'll be interesting to see. And then on the left side, I'm bringing Jedi. But then Lund is going to make way. Poor Lund. He's going to make way for DeWan Jones because DeWan Jones can play

right and left. So if you're missing Dest for that first game, you've got cover from Jones who can who can fill either. And then in a ridiculous emergency where you need another four back after that. You make Timway do it. Or you deputize somebody to just solve it. Maybe that's where Austin trustee comes in. Okay. Yeah.

I like Jones over Lund. I do. Even if I am a little mad at DeWan for that laser beam left foot across he sent into the stands, ending that really beautiful move in the January camp game. But yeah, I like that too. Robinson Jones, Descali. who are your midfield six i'm going to say who are your six midfielders okay so mcennie musa geo and malik

who i just feel amazing about as four midfielers coming in and then i'm going to bring luka and johnny so tim tilman isn't going to make it this round he didn't do enough uh lernard maloney is gonna is going to miss this one enter testman uh not going to be here so I feel good about those six, though. You know, it feels like a pretty good six. That seems like a pretty clear six. Like that, I don't know how you could disagree with that. That's exactly mine too.

All right. And then forwards. Let's put them all in one bin. I got Poulsick and Way as my starting wide players with Haji and Sergeant backing him up. And then Balo and Pepe. That's a solid group of soccer players, I think. Yeah. I have the same except also Aronson, but I, but I'm totally fine if Aronson doesn't make it to camp. So yeah, we're of, we're of basically one mind here, Greg, except when it

comes to centerbacks. Yeah, you just love McKenzie. You just have to have him now. I, he's, he's, you know, I see a few games without a oopsie and that that gets me perked up, you know, and he, um, he can. He can pass the ball in a way that a lot of our centerbacks can't. I think that's it from us. Yeah. Check out our Patreon. The link is in the show notes.

You get the Monday review, the Discord server, a lot of other stuff. And thanks for listening. Thanks, Greg. We'll see you.