SoccerWise - MLS Soccerwise | LAFC’s Next Move & USMNT’s Young Stars

Episode Date: September 28, 2026

LAFC have fired Mark Dos Santos with the playoffs approaching, raising questions about the club’s next move and whether Wilfried Nancy could be the answer. David Gass, Tom Bogert and Matt Doyle also breakdown the USMNT’s young stars after a 4-1 win against Peru, before diving into Philadelphia’s continued surge and the latest twists and turns in the MLS playoff race.0:00 Intro2:28 LAFC Fires Dos Santos 12:17 The Wilfried Nancy Question26:50 Takeaways from USMNT vs. Peru35:24 Young Kids Showed Out45:32 Chile Up Next 48:23 Rookies from College Goal-Scoring Quiz53:56 Philadelphia’s Incredible Run59:23 Who’s Still Alive in the East?1:06:32 Wide Open Western Conference1:10:13 Colorado’s Collapse & Noonan’s FutureFor the sharpest coverage of American soccer, we’ve got you covered:https://linktr.ee/soccerwisehq

What's up, everybody. Welcome back to Soccer Wise. It's been a little while since we had the three of us all together, David Goss, Tommy Scoops from Deep in the Budweiser factory and Mr. Matt Doyle himself. What's up, guys? Did you miss me last week? Yeah, yeah, definitely. Always. I assume you listened back to our performance. And I got to tell you, like, every time I have to host, it just, it. It makes me appreciate you more and more.

Hell yet. It's not an easy job, David. Listen, the absence that makes the heart grow fonder. I will make sure to schedule in a couple more vacations or misses over the next few weeks so that you can really appreciate me at my highest possible level. I think we got to renew it. So like it's more than a tone. You got to do it more than once a year. Like we, you got to renew it like every two months or so.

You just got to randomly take a day off and just throw the hosting chair at one of us. and then we'd be like, damn, yeah, Gus, I guess we need this guy. I brought this up on Thursday's show, but I was driving back and listening to the show that night, and Tom just immediately ripping to Zerby on the hair was just like, it was like the first thing that happened, and he just had it in the holster ready to rock. And I appreciate you, Doyle, making the comment I would have made, which is don't make fun of anyone with hair, not really in our space. We got to leave that section to it.

Yeah, when it comes to that, I'm just going to shut up and dribble because that is not, I don't get to be the expert on that. That's not our territory. We have a lot to do on this show today. I didn't think we'd have this much to do when I started working on the rundown yesterday. Obviously, the U.S. men's national team, I thought would be the only focus of this show. 4-1 wins over Peru down in Orlando. Tom was there.

He is in St. Louis now following the team. So I thought that was going to be the main conversation. And then, of course, we have our Continental Tire race of the playoffs. We had a wild set of games this weekend, international breaks, so it changes everything up. And then in the middle of all of that, news on top of news. You were deep in Jalen Brunson, SNL episode when you found out that LAFC would be moving on from their manager with seven games to go in the season. Yeah, LAPC fired Mark Dos Santos this weekend after a loss to FC Dallas. And on one hand, if you want to be just in.

in the literal moment. A bit tough to get fired in an international break when you just played without Boulanga and Sun. On that part of it, I understand, but I think the three of us all agree that this was a bit of a doomed hire from the beginning. It was, like, he earned it, right? Like, he was the lead assistant on successful teams.

He had the support of the locker room, support within the organization. He was previously already had head coaching experience in MLS. with Vancouver, but it was just like, ah, this leaves a lot to be desired. And you go, okay, maybe it's just a continuation of the last few years, which, while successful, left a lot to be desired. And this was the opportunity to take a clean break might be a little bit too far, but the opportunity to change and reset the play style to more be like Bob Bradley's L.EFC,

which had been the goal for this club, and less like what Toronto had done over the last few years, which was sacrificing, attacking, impetus for defensive structure and solidity. And Marcus Santos not only didn't go closer to Bob Bradley, he went further away than what Steve Gerundalo did. And ultimately, that's what cost him his job. You started, Tom, by saying he earned it. And I thought you meant getting fired, which I thought was a really mean way to start.

Also true, though. Also true. Joel, the LFCs won two of their last 10 games in major league soccer. They started out the year on fire. They now sit coming out of the loss against Dallas. in sixth place in the Western Conference. They actually only have six games left to play. They've played more than everyone else as well.

So they could fall even closer to the Colorado Rapids in seventh. At the same time, we don't normally see coaches fired at a moment of the season like this. What do you make as you came off your red eye flight about this news? Yeah, I mean, the caveat here is that I didn't see anything this weekend except for the highlights. Patriotism. Patriotism, that's right, yeah. I went to the U.S. Marine Corps Air Show at Marmar with my Vietnam veteran father-in-law.

So that was fun. So I can't tell you what about this weekend brought them past the edge, but I'll say it's been a while coming because, as you pointed out, Dave, they did start out hot this year. They did start out. They were playing good soccer as well.

It wasn't, you know, nobody is, going to mistake it for Wilfred Nancy's crew. And did I just mention Wilfred Nancy? Maybe as a bit of foreshadowing. Is that what we call it in the business? But they were using the ball more. They were actually playing midfielders in midfield. They were playing fullbacks at fullback.

They were trying to look, they were still obviously going to be a counter attacking transition team first and foremost, which is fine. You can do that, but still have a plan B, where you're effective when you have to carry the game. And as the season went along, they went further and further and further from having any sort of plan B.

Like they became more one-dimensional and it had to go in the other direction. And now what we've seen over the past month and a half, two months as they've gone into this, what is it, two wins and ten across all competitions or maybe it's just league play. I don't remember what... Two wins and 10 in MLS.

Yeah. Is that... Look, we know that this is how it goes with counterattacking teams. We know that by mid-late summer, they get solved. It is a good way to start the year because you just have to stay organized and rely on your talent up top. But the game gets more complex as teams log more miles with each other on the field. And teams that just defend and then hit get solved. And we're seeing it happen to Houston.

And we see it happen every single year to Charlotte. And LAAFC, with all due respect to Houston and Charlotte, are a bigger club with more talent and more ability to bring in talent and should play a different, more expansive style of soccer. And Mark Dos Santos, I think his remit was to actually try to make that happen. And he didn't. And now he's gone. Well, I understand the point there. And maybe that was his idea.

but like, like Tarundolo did in the past, where, you know, maybe you say the right things in a press conference, in the first time that, you know, you go back to that famous summer, I believe it was 24, a Columbus L-AFC, and Columbus just absolutely blitzed them and murdered them off the pitch.

This was when LFC were playing a little bit more expansive. And it was like from that moment on, we got punched in the face. How we're going to react is put our hands up and try to block everything, sit deep. Let that never happen again. We have Denny Belonga. They didn't have son at the time,

but they had one of the most special players in the league, particularly dynamic in transition. And I don't know if I haven't seen enough examples of Marco Santos actually genuinely trying to do that this season. It helped when they had Stephen Eustacchio. I still think that they should have kept them, but they didn't, whatever, and they weren't able to, however that went. But how many times did Eddie Seguera start defensive midfield or left back in a way

that he had to go forward? How many attacks died? Like that is on the coach. That is on the coaching staff. Trebka playing left back. He comes. Columbus, a cast off from Columbus and all of a sudden he's a, written in Penn starter for this team.

I was looking at like, because on the face of it, if you just want to go like pure number, like baseline numbers, six in the West, 15th and goals scored, 14th and expected goals. It's not a great season,

but it isn't a disaster, right? It's not like Rootsstrom and Columbus where it's like, all of us are like, yeah, I think this was the right decision because the underlying stuff is 24th in average possession, 23rd in field tilt,

26 and passes per defensive actions. That's just a quant way of saying They give up the ball, they drop deep And they're super cautious and conservative And go, Bwanga and Sun try to solve it for us And even on the games Where they would have a scoring outburst Coming out of the World Cup break

Which coincidentally, I know they had Sun at the World Cup and and But it was a little bit of a break For a manager who was not rotating the team very much Think back to the first games at a season They went up, what was it, 6-0 in aggregate In the Concaf Champions Cup And then ran back all their starters for the second leg

And like that's at the beginning of the season and these are the most obvious spots So like you said to the legs get heavy You get solved But even when you had the little bit of a break And they blitz some bad teams And it looks good, it looks cool But even in those moments of like positivity

It was like oh this is about Sun and Buonga just being different And that's gonna happen So it was almost even in the positive moments You reminded what you're lacking Or what isn't there And then LFC just I don't know Like it's really disappointing

how this all ended up. It was Sun Buonga and David Martinez. Davy Martinez is not on the team anymore. So maybe that's part of why Mark DeSantis has gotten. Tom, you made a lot of good points, the underlying sort of conversation. I think the other piece of it is, it is not Mark DeSanto's starting a new project. It's Mark DeS Santos' project. That's where I think none of us are surprised, which is the frustration you feel is not

he's been doing this for four or five months. It's this is two and a half years. And that's on John Thorrington. John Thorrington chose the assistant of the head coach who left where it felt like he had run his course. And we had Vanity Sartini on the show at some point a few weeks ago, and he talked about in Vancouver. Like at some point, players start to hear your message a little bit, and it's time for a new voice. And we've seen what Sorensen does. Was promoting Mark Dos Santos the new voice?

Probably not. And I think that's where I'm most surprised in this moment is that John Thornton is that John Thornton now turn the pressure up on himself because we have said over and over he is the sporting identity of this club he brought he brings coaches in like a steve tronzo whose only experience at a professional level was the two team under john thornton mark dos Santos who of course coached in vancouver and around but his now number one credential is being an assistant at lafc and leans into the fact that john thornton wants to set the way this team plays so the pressure now firmly goes to him because he's fired the coach.

So if it doesn't work again, one, you've gotten the coach higher wrong twice. And two, if we're going to start to look into this deeper, Doyle, it's going to at some point end on the guy who signs the players who want to play transitional, signs 15 centerbacks, signs players that have to play out of position. Like, at some point, that pressure is going to fall there. Yeah, absolutely. And I think deservedly. And even if he did get this wrong. And I don't think he had a strong summer. He really hasn't had a strong year in terms of roster build,

but that shouldn't obviate the previous eight years, where he's been clearly one of the best GMs in the league and someone who I would trust implicitly to dig his way out of this ditch. It's not a particularly deep ditch at all for most of other teams in the league. This is actually a plateau. This is like a high point. I mean, but that's the standard that they've said.

I think Marko Santhos won 19 games this year across all competition. I think Portland had won 19 in two years. Like semi-final of the Concapt Champions Cup, like a, yeah, they didn't lose any games in the league's cup. They didn't advance. But like, that's kind of why I said. If you just look at it like face value, like super like box score like lazy, it's like, like that doesn't seem like a fireball offense, but, but obviously it's everything that's

underneath. Well, it brings us then to the, you know, the elephant in the room, which is Wilfred Nancy at this point is the single best. coaching free agent in MLS history, right? Like he's at no point other than maybe like Bob Bradley in 2021 right before he went to Toronto FC was there a guy out of a job who was such a perfect fit for an MLS team. Obviously didn't work out with Bob in Toronto. Bob in 2018 or before like LFC's expansion.

Like your problem was a little bit of damaged goods at that point, I think. Remember he did he interview for Vancouver and not get it or not take it? Yeah, whereas I think Wilfred Nancy could probably have 22 jobs tomorrow in this league. And so that's the thing. Why do this now? Why fire the guy after he loses a game in international break, missing half his rest? Like maybe there's some urgency now. Maybe they feel like they could get Wilfred Nancy.

And like this is like, let's move quick. Let's end the year with something for our fans to be happy about. let's sell ticket renewals against this and let's build something that wins multiple trophies in the years to come. So maybe, and I think that's a fair theory and whether it's Nazi or somebody else. But I do believe that this has more to do with

Sunyongman is 34, Aaron Long turns 34 before the playoffs, Ugola Lurice is 39, Danny Mouang is 31. That fantasy football league is falling apart. I hope Joe Santos wasn't in it. It'd be awkward. But I think that this is them looking around. It reminds me when we're talking about Nazi,

a little bit of the crew when they fired Roodstrom the game before they entered the World Cup break for two months. And it was like, we don't think that we have a chance at winning in the Open Cup quarterfinals if he's our coach. I think the L.A.F. in the front office, Thornton, Neil McGinnis, and everybody else looked at this

and said, I don't think we have a real chance in the playoffs if he's a coach. I think that they'd rather refresh, even if this ends with so they haven't named an interim manager yet. Our guys at Happyfoot, Sadfoot, say that you know, probably going to be Andy Rose but who knows Doyle, maybe that means that maybe they have an ace up their sleep, whatever it is. If it's Andy Rose for the rest of the season, I think this is the way that you refresh things.

Like, at the very least, they think this gives them a better chance this year. And with Nancy, I will say, multiple MLS clubs have called them. I'm sure all of the teams that have had a vacancy this year, but I can personally confirm several of them. And everybody else spoke to said that it was a polite, hey, thanks for the call. I'm focused on Europe right now. I'm not ready to come back to MLS. granted this is obviously a different job there's the the roster as is the financial support the everything that comes at all you see and oh by the way the allure of hollywood and being in los angeles

and this is also after the summer where maybe he was expecting an opportunity in europe that never came he's a principled man i know that he has felt strongly about i did the if my one chance in europe was that Celtic job i'm not like i want another chance but maybe that doesn't come and maybe all of those things lead him to reconsider his position on, I'm focused on Europe, but that has been the feedback that he's given other clubs before this. Right, and things can change. Again, there is familiarity.

Neil McGuinness was the Chief Scout. Worked closely with Wilfrid Nancy in Columbus. So there's that. And then when you look at the LFC side of things, not to go to trying to read between the lines or deduce things too strongly without totally knowing. But, like, Doyle, you made the point that it was Toronto. First Senior Job, that was the guy who succeeded Bob Bradley.

Bob Bradley is a big name, big voice, he's earned having a big say in the way the club goes. When you hire somebody for the first senior job, yes, Steve Sherendolo is somebody to be respected, but like there's a power dynamic there. And then when you hire his assistant, who is probably not getting another job this cycle, or maybe people knew that he was going to get the LFC job, there's a sincere power dynamic there again. If you hire Wilford-Nansi, he's going to need to get assurances that he's going to have a big say. and people usually don't like giving up any power. But maybe then, you know, now we're doing criminal analogy.

And they're like, well, maybe John Thorrington's backed into, you know, a corner somewhat here. And I do know, I have heard repeatedly over the past few years, LASC ownership is not happy about the play style. Not happy about it at all. You talk about it at all. Maybe. Maybe. You know, if you want to reverse that, then Wilfred Nazi makes the most place.

One quick note, talk to people around the league and ask them, like, who is the best assistant coach? Like, who's the guy ready to step up? Andy Rose is a name that has come up a lot. Good point. I would be surprised if it went to another assistant coach long term. They simply can't. They simply can't.

But, like, again, he's really well regarded. But 36 years old, he was an assistant for the Seattle Sounders for four years. And then with LAFC, he would be the rare Bob Bradley, Brian Schmetser tree combo. I think he probably would be the only one out there. Tom, you mentioned a lot of stuff. I want to go back to one thing on the non-say side first, which is I did emergency pie with Travis Helwig yesterday from Happy Foot. Sadfoot, one of our friends in our MLS soccer collective out L-AFC. And I said to him, you know, I think for NANCE, there's perception externally as well when

you have a role like that. And like, for whatever we want to call it, LAFC is a step up from Columbus. Orlando and Portland are not. And I think, you know, Orlando has made some big moves. They have a presence in South America and Brazil. They brought in Griesman, Portland. It's probably the job I would take if I was going to be an MLS coach as an individual. But like if Nonsei wants to do something different and special,

LAFC have the potential to be a super team. Their perception in Mexico and the region and what they can do. And coaching sun puts you on a different level globally than whatever else you could do in Columbus for as good as Kucho is and for as much as they built. So I do think it on top of the timing you mentioned where now the summer is gone, You haven't gotten a job, so whatever job Wilfrid Nancy gets in Europe will be a Celtic situation where he takes over midseason, how much times does he get and all of that? On top of all of this, we have to mention the sprint season. Like, you know, on September 28th, you are, what, six months away from two MLS Cup finals.

If you think this roster's good, and I'll bet money that John Thornton thinks this roster is pretty freaking good, you have the potential to save two cup runs in this short. time span and you could even say to a coach, come here reset things and we're completely open to the idea that you could find a better role going forward next summer or the summer after which, as Nancy has said, he hated about the Columbus Celtic situation of having to leave in the winter to respect the club he was at, but then take over a club in a bad situation at a bad time. So whether it's not, I think the sprint season plays a factor in this, in the ability to win something pretty quickly. And I would throw in the wrinkle on top of all of this, which is the owner of this team just became commissioner of the league. And at some point, we'll have to

hand over reins of this club over the next few weeks, months, whatever it is. And that just feels like a little bit of a factor. Besides Andy Rose and Wilfred Nancy, is there any names that popped to mind or any things you're thinking about outside of that? For me, I don't have specific names. Doyle, maybe you do. But like, this is a, club that's so well positioned in that any MLS vacancy is going to get a lot of people reaching out. L.EFC is going to have a really, really wide pool. And they're unique in that I could see like a big league at Mackey's manager. I could see somebody from South America. And of course, the European ties and what they've done on the playing roster, whether it was Sun or Giroud,

or Ugo-Lor-Ris, like, they're well connected in all of these pools. And they have the brand name of being in Los Angeles and everything, like the connections that they've made over the years, Keelini, bail, all them. This is, or Wagon, whether it's Nazi or pick your favorite experience MLS manager, this is a team that could go in a lot of different directions. And I don't know which the best one would be beyond Wulfurnanasi. I think that's where we all agree. But it's normally an MLS.

It is a very wide pool given, like if you're in the, if you're Manchester City, Liverpool, Rionandembourg, Barcelona, there's only so many managers, so many players that got in your pool. MLS is much wider and larger. And I think L.EFC is uniquely even wider and even larger, given that they've done Trundleau and Dos Santos. Those are basically internal kind of things or rising coaches. But then they have all of the other connections for either big names arising from other places. So I think the pool should be very wide. Tom, breaking news, Bobby Smyrini Otis, interview for LASC happening now.

Do we feel like this is the best job in MLS? I think that a lot of people would say Miami, if I was an ambition, if I was Wilternanxi, I would not touch that Miami job with a 30-foot pole. Like that is clearly the most high profile in a jail job in MLS. But this is the best one, right? Yeah, it's a club that takes themselves seriously. It's a club in the global market that has done to an extent some things that are new, right? The way they've gone out and spent on young players before other clubs, their ability to move

players through the Mexican market into Europe, ability to retool, and then still also get a Giroud on Tam, get a Loris, get a son to come. But also, like, they haven't really leaned into the LA galaxy of, like, we are star-driven to sell tickets, and we don't really care what the soccer looks like. So, yeah, I think for someone like Nonsei, I do think this is the best case in error in the best job. And as I've said, like, I think they are already a fairly global club in the MLS context. Right. It's the galaxy. It's Miami. It's maybe Seattle and then maybe one of the New York teams, but in general, someone would just call them New York. So I don't even know that they would know what the team is. Like, you wear an L.A.FC. Jersey outside the U.S., people know what it is.

And I think for sure, like in Mexico, they're considered a Higante, which is 130 million people that love soccer and care about this. So I definitely think it's a big job. We have a lot in the chat, which I don't disagree with. I said last night on the short appearance. Nonsei doesn't really fit in the talent with a lot of these guys. Nonsei is an incredible coach. And one of the things he does really well is he gets guys to believe in themselves and do more. They are normally the unathletic good possession players.

And L.A.F.C. is filled with athletic bad possession players. Like, I don't know Timothy Tillman's future and Wilfred Nonsei team. I don't know some of these guys. But you would take it. He's won with Montreal. He's one with Columbus. Yeah. You would take it and you figure it out later.

And if I'm another MLS team, that's great because now I'm looking at these pieces and saying who's available and who maybe they have to move to get some allocation money and all this stuff to rebuild. But those are conversations we're down the road because we don't even know who it'll be. one one name that some lefc fans have floated uh el turqu mohammed the tuluka uh head coach which would be no funny given the direct relationship between him the lefccc f everything that happened um in the in the congev champions cup but like not probably he doesn't maybe make sense for this team but that's the kind of thing where um i did look up i forgot that uh jardine former club america manager who won everything

with that club he's in the middle east right now uh but like names of that ilk like i think they would be picking up the phone. Maybe they're calling L.A.F.C. You know what I mean? Like, not that it's indicative of much, but like, I've had multiple people reach out to me and be like, hey, do you know if they have a, if they've already like got a lined up a replacement or no? Like to find out if they're going to call LAFC.

And so these are the things that I'll have. Anybody who's connected to LFC are going to get a lot of calls. Last piece on this. Do you have them in a conversation as a contender this year in the West? It's such a boring answer. but it's dude it's MLS man like the Red Bulls made MLS Cup a couple years ago against the galaxy and the galaxy since winning have have gone the other way and yeah but it turned out Daniel outman was the best player in league history David gottze.

David got so the playoffs started today yeah LFC would play the San Jose earthquakes yeah if you had to bet your life on a result in that series LFC are technically the underdog what would you do are we going to do the Zach low bit don't bet your life you don't have to bet your whole life but um but like everything is a cool story until it's like oh that team has Denny Buonga, son, young men. For sure. Also, Dallas is a nice story.

Would you pick Dallas to beat L. have seen a playoff series right now? No. I might. But I agree with you. I wouldn't be surprised if they lost, but like this team. I'd probably, you're absolutely correct.

I'd probably pick L.A.S.C. Go ahead, Dave. Oh, I'm just saying if they were in the east, I would feel different. If they were in the east, I would say there are three teams I feel are clearly better than them. In the West, I think you could feel belief in every single matchup

that you're going to go and win. And to your point, Tom, they will have the best player on the field, maybe the two best players on the field in every single one of those matchups, which is like in the past has been a decent recipe for winning, which I do think is another piece of doing this now. Like light of fire under these guys, try and get a new coach bump, coming out of the international break. Denny Bwanga's overseas tweeting about the games while he's at Gabon.

So everyone's fired up, everyone's locked in, everyone's ready to move forward. We will continue to cover this as we get news. out of it. We will talk about the MLS results. FC Dallas, a 1-0 win over L-A-FC that moved them to second place in the conference. Vancouver dropping points, a 3-3 draw at home against D.C. United on what was a

broken night of Major League Soccer, as you'd expect in an international break. The 3-10-30 games, one team scored three goals in each of them. You had 3-2, 3-3, and 3-1. So it was like a wild way to end a night. We ended it because we started with the U.S. men's

national team in their match against Peru, a 4-1 victory to restart the 2030 World Cup cycle under Maricio Pocetino. 11 players make their international debut. And Tommy Scoops was right there for all of it, Tom. How do you feel? How's your regent? How's your recovery? By the way, regenerate recovery.

I went to St. Louis, like, you'd think that that was the normal thing. The U.S. flew from Orlando on Saturday night after the game to Atlanta to do the region at the NTC. they are currently right now waiting on player availability via Zoom from Atlanta. They fly, they train again, I'm sure, fly. Then later this afternoon, Pochitino's doing his press conference from St. Louis. So it's a lot of flying, and Pochitino has let it slip once or twice in availability. He doesn't love the longer window, which I was kind of surprised because he likes having teams for a while.

But he was like, you know, other federations played three games. I don't know. It's a lot. So I find that to be fun. But when we're just talking about this Peru game, it's a dream start to a new cycle. And I give full credit to Pochitino for one. I didn't think that he was going to call so many young players. I've said this on the show before,

but it's worth reminding. Cabin Solvin earned this start. But there is another world in which if he didn't start, it wouldn't have been like salacious. But Pochitino would have been asked about it. That would have been a big question. Whoever didn't debut against Peru, there would have been questions. They win.

They play very well. The first half, it was a little disjointed, the attack and open play. But they win, they play very well. It ends up being 4-1, and 11 guys debuted. So now you're going into this second game against Chile,

which is before Mexico and Canada. There's going to be obviously a ton of rotation. But like the biggest questions around this team were the young players. Eunice Musa, he starts. They answered all of that. All that's done.

All that's move. And now you get to move forward with, we're just going to do the soccer, talk about the soccer, everything else. It was about as perfect, the cycle, could have started.

Peru aren't very good. I was under the impression that they were going to have some young players too. Eight players in the starting 11 were 30 years or older. Eight. Gargoyles.

But like that's not a super great way to start a new cycle if you're a Peruvian fan. I've talked to a few, a few friends. It was like, oh, how do you guys,

like, talking to people in the stadium who came and said a low wearing a Peru shirt? Like, how do you feel about seeing, ah, you know, uh,

it's like, this is the time for optimism. And like, that's how you start to answer, question. I feel for them. But like, the U.S. played well, and they got a deserved win against a lesser team, and now they're playing Chile, who might be

worse than Peru. I don't know. They had a couple of red cards in their last game, which I don't know if that rules them out for the United States, but all in all, like, you could barely the only questions that you want to take away, so not to be fully positive, is George Campbell wasn't that good, and the, him and Austin

trustee was a little bit disjointed, and the two fullbacks were playing like wingbacks. That's it in terms of, like, critiques I can make. Yeah, I think no one on the field was perfect as will never will ever happen. And inside of all of that, the team put together the performance that helps you sort of cover up that. And for debuts for guys, like, you're going to be shaky, right? Kavin, I thought his decision making was here or there in moments. Peyton Miller as well, like for all the mistakes that sit there, you win for one, no one's

really going to notice. You got your feet wet and now you can get better going forward. I think that to your point I'm of like as a total group, it was a perfect start and that's the most you can ask for. Beating Peru 8-1, which is probably what you'd hope to do doesn't change anything. So there's no point doing it. And now you try and take steps from there. Doyle on top of that, Giorana gets the start. He gets a bunch of minutes. Tyler Adams gets a ton of minutes.

It's always good to see. And Justin Ellis gets the first goal, Julian Hall as well. What stood out for you sort of what have you been thinking about since the game? I mean, I think Tom covered it, right? The fact that they were able to get so many really, really young guys into the lineup and perform like they did. Yeah, Peru stinks right now. Like they're as bad as I've ever seen. Their coach, to be clear, said the clubs don't have gyms.

So players are not in shape. That's what Man Oman said or something. So listen, as a Cienciano die hard. I'm offended, but we do better. We grow together. Tom, does parking lot, beers FC have a gym? We have gym memberships. You have gym memberships.

So, all right. So that's why you're really having. Membership, they didn't delete after the first month. They never canceled after the first month. Look, maybe I'm going to read too much into this. But there's a difference between this generation of teenagers and previous generation of teenagers and the difference is these guys are playing professional games. And I didn't watch more than 15 minutes of the game and then the highlights.

So I can't pull apart the tactics or tell you about every single challenge. But from what I saw and from what everybody said, including you two, they didn't look out of their depth against a team of veterans, against a team that has largely been through Comey Bell qualifying three times now. Like that's the type of roster they were facing. And yeah, it's not the most talented team in the world. And they got to hit the elliptical, I guess, to get into, you know, fully 90 minutes fit. A quote.

But the fact is, we sent out a bunch of children and they beat their asses for one. And I don't think that would happen in previous generations. The breath and depth. And that's with Nico Shakiris, you know, not playing, you know, not getting called in, who is arguably. the best of them this year in MLS. That's with, you know, Matisse-Albert has not broken through yet for Burrish and Dortmund. So, like, there are so many reasons for optimism from this group already. And to see them manifest that over the course of 90 minutes feels really good. But over the course

of this four-game window, the games get progressively harder. So we're going to see. We're going to see how professional they can be in their recovery, how professional they could be when they trail because that's going to happen in this window how professional they can be when they suffer a series of bad tackles that don't get whistled because this is still Concaf, baby. So like all the tests that we want them to be ready for, here they are. They pass the first one. Going to be nothing but more tests coming up. Chris Richards and Cole Campbell were both unavailable because of load management. Yeah.

Tom has to throw the quotes in there. He's so angry. I'm just, listen, David Stern's working for the U.S. National team now, so watch out. Pete Alonzo can't hit anymore. I would be, listen, my guess would be you want Chris Richards on the field

for 90 minutes against Mexico. So I'll be curious to see what you do on Tuesday because coming out of load management and then saying, let's play him 165 minutes over the next five days, probably doesn't make sense. I thought trustee and George Campbell were the weakest points of this game.

I put it in the grades that I put up afterwards. Campbell gets his pocket pick trying to dribble out of the back on the goal. It then comes a little bit readjusted, but I still think that plus not a ton of great moments, although he has great recovery speed. I will say after that moment, he was as cautious as humanly possible on the ball

to the point where it was detrimental. And I'm not trying to pile on because I think he's a good player. He just didn't have a great game, but continue. And then trustee, I thought, I mean, trustee sort of loses contact on that first goal. It's between him and Miller where they both let the Lappodula sort of sit in between them. It's on trusty to communicate whether Adams has the guy in the middle or not. The other issue was the buildouts down the left were kind of a train wreck for the opening 45 minutes. Basically, the moment trustee touched the ball, Peyton Miller heard the start gun and just sprinted to the corner flag.

I don't know if the idea was trusty was supposed to play early into space for him to get to. or if that's what they wanted, but Tillman then left the area. And it didn't get better until Justin Ellis started coming out left and picking up the ball. Ellis, unbelievable story, Tom. He's in Orlando homegrown.

He makes his debut in Orlando. He scores the opening goal. And he played strong overall. Like, this is sort of the stuff we were hoping for. No, and like what a poetic moment that a South Florida kid, him and Alex Freeman. Yeah, him and Alex Freeman were doing a press conference where they didn't play a ton together in Orlando,

like even in the second team. It was like when Freeman was starring and Ellis was just getting in and Freeman graduates to the first team and basically by the time Ellis gets there, Freeman is off to Villarreal. But they're both from South Florida. And it was more or less like we kind of got overlooked

by Miami. They didn't say that directly, but it was like Freeman was helping Ellis when they were both in the second team. Like you're going to get your chance. And it was cool to watch those two. guys interacting and talking about those moments. And then they both start. The U.S. are attacking what is the Orlando City Supporters' Section stand. They get a free kick.

Earlier in camp, Justin Ellis said, Gio Raina was my favorite, has been my favorite national team player. And they've joked that, like, he was like this week, yeah, Gio's never going to let me live that down. I'm going to keep hearing about it. And like when Gio, Gio was showing a lot more of his personality this camp than he did maybe at the World Cup or previous. It's been cool watching some of those things blossom. And Gio told Ellis the night before the game, I'm going to assist you. And then he does. And in the celebration, just like the little human dynamics, how happy they all were for him. You could see it. The smiles are huge. Everybody's giving him a slap on the neck. They're in the corner. They're all together. And I like that togetherness.

And it was Gio Raina who grabbed him and shoved him to go, go have your soul. moment in front of the fans. And like those are little things that I don't know if Gio Rey was doing that a year ago. And maybe it means nothing, but like it's a sign of maturity. And just seeing those little connections, Tyler Adams, when he gets subbed out for Adjia Remyi, Tyler Adams is Aji Mermetti's role model. Audrey said that this week. Tyler said that like obviously I'm well aware of all of the young guys, but I've known

about Audrey for a long time because he came through the pathway I did. I got a lot of connections still at Red Boats. He's played with my brother. I'm going to look out for him. Audrey and Julian Hall said Tyler has had his arm around them this whole camp. And that's been really cool. Tyler Adams is the one subbing off for Hajimimedi. If you guys saw on the broadcast, Tyler's like normal stoic as he's running off.

He looks up when he makes eye contact with Idri Medi. Big smile, a little bit of a left. The camera pans back to Audrey Medi. Huge smile on his face. Like these are the moments that are just so cool. And then by the way, Mehmeti comes into the game immediately goes back to how mature and technical and every, like, like, stoic that he is completes like six. passes including multiple forward passes.

And while his teammate Julian Hall is scoring it getting an assist, like it's, these are the things that you love to see. And these young kids stepped up to the moment for by and large. And there are really few holes of poke. And like, what a, what a dream start. Yeah. If you look at the, if you look at the Burrhalter goal, it starts with a buildup from deep in the, the U.S. defensive half.

And it happens because Mehdi, in his way, gets the ball with defender closing him down, takes the extra touch to drag that defender in, then turns and plays back, which then allows the U.S. to progress up the left flank. It's a little thing, and I think a lot of people would miss it. But like, hovering up more pressure in order to transfer time and space to your teammates

is a superpower because there is a, like there is a baseline of, for professional soccer players, when you have this much time and this much space, you're going to look like Carlos freaking Valderrama passing the ball, right? And what Mimetti does is take so much pressure in from the opposing midfield and front line that suddenly his teammates look like Carlos Valderrama passing the ball progressively. And that's how you end up. up with Seth Burrhalter who hits piss missiles, hitting another piss missile from 25 yards out. A couple more, like, little funny notes if we're out of some of the serious stuff. A lot of these kids' parents were in the stands, which was super cool.

Like Julian Hall's mom flew the morning of. I was worried there was a North Easter in New York, New Jersey, and basically everywhere around along the coast. Thankfully, like, she got in. Obviously, many families there. The Sullivan's are there. The Sullivan's, by the way, the Twitter. in boys were supposed to have a game at St. John's this weekend.

That got canceled. All right, that's one less thing. The parents don't worry about Quinn Sullivan. The games didn't align, so you got to watch your son make a senior national team debut, and then your other son go play an MLS as he continues his store rise. But one funny thing that Kavin Sullivan said after the game, so there's like a friends and family section for the USA. Like the players can facilitate tickets for their families.

Kavan didn't know that, which is kind of funny and like very, very, like, innocent. for somebody who's been such a star through the youth national team ranks and everything. The Sullivan family were not in that section because the Sullivan family bought their own tickets because nobody knew. And Quinn Sullivan has played for the national team. Yeah, I was going to say, more than Kevin,

it feels like this is on the Sullivan family who have been around. Isn't that like something like... No, I respect that they're like, no, no freebies for us. We're going to pay our own freight every single time. So, like, there was a moment at the end of the game, like, Kavin was looking in the stands. it seemed like he was looking for, like, his family.

Like, he got asked after the game about it. And he starts laughing. He goes, yeah, now I know that, like, I had to try to ask a security guard to let them down. Nice. And, like, but, like, it's just a joyful, it's a little story that's just, like, a joyful moment in this camp. Like, Marisa Poitino said earlier in the week, like, these young players make me feel younger. And you could kind of feel that around the camp. And obviously, winning 4-1 makes that true.

And that's why we can tell these little funny, silly stories. And if it was a different result, this probably wouldn't be coming. coming up so much, but they earned it, man. And now they go ahead and play Chile in St. Louis tomorrow. I put this on our socials. You know, Kevin's, he turned 17 today as a time of recording. So happy birthday to him. Just being on the field and being competitive is an accomplishment.

At that age, he didn't look fully like himself. One of the things that's been great in Philly is when he's realized when to call his number because he is a game breaker and a difference maker, even in moments that maybe feel like the right pass is to move it along. But at 16, making your debut, like, that's going to happen. And hopefully it builds over the next few games at the same time. He almost scored. He created two half chances.

He ran into Pedro Gaiese and started a fight. So, like, you know, he got the stat line that you'd expect from a Sullivan out of Philadelphia. And it's exciting. Like he, as we've talked about over and over, is one of the biggest prospects we've ever seen on the same weekend that Jolberto Mora goes and scores his first goal. The difference with this, Joe Berto Moore is wearing the 10 and has the entire nation's future resting on his shoulders. The U.S. played 11 of these guys in this game, and it's not all responsibility on one of their shoulders. And I think you heard that in Kavana's post game comments of like came up with this guy. you know, everyone he was asked about Justin Ellis, all these other guys, came up to this guy,

youth national team with this guy, know that dude, played against this guy. And I think that part makes it a little bit easier is they're doing it as a group and they're doing it together. Julian Hall comes off the bench. He scores. Again, this, when it was Josie, this was our entire national team hinges on this guy's future. Now you're one of 11. That gets to do something like this. I mean, literally we had two teenage center forward score this game.

And we have, so Matisse Halber. comes off the bench. His first thing he does is wins a penalty. And Pojitino's talk about that after the game was like, look at this. He goes bang, bang, goes forward.

Was it a penalty? I'm not sure, but doesn't matter. That's not his fault. But like, if that was the only thing that happened, we would have spent 15 minutes on that. If Neil Pierre's debut was the only thing that happened,

we would have spent five minutes on. Like, who happened, we haven't talked about Diego coaching. We haven't, we haven't talked, Sebastian Buralter, the goal for Julian Hall,

unbelievable assist. And then he scores a banger from deep. We haven't said Zavier Gozo's name yet. We haven't said Frankie Westfield's name. Brooklyn Raines. There's just so much here, like, kind of told to your point about, like, Gibraltar and Mexico and Gaza, you said about, like, when Josie broke through with the U.S., or whether it was Juan Agadello, or Bregshank, or insert anybody, that was the entire focus.

And kind of like Cabin is going to get a lot of the headlines. We didn't talk about Gavin Sullivan until we were, like, 22 minutes into this conversation because there was just so many other things that go. And again, Eunice Musa, I thought he was going to be in the cold as long as Marisa Bocetor was the manager. He's back. He's starting. Tyler Adams goes 88 minutes and sometimes that would be

Top of Conversation. Alex Freeman this week is like laughing a little bit like yeah like at the World Cup he's this breakout young rising star three months later he's a veteran in this group that like the young guys are coming to him and he goes like yeah it's fun like

it's a new role for me to like be a leader and like that's what I want to be and Malik Tillman he's 24 yeah it's like a grizzled vent oh yeah when I did the show with Dunny last week it was like okay the vats and it's like Gioranus 23. This is the way I contextualize this

this weekend. Hormiga Gonzalez, who's like the other great hope right now for Mexico, Tudy N.A had like you could scan a QR code and watch a Hormiga camp. You could just watch him. He's a 23-year-old playing for Olympiacos. Zavirgos came off the bench for the U.S. As Tom mentioned, we haven't even talked about

him, you know, 40 plus minutes into a show, and he's already in the Premier League and is four years younger than him. So yes, there is a lot to be excited about. There's a lot to look forward to. The Chile game now is interesting. Like there's no doubt that from a like cultural and perception point of view,

getting a result against Mexico and Canada means more than against Chile. But also any slip up I think is going to be looked at pretty seriously. And this now to me is the toughest one because it's this in-between game of who do you want fresh to start against Mexico? Who do you want to be the core in the spine of the team? I cannot imagine Chris Richards doesn't start that game. My assumption is Tyler Adams won't start on Tuesday. I can't see him playing him. He shouldn't play a minute, honestly.

I don't think Giorina will either. I think those are probably the three that you look at and say those are the quote unquote veterans who you're keeping. Jedi didn't start this game. So that will be an interesting one. He was a difference maker off the bench when he got there. And Musa will see. Like, I love the things he does.

He still doesn't do the things he doesn't do. And that's going to be the question. Yeah, I don't know. But listen, I don't want to compare him to Darlington Nagby, but, like, at some point we all just gave up wanting him to play that, like, do more things going forward and just enjoyed him for what he is. He doesn't, Musa isn't that yet, and maybe he will be. But, like, at some point, I'm just like, all right, like,

we know what he is and what he isn't, and maybe that doesn't change. And hey, what is. It's good. It's good we have a press-resistant option back in central midfield. Because, yeah, the Darlington Nagby comp is the right one, because you can give Musa the ball in traffic and he'll just reset possession for you. It's just, it hurts sometimes

because if you could figure out a way to just meld Musa and Burrhalter together, you'd have the perfect soccer player. But that's another one, gosh. I want Burrhalter to play against Mexico, but he didn't start the first game, so he's probably going to start this one. But also, he's a machine.

I just assume if he needed to fly 360 minutes, he could. He shouldn't, but I bet that he could because he's... His recovery is running an ultra-marathon. today. There's the moment post game where he was talking about football and then he tried to correct over to soccer and you're like, it just feels like Greg sitting on the day and it just feels back at home.

If you are listening to us via Sirius Radio, we're going to run a little bit long now. We will have all of your coverage coming out of the Chile game on Wednesday. We're going to have Walker Zimmerman and Vani Sartini join us. So we're going to talk to USM&T. We also, I believe, we'll have a U.S. Women's National Team roster to break down as well as they head towards those games against Spain. So we'll have that coming up. We've got your NWSA coverage as we do every single week. And of course, we will be back on Thursday with a miscellaneous mailbag show that we're going to be doing the three of us together.

In light of that, we're going to move to our MLS conversation now. And I have a little bit of a quiz for you for the best thing we saw this weekend instead of whatever crap you guys wanted to talk about. Um, Sergei Solan scored his 11th goal this weekend. He is the sixth player in MLS history to be a rookie who played in college to have scored double digit goals in their first season. I have the list of the other five and I want to know how many you guys can get. I want to start rookies who played in college. I want to start because I saw this stat, found it interesting and wondered, I wonder who

the other five were. Did you look at up? And then I didn't look because I didn't go the extra yard. I didn't try to get 1% better every day. And now I'm paying for it. Well, I'm glad Doyle's here because half this list I don't think Tom is going on. Yeah, even. That's why I was worried about flight delays.

But let's start. Yeah. What? Duncan McGuire. No. What? What? I guess I can look it up and make sure that the list is right.

I bet he had like nine MLS goals and like four other competitions. Yeah. That would be my guess. Well, that hurts. You were in a decent territory with that, but Duncan McGuire. Duncan McGuire had 14 goals as well. Yeah, I don't know what the hell this list is that.

Yeah. I have a list. We windle. Duncan McGuire. Yeah. Kyle Laron. That's the Orlando City contingent. So I don't have.

Is it rookies out of college or is it rookies who were drafted out of college? But it would be the same. Well, so to be clear, D.K. only scored eight his rookie year. Oh, there you go. Oh, that's because it was a shortened. It was a COVID year. Yeah, Jordan Morris is correct.

So Jordan Morris is correct. My list had Jordan Morris and Kyle Aaron. So you have both of those. And Duncan McGuire. And Duncan McGuire, which I didn't have. So now it's a seven person list. And we need three more. Yeah.

Jeff, Jeff Cunningham. Jeff Cunningham was not on this list. I'm looking, Doyle. Just keep guessing. I know how to look things up now one by one. I'm not sure you do. Jeff Cunningham had eight goals, his rickier.

Yeah. So you've been formally invited to suck it. Fair enough. You know what? I'm batting 500 at this point, so I'm going to buy out there. I wonder if Jeff Cunning. Protect my numbers.

Okay, so there are three that you have not gotten. I can give you a clue on all of them. All right. Go for it. One, did not play for the U.S., and Tom has to work alongside now. To be clear, all of these are pre any of us working on MLS. Right. So we're in that territory. So someone who works at Galaza?

No. Work alongside was probably a tough one. It's not bad. Helps get player assigned now. Oh. Domani Ralph. There you go. I can't believe I didn't get that.

11 goals in 2003. And here's your next clue. He was not the only rookie in 2003. Oh, shoot. And the other, and this person is someone we also talk about still on the show. So played in 2003, scored 10 goals,

and still gets talked about in 2026. Oh, this is going to bother me. Give it to us. I'm not going to get it. He coaches in Major League Soccer. Not a national team guy, but not far off. Soccer royalty. Pat for us.

Oh. Yep. Good for him. And then the last one, someone I've never heard of, Doyle, you would have probably had a song for this person when you were playing the trombone in Giant Stadium. The Cornet. The Cornet.

Rodrigo Faria? Oh, yeah, Rodriguez, Ferria. He... Never heard of him either. Well, the famous San Jose earthquakes come back against the galaxy in 2004. Yeah, that's Faria scoring the final goal. And he was... He sandbagged it at the Combine because the Metro Star's coach at the time.

knew of him and knew that he was good. So he's like, yeah, suck at the combine. So you dropped to us with the 12th pick in the draft. But I thought, I thought this was coming out of college. Yeah, this is a little confusing to me. Yeah, he played at Concordia College. And then I don't know what he did for a year after that. And then he played for the Metro.

Yeah, yeah. At the time. Listen, I would like this to be known. I read the stat. I googled it. Google's AI thing. brought this list up. And I said, okay, interesting.

Yeah. That's on you. You can tell he's an executive, gosh. I'm going to blame AI. Congratulations, though, to Sergio Solanz, who has now scored 11 goals this year and RSL won a game for the first time in like two months. They beat New England this weekend.

I think as we expected, it was like a weird weekend of Major League Soccer, as it tends to be. This is our drive to the playoff segment. though, presented by Continental Tire, long-time partner and supporter of MLS and American Soccer. And Tom, the big game we looked at coming into this weekend was Philadelphia against Orlando. Both teams missing a ton of players.

Philly got out to a 4-0 lead. Milan Alasky had a hat trick. They win 4-2 in the end. And here is the stat. The Philadelphia Union have taken 32 points from their last 12 matches. It's tied for the most points in the 12-game span in MLS history. it's the first time since Seattle in 2018. So no Kevin, no Neil Pierre, a ton of these pieces out,

and it's like Ryan Richter's boys just keep rocking. Yeah, and Griesman did start, played 90 minutes. He was available. D.K. was starting in place of Justin Ellis. Like, yes, Orlando were missing players too, but that was still a strong enough side, Martino Heda and Gulo. Milotelowski's so good. He really is.

It took him a little bit at the beginning of the season, as it did for a lot of other players. I wonder what the common denominator was. he's just so very good. And, and Doyleu, this goes back to the point that you make so very often. If you're, if you're scoring goals and your underlying numbers are there in the U.S.L. championship or MLS and X-Pro, that's a pretty decent bet that you're going to be successful. And obviously Alasky proved in an MLS with San Diego before he went to the Philadelphia Union.

And we said it at the time. If the contract talked did not go well between Alaski and San Diego, San Diego were basically like non-starter. This was too much, like, we're not, we're going to be too far away. way we'll let you go somewhere else. When the Philadelphia Union are the team that's paying the player that it's usually the other way around. So that was an indicator of like, oh, I trust them and I trust San Diego as well. But I was like, oh, that's interesting that it's the union and not a different team that is San Diego would view it as an overpay because they didn't pay it. And

he's been so incredibly good for this team in this run. It has been him, Kamenzolva, and near Pierre, a lot of other players, but like he's at the heart of it. And he gets a hat trick and drives this team forward when some of the youngsters aren't there. Andy Vasslev has a few assists. And that's my takeaway that like this union team like they're, they're climbing towards a home playoff game. Like you can't you can't take them out. Like this team was 15th when the when we return from the World Cup break.

And Ryan Richter, I don't know if or when they're going to name them the manager. If they did it, maybe they should tomorrow. Right. Like, and he said like, you know, I made it clear that I want the job, but like he respects everything from the club. and nothing is stopping this team at the moment. 15 goals and 19 games for Milan-Eloski since moving to center forward. He spent the first two and a half, three months of the season playing in midfield because

Bradley Cardnell is bad at his job. Doyle, I like the point you made on the show last week when I wasn't here about watching minutes with Philadelphia, right? They've played a lot of players. So to get a win on a weekend where you're missing all. these guys and they have that next sort of 11 that pushes in there but like ben bender gets a start andrew rick gets a start um seri larsen gets a start we talked about hazes bueno last show i think that feels like a really good sign as well that it's not just we've got a solution with these three players

playing at an elite level but there are more there's more in the stable with this yeah they were able to get some contributions i thought indivasselov um another guy who we don't talk about a lot because he runs the hard yards, but he's been a much better, more dangerous player since Richter took over. I thought he was willing to take some chances with his passing and actually completed them as well. And if he's going to do that,

then it makes it a lot easier to use Queen Sullivan as a super sub or to buy Kevin Sullivan 60 minutes of rest occasionally and bring him in as a super sub. The other aspect about this, we mention every now and again, but it deserves a big callout, given the amount of injuries we see around the league. Philly's training staff is phenomenal. It's phenomenal.

They never have, and I'm worried I'm jinxing them here or something, but like they never have a rash of injuries, despite playing, you know, full out, high octane, pressing soccer for 90 minutes a game. They have their guys fit to a degree. that nobody else in the league matches. And I don't know what their secret is. But I've said, like, if I was going to buy one DP from Philadelphia Union, it would be whoever, like, is the head athletic trainer because he keeps their best guys healthy

all year long. Here's the delicious part. Other than Andre Blake for some reason, who was clearly playing on one leg for the past year and a half. Here's the delicious part. Someone who loves international soccer. I watched Dominican Republic, Trinidad, and Tobago last night. I'm deep in the message boards on what's going on in Costa Rica.

We are going to come out of the international break. Philly's going to play RSL. Then midweek and the following weekend, they're going to play Chicago, who sit three points ahead of them, and Charlotte, who sit four points ahead of them, and then the revs, and then Nashville. So not only can they solidify themselves in a conversation to actually win an east, they could secure a home playoff game by the end of that week if they're able to take care of business.

And right now there's no reason. not to believe that they can. It was the big game of this weekend, but there was a lot of movement in the standing. Chicago knocks off Charlotte 1-0 on the road. A big result. Obviously, inter- Miami dropped points late on Sunday night in Sunday night soccer. Messi's not super happy about stuff.

Not really sure what's going on. And maybe the moment of the weekend is Jamal Chieri, saying, I scored him ripping the shirt off. and his teammates just holding on for dear life to the back of that shirt. Just like, come on, dude. Let's get out of here with three points for the first time in forever. It was, it was, yeah, no, it was a, it was a hell of a, of a capstone on the weekend. I did watch a bunch of, of that game, the Miami and Columbus game.

Miami looked broken right now. Yeah. Their body language is terrible. energy is bad. The new coach is trying out new formations. Their shit housing is off the charts and good on Laurent Corteur for calling that out. I think Lauren Cartois said, if I was playing, I would get red carded within five minutes against guys.

I thought he said I'd get five red cards. I read that wrong. I just saw the five. Either way, the point is made. Like, I, look, man, no athlete in history has brought me more joy than Lionel Messi. like watching this guy play soccer is a gift but it is it is joyless this Miami team and it is gross and I'll say like the best thing I saw this weekend was a text from my buddy Tim who is like a borderline soccer fan who has gotten it into a little bit more over the past couple years

and he texts me every week he's like I'm hate watching Miami this week I hate watching Miami this week and it's because of all the shit housing and it's not a that blow up in their face the way it did. I enjoyed it too, you know, and I'm ostensibly neutral about these things, but they've been so odious about it all year long that I, I'm

I'm hate watching them too, man. I like seeing this team fall on its face. Gonic Bright went off injured. Yeah. And the first time, I did not like seeing that. I forgot David Aisjalo was on this team. I'm still surprised they didn't buy him out at midseason.

Because he's at the end of his contract. Buy him out at season open up that U-22 slot and bring in another Argentine U-20. Maybe an Ecuadorian centerback that you could play out of position. Speaking of the centerbacks, what do you guys think about Casamero in the back line? Because I just hate it.

I'm not going to say I hate it, but it's like it's a band-aid. And it's, why do we keep doing this, though? Like, Sergei Bousquet's ended up there, Swine Steiger, like, they clearly do not trust young centerbacks. They, they have rotated through some, the best young centerback they've had was Noah Allen. He was also the best young left back they had, and they sold them for a handful of magic beans.

And now playing a three at the back, guess who it fits perfectly as a left centerback? Right. Wait, I didn't even look into it. Did Noah Allen play for Greece? No, because he got called up. Yeah, did he get caught up to the first team or you 21? No, no, he was you 21.

You're right. I was like, did Noah Allen play against Germany in a Greece win? And I forgot about checking into that. Yeah, and for Columbus, by the way, like not completely out of it, which I'll be totally honest with you. I didn't even realize. So Columbus right now, they are four points off a playoff spot because NYCFC can't win a game. Cincinnati, this was the other big result. Josh, real quick.

Real quick, gosh, do you still have NYCFC as inner circle contenders for MLSC? I do. Okay, good, yeah. It has fallen apart so fast. I cannot even explain it to you. Like, I don't understand. the defensive core was strong for this group. I think

big part of it was that just like the Sounders like all their dudes got hurt all at once. But then I think what we're seeing is like maybe they don't have the cultural infrastructure that the Sounders veterans had and you know bringing all these guys like because Aiden O'Neils, well he wasn't back this week but like their guys are

healthy now and they're still making the same kinds of mistakes. And that's a big uh-oh. Yeah. Like things like maybe maybe this locker room isn't altogether now. And Nirore coming in. Having three goal contributions in the last nine or ten games, like when you take him out or like obviously when he's there,

but like they're pretty average in attack without Nika Mercow. And then Trowaree coming in being terrible, in theory shouldn't matter because it's not like he's replacing someone. He's an ad. But it just feel like culturally maybe it broke some stuff of like some players get belief. and then you replace them for someone who's worse and it doesn't seem to have fit.

So I am still super hopeful that the nine-seat NYCFC will make a run. Hey, Red Bulls did it a couple years ago. Speaking of, by the way, game on Wednesday night now. New York Red Bulls against St. Louis. That game was delayed from Saturday because of the Nor'Easter and it will be played on Wednesday. It doesn't change anything for international. I will say I was very happy to see

that the majority of players who are called up at least on the U.S. side for youth national team camps were available this weekend. So the only MLS game in the window, guys like Johnny Shore were still getting MLS minutes, as they should have, which I complained about last week. For Red Bulls, I don't know if that means like a Matto Santos was going to be available, and now he won't. They have 10 players that have been called up. St. Louis only player who has been called up is Damien Downs, who hasn't really played it on.

Glory, Hallelujah. I mean, this should be the last time we ever have to deal with this. Because with the schedule change, MLS, one of the points they've made, and I know that for a fact that this is one of the points that the union is fighting for as well, no more playing through international dates. So, like, what we saw this weekend with these, you know, half-filled teams, Chicago starting a 4-4-2 with no actual forwards, Montreal with three guys on the bench. Beating FC Cincinnati. Yeah, true. Kim Cooper Sanchez, who's a midfielder starting on the wing, like all of this nonsense, which we have watched for 30 years

because MLS has been stubborn about playing through international dates. This was it. This was the last one. So it was figuring all this shit out like the Chinese do now. God, yeah, right? I hope I didn't just change. It would be the most MLS thing ever if they changed the schedule to mirror Europe and still kept playing through international dates.

I think even for a. MLS that's a bridge too far. I think they should do one next year just for like the old heads, just like for fun. Like just like, isn't that so hilarious? Are we being so funny? We call it MLS Heritage Day. Exactly. To be clear, Liga Max played through.

Also true. I'll break this weekend. I do think then the World Cup makes it even harder because you're trying to slam games in. Out in the Western Conference. So we already said Dallas beat L.A.F. So they moved to second place in the West. San Jose smoked Portland. in that first half go.

If you haven't seen it, watch Preston Judd's second goal. Paul Marie cuts back on the side line outside of the boot, low cross. Judd is backtracking. Basically like an NFL wide receiver, like defender in between him and the ball, facing him. And he does like out or like middle of his foot into the far corner as he falls over goal. And San Jose now are in third place in the Western Conference. All of that was possible because sporting Kansas City,

beat Houston because Andre Luis is the best freaking player in this league. First goal, not a tap-in, but a pretty good finish. The second goal, defenders on skates, this guy is a monster time. He may be our player of the weekend. I'm just warning you. He was awesome. He's taking the league very quickly. You could see it in like the first videos that Kansas City put up of a training session.

Obviously, that's curated. It's going to be positive. But like the way that he was moving, it was like, whoa. I hope that that kind of translates to a game. and then very quickly it translated to games. And this was a really big performance. A man like Kansas City needs any boost of optimism. And you'd feel really great about at least he's part of the foundation moving forward.

There were worries about in overpay or worries about what he did in Greece. When the under like why he was signed for what he was. Tom, don't just read from tactics free zone. Give us your own opinion. Is that? Is that when you said? No, it's not. It's not actually.

Let me give you this Tom. So when he joined Sporting Kansas City, I'm just going to do some quick math, five and then eight. Sporting Kansas City had scored 23 goals on the season. They've eight goals in the last three games. So they had a 1.1.0 goal per game average, which was last in Major League Soccer. And since he has joined, they have been like electric to watch. So best case scenario for SKC fans to close. this year through the entire Western Conference now all over the map.

And there's like not a lot to be sure of. The Galaxy comeback. Austin FC scored three goals in 14 minutes down three zero against San Diego to maybe seen their season. Shout out, Christian Ramirez. And the ninth place team in the Western Conference Doyle is the Seattle Sounders. They are in the playoffs right now. They got their guys back.

You know, it turns out when you have seven starters missing due to injury, it's hard to win games and when you get four of those guys back, it's easier to win games. I still don't think they're anywhere near as good as they were the first half of the year and they're nowhere close to what they were this time last year when Pedro Delavaga was healthy. They don't have that dynamic presence on either wing to just win games. That said, they finally adjusted where they're drawing their line of confrontation. Our buddies at Sondert at heart did a great job of breaking this down. just like they're they're pressing high now they're controlling the game without the ball they're forcing

teams to defend in their own third and on top of that they're now more willing to shoot from outside of the box so it's a good combination that's opened the game up a little bit for them and they're a good team you know they're not going to win anything this year but they were never as bad as they looked during that streak the bottom of the playoffs in the west is L-AFC, Colorado, L.A. Galaxy, in Seattle. By the way, Colorado, after kind of defining themselves as a defensive team all year long, one that wants to defend it with the ball.

2-0 in this game. They have now conceded nine goals in their past three games, and they look terrible doing it. One of them was the Klaus special. How does he keep doing that? I don't understand. He's on a different team in a different team, in a different system in a different year and guys passing the ball.

It is absolutely insane to see. I was talking to someone about Paxton Aronson on Saturday and was like, you know, he's super talented. He's really good on the ball. I don't know that he's physical enough because they were talking national team like to get in there. Then he bodies someone around to score a goal in this game to go up to zero. And it's like, okay, the galaxy are going to die on themselves. And they didn't, to their credit.

They come back. They win three, two, without you. Lukai Lothano, who is clearly a Mexican national team starter now, which also makes no sense to me. And yeah, I don't understand who the Colorado Rapids are anymore. And I don't know that they do. But I do like Donovan Phillips. So I'm a fan of him. He's gigantic and really dangerous, but he should add to when he only had one.

Pat Noonan, by the way, after the Cincinnati game, because we said this and then passed over it. They lose 3-1 at Montreal. Montreal only dressed 14 players. 13 field players in this game. Prince O'usu had two goals, one of them a penalty kick, missed a big chance, Evander missed a big chance. But Noonin's sort of postgame said like,

there was no energy or connectivity, and I don't know where it is. I think we kind of all have heard the cries from Cincinnati fans for two plus years now about Noonan and have sort of laughed it off. And I think if he were to become available, he would very quickly get another job. but sometimes maybe it's just the end of a road and I don't know if it's there.

No Miles Robinson, no Kevin Denke, like it wasn't a full team, but Tom, this is like worrying that he's just sort of coming out and saying I don't really have answers right now. No, you're right. Like this is, this would be all the signs pointing towards end of the road kind of stuff.

And yes, they missed a few players, but like you said, Montreal, three senior players available on the bench. So it's not as if they were at full strength. And by the way, Montreal on 24 points dead last in the east, only three points now ahead of Kansas City. So they kept pace by winning this game.

These are inexcusable moments. The goals that they concede are inexcusable. And I feel for Noonan and the coaching staff for how they've had to put out fires basically all the time over the last couple years with injuries. But like, as a man, at some point, as you said, this might feel like the end of the road. And they are in 10th. They have conceded 64 goals in 26 games. That's as many as Orlando. And that's more than Kansas City now.

And that's with the team that has a guy, a goalkeeper who has national team call-ups, a DP centerback, had a Tam center back in a U-22 initiative one. And I don't know what teenage Hedby is, but he makes money. Yeah. So it's not like, okay, we've spent no money on the attack or on the defense. we're going to score 500 goals a season. And that's where I think it makes it really hard. No, I'm there.

It's kind of inexplicable to me. And yeah, like you said, the fans were, we laughed it off early. And it's certainly a serious conversation now. It's why teams like D.C. who got that wild draw at Vancouver and Columbus and Toronto are all still alive when their seasons should have been cooked months ago. Thomas Mueller called his own number in Vancouver on that goal. He was trying to for a little while just to carry that team.

Not the result Vancouver would have liked. They're not going to win the shield. They are still like a mark. Like when we talk about all the things we just said, all these talented players, we can't get results. And Vancouver's making Bruno Caycedo a must watch player after everyone has left and everything else has moved on is wild to watch.

We can't get through everything on this show because there's so much to talk about. That's why we do five shows a week here at Soccerwise. As I said, we'll have your Chile. USM&T reactions. We didn't talk Canada a ton here. Maybe we'll get into it in the next game. The game was not broadcast in the U.S. at all,

so I did not get a chance to watch. Jonathan David with the goal. Sounds like a little shit posting from Chile, two red cards, a lot of complaints post games. So something to watch for there. And now Canada gets ready for the U.S. game next week. So we will have all your coverage. We've got a bunch of interviews,

up we've got some special guests and uh always happy to be with you if you are not watching on youtube it turns out that i put a we be gos doyle uh graphic underneath us for the last 45 minutes didn't even notice got to tell you time literally thought it said you wasn't very so thank you tom for being here with us was that was that for for tom shit talking about the jets in the in the group chat is that what that was no actually like that that was good uh listen Listen, once Tom is technically west of the Mississippi, everyone becomes weepy. That's the way it will work on this show. So congratulations with me for being on the show.

And we'll talk to you all again very, very soon.