SoccerWise - USMNT Post-Game Copa Elimination

Episode Date: July 2, 2024

David and Tom get together to react to the USMNT's loss to Uruguay. They talk about what their Copa America elimination means for where this program stands right now. And of course they discuss the future for US Soccer. Soccerwise Live 2pm ET Every Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday on Youtube/Twitch/Twitter

Well, either way, this is SoccerWise live post-game show for the USMNT. We have been doing this every single game. Tom finally arrived just to make sure that the U.S. would lose. And we are going to be with you as long as you'd like here on YouTube and Twitch. And for anyone listening in post, thanks for listening. And we, of course, we'll have your Tuesday MLS show coming up 2 PM.

Eastern time. We've got Wednesday NWSL, and then we are off for July 4th here in the U S of course, the U S losing one zero to Uruguay being eliminated in the group stage of the Copa America Fox flash. This statistic, this was the 20th major international tournament hosted in the United States. The US had gotten out of their group in all 19

competitions before. The bulk of that is Gold Cups. You've got a 1994 World Cup in there. And you've got what 2016 Copa America Centenario. I think that's really all you're talking about. I don't know, maybe they count some of the weird things they played going into the 20 2002 world cup or whatever um so the u.s is out we talked a little bit about what could happen and how it could go down there was a moment where panama was tied with bolivia at one one and the u.s was tied with uruguay at zero zero that was about 45 seconds of time. Then the U.S. concedes off of the free kick. And that is all she wrote for the U.S.

Three goals in three games. Two of them against Bolivia in the group stage. So alongside Mexico, they are eliminated. Jamaica as well in CONCACAF. Canada, the lone CONCACAF team that moves on. For now, Tom, initial thoughts. First of all, cheers. jamaica as well in conca calf canada the lone conca calf team that moves on for now tom initial thoughts first of all cheers if we're going to be doing uh 11 p.m post live shows after teams lose hey tom if anyone will pay us you can show whatever you want well that's the thing we're

giving it away for free um yeah so where do you where do you want to go dave i think um where are you right now let Let's start there. Look, the most important conversation coming out of this is the manager's future. And after not getting out of the group stage at the Copa America, Greg Berhalter cannot continue as manager of this federation, of this national team. You can throw me the context, and it's fair. You can say he didn't tell Tim Weah to go punch another player and get a red card against Panama.

You can say the refereeing was atrocious tonight, as it was. I don't care. I don't want to hear about performance. I don't want to hear about refereeing. I don't want to hear about individual moments. I don't want to hear about excuses. Guess what? At the highest level, it's about results.

I don't need another press conference about how well they played when they lose 1-0 to Canada or how they did this and that. I'm sick of all of the process talk. I'm sick of all of the moral victories or trying to spin it away to the XG battle rather than actual goals and stuff. We've gone too far, and I don't think that it's much deeper than, and I know it sounds like a caveman, but I don't know that it's much deeper than and I know it sounds like a caveman but I don't know that it's much deeper than did you get out of the group stage at the the second premier

international tournament you're going to play world cup copa world cup did you get out of the group stage at the copa america in a group that had bolivia the worst team at this at this tournament and panama who's not exactly uh brazil or argentina did you get out? No. Thank you very much, new coach. It has to be. I think most people are going to be on your side. I think I probably am at this point as well. The Tim Weh apart is clear of like it's a group stage. There's not a lot of margin for error.

But you kind of got the result tonight. Like Panama at a 3-1 win was what you were hoping for like if you win this game against uruguay you're through at that point that was a prayer and a chance coming into this game and you don't score a single goal in this game and i i watched this game and i sent you my notes of like everything that i kind of was digging into and trying to find in all these things and one of the really tough parts about the U.S. is that it's unclear what their pressing triggers are and think about all the moments where Uruguay was able to play out or Uruguay was able to start to progress the ball up the field it was unclear

which way the U.S. wanted to cut the field who who they wanted to press, and then except for a couple moments where they pressed really, really high and won it back, they don't really know what they want to do once they get it back. And then on the flip side, there's a few moments where Uruguay extends their pressure and you're like, finally, great, now we have space to play into.

And Matt Turner launches it out of bounds. Or Chris Richards just plays back across the field because he's nervous about what's coming at him. And we'll talk about a bunch of the individuals as well, because this, as much as we can talk about the manager, because it's the one thing you're allowed to change in international soccer, it is not purely on him over the course of this week. And it hasn't been purely on him over the course of this time that he's been with this group. I think very few players stepped up over the course of this tournament.

And I think some of the guys that I had question marks about parts of their game, I think were exposed over the parts of this competition. But you are right in that at some point, the buck has to stop somewhere. And the exciting part about the opening 20 minutes, this game was like they played on the front foot. They played aggressive. to win they played like they had nothing to lose because they kind of didn't and you don't see that often enough and you don't get enough of that you didn't get i think it's tough to say like oh you got to open up and attack at some point or push your outlines higher playing down a player against panama for all that time but like you didn't see it at all you didn't see it at any moment where you're playing higher up the field

and taking risks and being progressive. And I think that's the part that's really frustrating. So you add that into the lack of results. They have never beaten a top 20 team under Greg Berhalter except for Mexico, and then you're at a loss. There is really nothing you're leaning back on except for the fact that these players keep saying that this is who they want to play for. And I don't know that these players are mature enough to know that and then look like that's that's important feedback and that's part of it but it's only

one part of it as you say um and again i think before we even dive in further to the game itself and and there's a lot of merit and that'll be interesting i still think that the focus is on the macro and the and a couple of things that i want to say is one you brought up that stat about how that they how poorly they've done against top 15 or top 20 teams in in fifa this game model has been set up to dominate concaf and again that is good except that should not be the barometer that should not be the goal that should not be the ambitionometer. That should not be the goal. That should not be the ambition. I think that this team, these crop of players, are at their best in a transition-based game model,

in a high-energy game model. Christian Pulisic is the best version of himself in the open field. And I thought we saw that a few times tonight, so I will give Greg Berhalter credit that putting Pulisic on the right and Reign on the left, which is something that Matt Doyle has been calling for this for like two years, that was a wrinkle that worked because Uruguay's left back was attacking a lot, and Pulisic was clearly told, just fill in that space. Don't track him back. Fill in the space behind him. Gio Reina's pulling in, and Gio Reina's trying to find him to Pulisic. The out ball is always to Pulisic. So I think that was a good wrinkle, but they don't really ever

play like that. So the game model is built to beat CONCACAF teams. And they've been really good at that. And that's an achievement. Ironically, it's the game against Panama that essentially is going to cost Greg Berhalter's job if he is fired. And that's a CONCACAF team at this tournament.

So even with all that said, at a bigger tournament, it's a CONCACAF team that might do the mint. The second point I want to bring up, our players have a ton of potential. There is a lot of talent here. This needs to be checked. It's not as good as I think our perception is. Look at Uruguay tonight, too.

And it's fun, like, some casuals that are in my life, and I don't blame them for looking, oh, like, Uruguay, are they good? Like, right? But it's like, oh, aren't we like 45, 50? Like I know Uruguay is a little bit better, but aren't we like if we played this game 10 times, we'd win like three or four, right? And I was like, I really don't think so.

Our best player is Sapulisic, key player from Milan. That's fantastic. McKinney has been a key player for Juventus, but more of like a role player, and he's might lead. Gio Reyna, probably the second most talented player, was benched by two different teams this season and played a grand total of like under 600 league minutes. Tim Weah is a role-playing wingback for Juventus. Tyler Adams plays for Bournemouth. Tim Rehm plays for Fulham. Jedi Robinson, Fulham. Matt Turner, bench.

Like, you go on down to starting 11, it's strong for, I guess, potential. And these are a lot of young players, and they can keep going. But right now, we're not talking about potential. We're talking about where they are now. You look at that Uruguay team, starters for Liverpool, Barcelona, Real Madrid, PSG, Napoli. And not just starters, every game starters. And that's the difference.

And, again, first and foremost, like, I believe that this run should cost Greg Berhalter his job. But I also think we've got to stop looking at this as potential and what this team could be. And take the reality of what it is. We're not better than Uruguay. We're not better than Columbia. We're not better than these second-tier teams that we want to talk about breaking into the top 10. We're not in that next tier.

We're not to the same level of these teams. I agree with you. I slightly disagree with you in the style that it's just built to beat CONCACAF. I think it's built to keep games close and then your talent overwhelms or your talent has that moment. And like, it's all very safe.

It's all about playing in the middle block. It's all about being clean in your lines in the defensive block. It's all about not overext your lines in the defensive block it's all about not overextending your lines and then winning enough 50 50 moments or having moments of brilliance and then i think that leans into what you just said which is like on the field today if you were going to say who's got the individual that's going to make a moment happen outside of christian pulisic the the next seven players you name are Uruguay players, that the team's probably not

good enough to be that. And if you acknowledge that it's not good enough to be that, then you start to lean in and say, okay, well, what are the different mechanisms we can use to make this team better? For example, we have young athletic players. Why? Maybe we should be a high pressing team. Maybe we should try and trap the ball into one half of the field and constantly be going vertical in those moments like those are things where you help players life be easier because they don't have to figure it out and there is so much of it figuring out and it's i thought today was telling and that tim ream looked lost in possession the entire game and you're talking about someone who's, what, 35 and has been

a starter in the Premier League for seven years or so. And it's like, if he doesn't understand what the plan is and the build-outs are when he's in possession in supernatural spots on his left foot towards the left side of the field, then it doesn't feel like there's enough there. And then you start to see players get lost because they start trying to figure it out. And then once they went down, they threw 17 center forwards on the field and it made no sense. And they lost every header anyway. So I don't know what the point of that was, but fine. So I slightly disagree with you in that way, but I agree with you overall.

And like, it is very stodgy. It's very structured. It's very safe. All of the things that happen. And it is for us and we are an mls show heavily heavily it is a lot like what you saw lucio gonzalez's teams do it's a lot like what you saw nico estevez's teams do and you see players get lost in these moments and in this whole mindset and they don't feel like aggressors and they don't feel like they're they're there to

make the game and win the game they're there to not lose the game and then you watch the world cup and you say it was enough to get the goal against iran it was enough to break through and get the goal against wales and that was it like that's when you look now over this three-year span coming out of world cup qualifying and then through that to now those are your moments right that's all we're talking about is your peaks where you're losing to germany and friendlies um you're putting up some strong performances the one one against brazil fine like but again the one one against brazil was mid-block stayed in the game get a free kick goal like are those is that enough to say that there was something built in that

that's a fair question. But I think that it's just about being more realistic about where this group is and where it is in the hierarchy of global soccer. If they tried to play, I don't know, take 60% possession or, again, even high-press Brazil. So that's not even what I'm necessarily calling for. It's, I guess, more chameleonic and more of relying on high pressing and i mean i'm sorry in transition not necessarily always high pressing but that you can still find those

moments to come forward so that's where i see the the state of the pool right now that's where i like i just keep on coming back to the macro stuff and and we can talk about those little moments and and yes like that that's not good enough but dude you think back to the early 2010s teams or the early 2000s teams like i the talent is probably better now maybe better now but i just think it's a completely different we're not playing up to the potential of the talent or the potential of the potential to even sound a little dumber um i was a little bit thrown off by your user stodgy i thought that was excellent and just as I'm yelling into the microphone, I just want to say well done to you, David Goss.

So shout out to the comment section so far. Ben Wright, who does a great job covering Nashville SC, you should follow him, says, Hey, guys, please help. I'm dying inside. We're getting a bit of that from some U.S. fans. We've got some, I'd say, trolly statements, one being we're not better than Panama, which right now is true. So that's fair. I think one from some guy named Matt Doyle,

who says the two teams with more MLS players today won both their games. What does that tell you? Because Kiki Oliveira played for this Uruguay team and, of course, Panama, a loaded group with some MLS players in there as well. So don't worry. The trolls are out in our own way. Eric Gonzalves says game needed more Dax McCarty. A lot of question marks, though, about what would come next and what this team is and where it would go.

You texted me during the game and you said, if you're going to hire an American to coach this team, which for a lot of nations you often lean into a coach from that country so it's not like uncommon it's not a necessity but it's not uncommon um who would you pick and we both said jesse marsh who is currently unavailable and seems like probably won't work for U.S. soccer again anytime soon based off his experiences of trying to get this job originally. And outside of that, there weren't a ton of names that made any more sense. I think, by the way, and everyone can get as mad as they want. I think Greg Berhalter is a genius when it comes to soccer.

I think when you sit around and hear him talk the game he understands the game at a super high level he understands the game from so many points of view around the world I don't believe in having managers for a second cycle in national teams I just think you only touch the players so often and there's only so much you can do and I think once you've done it in a cycle there isn't really much to add after that because you can't be tactically perfect at the international level. You will never get there. Like, that's just not a reality. So you can get to your 80% and you can do your rah-rah and you bring in this motivational speaker and you show this video and you tell this story and you've got this little nugget.

And, like, I think after four years, you've kind of done them all. And so I've always felt that way and i think that's part of it and and so you could convince me on like a fresh voice but you're in a danger zone now like there's no other move after this if you bring in a new manager that is your manager for the 2026 hosted world cup that is your best opportunity to win a world cup ever and is this one chance to change the perception of the team and the sport and all these things that we're talking about and that's it and the last interview process took i don't know 12 months and they netted out on the same guy who does it now so i don't know where you go from here if that's really the situation you just you decide to lean into

yeah um a couple things off that first i want to talk about that process as well i was very frustrated by that i think a lot of fans were i think a lot of people were asking questions about why does it take this long to name a new manager and particularly to name the one that was already in charge of the team it does not need to take that long i think that a lot of these processes and talking about how complex and how many people we called and how many things we did and all the questions we asked, there's an overload of data. And I think that we're overthinking some of these things. has more to do with perception of look at all the things we tried than like, if you asked interview candidates in, you know,

how many doors are in the city of Chicago just to test their processing and how they do thinking on the feed, whatever, this is a real thing that consulting agencies do, by the way. Does that, does that matter in this process? Like,

did you change your mind on who the final candidate was going to be? A lot of this can come down to contract talks too. Like it should never take that long to identify and name a manager. My biggest fear coming out of this right now is that even if they do decide to let go of Greg Berhalter, they're going to be like, let's take a step back. Let's analyze the tournament completely. And six or eight weeks is going to pass. And there won't be a decision yet. And I think that is catastrophic.

And it will make us look like an absolute joke. The forward looking part is. I'm not exactly sure who the next manager is. And I sound hypocritical. And I'm making fun of myself for framing it all like that. There is no obvious American candidate now. Is it Pellegrino madarazzo david wagner like are those the the best two like jim curtain stock has taken a big hit um

you kind of look at mls like there aren't there isn't an obvious next american manager kind of breaking through there isn't an obvious american manager like jesse marshall was when he was available before he took the candidate job there is is no obvious solution. And I'm not binary on it has to be an American. That's my preference. But just like all these other things, like my preference generally, Goss is the same as yours is shouldn't be a second cycle for national team coaches,

but I'm not binary with that. Like, I think that there's a lot of context that comes with it. So all of these things aren't non-negotiables. What is a non-negotiable for me is that these decisions should not take that long. It really should not yeah and i think the the stressor is like if if you believe somewhat like clearly we do about the cycles also like you're going into a world cup that's the moment like a lot of that work should have been done already like you should have gone to qatar and like it's

not an offense to greg burr alter it's like, well, we're doing our due diligence. Like this is our job, right? NBA free agency started today. Every team trying to resign a guy should have the next 17 guys already ready. Cause like, that's just the reality of the world. It's not even professional sports. Like if I quit my job, obviously I don't have one. Don't quit this show.

Are you kidding me? I just started. For sure. But if I quit my job job like you have to be prepared for that and I have to be interviewing like we're all doing the same thing at the same time so I I agree with you I think that part's really frustrating um we got the questions about why does it have to be an American in the chat it doesn't um it also literally said that yeah It also can be someone who is from the soccer culture in this area. Wilfred Nance is a name that I mentioned because I'm an aired and it is probably too inside baseball to give him that opportunity. The belief was Juergen Klinsmann was that person.

Juergen Klinsmann lived in California and had lived in the U.S. for a really long time. And the hope was that he would sort of be that bridge and in between. It turns out Juergen Klinsmann's insane. So like that part made it really difficult for him to be the national team manager. But you can just ask South Korea and they can sort of verify for it. So we don't have those clear names. I mean, you mentioned the two Americans who are coaching in Europe. And like, I guess that makes them qualified and like Pellegrino Matarazzi has done some really good things in a good league.

David Wagner, I would argue, has done okay things in sort of comparable situations to other American setups. And I don't even know how much he's operated here in the soccer world. Like there's a lot to go through being a national team manager, which is dealing with local media, dealing with a lot of the soccer entities in the world. Like it's a political position and a CEO position as much as it is a coach. It's less so for the U S now. Cause Matt Crocker should be doing a lot of that. A Gucci on Yale should be doing a lot of that.

So you could argue then it's like, now you can go really lean into a coach, but it is like most of what Greg Berhalter does is visiting other teams so that he can get them to send players when he needs to so if you don't know already the 29 teams that exist here in Major League Soccer where the bulk of your players play that just makes your job a little bit harder but it's not impossible and like you can hire assistants and do that if you want to i just still i mean i would have said i said two years ago ricardo gureka he obviously now has done the chile job um i thought that's one where it's like an interesting coach who be also the same kind of the same of like just give guys belief and make them play really hard

and that i think is still 95 of being a national team manager. And we're talking about names, right? Like in the chat. And, and I've, I saw this in the last cycle as well of why not Jurgen Klopp? What about Jose Mourinho? What about this?

And like, that sounds lovely in theory. Yeah. If, if we can convince them to take, to take the job, obviously Greg Berhalter in 2022 made 1.4 million with potential own, with bonuses up to 2.3. So let's just call it 2.3. You know what Jurgen Klopp makes a 2022 made $1.4 million with bonuses up to $2.3 million.

So let's just call it $2.3 million. You know what Jurgen Klopp made at Liverpool? Like $15 million a year. You know what Jose Mourinho is making in Turkey? $11 million a year. Somebody put Ralph Rangnick in the chat. Why in the hell would he leave Austria for this? Also, why would Austria let him leave?

He got to the knockout stage of the Euros, auto-extended his contract. You would have to pay at least, I believe when Bayern were trying to get Ralf Rangnick, the reports were like a $3 million compensation to Austria. That's more than Greg Berhalter's salary. And then you have to pay Ralf Rangnick, who's like the godfather of gigan pressing and all this stuff. I'm going ahead and assume that his his uh salary s aren't gonna be you know cheap so like yeah all those names make sense but this isn't a realistic word like that's not that's not something that that they're gonna do and again unless that god love them if one of these guys says i love the united states so much i'll take a 90 pay cut sure let's do it it's realistic. Um, when we're wrapping up,

I'm going to read through, uh, my friend, Matt Folger in the comments who has named literally every fake name you could name like Hans Baca, Peter Novak, and, uh,

and Chalice as potentials, uh, there, Nathan Hill says, Peter Vermees will be available soon. Man, sporting Casey would get a huge favor if the U.S. if the U.S. went and got him Sporting KC would be stoked it would be a get out for them um I think

it goes though to the like there are not obvious names I don't know that Jose Mourinho is an obvious name the guy burns down every building he's in he gets a little bit of time period and and I do think there's a ton of value in when you are whoever it is, right? When Ricardo Pepe walks into a locker room and Jose Mourinho says, I believe in you, I think that has value to players. I think that inspires them. I think that pushes them. And as I said, I do think that is 80%, 90% of international soccer. And I think you've seen that from Greg Berhalter.

I've said this a ton. Like I was, I remember being in the tunnel before the 2015 Eastern conference championship between Toronto and Columbus and talking to Greg Berhalter. And it was a hundred percent about tactics. And like, you can't bait him into a tactics conversation anymore. You can't ask him about it in press conferences. He, he doesn't talk about it.

He talks about intensity. He talks about winning battles. He talks about being like, he talks about all these things which he has clearly identified are the few things you can control in international soccer in the time frame you have of like playing on the front foot and attacking and being aggressive they just don't really then when they're on the field lean into a lot of these things. Let's talk about this for a minute. We haven't even broken down the game. I don't know how many people want us to.

We can do it. I've got notes. We can go into it. But in the conversation, just read your notes and that'll be it. That'll be good. Well, that's what I've been doing on this show, by the way, for the last week is these monologue episodes. If you want to listen to the weekend recap mailback, it's an hour and four minutes from earlier today. And I did it solo, which is an absurd thing to do. The questions were amazing. How do you get in there? You have subscribed to the Patreon, SoccerWise Patreon, you get into the discord, you get to be a part of all of this, get to sweat with us and die with us in all these big

moments and enjoy the games and blah, blah, blah. And you get to be a part of the mailbag. In watching this game, though, and watching these moments and to be a part of the mailbag. In watching this game though, and watching these moments and talking about like, what can the U.S. do better and what can't they? There are a lot of flaws in this team. And like in your conversation about where team players start and all these things, if you want to build out of the back, you're building out of bat through Matt Turner, who's fine. And then you go to Joe Scali and Anthony Robinson and neither of them want to be in possession. And nine,

neither of them are clean enough to be able to really pass between lines in dangerous moments. And when they get pressured, they panic, they turn back and they play back. And like, you're already at a disadvantage. And when you win the ball high up the field,

even like Tyler's not aggressive offensively. And like, he is world class at the things he's world class at and I'll use that term because I believe it but then the holes in his game are massive and you don't have complete players in these moments and so you could talk about all the things you want to see this team do a lot of it is they struggle to physically do a lot of those things and so when you watch a game like this where the u.s has high possession early high energy doesn't really create chances then and a lot of this i

think was after the injury that occurred but to the u.s's credit i thought they kept up a lot of their energy after that i thought they reignited um when it's in the mid-block game and it's back and forth there's just not a ton of cutting edge and the cutting edge is not an individual moment and it's not in ball progression quick enough to break a team down and a lot of the ball progression not being quick enough is messy first touches is poorly played passes is Eunice Moussa wins it back first touch to Weston McKinney and Weston McKinney clips a ball seven yards over Euniceice moose's head that rolls out of bounds and like that's your re that's your repress that's your counter press into an attacking phase it no longer exists and so there are all these things

you can talk about but like there are major flaws throughout this team and i think one through six is really the conversation you have where you say this is a golden generation the best team we've ever had i think after that it is a really tough spot to say and especially once you have an injury once serginio des goes down and joe scali's your full-time starter and joe scali pulls up and now you're talking about shack more potentially coming on the field and playing like it drops off really really quickly yeah again i like i'd push back again even at the top six again I think Gio Reyna is an extremely talented player I think his best moments of the past year has been with the national team because he's not playing at his club

Matt Turner is not playing at his club again you go on down the list and again I understand your point of one through six isn't maybe necessarily a problem but like we call it a golden generation and two of the players are playing key roles for really good clubs. Three. I mean,

Jedi Robinson, I think it'd be fair to add them into this, but like that's a left back playing for Fulham. Again, Uruguay has starters for Barcelona, Real Madrid, Liverpool, PSG,

and Napoli. It's different levels, man. It's simple as that. I want to throw one more thing out there, is because the matt biesler comments have obviously been big this week which i think he's already walked back i don't know how you walk that back like you said a thing it's fine it's fine right just say your thing and move on i didn't know i was getting aggregated matt biesler i yeah right if you get it now you get it uh Matt Beazler was 27 at the 2014 World Cup didn't

have a ton of international experience um on this team let me just skim it real quick there are one two three three field players that are 27 and above on this team so like Matt Beazler can talk about playing hard and trying and having their roles. Cool. Clint MC scored in the first three minutes. You guys sat behind it for 97 unreal second half against Portugal. I was in the building.

It's one of the great 45 minutes in us men's soccer history. And then Germany showed up in a hurricane, decided not to play. And you got through to the group stage where Tim Howard played great and you lost. So international soccer, we are talking about moments. I mean, Timothy way doesn't get that red card. and you got through to the group stage where tim howard played great and you lost so international soccer we are talking about moments i mean timothy way doesn't get that red card we're probably talking about a team that got out of this group and like those are moments this is still one of

the youngest international teams in the world and so one of the things that frustrates me and we have some people on twitter who are like 11 mls players get out of this group. Yeah. Cause all 11 of those MLS players are probably in their prime or like post prime. Like the, the team we would put together in this scenario would be all players who are experienced and at the peak of their game and all these things. That doesn't mean that Weston McKinney is not experienced, but he is the 10th or 11th most important player on the field.

Most of the times he steps on the field for you, and so he can pop up and have his dangerous moment and create a chance and um a lot of what he does right is being the extra runner and like seeing the gaps and seeing the opening and reading the play and getting there but he's the extra runner because like you're not going to help off the other guys if Gwesson McKinney's flashing by you like you're not going to leave the world class player that you're already marking which gets tougher and tougher as you talk about uva but fine and like getting right now and then get into that space and like that is a part for the u.s that you can't accelerate you can't accelerate that these players are not at their peak i think what we see

with pulisic right now is like pulisic is finally at a spot where he's played pro in europe for seven years and he has found a club that relies on him and he's relied on every single week and he has elevated his game to that and like he has figured that out not all of these players are in that situation and so they come to play with the u.s and that's a new role for them and like even when you talk about you want to say like compare teams and whatever look at some of the players on the field for austria like they're the stars for strom grotz they're the stars for rb salzburg they're the stars for sparta praha wherever they play like that's their role and

then that's their role they're not that great They're not elite world-class players, but like, that's the role they play. That's not the case with this U S group. And as much as we want to like get it moving quicker and do more and all this stuff, it still sits in that spot where you're talking about guys who are being asked to do things for the first time in their careers. And they're being asked to do it on this huge stage. And they're only around this five to seven times a year.

Fair enough, but I mean, the obvious counter to that would be, so do you think Weston McKinney to FC Cincinnati would be better for his career? Because that would be the role he's in. Or again, if you don't even want it to be the pyrotechnic, the type of conversation of MLS versus whatever, like, I don't know, let's say Weston McKinney went to Club Bruges, hypothetically. Obviously not a realistic thing, but where he'd be an essential player

in a worse team in a worse league. I said it when we brought it. I said it to the aggregators when we brought it up in the Cincy combo. I do think it might develop different players in different ways. I think there are some players who need to be in an environment where they need to fight for their starting spot. And then there are some players who need to be in an environment where every day everyone else is watching them. And if they train poorly, the team trains poorly. And then the coach gets fired.

And like, that's the whole scenario that they are on. I think that's a different life experience. And Weston McKinney wouldn't be one that I would say doesn't need that. Like consistency and having the game on your shoulders a ton is one of those things. I will say this for Weston McKinney in this tournament. I thought he struggled in possession. I thought he struggled in a lot of ways where he could be elite. I thought he worked pretty hard. Like he was upping the tempo when he could. He won a ton of tackles in midfield, especially when Tyler wasn't on the field. Like he's chasing back and creating plays.

So that's a credit to him. That has nothing to do with this conversation. I just, his name came up, so I wanted to say it. I don't know. What would be your response? Sorry, I was trying to get quotes ready for Berhalter's press conference to pull up, and I found an interesting one that we can go to next, but I'm going to need you to reset that for me.

You asked me a question, and then I just said I wasn't listening. What's your response to your question? Do you think Weston McKinney becomes better for playing at FC Cincinnati? No. Wow, I asked myself a question. I wasn't even listening to myself. That's tough. You hate to see that.

Don't play back that clip. No, I don't think so because, again, I asked myself a question. I wasn't even listening to myself. That's tough. You hate to see that. Don't play back that clip. No, I don't think so because, like, again, I see that argument, and I was hinting at it and trying to play devil's advocate, play both sides on, hey, let's talk out the Weston McKinney-Cincy stuff. I see there is a value in that. There absolutely is. But I think that there's more of a value for a player like Weston McKinney in going to the Premier League again or, you know, staying,

not staying at Juventus anymore because that's not on the table. But they had contract talks about maybe. Wes McKinney in going to the Premier League again, or, you know, staying, not saying he went to City Morgan, that's not on the table, but they had contract talks about maybe. So I think that's more valuable for a player like that, particularly at the player at this time of his career. Maybe when he's 28, 29, I could be talked differently to it. But I think right now, that's where I stand. And then again, the question I think that that's really gonna set things off, and I don't blame Berhalter's answer for this, but as per Jeff Carlisle, who's at the press conference,

Berhalter was asked if he feels like he's the right man and the right voice to lead the U.S. national team into the 2026 World Cup. Berhalter says yes. Yeah. What else is he going to say? Exactly. Exactly. But I think that that's going to get picked up pretty heavily. It is. I mean, there is a world in which he can step into that space and say,

like, this isn't working, and then walks away. I don't. I'll just be straight up. From a money point of view, you're just not going to pay. Exactly. You're just going to get fired and get paid out for your contract and to be clear there isn't pretty smart for everyone who's like oh it's a meme blah blah blah when he does leave he's gonna get a really good job from someone who knows a lot about soccer and

you're all gonna think it's ridiculous and like it has happened already where the offers he has gotten are from legitimate it It's not just like, Oh, it's like in the U S soccer sphere and like everyone's friends and all of that. Like it's from people outside of that who think he's a very good coach. And I think when offered it, he wanted the opportunity to coach the U S at a world cup at home.

I'm like, that was a thing you're not going to turn down for anyone in this conversation, because for the most part, all of these people feel very strongly about this program, this team, this group. You are talking when you bring up the Jesse Marsh's and the Peter Vermees' and the Greg Vanney's and all these people like for most of them, the U.S. soccer national team was actually the biggest part of their careers. And they feel very strongly about what it can mean going forward where now you're starting to see the next generation of people who are like in mls for example i talked to a bunch of mls

people who are like why do i care why is the national team my problem like you talk about young players and academies being like oh what who are they eligible for like and they're like i don't really care as long as we can sell them off the back of a performance for one of the teams like we had this whole debate when Atlanta wouldn't release players for the Olympic qualifying a few years back, right? Like, it wasn't their problem. Their problem was to win games and be competitive. That is starting to shift and starting to change.

But for a lot of these people, like, this is the dream scenario. This is the dream job. All of those things. Hence, I think why you're going to see a Greg Berhalter say something like that. There is not an obvious name, by the the way on the bench that you'd say oh for example Jill Ellis took over for Pia Sundhog and then became the coach for the team and maybe she wasn't the obvious name at the time I can't really remember back successful college soccer coach

whatever there's not someone like that and all of the Nashville fans are in our comments right now being like get BJ Kellyanne out of here and get him to Nashville so they're hoping that it's not him but again soon I think I think it's very clear that there's not one simple name and like if they have to do this then they're gonna have to go in and do this this is gonna take a little bit of time to go find the next person and figure it out going forward and the time is not what's of s or time is not really a luxury that this program has right now the rumors by the way today are that jaime lozano is going to keep his job for mexico which i am shocked by yeah that's very shocking i i don't know maybe part of it like i wonder if he came to the

federation before the tournament and was you know because they made a whole thing about taking a younger squad and trying to move into the next generation and like even leaving behind somebody like Chucky Lozano who's in his late 20s and again he's been yeah hasn't quite lived up to the hype I think that they wanted but like he's still pretty clearly one of the Mexico's best 23-26 players so maybe there was part of it okay you need to give me long-term security if I'm going to do this. I'm going to call in Memo Ochoa

and Raul Jimenez and whoever else. So I don't know what went on there, but to your point, I'm absolutely shocked as well. Let's do, we haven't really talked the game that much. You want to talk about it a little bit? Yeah. So US comes out on the front foot. They need to win to go through.

They come out the opening 20 minutes. I think it's the best 20 minutes they've played the entire tournament so far. A couple have chances. Nothing's super clear. You've got Pulisic on the right and Reina on the left, which I think was the one real change. Musa gets inserted to the starting lineup for the first time. The back five remains the same tyler's clearly 90 minutes match fit so it kind of takes that question off the board uh what did you make of the decisions of how they replaced waya and i know you talked about pulisic on the right side but how they set up

yeah i thought it made sense that that was my assumption going in I mean other than just I like I prefer Pulisic on the right particularly in a game like this my assumption was that we just haven't seen uh Berhalter invert Reyna and Pulisic so I didn't think it was gonna happen so I like that change but everything else I thought was what it was gonna be like Berhalter's not dumb he knows that this could have been him coaching for his job. In these situations, back against the wall, I think you go with the guys you trust. You go with the guys that, you know, again,

the first two games, this starting 11, essentially, again, with Hoya coming out. So I'm not surprised that there wasn't wholesale changes. I'm not surprised that Haji Wright didn't all of a sudden get a look in this game. I'm not surprised that they didn't change the system or whatever, right? So for me, I thought that was pretty straightforward. What I really liked at the beginning of the game was the U.S., I think, not just matched Uruguay's intensity, but I think they surpassed it a little bit at first. It seemed

like Uruguay was struggling a little bit at the beginning of the game, and they kept on bringing up the stat on the broadcast of Uruguay's absolutely blitzed teams in their first two games of this tournament. Again, against opponents that they should be dominating of Panama and Bolivia. I'm sitting here talking over and over again about how good I think this Uruguay team is. But still, they've been blitzing teams at the beginning of these games. And I thought the United States was the better team. Not by much, but I thought they was the better team, not by much, but I thought they were the better team in the first 20 minutes.

The XG isn't going to tell you that because I think their two biggest chances were crosses that were gobbled up by the goalkeeper. You don't get expected goals for that. And again, not that the XG battle is the be-all, end-all. But I thought that the performance was really strong early in the game. The intensity, the fight, the the willingness that trying to get the crowd into it i loved all that didn't love that they weren't creating a ton of course but like 20 minutes in i was like all right like they're playing very well i that's what i thought and

then again you look at the numbers at halftime and you question that but first view that's where i was at we have a comment in the comments who say should this not have been the plan a um when you look at this team you mentioned liking pulisic on the right like should this not have been plan a reina a little bit higher moose in midfield i i agree and and with just the way that it fits to are attacking fullback without dest it's jedi robinson it's on the left side so you want the player on the left to be the one that's tucking in that's playing in that half space of like um a little bit wider kind of number 10 more of a playmaker than like a direct winger so i thought this was which made a lot of sense this is probably how it should have been of you so you let robinson

overlap and then scally is the one that stays home a little bit more on the right and pool of six providing the width on the right so yes that's how I do believe that's how it should have been um I'll disagree I thought Reina was lost until the like we throw everyone on and he then came inside and was playing center mid by himself because I don't really know who was playing where uh I thought Reina was invisible most of the game and and that's the only drawback of this and you could say you want way out on the left, fine, but that's the drawback of this setup is, like, for Dortmund, when they have a ton of possession and they're playing higher, then Reyna as a quote-unquote winger is just one of the three attackers.

But with the way the U.S. was stretched wide, he was never really connected, and the things that Jedi wants to put put his head down he wants to get a cross off like that's 80 90 of what he's going to do there is not much interchange there and so i think reina got lost throughout the game i think musa should be on the field because i like players who are press resistant and i like players who want possession and people can complain as many times as they want about darlington nagby not being goal dangerous and not trying to create chances. I play with 11 of them, so I'm the wrong person for this convo. But I said it off the back of the last game.

I thought Johnny coming on after the red card to add to midfield in place of Weah and try and make things a little bit harder to play through. I thought that was a mistake. I thought that should have been Musa because if it is Mus musa there's a chance that you can relieve pressure more often and maybe at that point after he relieves pressure and finds your first option then maybe there is some attacking opportunities throughout that game we saw chile have a little bit against canada not a ton most of it was like we need to score and go forward which the u.s sitting on a 1-1 probably wasn't going to do in that game.

Like, if they draw that game, that would have been the result they wanted. So it's a different scenario slightly. But I thought Moussa should have been put in in that game. I thought in this game he wasn't great, but he still showed why he needs to be on the field. In the balance between Weston McKinney going and doing the things he does well and Tyler Adams going and doing the things he does well, there is not really a clean option for most of the players on the back line to play in possession under pressure. And Moussa is that player. And I thought when the U.S. did press, he was very good at reading the play, winning it back, and then he's the best player at making the first pass once they win it back. So I liked Moussa being on the field. i liked pulisic on the right side as well he clearly found space

he pinned the fullback that's a good opportunity for him and like that made a ton of sense coming inside i mean i thought he was dangerous the first game too like obviously it's bolivia but i think at this point he's playing at a level where like you're kind of going to get it from him wherever you put him. And so that part's pretty easy. Florian Baligan goes down with the injury after the big Uruguay injury, which you said how the U.S. started. Like Uruguay was dying to kill the game, which is not what they're supposed to do under Bielsa. And it's not what they're supposed to do at this point at all.

And like they were trying to kill the momentum and kill the energy of the game. It unfortunately happens with a massive injury as i said i thought the u.s did well to then actually pick things back up and push and then florian bolligan goes down and it's it's tough because this is the best two games he's played of his u.s career and you're looking at a guy who's capable of a moment in a game now where we both agree the u.s played well and they finish with 0.56 xg i think and like they're not goal dangerous and he's capable of a moment like we saw against panama that's different and he seemed up for it like he's physical he's battling he was getting the ball played into his feet in tough moments and he was holding it and that was not the case with ricardo pepe after

and i don't know that that was the right substitution and that you could have pushed pulisic arena to center forward or you could have played haji right out wide whatever there are other options there but no matter what once you lose ball again you're up against it in the if you think the six players are competitive you're now pushing into the 12th and 13th pretty early in this game yeah i mean i understand the peppy sub i i think it would be an absolute waste if you put pulisic or reina as center forward in a 4-3-3 i mean you could talk me into it if you put like another more traditional striker next to them but this would be a 4-3-3 i think that would have been super wasteful for either of those players.

And so then it becomes Pepe or Josh Sargent because Greg Berhalter before the tournament said he's viewing Haji Wright as a left winger. If Sargent was fit enough, I think it should have been him. But again, I would go back to, I completely understand the Pepe substitution and you just kind of go like for like there. And it's not ideal because I think Bowen strikes more fear with more dynamic athleticism more kind of off by

off ball running like you said I just think that he's straight up and better than Ricardo Pepe over this little run here of the friendlies and then the Copa America and I think that he was a better fit for this game so can't control't control that injury. That's unfortunate, but I don't know. I think that we're overthinking it. If it was like, well, why didn't they change the formation or why didn't they do this? Like we said, I think that they are a lot good.

And I know that this isn't about the game, but I'm remiss that I haven't added this yet. It's not all bad with Warholter. There have been tremendous continental success in kakakaf and again you can say we should expect that sure maybe we should but you still went out and did it there has been excellent excellent dual national recruiting balgan musa dest gotta go back to all these players that comes from this environment that he's created.

That comes from an environment where players are going to the federation and saying, we want Berhalter back. That's a real thing, and that's a real achievement. So, again, while we're being critical, while I started this show by saying there should be a change in manager, they should fire Greg Berhalter, it's not all bad. It's just time. So all of that is to say that it doesn't really fit

in kind of the game breakdown that we're having, but I don't blame them for putting on Pepe for Balgan. And I would say, and we will do this on SoccerWise if this goes the way we think it's going to go, Greg Berhalter did the job. The problem is it's a second job now. Like the first job was post-Kuva. Stabilize, establish a culture,

make players want to be a part of this, create the next generation, right? Create the next hub that it's all built around. Like you hear players from 2002 to 2014 talk about being part of the national team was like this club that you couldn't break into and it was like impossible to be a part of the group and everyone knows the group like you can go listen to charlie davies and josie altidore and moa do talk about the group you can listen to stew holden like they were all part of the culture of the group and landon donovan was a huge part of it. And Tim Howard, all these.

And like, you needed the next thing. And Greg Berhalter accomplished it all. They qualified for the World Cup. They got out of the group stage. They, you know, reestablished the excitement around the team. It's just that was a different job. And so I think to your point about the dual nationals, like that is, that's a major part of that because I think a large part of the dual national recruit now, and we hear this from Eunice Moussa, is the players that play near them or with them doing it for the federation. It's Weston McKinney and Tyler Adams and Christian Pulisic being players playing in Champions League, talking to players playing in Champions League about doing this. So that is, I think, a really good point. And it's also one of the positives.

And like, as you say, there are a lot of positives. And it's just the question of, did we all stay too long? And did we ruin it after that? And stuff like that. So that's that opening 25, 30 minutes. I thought Pepe was fine. He tried to lay it off a bunch in weird spots. And he actually was slightly successful.

He didn't get the big chance. Like like he got them all against bolivia he didn't get them in this game and i don't know how much more he was going to do because i think then in that middle stretch of the game it's like uruguay starts to get possession they start to play a little bit higher and outside of moments where polisic touches the ball it just it doesn't feel like there's a ton of creation there's a ton of attack um would you want to talk about the ref how we've got like 87 questions about the ref yeah the ref was bad like awful that happened the the segment of the yellow card being pulled out of his pocket and then oh no we're gonna let a quick free kick go like that should be enough that this referee shouldn't be on a major game for a while and i don't say these things lightly i don't like guys you know me and i hope that you could vouch for me i hate talking about refereeing i because a lot of this i think every single fan base not just in soccer

i think every single fan base across all sports it it's the easiest thing to do. Ref sucked. They were against us. There was a conspiracy. It's not our fault. And that comes from, you see things different ways when you're as a fan, right? So for me, I just don't have any juice to be like, yeah, okay, well, you've never gotten on the right end of a call. Okay. I don't know how to kind of go with this. He was awful tonight. And again, that's not why they lost. It's not why they didn't get out of the group. But it's pretty factual. I know it's opinion, but it's pretty factual.

I don't think that he had a great handle on the game. I am stunned by the more and more revelations that came about this referee. And by the way, things are going pretty bad if you become the topic of conversation and people are digging up your resume as a referee within the first half. That happened really quickly. That he's 32 years old? Why was this his first Copa America game? Why is it not Bolivia-Panama or the opening game or the second game?

Why is his first Copa America game United States-U Uruguay to end the group stage because they probably thought it was going to be two teams on six points I didn't care I guess that's like probably what happened I didn't think about that until just now he was clearly overwhelmed there was a ton of I mean the two hand balls that

he didn't blow dead and then the US got out of the problem and then blew the play were pretty brutal the goal i i still can't really see it and i thought stew kind of went off in his own direction as a former u.s player in a lot of that of like demanding lines be straight and stuff i think all that's fair like clearly the technology is not at a high enough level from the the wait wait wait you you mean where they drew the line from the blimp camera angle you don't think that that was reliable also world feed experience we barely ever see the like you see the line and then it's gone before you can actually look at what's happening first

screenshot the player's knee. It showed red. Like as if he was off sides. And it was like clear. And that's. That's the part that I'm not sure on. It looks like the knee's off side. I think his feet are behind. Clearly his hands and arm are in front.

Which are not a goal scoring part of your body. So that part's fine. And then the question is. Who does the ball come off last? Is it a defender or an attacker? If it's a defender it's fine. If it's question is, who does the ball come off last? Is it a defender or an attacker? If it's a defender, it's fine. If it's an attacker, obviously it's offside. And then is he past the line of Chris Richards' back foot?

I'm not sure. The U.S. didn't score in this game. Like, you still come back to the ref could do whatever they wanted. The U.S. ties 0-0. They're out. They're tied 0-0. Do they score going forward late? No, they don't.

Like, that's what ended up happening and i think so that's the part where as as annoyed as i can be about refereeing as annoyed as anyone can be about refereeing you don't walk away from that game and saying it decided it because it didn't actually even with those moments that killed momentum and the weird yellow card that let the play run on whatever it didn't actually really affect the play of like oh one team is fouling it's actually thought yvonne bartone affected the game more besides the red card with timothy wea in the last game of like letting panamanian players pull bolligan down

on the run with no yellow cards and then when they became yellows later they should have been second yellows for reds and they weren't and like there was no real issue for panama to to kill attacks because they kind of knew they weren't going to get punished and they didn't, and there was no real issue for Panama to kill attacks because they kind of knew they weren't going to get punished, and they didn't get punished. I didn't actually think that happened a ton in this game. There's some weird moments and whatever, and if the U.S. had snuck through, like, man, everyone is injured, and I'm pretty sure everyone suspended on yellow cards.

I don't know it because I didn't go through and check because it doesn't really matter, but I think all of that ends up coming back on the US going forward. Some of the individual performances that stand out. Let's start in the back. I think Turner is fine. There's not really much he can do on the goal. He makes the initial save. I thought he was okay with his feet. The one thing I did like was he was really quick to restart play. Anytime they had a goal kick, by the time the camera cut back to play, they were into the attack, including the chance Pulisic tries to create for Pepe sort of midway through.

I don't even know when. I was taking pictures of Michele Giannone behind the sideline holding his face. I have like 18 of them now. So shout out to Michele, the legend, who's like dying behind the goal for that one. But I thought at least Turner did that at a minimum, So shout out to McKaylee, the legend, who's like dying behind the goal for that one. But I thought at least Turner did that at a minimum. And otherwise, it seemed like he was healthy enough to play and give them the performance they needed. Yeah, I agree. Again, I think Anthony Robinson is always a standout.

Just he's super consistent. I don't think that he did anything special in this game. But again, every national team needs some players like this where you just get a consistent seven. He was up and down like always. He didn't have many bad moments in possession. Again, he didn't have any special attacking moments either. But I'll take that against Uruguay with everything.

I thought they handled Darwin Nunez well enough. The field handled Darwin Nunez pretty well too. He went down a couple times with his foot getting stuck in the turf. But he wasn't really dangerous. Kiki Olivera, like Joe Scali, to his credit, he played through an injury, and I thought that was very impressive as well. Kiki Olivera wasn't really shaking him. So there was a lot of that was solid, man.

It was just, again, when you get yourself in this situation, they needed more than solid. And obviously, this wasn't the plan. And I don't know. I'm kind of running out of it. Because as I'm complimenting the players, I'm like, yeah, but, well, they needed to win. And, okay, what did Joe Scali do going forward one single time?

Like Jaddy Robinson, I think he was good. Do I remember a key moment where he got into a good position and even messed up across, let alone played a good one? So all these things, and it's doom and gloom, so it's difficult, but that's where I keep coming back to. And again, talking about Tim Rehm on the botched refereeing call of the yell card coming out, Tim Rehm was the one who back and and cleared the ball so like there was good moments within there but i'm not walking away being like oh eight out of ten performance well done it it is tough because

you said it like darwin nunez did not really appear in this game and like wow on the one hand credit to chris richards and tim ream for handling that on the other side i thought both were atrocious in possession um i thought they both really struggled I thought Richard struggled with the speed of play and then the he seemed to be completely confused by the angles the pressure was coming at him and the whole first half he went back to Turner pretty much every time he touched the ball he went back to Turner and I've mentioned Ream's struggles passing out of that left center back spot where he's normally very comfortable and like those are moments where it's like that's

the CONCACAF setup right you have the entire back line stepped up to midfield Reem is stepping into that left channel try to draw out a defender a little bit what's the first pass like those are things we see in every nation's league semi-final that's where it's tough to say that the u.s looks so bewildered in those moments because they should have been comfortable in a lot of those spots yeah and and that's a great point to go back to that so again like while i'm giving kudos for some of these solid defensive performances it was like one of the like handful of times that Chris Richards broke lines they were moving forward so if there was consistent being able to play a 15-yard pass forward and a little bit risky if I like Chris Richards is probably feeling a little bit of heat from giving the ball away so many

times in their first two games that hey let's play a little conservative here I think that informs the decision to go back to Turner I think that that, plus, as you said, the angles of pressure that he seemed to struggle a little bit with. Again, the very few times that he did break lines, it was super advantageous for the National Team. Again, like, I believe one of them was when Tyler Adams got the L-card. It was a heavy touch from Adams.

And again, like, he shouldn't have gotten the L-card on that. He got his angle stomped on. But like, if he doesn't have a heavy touch there... He comes through a ball that he doesn't get any on where it's his long touch. And the broadcast was furious about it. But that's one of those moments where it's like Adams has put himself in a spot to get yellow card. And that was a bad long. And that was a moment, too, where it's like he's breaking through off that layoff.

That could be a dangerous moment. And that's my point. That started with a really nice pass by Richards, if I'm 99% sure on that. And that's where the break could have happened. It ended up not happening. But it was like any time that Richards or Ream did make that pass through the midfield, or we were good at finding Reina in... Like, Reina had a couple, in the first half in particular a couple good

one touch long switches to ballistic direct yeah those were good moments there just weren't enough of them yeah um that was sort of the one outlet the u.s had uruguay tried a little bit they tried to hit those big crosses in transition moments to try and start the attack. And for the most part, again, the U.S. defended pretty well. Tyler did the things he does really well, killing transition moments by himself in moments he shouldn't. There's a play late in the game, which is like classic Tyler, which I get juiced about, where he wins the ball back at the edge of the attacking third, clips it into the corner.

Pulisic loses it. Pulisic's pressuringuring and then Tyler cuts off the pass on the end line he bypasses three American players to get there because he's like I'll just play both positions and it's like one of those absurd moments where again I say the things he's world class at I use the word world class because he is that now in saying that I'd love to see that be the gameplay like i'd love to see tyler adams leading pressure for 89 minutes and like if you lose that way you lose that way but like it's so clearly the way when we've asked this question for 50 years what is the american style like now there's this system that's come into play where most teams live on where it's like we create chances with our energy and our aggression off the ball and that creates chances

for us then in possession and it feels so clear that you should lean completely into that and it's we don't i mean austria is really the one example of like you can build a national team it took a little while you're also now in that scenario drawing directly out of red bull players for the most like all of that is pretty perfect but you also don't have to qualify for this world cup so like the u.s the thing that you had this opportunity with for these four years or three years in this cycle was you get an international cycle that very few coaches will ever get where there are no stakes and it's we're saying that in a time where because of the performances you're making these comments but if there was that clear cycle

and there was a clear okay the results weren't there but the performances started to move in that direction fine from this tournament. And I don't believe that's the case. And the results weren't there on the top of it. And I think that part is really hard to deal with. On top of, we've got a bunch of questions, which is like, why are there not millionaires in the U.S., like in Canada, who will just pay for the U.S. coach? I don't really know the mechanisms behind that. Because U.S. soccer is a nonprofit.

I guess you could donate money and you could donate money to a cause and if you wanted to do that you could do that i don't know a lot of rich people but they normally don't give money away but maybe you could find one maybe drew carrie would do it dude no no if if drew carrie did that um if i was the seattle sanders front office and and a fan i'd be like whoa we could have bought a center forward what are you doing right you could have bought Darwin Nunez instead of uh funding a U.S. coach uh on top of that uh we've got 87 more comments about Juergen Klopp although I appreciate this one from Filmographer's Podcast who says yes Klopp has

just been dreaming of the chance to coach the likes of tyler adams and eunice musa which is a fair point although managing a team that's about to host a world cup i think is the unique part that becomes really interesting um ph swimmer asked can this team learn how to deal with physicality panama and uruguay both roughed this team up did you think that was a major issue or is that something that's no no no no so that that's something that i've gone to before of like in some of these games the intensity intensity was not lacking today i don't think intensity was lacking against panama again pretty intense by tim way uh tim way to get the red card. But I don't think that's why they lost that game. And I don't think that's why they lost today.

Shout out to Hammer 105 who says Bud Light needed today. Someone asked what I was drinking. It was a local bourbon, I believe, from Brooklyn. I was scrambling around because I'm out of beer. So I was trying to find something to pour before this. You're so classy, dude. It's sick. I know.

Well, listen. I dragged on the field today in co-ed we were up to one we lost three two and i was limping over the finish line i almost looked at the ref losing three two and wanted to be like come on come on man just call it like just blow the I'm done. So I had to try and I got to try and lighten things up sometimes. The barbecue that I ate before the game probably was not the best pregame meal. And being in Kansas City, I do worry about the U.S. having done the same thing as me in all of that. Eric Nuchen, why her? I'm just going to go with this comment says,

I think it's just that our golden generation of talent is only good enough to be a top 12 team in the world. I think that's not that far off. I would like to say for the 7,000th time, I don't believe this is a golden generation. I think the structure has been rebuilt. And I believe that the generations coming through are going to continue to be as talented and i think diego luna and jack mcglynn and fidel borajas and all of these players are really really special and are going to be really special problem is it doesn't help you when i talked about this team being all you 27 like adding two more 20 year olds in midfield is not going to make you much more competitive in 2026.

It will going forward after that. Yeah, I think that's the whole point is that we continue to talk about potential. And I think that we got ahead of ourselves in talking about the potential of dream, like particularly after 2018 of, all right, miss the World Cup. Huge, huge embarrassment, huge disappointment. How do you cope? Hope. You look forward. Okay, look at all these young players we have. Oh, by 2022, they're all going to be world-class.

You play out the best-case scenario for all of these careers. Same thing now with 2026. These are a lot of young players and a lot of unproven players. Or a lot of players that, again, I just don't want to keep repeating myself. I have earlier in the podcast, like you point to McKinney is, is he's closer to his prime or early prime. And he's, you know, ninth or 10th most important player when he starts for Juventus. Right. Like that, that's different with the national team. And then we talk about every, all of the, some of the other players.

And again, Raina has got to be the poster boy for this of, because he has the talent to be elite. He has the talent to join. Yeah. Balgan too. Balgan was awful with Monaco this year. Gio Reyna, as well documented, was awful with Dortmund and Forrest. Or maybe you can't even say awful because he never got the chance to be awful because he never played.

So, just pulling up the FIFA rankings, which is obviously not always correct in that USA are ahead of Colombia or Uruguay, Germany, whatever, right? Like, but just the generalities. Boom, that's a championship right there. Just going ahead of, like, these are, like, the tiers or whatever. And, like, in this tier, like, dude, like, Uruguay doesn't have those players. Germany, like, Japan. Like, Japan's better than us, right?

Like, there's Switzerland are 19th. And you even looked at them, like, oh, like, they lost, like, you know, they're too old now. And, like, boom. than us, right? Like there's Switzerland are 19th. And you even looked at them like, oh, like they lost, like, you know, they're too old now. And like, boom, there they go again. They get into the knockout rounds. They just continue to do that. So, I mean, I struggle to even get too micro about this now is that I think that the 10,000 view take is just not as good as I think the potential

that we could be. And I think that we get lost potential versus talent, potential versus what are they right now? And that's been the argument in 22. Why are they bringing in these veterans? You know, oh, Joe Scali is going to be better than Yedlin and going to be better than Shackmore, going to be whatever, right? Like in 22.

And Pepe's going to be better than all these players. Well, guess what? The 2022 World Cup, it doesn't matter what Pepe's going to be in 26. It matters what he is right now. And I think that we keep on getting lost in that. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's completely fair.

And I think part of what we just talked about with the cycle is the Kuva won't happen again. 2022 won't happen again 2022 won't happen again where it's like you have to reset and lean on a bunch of kids to be the adults and be the veterans because you don't have a generation in the middle that's the part that you've now worked against but it doesn't mean the team's ready to hit and ready to roll right now and like that is to all of the comments we are getting here uh a lot of the issue uh we have one here that's conca calf is a problem go to conmable or uefa um i don't think that even matters anymore like 175 teams get in the world cup qualifying is going to be so minimal to what you do i'm sure conmable and conca calf are going to run copa americas across the two regions over and over because of what uefa is doing

and solidifying and sort of creating a scenario in which their teams can't really play friendlies against other people for a ton of time because of nation's league schedule and everything they've done as well as less window so yeah i think all of that's fair i think all that's fine um i think it'd be nice to build up the region and make it better. And that actually is one of the things MLS is doing, which is a lot of the best players now on a lot of the national teams across CONCACAF are American born or raised, came out of MLS academies and are playing for countries where their families are from, where the countries where they're born. And then a lot of other players are coming at a really young age. I mean, Venezuela is like 50% MLS players that came and played in. I would say

if you look through this Venezuela team, there's like multiple players that played in USL or MLS next pro. Like that's sort of the setup for a lot of these countries. I think Columbia is going to be a part of that. I think Ecuador is going to be a part of that, think ecuador is going to be a part of that but a lot of conca calf is as well and i think you kind of have a responsibility to your region but at the same time um i don't know that anyone else cares about this thing that i care about in this region and all those things and all of that going forward um this is team x question says can you expect to see the u.s start playing in copa consistently now moving forward not everyone every other one would love to see that like it just feels obvious i mean we're talking about copa lib sometimes about like it feels like we're on the verge of conor ball and conca calf

or at least mls and league mx finding a way to get clubs back in if that's the case then you've got national teams in 100 tom wants to talk about this sure whatever cool i don't know like it's it's all these decisions are driven by money they're not driven by like we're talking about it from a developmental sense yeah that'd be great but like let's see what the money shows and that's what it'll be and like it look at the field sizes look at the if a stadium in this tournament could not have a regular size field you know the five yards more it shouldn't be a stadium in this tournament could not have a regular-sized field, you know, the five yards more, it shouldn't be a stadium. It shouldn't be a question.

That should be something non-negotiable. But instead, look at when they played at Sporting Kansas City Stadium. They redrew the lines to make the field smaller to match all the other ones. My Canadian friend was texting me about this, and I was like, there's no way. It's a soccer. Like they're playing on the field. What are you talking about?

And then I saw you could see the top of the box. Yeah. Inside the box or above the box, whatever. On one side, I think in front of the blue cauldron. So, yeah, like if it makes more sense, if they find a way to make more money by coming to America. And by the way, I'm sure that they will. But like, that's why it's here right now. So, yeah, maybe it will be.

But then they're going to play on crap grass. They're going to do whatever. Or they're going to be, I don't know, 75 games of qualifying just to make sure that they can sell tickets or they can sell TV rates or whatever. Who cares about the players? Who gives a shit about the quality of the game? Everything is just about people in suits maximizing profits. That's great. So cares about the players? Who gives a shit about the quality of the game? Everything is just about people in suits maximizing profits. That's great.

So who cares? All these decisions are being made for monetary reasons not for developmental reasons. Matthew Bruce says would Lucho Acosta fix would he fix the US Men's National Team? As you can see if you're watching live on the bottom of our

screen we'll be live at 2 PM. Eastern time. Technically later today on Tuesday, we will do our MLS show. Bradley Carnell was fired. We've got a ton to talk about. Tiago Amada seems to be on the move. So reminder,

we've got that. And then Lori Lindsay's going to fill in for Jordan on our Wednesday show to talk NWSL. Amy Rodriguez was fired. We've got a lot to talk about there as well so if you like questions like does lucho acosta make the u.s better which no one else in the world wants to talk about except us uh and maybe we be who's probably texting us about it right now as doyle floods the chat with a bunch of troll uh tweets from other people that he found super entertaining

uh you can join us there or you can subscribe to the podcast. So go to soccer wise, search soccer wise or soccer wise HQ anywhere on your socials, subscribe to the Patreon as well. So you can get involved. You can jump into the discord. You can get our depth charts as well, which are coming from MLS.

We have them done for NWSL and us women's national team. We're going to have to do ours for us men's national team as well my depth chart is like insane it goes deep to the point of like players that should never be in a national team conversation there are not a lot that i a roster comes out and i can debate or really think about like because it's one of the questions we've had in the chat which is like who brings more to this team? Who changes this group? The pool is not in a place where the debate is who's in, who's out. The pool is what it is, right? Like there are not names that got left off this list.

You brought up DeAndre Yedlin. Like we're talking about all like backups in backup situations. We're talking about is Sean Johnson the third goalkeeper or not? There's maybe a little debate at the center forward position um how important are the aaronsons like but is there anyone that comes to your mind that you say changes the reality of this tournament brandon vasquez just because attackers have a bigger impact particularly off the bench um yeah but again like i i don't i'm a big big brandon vasquez guy i wouldn't have complained if he was on the team.

But, like, I don't think it was egregious. And maybe that's just part of me. Like, I don't have a lot of juice for arguing about 24, 25, 26 slots on a roster. Like, how many of them didn't play at this tournament? Hadji Wright got, you know, seven minutes or whatever the hell. Yeah. Like, yeah, maybe. But, like, again –

I don't think Luca Dellatori played in this tournament. And center mid is one where you could debate a couple people in a couple spots. yeah maybe but like again i don't think luca delatory played in this tournament and center mid is one where you could debate a couple people in a couple spots but like was he really gonna or like was tanner tessman gonna start over these guys like again like we like these are talking points and they're fun to argue about but like i don't think it matters what matters is the top end of this team um vasquez also has has played over 60 minutes he played over 60 minutes He played over 60 minutes Once in his last six games of the season

In League MX and then obviously the season Is not in right now so Technically not in form coming into this tournament I think that's a good name though It's a different element it's a different style And part of the problem With some of this was like You leaned on Josh Sargent and he clearly wasn't

fit to play in this tournament which is kind of one of the ways you have to judge these things but it's probably doesn't change the reality and it probably doesn't matter at all Timothy Way gets a red card unfortunately early against Panama the U.S. goes up 1-0 three minutes after that then they are tied three minutes and 36 seconds after that and that sealed a lot of the u.s's fate although today the result went their way panama winning only three one it put the u.s in a situation where if they won they would have been through they failed to score they lose one zero against uruguay uh and that's kind of the end of things for this u.s team we got the brian white shouts for the new jersey mario gomez today on that's what of the end of things for this U.S. team. We got the Brian White shouts for the New Jersey Mario Gomez.

That's what I was saying yes to. I was very happy about it. Today on the recap show, first I called him Miroslav White, and then I called him Brian Drogba. When you score goals the way he does, I think the New Jersey Mario Gomez is disrespectful to him. Screw you. That's been my mission to make that a you. I came out. I've been,

that's been my mission to make that a thing, but I do Marislav white. I don't know. That hit me. I love that too. Yeah. Cause it is the most absurd name. And it was also like kind of a perfect comp for them. And then we're getting the list of names for all the kids.

Esmir Barak, Tyrovich, all these kids, they're all really good at soccer. There are a lot of them are going to be really good pros. Some of them are going to be great national team players. None of them are going to affect this right now. The U.S. is out of Copa America alongside Mexico and Jamaica,

three teams that thought they could do something special for Mexico and the U.S. This is the last warm-up to the World Cup. There is no world in which the U.S. goes into the World Cup where we can say we know what we're going to get. That's the reality now. This was your one shot in a competitive tournament in this environment, in this structure, in this country where you are going to play in 2026,

where you would have a chance to beat Uruguay, knock off a Brazil or Colombia, to a semi-final be on the big stage perform at that level and be able to say to your fan base and be able to say to the wider fan base believe in us and pay attention to us in 2026 because we can do this they can still do it but they have no proof going into it so you are at this point going to have to convince everyone live at that tournament because you've got no cachet going in and i think that is a lot of what was lost over the course of this week yeah i i don't have anything yet like it's 100 like that that's what i keep going back to with just the macro view of this and that's the

most important takeaway from this game from this tournament from this experience all that they can still do it this is not that doom and gloom I don't think that the player pool is like broken again I just think that we need to reconfigure expectations and also reconfigure playing to their strengths and it'll be interesting now over the next two years to see the Aiden Morris's of the world who are a little bit older but get their first shot in Europe or get their first shot being the leaders of a team and MLS right maybe Georgie Mihailovich and Cole Bassett guys like that if they can slide into the pool rather than grow into it from a young age and maybe reinforce things as they go forward. But I think for the most part,

we feel pretty good. Tom, we're done. Yes. I was, I was about to text you and say, I think it's time to wrap. People in the chat don't say so,

but also they're all trolling us. So I appreciate that as well. We've got questions about the Maldives national team. That's where I went on my honeymoon a few weeks ago. Shout out to ludicris on that one. A lot of stuff about burgers. I don't, I don't know what's going on with burgers.

I don't know where that came from. Somebody called the United States a burger team. And a lot of people enjoyed that. Good. I'm glad I enjoyed it as well. Well, if you enjoy being a part of this live, we're back 2 PM Eastern time coming up today.

As I said, a ton to talk about. If you're listening to it later on the podcast. Thank you for joining us. We appreciate you being around with us. It wasn't fun to say the least, but it was an experience and I'm glad we could all be in it together. I hope you enjoyed our coverage of this Copa America on the U.S. side. I might have to fire up the Canadian postgame show again like I did last week for the Peru game for this knockout game because Canada against Venezuela, they've got a legitimate shot. Also, to throw out the whole international soccer thing, Canada scored one goal in the group stage, and they are through to play Venezuela in a quarterfinal.

The U.S. scored three goals, and they are out. Mexico only technically lost one game, 1-0, and they are out as well. So it is tight. The margins are tight. The opportunities are tight, but it was a big one for the U.S. I said it on the last show. I thought that this was a chance to change the perception of the sport and move the sport forward and especially this national team,

and that did not happen. And you don't get shots at that every two years. You get shots at that once in a generation. And this may have been the one lucky for them. They have 2026 coming around, but the two year buildup would have been wild. And it will have to be a little bit different now going forward. We, of course, will cover all of it on soccer wise we've got live shows we've got podcasts we have gonna start working on some longer scripted series things i've got some ideas popping around about some stuff i really want to

dig into and dive into especially around of course youth development and the structure of the game in this country and in other countries and what we can learn in all of that. So I will see Tom very, very soon at 2 p.m. this afternoon, Tuesday afternoon. Thank you to all of you again for listening. Thank you to all of you in the comment section for being here with us. We always appreciate it. We love what we're doing so far. You've been listening to Soccer Wives live postgame show here for the USMNT. Hope you enjoyed it as much as you could.

We'll talk to you again very, very soon.