The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - USA VS. BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA WORLD CUP REACTION SHOW (FT. HEATH PEARCE) | Morally Abhorrent

Episode Date: July 2, 2026

Mike Ryan Ruiz is joined by former USMNT player Heath Pearce to react and breakdown the USMNT's round of 32 World Cup matchup with Bosnia and Herzegovina. They also take a look around what has been an incredible World Cup to recap what has gone down and what is yet to come. ✅ Follow & Subscribe to Our Podcasts on Spotify & Apple Podcasts ✅ 🔊 The Dan Le Batard Show 🔊 🟢 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2FuorRy... 🟣 Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... 🔊 Le Batard & Friends Network 🔊 🟢 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2ZYllDN... 🟣 Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... 🔊 Mystery Crate 🔊 🟢 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6nCctQZ... 🟣 Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ✅ Follow Us On Social! ✅ ☑️ The LeBatard Show on Twitter: https://twitter.com/lebatardshow ☑️ 📸 The LeBatard Show on Instagram: http://instagram.com/lebatardshow 📸 💥 The LeBatard Show on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lebatardshow 💥 🪄 The LeBatard Show on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lebatardandfriends 🪄 ✅ Subscribe! ✅ 💻 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAIZ... 🤑 MERCH! 🤑 : https://lebatardaf.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Best Daily Sports Podcast on the Internet #lebatardshow #lebatard #thepirateship #sports #live #danlebatard Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Wayfair, every style, every home. Who won? The United States men's national team wins Dosacero against Bosnia and Herzegovina. And it is not without controversy and or, drama. I imagine we're going to get some sort of appeal for Flo Balagan on that straight red that angered everyone I know that was engaged in this match that was on a group text. Everybody lost their mind. You had a whole bunch of VAR takes flying by a bunch of people that can't get

targeting right in their sport. So I imagine the discourse is going to be something for the next 24 hours. But welcome everybody that is live on our YouTube page right now. Very glad to have you. Congratulations. I imagine the vast majority of you are super pumped up about the U.S. making it to the round of 16 a knockout victory. These things don't come often for the U.S.

Their last and I believe only knockout stage victory, at least in our lifetimes, came all the way back. in 2002. It was another dos a zero, and it came against our arch rivals. The U.S. is now headed to Seattle against Belgium, who pulled off a miraculous comeback today against Senegal. They look deader than disco, and yet they come back and win it in extra time. So it'll be the United States against Belgium. We are now joined by a familiar face, a podcast host, a former U.S. men's international and Heath Pierce, Heath, we're just getting into it. Tree top view at first because right now the overwhelming sentiment is excitement and it's

immediately couched by let's appeal this red. But the U.S. was gutsy. Balligan was unbelievable until that red. What was your chief takeaway from this match against Bosnia? Well, I think it's that collective mindset, right? And I think, again, that was probably the biggest mystery that, you know, maybe maybe you feel differently. But the biggest mystery I had going into this tournament was what is the collective mindset, right? There was talks about Pochitino. There was talks about the team.

Is there that fighting spirit? Can we tap into that American DNA that we've always gone into these tournaments with? What was it going to be? And what we've seen from the very first minute of the very first game through this Bosnia match is the collective mentality, just the willingness to run, the willingness to be tuned in. And it's hard to see some of the stuff that I'm seeing at times because it's very, very nuanced in terms of little things on the field when you're playing in a team and you're getting a little bit tired. When you see these little movements of their teams and the counter movements of, hey, if I go, knowing when it's your time to go and how you move collectively, that to me is the biggest takeaway I have from this game. Obviously, this is the most quality

we've ever had in our national team. It's the best team we've ever had. But what we haven't seen is, how do you bring that all together and say, at a minimum, we're going to fight like hell. We're going to make it really difficult for our opponents. And then we're going to earn the right to play. And when that happens, we're going to have special moments from some of our best players. Tonight we got that. We've gotten that so far in this tournament. We've got a long ways to go.

We're going to be facing more and more difficult opponents if we can continue to get results. But overall, just really, really proud. And I think the one thing you won at any point in the World Cup is to embody your country, to embody your nation, to embody those that came before you in your national team. And this team has done exactly that. Excellent points by Heath. By the way, you can support Heath. He's got a podcast, an incredible name.

I actually had a written down in my notes app for this game that we play real or fake podcast. Orange slices with Heath Pierce. Heath, you mentioned the mentality and it's hard. This team, the book on them was immaturity with the last World Cup cycle, the whole Burrhalter saga. We don't have to get into that. They've gotten older collectively, but they didn't have the World Cup qualification process that kind of tests their mental fortitude. And Poach's approach to the friendlies was a very Argentinian approach that these things really don't matter.

The friendlies are for me to figure things out as a head man. So you need an opponent like this and a match like this to kind of test your mental, not dissimilar from what we saw earlier in the day with England, a national team that is constantly being called out for their intestinal fortitude or lack thereof. This is a huge moment. This is a huge galvanizing moment for this team. Let's talk about the back line, your expertise. I thought Bosnia were pretty poor on the day.

I was a little stunned that once they got the main advantage, they didn't try to keep possession and make the United States men chase the ball. But in the back, pretty clean match from the back line. Ream didn't get caught out of position, which is I know like a huge concern for many people. What did you notice along that back line? Yeah, I really like the way that they played. I don't think they were tested all that much in a way that I think other teams are.

I think we saw more from Turkey in terms of if you give me a sniff, we're going to take advantage of that. If you give us an opening and as you play against better and better strikers, and that's no disrespect to Begovich and Injeko well past the best years of his career. But I thought that the U.S. didn't have to suffer. What I like to see, though, is that when we went down a man, that willingness to say, let's sit in our blocks, let's be disciplined, we're going to be hard in those because you saw in the second half, there were moments where you could tell fatigue was kicking in, maybe broke a little bit of the press, and then it's an errand ball, and then we have to defend for longer periods of time. You have Bosnia chasing the game. But the back line, I thought overall, very, very organized. What I, very, very opposite, I guess, from what we saw against Turkey A in terms of you put out nine new players, basically 10 new players into a starting lineup.

You can't do that at the club level without losing some sort of rhythm and timing and, you know, who's playing off my shoulder and what's going on around me. But it seems like right now this back line, the back three, the back five. And then when you talk about sort of the double pivots that play underneath, whether that's Tillman and Adams or you want to have Westman, call that Weston McKinney and Adams, there's just a real cohesive unit in the way that they play. When one steps out, one drops. How do they cover inside?

There wasn't any lazy wingback defending where we were able to get penetrating, passes between that. That happens once or twice a game at any level, but by and large, when teams start to eat you up because if they find the gaps in your team, that's where they start to exploit. So I feel like there was a real discipline and a buy-in and also an accountability more than anything. It's one thing to buy in. It's another thing to say, you know, I'm going to do my job today. It's another thing to have that accountability from your teammates, the leadership from a Tim Riem, the leadership from a Chris Richards, the leadership from a Tyler Adams that are holding the players around them accountable to make sure that,

hey, when we move, we do this together. And it's been a long time since I could say that about this team in terms of, other than raw ability that we've seen time and time again, that this team has looked this cohesive in terms of everything that they're doing feels well-oiled. It feels well bought into. And then the execution we're seeing the benefits of and the fact that we're advancing to the round of 16.

There were a couple of individual performances I want to highlight. I really want to celebrate the team before. I know the chat's going nuts with complaining about the officiating and the red I promise you, we'll get into that. But today's a great day for celebration. These days don't come often for the U.S. men's national team. Tillman was fantastic, very skillful, really ambitious passing. And then obviously the second goal that puts that away, that led to a huge side of relief.

I didn't think Bullisic had his best game, especially early on. But once the United States went down, man, Christian's ever been like the most vocal leader, right? He's a lead-by-example kind of guy. And I thought he kind of played his best ball after. after we went down to 10. And for me, the best player on the pitch for the U.S. men was, I mean, balligan until he got the red, which we'll get into. McKinney was all over this pitch.

I mean, his cardio was insane today. Whereas in the first match, like the United States was playing with such a lightning fast pace that McKinney actually looked slower and a little lacking compared to the rest of his teammates. And that's not usually his game. I thought he was spectacular today. Yeah, I thought McKinney was phenomenal. And he's probably the player I'm most critical of on a regular basis, just because he has the ability to sometimes play at one speed and you go,

where's that extra bit? Where's that extra bit of special that we see in the highlight tapes and the reels and when I'm watching him over 90 minutes over long periods of time when he's playing abroad? And he's a guy that just he can really upset me at times. And in this match, he was just fantastic. The intensity, the high speed running, the change of pace, the change of directions, the combination play, the comfort on the ball, the tactical side of the game, his technical ability in tight spaces really, really good.

And you mentioned Tillman as well. He's another one that I think for me has had indifferent performances. I think a lot of our guys have had in different performances over time absolutely lights out so far in this tournament. Just in terms of, again, the ability to get out of tight spaces, seeing the game a step ahead of our opponents that are allowing us to where it might be a normally be a turnover, right? A loss of possession in a tight space. It feels like our midfield is really able and confident to play out of everything where as soon as I'm, you know, my mindset goes to anything. When somebody collapses on us and impresses, I'm like, oh, no,

it's going to be one, two passes and we lump it long. But we've been consistently breaking presses of all of our opponents so far in this tournament. And I think that that's a sign of respect. That's a sign of quality in terms of this team's ability to take that risk, right? Of course, you you you turn over a ball in a bad spot, you get punished at the next level. But so far, it's been building that momentum and confidence, which I'm really, really proud of for this group because there were a lot of times that we've seen so far in this tournament, especially now down a man, down a man, up a goal, trying to manage the game, where your and your legs are tired and your mind's telling you, this ball comes to me, I'm lumping it

to the corner flag. And they still find, found opportunities, slow the game down, change the point of attack, open the game up a little bit, trying to play a little bit. And the last thing I would say, by the way, as you mentioned, Polisic, and I agree, I don't think he had his best outing, but what I like from him is what we need from him every single game. In the first four or five minutes, open up the field, drive inside, pull defenders out of positions, because if he can do that ever so often, it keeps that side of the field pretty neutralized in terms of the attacking players, right? Their best attackers are on that side of the field. So when you have a Polisic that's driving at you, it's pulling those attacking players further back, keeping them honest, but it's also forcing

them to keep attention to him, pulling players over, which then opens up our other side of the field where we actually get more overloads with Destin Freeman. We didn't see Freeman as much advanced today, but we start to get some of those overloads. So overall, I feel like this team is really, really intelligent so far in how they're moving, how they're opening up the game, taking what the game gives them right. They take what the game gives them. They get space on the wings. They take what the game gives them. The game can come up through the middle when the space is there, and they're taking that. And I think that shows more than anything, the individual quality of this group is to recognize in real time what's going on, take those moments to their advantage, and then

really start to sort of execute on what the game is giving you. Yeah, I think you touched on it. I think the advanced metrics would suggest that the United States is one of the more exceptional teams dribbling through traffic, taking on defenders. Look, we've had skilled players come through the national team that are more than capable of dribbling through traffic, but for whatever reason. Generationally, our style has not really afforded that. We've had our identity. And you knew that that would be an investment in the national team. And once we got the quote unquote golden generation, these were supposed to be the guys that could do that. And you're seeing it play out. The United States is getting itself out of jams and creating chances in really

skillful ways that are kind of foreign to this men's national team. It's a, yes, it's a credit to the players that are on the field, but also this is an investment by U.S. soccer paying off. And I've got to tell you, I've been one of the louder critics. I'm married to the identity that I've seen us be most successful in counterattacking, get behind the ball, stay organized. We're not going to outskill these guys, but maybe we can get a long ball and out, athlete them. So far, throughout this tournament, the decision to hire a poach, the decision to have

more of an attacking mindset and trust this generation of players, it's paying off heat. Yeah, and one of the things I really like, and you mentioned it, is we can play in transition. We can do that. And I think there were times that Bosnia went high on us. And you could see these very clear plays develop where maybe Balagan peels off. Maybe he checks back. He creates space. And then you have Weston McKinney running in or you have Sergenio Desk playing on that highest line.

And the way that they're playing right now with this sort of back three, back five, is that it's allowing Desk at times to cheat way up the field, right? It's allowing Pulisic to cheat way up the field. And so when you have these counter movements, it allows you to be directed. It allows you to take a transitional moment. And if you do that one or two times, then Bosnia starts to go, I'm not chasing that guy to the corner flag again. I don't want to have to go all the way back and track back 60, 70 yards with eight, nine players now behind the ball.

I'm going to just sit back. And that's where we start to get that play underneath. But I fully agree with you, getting out of these jams, getting out of tight spaces, one or two touches. And it's not that we haven't been able to do that in the past. But in order to get out of tight spaces, you have to hit sometimes six or seven perfectly sharp passes to the correct foot into the right position with the body set up the right way, with you seeing the game and the triangles that are presenting themselves to be able to execute that.

And we've seen the attempts in the past where it's three, four passes and then maybe someone sends one up and somebody has to take touches to get it down. And then the space closes, right? The opportunity closes. But we're turning tight spaces into attacking moments because they're collapsing. on us. They're trying to win the ball. The technical ability is really good. The vision is really good. Now we're out the other side. And when you do that to teams, it just wears you down. I've played in plenty of games with the national team where you're all energy and you're just trying to collapse because you're like, we can get them to cough it up here.

And when you break that multiple times, then you've got a back line that wants to sit deeper. You've got a midfield that stepped out higher. And you start to find the gaps in the field. And I think we have that technical ability, whether that's holistic being able to drive inside when he gets the ball. Serginio Dess being able to be much more dynamic that So, Sergio Dest under pressure with the ball at his feet, he can go either way with you. And we know he's always been that type of player that can disrupt you by eliminating the first defender. Now he's driving at you. And the movements and counter movements start. And so we're starting to see that in more positions on the field.

And again, to go back to your point just a minute ago, Tillman is a huge part of it. The way he floats into spaces and out of spaces, his final ball, his willingness to make late runs, to get into attacking positions, to play on the half turn with his back to the field and sometimes just play simple. I go back to a player that I played against. We were playing the Netherlands before the 2010 World Cup and in Amsterdam Arena and Dirkout came on. And everything he did was at the highest level intensity against me. He would run 15 yards, full speed, cut back, check back to the ball.

They'd play in the ball. And he'd just lay it off. And I'd go, okay, that's one. And he checked back as hard as he could, come back, lay off the ball a second time. And then by the third time, I'm like, this guy's just going to lay off the ball. And he'd check his shoulder. turn on me and start running at me. And that level of intensity and confusion just starts to wear on defenses. Centerbacks don't want to get pulled all over the place. And we pulled their centerbacks

in and out of positions constantly and then dealt with it the right way, which again, over time, it's just like little chips at frustration that opens up the field and then you earn the right to play. We're seeing that quality. It's been really fun. I'm going to welcome in a friend of morally abhorrent, a friend of ours, Chris Whittingham from the Galazzo Network, a brilliant play-by-play guy. I want to see the look on his face and his excitement here as we talk to Heath fears. Heath, I do also want to pick your brain on Chris Richards. I know Jekko is at an older stage in his career and there's no real strike or threat on Bosnia. But yet again, this guy continues to impress Chris. Chris Richards has been a godsend at the centerback position. But before you answer that question,

witty hop in, I got to see the look on your beaming face. Look at you. Look at that face is flush. I saw that pre-match shot that you took to relax. We have Heath Pierce on with us. I want to ask him about Chris Richards. But first, let me get your macro thoughts here. I'm sure beyond just elation, what did you, what was your main takeaway from tonight's performance from the U.S. men? I really thought it was the manner in which they played when they were down to 10 men.

And I think before that, they were okay. They weren't spectacular. I thought they were better against Paraguay and probably started better against Australia. but you're 1-0 up and you have all the flashbacks. I'm sure you did, Mike. You root for the Italian national team of that qualifying game where they went down to 10 men. And albeit it's a completely different situation. Bosnia are at home in that circumstance.

But the U.S. did not stop playing at all. They continued to play with audacity. They play with bravery. They went forward. They took first touches. They played in dangerous areas. I was screaming at them to play calmer and to play less risky football. But they kept going.

They went in certain. of that second goal rather than hanging back and trying to defend for 30 minutes, although I think they might have been comfortable doing that. You mentioned Richards, and I want to hear Heath's perspective on this, but Richards was so good in the middle of that box, and this is what he does for Palace, and is probably elite in world football at this, is just heading balls out of the box on crosses that come in. He positions himself fantastically well. He puts himself in good areas, obviously has the physicality in order to win the ball,

and just goes and smashes balls away over and over and over. again. So I really love the way that they played down to 10. And unfortunately, the takeaway for the longer term is now the red card suspension of Balligan, which I'm sure you guys have talked about. No, and I yet. Oh, yeah. No, no, no. We're celebrating the men. And we're going to celebrate Chris Richards. You heard Woody there Heath have at it. Chris Richards. Yeah, it's just phenomenal. And again, I agree in the sense that his comfort and I, and I, and I, what I liked, and I talked to a few players going into this tournament, and I think they all wanted to land on. formation, right? Are we back four? We back three. We've actually seen a hybrid of such in terms of

with the ball and against the ball in terms of how the team sets up. But when I look at the difference, and I hate comparing these games to the Turquia game, because I would have been, it would have been a dream to play in that game, but I would have hated the fact that there's 11 new players basically on the field and you've got to figure out rhythm and timing. But it's the spacing in the back three that I like. When you have a Chris Richards, when you have a Freeman, when you have a, Tim Riem, each one of them has a set of strengths and each one of them has weaknesses. But the way in which their spacing is in terms of the box, who's got near post, who's picking up the runner, who's coming inside.

It feels like, and then when you add a six into that equation, it feels like a very crowded area where we've got most space covered. It still requires you, though. It's even more stressful because it's a little bit more of what feels like an Italian style of just distancing between players that when one steps out, you come in and it's a really compact space in terms of that pessimistic mentality of if I'm Chris Richards and Tim Ream gets beat, I've got to be the next guy to be there. And I've got to assume every single time Tim Ream's going to make a play, I'm going to have to make a play for him because Tim Ream's going to get beat.

Not because of his age or anything like that, but because positionally and the mindset you have to have to have to be good at this level is that you have to assume that every single play, you're going to have to make the play that keeps your team in the match. And that's spacing and that comfort, that size, that ability to win balls in the air, to clear the lines, that comfort of tracking runners. And sometimes you've got to cheat a little bit, be one-on-one for short periods of time until you have cover. All of those things have been really, really elite.

Now, what I will say is that we haven't truly, truly been tested. I think Turkey would have been the best thing to put our best team against because of the way in which they have players like we do that can disrupt you, right? They can break the press on the dribble. And then it's kind of an oh, oh, crap moment, right? what do we do? We're falling back to our own goal. There's a player driving at me. There's two dynamic runs coming off of our shoulders. I think we saw that against Turkey. We haven't seen that much other than other than that in terms of this tournament. So it's still a worry for me of what

type of opponent is going to give us that that's going to cause us headaches in our backline. But so far, I can't just say we haven't faced difficult opponents because we have. It's been extremely challenging. And the focus and discipline and the key moments, especially defensively, I thought's been really good. Well, you both made mention, of the Italian game. And I know that you're referencing the World Cup qualifier that recently happened,

but the Italian match I was going through my mind was O2 in South Korea because the officiating here was brutal. If you're a U.S. soccer fan, Whitty, you're typically reserved on the broadcast. You have to keep some of those thoughts buried. But when you're at home watching the game, you're letting the emotions fly.

Am I crazy? That seemed one-sided. Yeah, I don't. I don't know. It's hard because I'm currently wearing a U.S. soccer jersey. I don't know if I could ever be fully unbiased. We're all trying to sort through our feelings. But I do think that there were just moments where I thought the very light contact went punished, which I thought was strange. Ultimately, the game comes down to the VAR decision to send off Balligan. I am of the opinion. I am increasingly of the view that I understand why that was a red card. I understand we're

all emotional about it. And I also understand that it is sort of putting the game under a microscope that maybe it wasn't meant to. But ultimately, you look at the image of Muhammadovich's ankle sort of bent at an angle with balligan studs in it. And I appreciate, and Heath can probably talk to how that happens and why that's sort of accidental. And people talk about accidental all the time. It's not in the loss of the game. Ultimately, the language of the loss of the game that was used by the referee was endangers the safety of an opponent, which is not necessarily in a attacker's control. So I am both of the opinion that I kind of understand why they went to VAR, and I really don't think that's going to be overturned. So I think the next game is probably going to have to be

with Pepey. But really, my frustrations were the red for two things. One was all of these fouls that were given against the U.S. in moments where it felt like it was a bailout for Bosnia, the number of times that they held on to U.S. shirts to slow down counterattacks that happened several times throughout the game. They went to punish without yellow cards. And I was just throwing things at the TV when he gave 10 minutes at the end of the game. I thought that was absurd. I was beyond outraged with 10 minutes at the end of the game. But look, they survived. They won the game. And ultimately, you know, the feeling coming in was, if anything, the reps were going to be in the U.S.'s favor. But clearly, that has not proven

to be the case, at least as yet. Yeah, the holding was gratuitous. And it felt to me like Bosnia was intentionally trying to take some yellows and seemed a little surprised when they didn't happen. But let's talk about the moment in question, Heath, that's a tricky spot. We all know that that couldn't have possibly been Flo's intention there. What was your reaction as it played out? Did your mind change after you saw it on replay? Well, first of all, I want to go back to the fact of the referee, and then I'll get to this point. The one thing I will give him is the off the ball sort of like delayed foul call for Sergenio Des that ended up getting us the free kick from Tillman, where I'm like, it's kind of

of after the play, could have just let it on. It was a little bit of a tug, and then he gave it to us, but I agree that it just felt like he was constantly sort of chasing the previous call to make up for the call, at least in my mind in terms of never really feeling the flow and the pace of the game was sort of like, oh, I kind of messed that up. Let me see if I can fix it somewhere else. But I think no red card, and for a few reasons. One, if you just look at the way in which they're dueling for space, right?

They're trying to occupy a finite amount of space and they're scrapping for it. And when his body loses control, naturally what you do is you're trying to find your balance. And he's trying to get his foot on the ground. There's also a release of his foot as it starts to go down that he realizes it's not going to ground, that he pulls his foot back up when he realizes, like, I've just raked, you know, a calf all the way down to the heel of a player. And so that's the first thing. I get the endangering an opponent thing.

But that's where you start to get into some really gray area because there. there is endangerment of an opponent in most high velocity challenges that are deemed to be clean, right? There is an ability to endanger an opponent, right? If a player doesn't jump out of a challenge, if they don't jump over it, those types of things. And so for me, what's always missing in these things is context. And if you look at his body, if you look at the fact that his eyes are away, if you look like, how could somebody off balance on their left foot stomped down on a right ankle and blade without being able to sort of cue in on it with their eyes,

because in most cases where it's like a true red card, you see a player, they see red, and then there's like a certain thing. And even if they haven't seen red, you still see this velocity of like, I'm going for this and they take the chance. But this is a guy who's off balance, he's throwing his leg down.

It's unfortunate. But unfortunate things happen in the game all of the time. Players get injured in unfortunate situations all of the time. You know, the head-to-head contacts, right, in this tournament, there's been so many head-to-head contacts in this tournament. so far that at a certain point you go, which one of these is endangering the opponent? The player in the front, the player in the back, at a certain point, it becomes a feel thing. And I think if you were to ask most players who played the game at the high level to sort

of scope that out and have a feel of like the millions of times, it's like talking about a dog pile in the NFL, right? Is there flags that should be thrown every single dog pile? Absolutely. But when there's just natural contact and it's accidental, that to me is where it hurts. And it's not even so much just about this game because I think. I think Chris said it well in terms of the response was the greatest thing that we had in this game, right? They could have just sat back, get pushed back deeper and deeper until you can't get out and

then you're just hoping for the best. Then you see this a little bit of this fear of like we, we played not to lose given the circumstances. But what we saw was a team packed with energy and belief of like we're going to keep going. And unless they're going to really lean on us, we're going to just match up and play like we're not down a man. And so the thing that hurts the most, though, is to get to my point is is no balligan in the next game. That's the part that I think hurts the most because what we've found now, I think, is our best team. We've seen our players that are key coming off of the bench. And Balligan has been one of the best strikers in this World Cup in terms of his dynamic

movement of just keeping defenders in distress in terms of playing off their shoulders, the little darting runs, the long-winded runs, all of these types of things that you can tell. He's just frustrating defenses and back lines. And so to lose him, we get a different player in Pepe. We haven't seen his best yet, at least in this World Cup. He's mostly gone on and played a physical battle. I think he was kind of outnumbered and out kind of strength against or whatever the word might be against Turquier. But that to me feels like beyond punishment.

It feels like, okay, you want to get him out of this game. Take Baligan out of this game. We'll keep grinding it out and fighting it in retrospect. But to lose him into the next one, that's the part that hurts. And I agree, if you kind of look at this replay over and over again, and that's the problem with VIR. When you really slow it down and you see a cleat go down, a leg through an ankle, and the ankle roll. over and flip over, it's hard to watch. And when it's hard to watch, your natural reaction, your physical reaction to something

that looks like it hurts is to be like, that's wrong. And so when you slow things really down, yeah, it's tough to really get those back. So I don't see them winning that appeal. I think they'll obviously try to appeal it. But that's the part that hurts the most to me is this team's really on to something special. And to have something that I don't believe is true, affect them in the next round. Maybe it's another adversity builder for them.

But I think it just feels unfair. Well, they went to a red with no yellow on the field. When you apply what you've seen throughout the entire game, I didn't even know if it was given us a foul in that respect. No, Witty? I didn't think it was given as a foul in the field. It's kind of wild. They stopped the game for an injury, and then they went back.

And by the way, you can look at something, see the incident, think it's a yellow card and give a yellow card from VA. You don't have to give a red card. And the longer that he took looking at it, the more that I thought he was going to come out and give a yellow card. But he came out. He was so calm. He was so calm when he came out.

And then I saw him tap his shirt and I was like, oh, he's looking for, he's making sure he's got all of his gear with him because this is going to end bad. There was another one where he reached to his short pocket and grabbed like batteries or something. And then like to go home the ground. What was that about? I don't know. He threw something off the field and then those things fell on the ground. I don't know.

Not my, not my best judgment of a referee in this game. And these are big moments and these knockout rounds, you can see the intensity, you can see the anger build, every single one of them that's happened, right? You can see this intensity and anger building of somebody's going home. And so I think that's when we're going to see the elite referees immediately go, okay, that one challenge is a domino effect to everything that's going to happen from here on out. I'm going to kill this now.

I'm going to the shirt tug. I'm going to give the yellow card. I'm going to just get control of this. And it felt like he was always sort of trying to make up control versus control the game. Well, I'll get to final thoughts here. in a moment, but quickly on the goal, gentlemen, that in real time, I don't think most people picked up on the skill that that took the strength. That was a quality goal from Balligan. And even the shot selection itself and the placement as a DDA Dragba ass goal there,

Witty, we're really going to miss this guy. He's making himself a lot of money in this tournament. Emphasis on ass because he kind of sticks his backside out in order to sort of really get into that good position. Yeah, I mean, it was incredible because you would normally kind of play that off the other shoulder, gets into that physical tussle, and it's in that position, and then has the composure to think of putting it between the legs of the goalkeeper rather than curl at either side. That has been the part of this tournament that is almost unnerving. And I don't want to talk bad about strikers in the past. You have some good strikers, but there is a feeling of calm that you have as a fan of when he is in on goal, he is going to score. And that is sort of one of those things that you feel when you

watch Killian Mbapé at this tournament. He had one yesterday that was actually deemed to be offside in the end, but he's darting in behind and then goes and finishes like it's easy. And that is one of those where I feel like every time he's in a good position, he had the LeBron Selly ready to go, and he knew he was going to get that off at some point today. And it is amazing to watch a U.S. Center Forward operate at that level because, and that is what you will miss. And I think Pepe has probably had a fairly up and down tournament. Mike, I know you love Ricardo Pepe, but I don't think he's good today. I thought he delivered what the U.S. needed.

Yeah, yeah, in that moment when you're down to 10 men, he was okay. But he's going to need to perform like he did against Senegal when he helps create the goal for Polisic to score that ball for Zegino Dest in the friendly against Senegal in Charlotte. I thought he combined Moe with Polisic. That is sort of the one thing that you're sort of hanging on to his hope. And if they have training until Monday, you would think that's the number one thing they'll be working on. It's sort of integrating Pepe into doing all the things they've been doing at this tournament and playing at a high level. but I do think it's a drop off. And I think that goes, that is more about what Balligan has done,

more than necessarily about what Pepe hasn't done or has played poorly. I think he has been such a level above what the U.S. has had at Center Forward in the past. And it's demonstrated in that first goal, as you mentioned. Yeah, I totally agree there. We got to pick up the phone, call Johnny Soccer. We need this appeal because Belgium, well, I mean, they got the name brand recognition. They really struggled today.

And for 84 minutes, they were pretty listless. and then they tapped into something special. They certainly have more threatening players. Bosnia doesn't really add many of those, but let's assume Johnny Soccer doesn't come through for the United States, and it is Pepe out there. Heath, what is the path to defeat this opponent? What do you think is going to happen?

And do you have a prediction for it? Well, again, I think what Pepe did well, as Chris just mentioned, is that he brings other players into the game really well. When he's at his best, he's checking off the shoulder, playing one, two touches. And so if you're looking to neutralize Pulisic, right? You're trying to cut him, keep him out wide, keep him on his left foot, keep him from being able to drive inside.

But when you can start to skip that line and Pulisic can come up underneath and he's facing the game, it's a whole new dynamic. And I thought again in that match with Pepe and Pulisic, the Senegal match, he did such a great job of bringing players into the game around him. And he's not necessarily going to be the guy that gets you your goals. I think he's a brilliant finisher. I think when he's come in in some of these games and even against Turkey, it seems like he was just sort of off the market, even though by and large, the team was off the market in Sturkey, but in the other matches, just sort of chasing to find the rhythm of how he could be

impactful. And sometimes that's just pure energy of like chase and run and everything and you're just burning yourself out to try to show impact. But what he does do well is he brings players into the game around him. He's a hunter in the box. He's going to constantly look every time there's a ball in the box, he's the guy that's going to go, I'm going to go, I'm going to make that run to the near post. I'm going to get into these spaces. And so when the patterns are clear, PEPI is at his best. When the buildup play is allowing him to, you know, I think his first touch has gotten a lot better. I think his decision making at speed, something that I thought Baligan used to actually struggle with is sort of getting stuck with the ball on his body, something that we haven't seen in this tournament is that, you know, his first touch, bam, dumb, gone, moving around, back into position.

Like that speed and the ability to manage with all that pressure on your back of a defender up your backside, Pepe has the same ability. And when he's best, he is playing simple bringing players in around him that I think will bring a different dynamic than maybe what Belgium. is going to look at in terms of Balligan and saying, hey, be careful because he can spin off your shoulder and he's really silent in the way that he swims the line. And, you know, if you sleep for one second, he's looking for a ball over the top into some of those other spaces. Pepi's different. He's going to hunt in the box for you. He's going to go after everything. He's going to put his his head where you don't want to put your foot. And then everywhere else on the field, he's good at bringing his players into the attack, which I think is a positive in a way that's

different than Baligan. Common section loves Heath, mostly his hair and his wonderful green eyes. If you like Keith, and you're such a big fan of his, check out his podcast, Orange Slices. Whitty, close us out here with your thoughts, your fears, your hopes, your desires for the next round. By the way, I just put this in our private chat here. Tom Bogart of the athletic friend of the program says that per FIFA's regulations at the World Cup,

the U.S. men's national team cannot appeal Flo Balegan's red card. What? In all that you... Whittingham, do you think that's better that, you know, because there is an emotional distress that goes into, you know, whether or not an appeal gets... gets worked and works within the team. Do you think it's better that it's just set and like they got to move on for

sure? I mean, it sucks, but like it probably would have been, you know, a closed case anyway. You spend five days preparing with Pepe. I think that's the number one thing that you do now. And people look at it themselves? I don't know. He said, I'm only reading to you what he said, which is that for the regulations, US men's national team cannot appeal.

Maybe there is a disciplinary board, but that is one of those things that can be looked at in the coming days. I think that seems pretty self-aware. They can say they got it wrong, though, right? Even if they can't overturn it, they can say that it's the, you know, we've seen a little bit of that, but I don't know if anybody's going to do that. The final two-minute report. That always makes me feel so much better when I see a blown call.

I'm sorry, Woody. I know that was a very helpful news tidbit because I was under the impression that you could actually appeal these things. Many people were. That was one of the takes that was flying out there. So that is a big development here. So knowing that, what do you think happens? Well, look, first off, I have tickets for the game. I've bought a flight and I have a hotel.

So I think I'm going to the game. And I'm really looking forward to what Seattle can bring. And I think the number one feeling that you have, especially without Balagan, is I think you draw a lot of heart from frankly how bad Belgium were today. They were not very good in that game against Senegal. Or this whole tournament. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it was really only the game against New Zealand when they were desperate and up against the wall that they really kind of turned on the style. That being said, they did beat the U.S. and a friendly and more.

March and they still have those talents. They still have Jeremy Dooku. They still have Kevin DeBrona. You're worried about individuals, but you're not worried about the team, which I think is one of those where that is sort of what you have to trust at this tournament is what you see with your eyes with teams because there are individuals who can change things. But if a team is not performing well, the level of the rest of the world has gotten good enough that England is made to sweat against D.R. Congo, Germany goes out to Paraguay. If your collective is not in a good shape, which I think the U.S. is, is, then you are very vulnerable. And Belgium just have not delivered at this tournament.

They don't have a good collective. They don't have a good team. So you will spend the days to come worrying about the individuals and worrying that maybe they find a performance that we haven't seen yet. I think for the first time, and Heath mentioned this earlier, there was that feeling that the opponent is going to attack you rather than sit in against you. Turkey, I did that, but against the B team, so it's not really valid information. So for the first time of this tournament, we're going to see Richards pressed on the ball,

Reem pressed on the ball, Freeman pressed on the ball. What are you going to do to play through that? But I don't know. There's something about that home crowd and the way that Belgium have looked that at least gives me some heart. I think there's a real chance that the U.S. can get through to a quarterfinal. Yeah, I agree. It's what I expect. You know, in the group chat they were asking,

who'd you rather play Senegal and Belgium? And we have very recent results. One very bad given to us by Belgium. And one that started this whole hopeful movement that we've had here that we've seen carry into this tournament against Senegal. and I still wanted Belgium. I like the individual matchups. KDB can still be a problem.

Tilleman seems to be a dog. As a Chelsea fan, I've seen him do some damage. But, yeah, they have threatening players. This is a step up in opposition, no doubt. But you couple what is, as Heath has referred to already, the best U.S. men's national team perhaps ever. And that home field, I know we're missing flow, but I think it's there for the taking.

and I anticipate that we get there and we finally avenge the Chris Wondeloski Misk. Gentlemen, I really appreciate you taking the time out here. I know, speaking for myself, I'd much rather be at a bar, high-five, and friends and celebrating it. So it means a lot that you spent your Wednesday evening over here talking about what is really one of the coolest moments in Federation history. Heath, a huge fan of yours, both in your playing career and hearing you on the

a show today, your insight is truly amazing. It'll be following your stuff from here on out way more. That's for sure. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. Witty, I'll see you very soon. Hopefully we'll be at one of those bars embracing. Yes, for sure. From Seattle as we keep this this magic ride going. Thank you to everybody that tuned in live. Great audience participation. Very active in the comments. Morley abhorred has this more occasional cadence. We try to step up and deliver preview episodes will be coming your way no doubt i'm going to be traveling to some world cup game so uh maybe we'll do one or two of these from the road but thank you so much for your support great feedback on this will be live in the podcast feed momentarily too so if you miss any of

this show you can always catch it on demand here on the youtube page or check out our various podcast feeds wherever you get your podcast the levittar show main feed it'll pop up over there till then we'll speak to you next time