soccer soccer soccer

[stitchface]

It's good to see Pulisic on the field if for no other reason than to remind us how much cleaner he is on the ball than the rest of the pool. Just a cut apart when it comes to tight control. Less good from Reyna, who hasn't been all that good in a US shirt. Aaronson has been on for 10 minutes and is already a huge problem for Jamaica.

 

Not sure I agree with either of these points - Dest is pretty damn tight. Good argument to be having. I haven't seen much wrong with Reyna.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

It's good to see Pulisic on the field if for no other reason than to remind us how much cleaner he is on the ball than the rest of the pool. Just a cut apart when it comes to tight control. Less good from Reyna, who hasn't been all that good in a US shirt. Aaronson has been on for 10 minutes and is already a huge problem for Jamaica.

 

Not sure I agree with either of these points - Dest is pretty damn tight. Good argument to be having. I haven't seen much wrong with Reyna.

 

Dest is a fair call out, my brain was thinking of the midfielders/attackers, but calling those 2 in a class of their own in the player pool works for me.

 

With Reyna, it's a combination of him not having taken his chances, and the ball sticking to him too much at times, like this. Not a long term worry, especially since he has like 200 international minutes, but his club form hasn't translated yet.

[stitchface]

I wrote that before watching second half - I always feel more confident about young players with good movement - seems harder to learn to me so when he pops up in the right place all the time, it encourages me on Reyna. That said, letting the ball slide outside your foot on a through ball is a huge pet peeve . . .

 

You could make a good argument Dest is the better player in terms of complete participation with his defensive effort. The two of them on the one side of the field looks absolutely lethal. The announcers were killing me with their constant talk of Dest needing to play right since that's where he plays for Barcelona. First, he plays wingback currently, which is not exactly the same position. Second, the USMNT will never be Barcelona - no international team will be. It's a totally different setup. Pretty sure Dest is fine on the left.

[wolf stansson]

They both can play each side. Either side they’re on is too much for any concacaf team to stop for 90 minutes without shenanigans.

 

Adams, Musah, and McKennie filling the midfield and forcing turnovers to spring counters backing them up. Best team we’ve ever had by a long shot. Now they just need to solidify their identity and stay healthy.

[bukie]

Ridiculous deflection, but hey, Reyna gets a goal.

[bukie]

Of course, the big game today is the U23 Olympic qualifier vs Honduras, a win and I think they could do some serious damage in the Olympics with a full squad, even all 23 and under with Dest, Pulisic, Reyna, Sargent, Adams, Musah and McKennie.

[bukie]

Northern Ireland isn't top tier UEFA competition, but they did play in the Euros last year and are better than a scrub CONCACAF team that hasn't played in a year. And the US is having the clearly better play here in Europe.

 

And just as I say that Northern Ireland pulls back a goal late.

[stitchface]

How ridiculous is it that UEFA WC qualifiers have neither goal line technology nor VAR?

[bukie]

Cmon, u23s, beat the crap out of Honduras and win a big game on the national scale for the first time in 8 years.

[bukie]

Well that was an awful first half performance.

[bukie]

And it's 2-0 Honduras early in the second half.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Woof

[stitchface]

meh

[soccer10k]

meh

 

Pretty much sums up the state of the USMNT the last few years.

[wolf stansson]

Real soccer countries don't like the Olympics because typically, they have many u-23 players contributing to the senior team and huge clubs, which prevents them from getting released for the tournament, let alone qualifying.

 

 

So while we should definitely expect to qualify from CONCACAF, even with a u-23 B or C team, our best u-23's play for huge clubs that have zero interest in their multi-million dollar investments participating.

 

The fed definitely shouldn't have hired Jason Kreis, but all things considered, this failure doesn't mean much. Especially while we're consistently producing the best men's talent we ever have.

[bukie]

In World Cup qualfying news, the new and different CONCACAF qualifying round has started.

 

Reminder, this time around the top 5 teams in CONCACAF have a bye to the final round of qualifying, which for this cycle is Mexico, USA, Costa Rica, Jamaica and Honduras.

 

Teams 6-35 were broken into 6 groups of 5 and are playing a single round robin group play (4 games each), followed by a 2-leg playoff to determine the final 3 teams that advance to the final round of qualifying. Here are those 5 groups:

 

A - El Salvador, Antigua and Barbuda, Montserrat, Grenada, US Virgin Islands

B - Canada, Suriname, Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Aruba

C - Curacao, Guatemala, Cuba, British Virgini Islands, St. Vincent and the Grenadines

D - Panama, Dominican Republic, Barbados, Dominica, Anguilla

E - Haiti, Nicaragua, Belize, Tunis and Caicos Islands, St. Lucia (withdrew)

F - Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico, St. Kitts and Nevis, Guyana, Bahamas

 

Have to figure the favorites to advance out of that are Panama, Canada, Haiti, Curacao, El Salvador and T&T, but T&T and El Salvador already dropped points and with only 4 games crazier things have happened.

[stitchface]

In World Cup qualfying news, the new and different CONCACAF qualifying round has started.

 

Reminder, this time around the top 5 teams in CONCACAF have a bye to the final round of qualifying, which for this cycle is Mexico, USA, Costa Rica, Jamaica and Honduras.

 

Teams 6-35 were broken into 6 groups of 5 and are playing a single round robin group play (4 games each), followed by a 2-leg playoff to determine the final 3 teams that advance to the final round of qualifying. Here are those 5 groups:

 

A - El Salvador, Antigua and Barbuda, Montserrat, Grenada, US Virgin Islands

B - Canada, Suriname, Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Aruba

C - Curacao, Guatemala, Cuba, British Virgini Islands, St. Vincent and the Grenadines

D - Panama, Dominican Republic, Barbados, Dominica, Anguilla

E - Haiti, Nicaragua, Belize, Tunis and Caicos Islands, St. Lucia (withdrew)

F - Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico, St. Kitts and Nevis, Guyana, Bahamas

 

Have to figure the favorites to advance out of that are Panama, Canada, Haiti, Curacao, El Salvador and T&T, but T&T and El Salvador already dropped points and with only 4 games crazier things have happened.

 

Let us know when the real games start . . .

[stitchface]

Real soccer countries don't like the Olympics because typically, they have many u-23 players contributing to the senior team and huge clubs, which prevents them from getting released for the tournament, let alone qualifying.

 

 

So while we should definitely expect to qualify from CONCACAF, even with a u-23 B or C team, our best u-23's play for huge clubs that have zero interest in their multi-million dollar investments participating.

 

The fed definitely shouldn't have hired Jason Kreis, but all things considered, this failure doesn't mean much. Especially while we're consistently producing the best men's talent we ever have.

 

I said "meh"

[bukie]

In World Cup qualfying news, the new and different CONCACAF qualifying round has started.

 

Reminder, this time around the top 5 teams in CONCACAF have a bye to the final round of qualifying, which for this cycle is Mexico, USA, Costa Rica, Jamaica and Honduras.

 

Teams 6-35 were broken into 6 groups of 5 and are playing a single round robin group play (4 games each), followed by a 2-leg playoff to determine the final 3 teams that advance to the final round of qualifying. Here are those 5 groups:

 

A - El Salvador, Antigua and Barbuda, Montserrat, Grenada, US Virgin Islands

B - Canada, Suriname, Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Aruba

C - Curacao, Guatemala, Cuba, British Virgini Islands, St. Vincent and the Grenadines

D - Panama, Dominican Republic, Barbados, Dominica, Anguilla

E - Haiti, Nicaragua, Belize, Tunis and Caicos Islands, St. Lucia (withdrew)

F - Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico, St. Kitts and Nevis, Guyana, Bahamas

 

Have to figure the favorites to advance out of that are Panama, Canada, Haiti, Curacao, El Salvador and T&T, but T&T and El Salvador already dropped points and with only 4 games crazier things have happened.

 

Let us know when the real games start . . .

USMNT plays the A/F winner on the road, then the B/E winner at home, both in September.

[stitchface]

could both be challenging - likely T&T in a field underwater and then Canada at home. - should win both though.

 

Thanks for breaking it down!

[stitchface]

Great return to club soccer this weekend:

 

Saturday is Bayern (sans Lewandowski) at Leipzig - love to see Leipzig make it a race.

 

At same time City is at Leicester.

 

In Spain, Athletico is at Sevilla.

 

Nice that the qualifiers mean something instead of friendlies, but too few of them are competitive to make it interesting.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Great return to club soccer this weekend:

 

Saturday is Bayern (sans Lewandowski) at Leipzig - love to see Leipzig make it a race.

 

At same time City is at Leicester.

 

In Spain, Athletico is at Sevilla.

 

Nice that the qualifiers mean something instead of friendlies, but too few of them are competitive to make it interesting.

 

And then the following week we get back to the best competition on earth. That's right CONCACAF Champions League kicks off in just 7 days.

[bukie]

Great return to club soccer this weekend:

 

Saturday is Bayern (sans Lewandowski) at Leipzig - love to see Leipzig make it a race.

 

At same time City is at Leicester.

 

In Spain, Athletico is at Sevilla.

 

Nice that the qualifiers mean something instead of friendlies, but too few of them are competitive to make it interesting.

 

And then the following week we get back to the best competition on earth. That's right CONCACAF Champions League kicks off in just 7 days.

I do have to say I am not overly optimistic about the quality of MLS teams that are participating in this year's event. Columbus, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Portland aren't exactly the cream of the MLS crop, but hey, one of them might beat a Mexican team.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Great return to club soccer this weekend:

 

Saturday is Bayern (sans Lewandowski) at Leipzig - love to see Leipzig make it a race.

 

At same time City is at Leicester.

 

In Spain, Athletico is at Sevilla.

 

Nice that the qualifiers mean something instead of friendlies, but too few of them are competitive to make it interesting.

 

And then the following week we get back to the best competition on earth. That's right CONCACAF Champions League kicks off in just 7 days.

I do have to say I am not overly optimistic about the quality of MLS teams that are participating in this year's event. Columbus, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Portland aren't exactly the cream of the MLS crop, but hey, one of them might beat a Mexican team.

 

Columbus is definitely a Top 4 MLS team at the moment, maybe Portland too depending on your opinion of their offseason. Big problem is the draws are basically the opposite of what you'd hope for to maximize MLS advancement too. Best hopes are Atlanta gelling quickly and making it through the weaker quadrant of the bracket, and either Columbus or Portland outslugging a Mexican team or two and making a run.

[bukie]

 

And then the following week we get back to the best competition on earth. That's right CONCACAF Champions League kicks off in just 7 days.

I do have to say I am not overly optimistic about the quality of MLS teams that are participating in this year's event. Columbus, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Portland aren't exactly the cream of the MLS crop, but hey, one of them might beat a Mexican team.

 

Columbus is definitely a Top 4 MLS team at the moment, maybe Portland too depending on your opinion of their offseason. Big problem is the draws are basically the opposite of what you'd hope for to maximize MLS advancement too. Best hopes are Atlanta gelling quickly and making it through the weaker quadrant of the bracket, and either Columbus or Portland outslugging a Mexican team or two and making a run.

 

I think LAFC/Seattle/NYCFC would probably fare better in this event, but yeah, Columbus was good at the end of last year for sure and should be good again. Portland might be good again, and Philly probably lost too much to pose too much of a threat. Once again, though, it's likely that at least 3 of the 4 best clubs in the event are Mexican again, and just hoping for a final that isn't just America/Monterrey.