1. I think the team and the program will benefit, with him at the helm for a full cycle. Last night notwithstanding, he has improved the team's play and tactics.
2. I don't trust the USSF to find anybody equal or better. They will take a Swarbrick approach and hire some MLS ham and egger, or some past their prime retread.
That criticism for last night doesn't erase the great things he's done.
They could have named Levi's Bruce Arena instead of San Francisco Heavy Industrial Concern.
The players wilted, plain and simple. Everyone but Tillman played scared.
And soccer isn't like football or basketball where you can bench someone to send a message and snap them out of it. Once they're out there, they're out there.
He taught them the spacing and movement to carve up Paraguay and dominate Australia and Bosnia. They simply forgot it when the pressure was on.
of the second half until the Pulisic injury and fuck up of all fuck ups to let in the third goal. We were getting reasonably dangerous there for a while, and it felt like something was coming. Lukaku's goal was a result of Richards trying to keep the ball in play late to have a last ditch chance to get back up the field instead of (what he would do 99 times out of 100) clearing it out.
A lot of existential dread about the state of American soccer, our development programs, etc. this morning - much of it, if not all of it, justified. Not just pay for play, the development stuff, etc. We have big ass holes in the roster right now and not much depth.
But we fundamentally just played like total shit in the worst possible moment. There is a gap, but it isn't as big as it looked yesterday.
He seemed his most unsettled in the dugout last night of any of our matches. He was emotional and obviously frustrated.
When we got the red against B&H he didn't display much, he just went to work. He didn't respond with spastic subs, he observed & monitored then around 75 made his effective subbing. I was impressed by his nature all tournament including not giving a fuck about nobody's business but the Turks.
I thought before last night if I were a strong club I would grab him & guarantee him 5 years to make sure I work with a good manager and build a team with him.
Our team not showing up much I shall not lay at his feet.
Ned shit the bed, Germany shit the bed, it happens. We should not have faced Belgium, but Senegal COMPLETELY shit the bed. Shit happens.
But everything I saw on the field last night was very highly paid very well-trained professionals not taking their jobs seriously or at least puckering far too severely. Belgium didn't even start DeBoyband or Lukaku. Probably great decisions, shake things up. But our players did miserable work last night.
Their pressure seemed to result in our players getting out of position. So yes, spacing was very disrupted and passing was inaccurate.
All their goals appeared to be breakdowns under duress. Their second goal had two of our defenders marking Trossard crossing and two of our defenders marking 17, with Ream getting bullied off the header.
All of their goals were way too easy.
Although I really have zero expertise as my tactical knowledge is rudimentary.
It is extremely disappointing how we lost. But I will wash this game from my memory and just remember the fine things was saw from the team in the other matches. Balogun is a class act, I enjoyed his play, Tillman’s free kick goals were world class that Messi would be proud of.
Pulisic destroyed Paraguay.
Like the Alabama beat down didn’t take away the good Manti and team memories of that season, I won’t forget this USMNT run.
Frankly getting to the round of 16 seems to be about right for the quality of the team versus the rest of the world, which also has improved over the years.