European Soccer

Off Topic
81

Yeah, they tried Sargent, tried Wright, tried Ferriera. The idea was clearly to play guys who can do some other things like link up play, pressing, etc. So I get that part.

I don’t think having a more pure version of a No. 9 is always the answer when you don’t have a good striker.

But Balogun is the guy now. So that’s fixed. Hard to overstate what a massive land he is considering there are no real obvious prospects in the pipeline.

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82

Let’s hope!

83

Massive. If he can stay healthy, it’s not out of the question he’s available at the next 4 World Cups as a starter.

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84

Won’t he be 36 by the 4th World Cup from now? :rofl:

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85

Yeah, four is definitely a stretch. Means either he is the best American of all time and still a top forward in one of the larger leagues or things have gone really badly for US soccer

86

So many fascinating transfer moves coming up for USMNT guys this summer too. Pulisic, Adams, Musah, Flo, McKennie, Dest, Weah and Aaronson all probably moving.

Sort of a rubber meets the road year coming up… Can’t always be a fun young prospect.

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87

Going to be our Miroslav Klose. Y’all right though, if we got 3 out of him and he locked down the position for awhile, that would be nice.

Most interested in Puli’s move. I’m not really blaming him considering Chelsea made Raz look pedestrian all year.

88

I don’t follow the USMNT close enough to have strong opinions, but here are my weak ones:

  • No point getting upset with Greggg and blaming him for the striker position when there was literally no one who played well. Sure, he tried a bunch of randos up there…but they all stunk. It wasn’t like he left someone off who should have had it or was trying to do some goofy strategy. He couldn’t find a competent player and kept trying. I don’t hold that against him.
  • I’m surprised to see people so worked up about his love of MLS. While I know he used those players at times…it wasn’t like they were part of his core WC group. Most of our main players when it counted were Euros. I actually prefer a manager that can mix and match. I think Klinsman was TOO infatuated with Euros sometimes.
  • It is a weird job and you’re unlikely to get a stud manager for it, especially in this non-WC window. Whoever you get is going to have warts because the best managers want to go to big clubs with a more consistent roster.
  • They had to punish Gregggg in some way because of what came out and due some diligence to make sure it wasn’t going to be a bigger problem. I don’t fault them for sidelining him for a few months. What he supposedly did was bad and needed to be evaluated. But thankfully it seems to have been an isolated situation from 20-years ago that he worked past.
  • I now despise the Renya’s for their behavior. I can’t wait for them to get mad at the Dortmond coach in the future because he didn’t get to take a free kick and leak to the media that he stole another kids crayons in pre-school.

Despite the late red-card fiasco (after I fell asleep) it was nice to see the US dominate that game and Pulisic play really well overall. I was worried that the Chelsea mess would alter his trajectory with the national team and I thought that was one of his better games and this wasn’t some fluky 1-goal victory. It was dominance.

89

Yeah, Chelsea was definitely a disaster. But he really needs to go somewhere and play well for a season.

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90

The MLS thing is much more of a long-standing political beef/hatred that people have with USSF and the politics that go into how the whole thing has been run.

MLS is also improving rapidly and has gone from a retirement league to a competitive league that is churning out a lot of young talent.

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91

I agree with that. I also hear people complain when we use Euro players who aren’t getting regular minutes instead of guys playing in peak form. In certain cases there’s a lot of value to get an MLS guy (or other lower league) who’s playing a critical role and tons of minutes than a better player riding the bench. The Keepers are a good example of this.

92

Yeah, that’s another good sign that it is this political rift – and there are real reasons to rift, don’t get me wrong – that then (IMO) got amplified by “casuals” during the World Cup who started riding that wave.

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93

We just glossing over the fact that GGG made up an injury of why Gio didn’t play the first match of the WC or why GGG trashed Gio at a conference a few weeks after the cup was over that kind of accelerated this whole investigation or……?

The Reyna’s were the worst of the two but acting like GGG isn’t a total clown for what he did isn’t the move either.

94

Reyna was recovering from an injury and wasn’t playing full 90s at the time, right?

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95

He was available to play. Maybe not the full 90, but what Gregg said post game was flat out wrong and that was refuted all over the internet.

96

People like to dump on MLS but you can’t argue with the facts

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97

So he should have said, he was only going to be able to play a small role because of his injuries but actually he’s not playing because he threw a tantrum?

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98

Going to be must see TV for awhile. Won’t beat out Zlatan’s debut for the Galaxy from a quality standpoint, definitely from a ratings standpoint though. Craziest 20 minute debut of all time.

99

Yeah, I’m with you. I’d rather my coach cover for a player and give him an out because he’s a young kid still figuring things out. I don’t want the coach to come out and say “he hasn’t been one of our best 11 and his behavior off the field doesn’t warrant giving him minutes - so he sits.” I think Greggg was actually trying to cover for his childish behavior and they burned him for it.

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100

lol. He could have easily said he’s working his way back to match fitness and was available in some role.

Is Gio in your top 11? If he is, why are we blaming him for being upset when told he wasn’t going to play much?

I’m really curious the people who think Gio doesn’t have a spot on our best 11 and how they arrived at that conclusion…

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