State Of The Union

Despite Southlandish's forebodings I will not be laying waste to his musings on the state of the USMNT. Indeed, if you have watched the last six months worth of US play you should come up with something like the pessimism voiced in his post.

However, I do offer some hopeful caveats.

1) The fact we haven't played a meaningful match in some time can mask real development. The last competitive match we played was last July 5th in the Copa, and even that was played with a "B" team of mostly MLS players. You have to go back to the Gold Cup final against Mexico (June 24th, 2007) for the last time the "A" team played for anything.

Friendlies play their role, and they are certainly fun for the fans, but you can read way too much into them for good or ill. I was in the crowd that saw the US beat Argentina 1-0 in a friendly back in 1999. How much did that really tell us about the state of American soccer? Not a whole hell of a lot. The next competitive matches we played (which were not until the next year admittedly) were a tie at Guatemala and a loss at Costa Rica, sides no one has ever confused for Argentina.

2) I will not be caught selling US talent short...not until I see them in real matches. Our main problem, projecting forward here, is the dearth of options at forward. McBride's international retirement has been a huge blow to this team, who relied so heavily on McBride's workrate and his ability to play with his back to goal. There is no player in the US pool who can play that way, and it has taken far too long for the US coaches to realize this. Brian Ching is a solid pro who has a McBride style game, but it seems unlikely he will ever enjoy the same kind of success as he simply isn't as fearless as McBride. (The same goes for Kenny Cooper.)

None of the other options, especially the lengthy attempt to get Eddie Johnson going, is particularly promising. To my mind the best approach would be to put a poacher like Taylor Twellman or a Chris Rolfe, neither of whom will ever dazzle anyone with their skill, in there every day, and allow our midfield to run, run, run. Between Donovan, Adu, Beasley, Bradley, Dempsey, and, if he ever gets healthy, Convey, we should be able to cause enough trouble for opposing defenses that a Twellman (or a Rolfe) should be able to pick up the junk.

The desire to field a classic striker has repeatedly tempted US coaches to put Donovan up top, which only works against inferior opponents. If we simply accepted that most of our offense is going to come from midfield, the standard of US play would improve dramatically.

To my mind, with this player pool, we should be playing a 4-5-1, featuring a midfield of Donovan & Dempsey in the middle, with Adu and Beasley on the wings, and Bradley (or Ricardo Clark) slotting behind as a holding midfielder. All five of those players have to ability to pressure defenses, so that a lone Twellman or Rolfe up top wouldn't be expected to create chances themselves.

3) Southlandish is right in saying the US team seems like it cannot pick a style and stick with it. Part of that has to do with the vagaries of who is available in the player pool, but most of it has to do with the transition from Arena to Bradley. Both have the tendency of bringing in a lot of players for a look see, but Bradley seems slower to make final judgements than Arena. For that reason we have had extended periods of experimentation in the US side, which has made for some uneven play and a lack of focus. Of course, the goal is to be ready for World Cup qualifying, so we will get a better feel for this team starting the 15th.

Actually, playing a minnow like Barbados might not tell us much either, but you may see the US pick a style at least.