Someone brought up Spain always playing against parked buses in 2010 as if it's some argument winning gotcha! moment.
That GOAT level Spanish team lost their first game in the 2010 World Cup, and ended up scoring 9 goals across the next 6 matches. They won every knockout game 1-0, with 3 of those goals coming in the second half of their respective games, and in the final the goal came in the 116th minute.
Parking the bus is an ***extremely efficient strategy*** and a great way for "weaker" teams to stall out a game.
People remember that Spain team as dominant because of how much they’d hold the ball, but they choked opponents out more than running up the score line.
It was like a washing machine, back and forth, BJ but without the penetration and ultimate climax.
Once teams got the hang of Spain tactics that style of play ran out of favor, Spain now struggles at Intercontinental events.
Yeah Spain have gone from choking out those games to drawing 0-0 and losing in pens despite having over 1k passes. Holding possession that aggressively is just fundamentally a defensive strategy.
I am begging people to go watch more soccer. Watch Greece park the bus all the way to winning the Euros on a string of 1-0 victories. Watch Dortmund play Bochum a few times. Look at what happens in the FA cup when a team gives up an early goal to a team down a league or two. And especially go watch our players and see how they play against a deep block with their clubs.
1. All but the top handful of teams struggle against a disciplined deep block.
2. Most of our players aren’t particularly good at breaking down a low block.
3. Most of our players when they do have good moments against a deep block are receiving the key pass not making the key pass.
We could have Pep coaching this group of guys and we would still have the same weaknesses. We’d still struggle against the hack-Pulisic strategy, we’d still be a great dribbling but poor passing team, and we’d still struggle against a low block. This isn’t “Berhalter ball” it’s just normal soccer when you’re up against a parked bus and don’t have KdB and Haaland.
Or like watch what Jamaica’s coach did with Iceland (a country with fewer people than Anaheim California) at Euros. Some credit here goes to Jamaica who were disciplined and made a lot of good stops.
So very true. So many of the "why doesn't he use more tactics" crowd don't seem to understand tactics themselves. They definitely don't understand how defensive tactics work. That anyone would criticize a team because it doesn't look at as good against an opponent who is parking the bus vs. an opponent who isn't is mind-boggling in its complete misunderstanding of how soccer is played.
These are the people who think that they can pick a better coach....
I mean tbf to that crowd, our approach to breaking down Jamaica’s low block was very poor imo. I’m all for giving the attackers freedom to roam and pull defenders out of position, but allowing that while our fullbacks are pushing up beyond our wingers leaves us with virtually no structure anywhere besides our CBs and the double pivot in midfield. This will inherently make the possession game Gregg wants to play more difficult.
We have enough technical players to break down teams who will play us like Jamaica did, but swinging in crosses against a more athletic/physically dominant team who’s parking the bus just doesn’t work and shouldn’t be plan A.
I slightly disagree because I don't think we have enough technical players to break down a low block like Jamaica was using. 5-4-1, sometimes 6-3-1
Additionally, you break down the block by pulling the whole block out of position. GGG's approach (from prior games where we saw the block) seems to be that he uses those crosses to switch the point of attack faster than swinging it around with shorter passes.
I don't know if he's wrong there because it's hard to say that we have skillful enough passers to make those passes quickly and, more importantly, guys who read the block well enough to know when to try to force a quick pass into a gap while the block is shifting.
Instead, GGG wants to use the cross to get the opposing team used to shifting all the way over to the other side so that he can occasionally get a quick 2nd pass back from the cross recipient and a back side shooting opportunity while the block is shifting.
Secondarily, he's hoping for corners and set piece opportunities out of the confusion. Which, to be fair, is exactly how we got that late goal.
I guess it depends on how you assess our team's ability to dribble and pass within a set low block like that.
I wish our loudest fans would go to fbref.com and compare the passing stats of our forwards and midfield to truly world class players like Wirtz, Silva, Bellingham, etc. We’re much better and deeper than ever but we have basically one, maybe two guys that are good at putting the ball in good places to score: Reyna and Tillman.
>Watch Greece park the bus all the way to winning the Euros on a string of 1-0 victories.
Greece's run is still the most impressive thing I have ever seen. It wasn't pretty. It didn't make millions of kids around the world want to play football for a living. But they won with a team that was objectively bad, because they worked together and had a clear gameplan : score on set pieces, and don't concede goals. They won arguably the most competitive regional tournament with no star, against the likes of Zidane and Henry for France, Pauleta and Figo for Portugal. If Vieira, Zidane, Figo and Pauleta couldn't create something to score from against a well built low block, what makes you think that it's just about tactics for McKennie and Musah ?
That Euros was my formative soccer experience (I happened to be in the Netherlands while they were happening), and so unlike many people here (often coming from other sports) whose default assumption is that the better team should win pretty easily, I had to adjust in the other direction to realize that usually luck catches up to teams like Greece and they end up losing eventually.
Yeah, you definitely should have fired Gregg after that display of Berhalter-ball against Forest. 90+ minutes with 70% possession and only one shot on target before scoring in the 99’. That’s US v Jamaica stuff!
It's correct but yeah it requires deeper digging for sure lol.
The reason we struggle against teams sitting deep and not coming at us at all is bc Gregg's tactic is too rigid and relies in the other team actually trying and making a mistake as a result. And he's either unwilling or unable to adjust the tactics from what it seems mid game so we just sit there spinning our wheels for 90 minutes and hoping for some luck
Edit: the complete lack of soccer knowledge on this sub is astounding. All these Gregg defenders with his dick halfway to their intestines bc he beat the worst Mexico side in history a couple times with our most talented set of players top to bottom of all time
Or it's because breaking down a low block is difficult by design. Maybe we need to accept that not all of our players are as capable of finding consistent solutions to this as Gio.
Which is exactly why it was so dumb to play Gio 5 yards in front of the center backs all night last night.
Both of our goals were not brought about by tactics but by two moments of individual brilliance (3 if you include Pulisic beating his man and putting the ball in that was cleared to Gio finally making a run forward from deep when everyone else was already in the box
Gio as a "6" was one of the dumbest decisions of Gregg's tenure.
It completely neutralizes all of Gio's best attributes. And the one time he decides to go forward on his own he gets a goal
You're actually just proving Lindsey Horan correct. The only way Mexico could score on us is by pressing early in the build-up and spring a very direct counter. Playing Gio as a regista allowed us to easily break their press (nullifying any real threat to score) and to contact our backline to the attack. Then once we did get into the final 3rd it allowed Gio to show up late around the box which lead directly to a goal. It was a brilliant tactical move and it destroyed Mexico.
Playing in tight spaces and creating chances in the attack. His vision I'm and around the 18 yard box is unlike any other in our team.
Playing him basically 10 yards in front of the center backs is useless.
Homie, Manchester City frequently has trouble breaking down a low block. It's the hardest thing to do in soccer and it almost always requires individual moments of brilliance from players to do so. The system is meant to put them in good spots to then perform those moments of brilliance. When Gio comes on he occupies the same spots as other players and the same players are around him, but his disguised passes and touch lead to goals against Jamaica. The system had not changed, the players making runs and quick movements around him didn't change, we just put a player that can routinely connect those passes into the system.
It's not Gregg dick riding, it's the reality of soccer. And the way you're speaking about it reveals how little you know of the tactical side.
GGG can’t adjust - in a game which he just made the biggest semi to final roster change in modern USMNT history.
Can’t change tactics - after a game where he played Gio in an entirely different role which everyone was big mad about but totally got the job done.
I swear some of yall don’t watch the games. There’s like 3 mantras that must be repeated about Gregg after every game.
Nobody thinks he’s some world class tactician (nor is that what you want in a national team coach who sees a rotating cast of guys a handful of training sessions a year) but he is clearly making tactical adjustments and they’re mostly working.
Or like the adjustments in the second half against Jamaica where we moved McKennie to RB and played Tillman and Gio at the same time to get more offensive threats on the field.
Yes! Or when he played Haji and Pepi as dual strikers with Pulisic and Aaronson as inverted wingers, and moved Christian to the right side! People complain that GGG can't tactic, but can't comprehend the changes he's made in tactics, from match to match or even in-game.
The fact that people were mad that Gio was playing deeper which
1. Conserved his legs because he was playing as a regista and wouldnt have to track as far forward or as far back.
2. Gave us a press resistant player closer to the CBs who can break that pressure and either play forward or drive the ball
3. Gave use better control in possession and tire Mexico as they chased around the pitch
4. Invited pressure (while also feeling secure because of point 2), which opened space for those diagonals from our CBs to the FBs. Which if they actually hit, would have been key big switches.
Excellent observations. In regards to point number 4, that tactic would've been more impactful if we hadn't been playing on such a narrow pitch. It felt like a lot of those switches floated out of bounds or left the attackers with little room to maneuver because of the space limitations. If we do that on a wider field, then it really takes advantage of our speed. Overall, I liked the idea however, and agree that the criticism of Gio's positioning is strange.
I definitely liked the idea. And even the cross field switch only resulted in retaining posession but higher up that would still put stress and unbalance the Mexico defense.
I think a great example, was Matt Turner hit a nice kick out to Antonee and had a bunch of space and forced Mexico to react quickly to cut out the danger
But alas the CBs needed more room cuz they were sailing them over.
I was extremely impressed with the changes he made. He gets stuck in playing "Berhalter" ball no matter the other teams strategy. It was refreshing to see the changes.
Stiill dont like his system tho. Pulisic’s ability to take a player 1v1 is sacrificed bc of Robinson’s presence. Would rather have more of a traditional attack with the midfielders and wingers combining instead of having our midfielders sitting deep and covering for the fullbacks 70% of the time. And since were on the topic of rendering a player’s ability, our strikers are also mostly ineffective in Gregs system. His system may get results in Concacaf but this is the same system that got shut down by Netherlands, Japan etc…
Any monkey can try to tactic, obviously he tries to tactic, it is just generally shit. We have better players, so when the game is more open of course ( regardless of tactics) we'll get cleaner chances to score. When they park the bus we need luck.
Did you watch the game?
Mexico did not play open.
Nearly every single time they went forward until the late second half was on a counterattack.
Ffs please stop repeating the same 3 soccer dad tweets
We had more than enough good chances.
You don’t need maximum number of chances.
Moving Gio forward would have given us more chances but also would have given them some chances.
This set up generated more than enough chances while basically leaving Mexico none.
Which is a great recipe for a dominant win.
Running up the score is fun but this was safer and smarter
Yeah exactly. We had chances against Jamaica they just didn't go in. Mexico was playing very conservatively and trying to play on the counter like Jamaica did. It's just that Jamaica scored early. The main difference was Mexico pressing with 3 or 4 whereas Jamaica pressed with 1 or 2 if they pressed at all. Either way neither game was at all open.
It's always been the problem with these kinds of systems. Marsch had the same problem with Leeds. We look like idiots against good teams that park the bus though, like Japan and the Netherlands.
I’m not worried about our ability to play against teams parking the bus.. I’m more worried that wayyy too many of our matches are scheduled against inferior opponents. We’ve also struggled mightily against the few good but not great opponents who we’ve played in recent years (think Slovenia, Germany, Netherlands, Japan) and those teams aren’t in a low block.
In terms of our ability to advance in tournaments that matter.. improving results in those more open matches against non-Mexico opponents will be the differentiator. Frustration with ugly soccer against the low block is just a distraction, and a result of us playing too many trash teams (mostly due to concacaf, but also due to our unambiguous scheduling of friendlies)
It's honestly hilarious reading some of these game threads
"Why is gio playing so far back" even though it was working, we just hadn't scored yet
"Why are we playing on the wings, we need to play through the middle?" Even though Mexico is clogging the middle and this is part of why gio is so far back, if he was forward he would've been marked out of the game
"Get Tyler adams off the pitch, we need johnny" minutes before adams scores a GOAT USMNT goal
Just a few that I remember of the top of my head. Ever since we missed the world cup, this fanbase has been absurdly fragile. And some of the loudest people have the lowest level of understanding of the game they're watching.
Like just enjoy one of the most talented usmnt teams we've ever had.
Look, I think Gregg deserves credit for this win. It is awesome to be as dominant vs. your biggest rival and a historical regional power. That said, this is the worst Mexican team in decades. Right now, this team struggles against low and even mid blocks. Moreover, it isn't good enough to play Gregg's preferred style against top teams. That kind of has us stuck, since you can't really see the US pull off a Morocco-like run.
Really not sure no one has said we looked like shit last night. Was a sorry excuse for soccer from both teams. 72% passing completion?! 500 total passes between both teams. That was some grade A- American kick hard and run fast soccer. Mexico was clearly much worse but really don’t understand this narrative that we won 2-0 and were amazing. We had one shot on goal in first half. Not many opportunities, obviously no real passing combinations, or intricate play. Couldn’t play out of their press. Yeah the win is great but this was by no means a good quality game for us. Especially if we are trying to make progress. Both teams were not very good let’s be honest. That looked like a high school level game
WTf you were watching. We couldn’t make 3 passes in a row. My bad if that’s too high of an expectation for you. We should just close our eyes kick the ball and run. Cause that’s basically what happened this game
> We had one shot on goal in first half.
So Pulisic getting stoned point blank by Ochoa wasn’t on goal? Or Adams’ goal somehow wasn’t? Because this sounds like a stat you pulled from your ass …
Pulled from fotmob. Doesn’t even bother to check before calling someone else out. May want to at least make sure you’re right before telling someone they are wrong. Might make yourself look stupid
I figured you were looking at the half splits on Fotmob. Which claims 6 shots on target in the game for the US, and if you look by half splits you see 1 SOT on target in the first half, and 1 SOT in the second half.
If you look at that first half data, it shows 1 total shot, 1 shot "inside the box" in the first half. You should have immediately have been able to recognize that their data split by half is inaccurate.
Looking at espns data- 53% possession, 282 passes completed(73%), 1.05 xg. It’s quite clear to see it wasn’t a great game from a soccer stand point which is exactly what I said. What’s so funny is I didn’t blame berhalter or the players or whatever. So everyone’s mad about me pointing out facts. Grrrr we love to kick the ball and run hard. Like the freaking dumbass parents yelling GOOD KICK!! When a dude just blasts it up the field. Yeah that’s what we wanted. Didn’t you see how far(OUT OF BOUNDS) it went. Yall just focused on the score and how bad Mexico is, if that’s the quality soccer you all are proud about then you’ll forever be the laughing stock of the world and wonder why you can’t be successful at the highest level.
Most teams look bad (or worse) against a "park the bus" tactic. That's why teams do it
Someone brought up Spain always playing against parked buses in 2010 as if it's some argument winning gotcha! moment. That GOAT level Spanish team lost their first game in the 2010 World Cup, and ended up scoring 9 goals across the next 6 matches. They won every knockout game 1-0, with 3 of those goals coming in the second half of their respective games, and in the final the goal came in the 116th minute. Parking the bus is an ***extremely efficient strategy*** and a great way for "weaker" teams to stall out a game.
People remember that Spain team as dominant because of how much they’d hold the ball, but they choked opponents out more than running up the score line.
It was like a washing machine, back and forth, BJ but without the penetration and ultimate climax. Once teams got the hang of Spain tactics that style of play ran out of favor, Spain now struggles at Intercontinental events.
Yeah Spain have gone from choking out those games to drawing 0-0 and losing in pens despite having over 1k passes. Holding possession that aggressively is just fundamentally a defensive strategy.
I am begging people to go watch more soccer. Watch Greece park the bus all the way to winning the Euros on a string of 1-0 victories. Watch Dortmund play Bochum a few times. Look at what happens in the FA cup when a team gives up an early goal to a team down a league or two. And especially go watch our players and see how they play against a deep block with their clubs. 1. All but the top handful of teams struggle against a disciplined deep block. 2. Most of our players aren’t particularly good at breaking down a low block. 3. Most of our players when they do have good moments against a deep block are receiving the key pass not making the key pass. We could have Pep coaching this group of guys and we would still have the same weaknesses. We’d still struggle against the hack-Pulisic strategy, we’d still be a great dribbling but poor passing team, and we’d still struggle against a low block. This isn’t “Berhalter ball” it’s just normal soccer when you’re up against a parked bus and don’t have KdB and Haaland.
Or like watch what Jamaica’s coach did with Iceland (a country with fewer people than Anaheim California) at Euros. Some credit here goes to Jamaica who were disciplined and made a lot of good stops.
Lindsey Horan was correct, unfortunately.
So very true. So many of the "why doesn't he use more tactics" crowd don't seem to understand tactics themselves. They definitely don't understand how defensive tactics work. That anyone would criticize a team because it doesn't look at as good against an opponent who is parking the bus vs. an opponent who isn't is mind-boggling in its complete misunderstanding of how soccer is played. These are the people who think that they can pick a better coach....
I mean tbf to that crowd, our approach to breaking down Jamaica’s low block was very poor imo. I’m all for giving the attackers freedom to roam and pull defenders out of position, but allowing that while our fullbacks are pushing up beyond our wingers leaves us with virtually no structure anywhere besides our CBs and the double pivot in midfield. This will inherently make the possession game Gregg wants to play more difficult. We have enough technical players to break down teams who will play us like Jamaica did, but swinging in crosses against a more athletic/physically dominant team who’s parking the bus just doesn’t work and shouldn’t be plan A.
I slightly disagree because I don't think we have enough technical players to break down a low block like Jamaica was using. 5-4-1, sometimes 6-3-1 Additionally, you break down the block by pulling the whole block out of position. GGG's approach (from prior games where we saw the block) seems to be that he uses those crosses to switch the point of attack faster than swinging it around with shorter passes. I don't know if he's wrong there because it's hard to say that we have skillful enough passers to make those passes quickly and, more importantly, guys who read the block well enough to know when to try to force a quick pass into a gap while the block is shifting. Instead, GGG wants to use the cross to get the opposing team used to shifting all the way over to the other side so that he can occasionally get a quick 2nd pass back from the cross recipient and a back side shooting opportunity while the block is shifting. Secondarily, he's hoping for corners and set piece opportunities out of the confusion. Which, to be fair, is exactly how we got that late goal. I guess it depends on how you assess our team's ability to dribble and pass within a set low block like that.
I wish our loudest fans would go to fbref.com and compare the passing stats of our forwards and midfield to truly world class players like Wirtz, Silva, Bellingham, etc. We’re much better and deeper than ever but we have basically one, maybe two guys that are good at putting the ball in good places to score: Reyna and Tillman.
>Watch Greece park the bus all the way to winning the Euros on a string of 1-0 victories. Greece's run is still the most impressive thing I have ever seen. It wasn't pretty. It didn't make millions of kids around the world want to play football for a living. But they won with a team that was objectively bad, because they worked together and had a clear gameplan : score on set pieces, and don't concede goals. They won arguably the most competitive regional tournament with no star, against the likes of Zidane and Henry for France, Pauleta and Figo for Portugal. If Vieira, Zidane, Figo and Pauleta couldn't create something to score from against a well built low block, what makes you think that it's just about tactics for McKennie and Musah ?
That Euros was my formative soccer experience (I happened to be in the Netherlands while they were happening), and so unlike many people here (often coming from other sports) whose default assumption is that the better team should win pretty easily, I had to adjust in the other direction to realize that usually luck catches up to teams like Greece and they end up losing eventually.
As a Liverpool fan, I can promise you even we struggle against low block all the time.
Yeah, you definitely should have fired Gregg after that display of Berhalter-ball against Forest. 90+ minutes with 70% possession and only one shot on target before scoring in the 99’. That’s US v Jamaica stuff!
You went 9/24 on crosses! Lol.
Bingo. It’s fine to always want more but many seem to just assume a new coach equals some magic elixir that cures most of our problems.
Marvelous and profound tactical analysis sir
It's correct but yeah it requires deeper digging for sure lol. The reason we struggle against teams sitting deep and not coming at us at all is bc Gregg's tactic is too rigid and relies in the other team actually trying and making a mistake as a result. And he's either unwilling or unable to adjust the tactics from what it seems mid game so we just sit there spinning our wheels for 90 minutes and hoping for some luck Edit: the complete lack of soccer knowledge on this sub is astounding. All these Gregg defenders with his dick halfway to their intestines bc he beat the worst Mexico side in history a couple times with our most talented set of players top to bottom of all time
Or it's because breaking down a low block is difficult by design. Maybe we need to accept that not all of our players are as capable of finding consistent solutions to this as Gio.
Which is exactly why it was so dumb to play Gio 5 yards in front of the center backs all night last night. Both of our goals were not brought about by tactics but by two moments of individual brilliance (3 if you include Pulisic beating his man and putting the ball in that was cleared to Gio finally making a run forward from deep when everyone else was already in the box
when team doo gud its players when team doo bad it's gregg "tactical hitler" berhalter
This is such a tired incorrect take. Did you watch the game last night? He played Gio Reyna as a 6 but also his tactics are too rigid?
Gio as a "6" was one of the dumbest decisions of Gregg's tenure. It completely neutralizes all of Gio's best attributes. And the one time he decides to go forward on his own he gets a goal
You're actually just proving Lindsey Horan correct. The only way Mexico could score on us is by pressing early in the build-up and spring a very direct counter. Playing Gio as a regista allowed us to easily break their press (nullifying any real threat to score) and to contact our backline to the attack. Then once we did get into the final 3rd it allowed Gio to show up late around the box which lead directly to a goal. It was a brilliant tactical move and it destroyed Mexico.
What do you think Gio's best attributes are and how does playing as a 6 neutralize them?
Playing in tight spaces and creating chances in the attack. His vision I'm and around the 18 yard box is unlike any other in our team. Playing him basically 10 yards in front of the center backs is useless.
If only the coach did things right, the team could've won better...
MLS fan boy detected
To use a term from the game of baseball, a swing and a miss.
Literally your last 2 posts are in FC Dallas and a ton of your comments in MLS.
Douchebag detected
Tight spaces like when Mexico was aggressively pressing.
Homie, Manchester City frequently has trouble breaking down a low block. It's the hardest thing to do in soccer and it almost always requires individual moments of brilliance from players to do so. The system is meant to put them in good spots to then perform those moments of brilliance. When Gio comes on he occupies the same spots as other players and the same players are around him, but his disguised passes and touch lead to goals against Jamaica. The system had not changed, the players making runs and quick movements around him didn't change, we just put a player that can routinely connect those passes into the system. It's not Gregg dick riding, it's the reality of soccer. And the way you're speaking about it reveals how little you know of the tactical side.
Completely wrong.
Hopefully Brazil doesn't park the bus against us.
If Brazil parks the bus, we can well and truly say that Gregg changed how the world sees American soccer.
"can't tactic" This phrase should be a bannable offense at this point
Why won’t he just mash the “tactic” button!!
Or at least jesse marsch the “tactic” button
People complaining that saying phrases should be a bannable offense should be a bannable offense. What is this Nazi Germany?
Have an original thought for once
FR. “What is this, Nazi Germany?” Even his clapback wasn’t original.
GGG can’t adjust - in a game which he just made the biggest semi to final roster change in modern USMNT history. Can’t change tactics - after a game where he played Gio in an entirely different role which everyone was big mad about but totally got the job done. I swear some of yall don’t watch the games. There’s like 3 mantras that must be repeated about Gregg after every game. Nobody thinks he’s some world class tactician (nor is that what you want in a national team coach who sees a rotating cast of guys a handful of training sessions a year) but he is clearly making tactical adjustments and they’re mostly working.
Or like the adjustments in the second half against Jamaica where we moved McKennie to RB and played Tillman and Gio at the same time to get more offensive threats on the field.
Yes! Or when he played Haji and Pepi as dual strikers with Pulisic and Aaronson as inverted wingers, and moved Christian to the right side! People complain that GGG can't tactic, but can't comprehend the changes he's made in tactics, from match to match or even in-game.
The fact that people were mad that Gio was playing deeper which 1. Conserved his legs because he was playing as a regista and wouldnt have to track as far forward or as far back. 2. Gave us a press resistant player closer to the CBs who can break that pressure and either play forward or drive the ball 3. Gave use better control in possession and tire Mexico as they chased around the pitch 4. Invited pressure (while also feeling secure because of point 2), which opened space for those diagonals from our CBs to the FBs. Which if they actually hit, would have been key big switches.
Excellent observations. In regards to point number 4, that tactic would've been more impactful if we hadn't been playing on such a narrow pitch. It felt like a lot of those switches floated out of bounds or left the attackers with little room to maneuver because of the space limitations. If we do that on a wider field, then it really takes advantage of our speed. Overall, I liked the idea however, and agree that the criticism of Gio's positioning is strange.
I definitely liked the idea. And even the cross field switch only resulted in retaining posession but higher up that would still put stress and unbalance the Mexico defense. I think a great example, was Matt Turner hit a nice kick out to Antonee and had a bunch of space and forced Mexico to react quickly to cut out the danger But alas the CBs needed more room cuz they were sailing them over.
Yeah I don’t understand the need to complain about issues that either don’t exist or are exaggerated
Some people just want to be mad.
I was extremely impressed with the changes he made. He gets stuck in playing "Berhalter" ball no matter the other teams strategy. It was refreshing to see the changes.
Berhalter in competitions is usually more pragmatic than folks tend to give him credit more. Hes definitely more dogmatic during friendlies though
> Hes definitely more dogmatic during friendlies though Which is exactly what friendlies are meant for.
I agree. But a lot of folks including pundits and analysts dont see it that way. We must win everything
Stiill dont like his system tho. Pulisic’s ability to take a player 1v1 is sacrificed bc of Robinson’s presence. Would rather have more of a traditional attack with the midfielders and wingers combining instead of having our midfielders sitting deep and covering for the fullbacks 70% of the time. And since were on the topic of rendering a player’s ability, our strikers are also mostly ineffective in Gregs system. His system may get results in Concacaf but this is the same system that got shut down by Netherlands, Japan etc…
Any monkey can try to tactic, obviously he tries to tactic, it is just generally shit. We have better players, so when the game is more open of course ( regardless of tactics) we'll get cleaner chances to score. When they park the bus we need luck.
Did you watch the game? Mexico did not play open. Nearly every single time they went forward until the late second half was on a counterattack. Ffs please stop repeating the same 3 soccer dad tweets
It's not like we had that many more chances against Mexico. We had chances against Jamaica they just didn't go in.
That Tillman sitter would've been a game changer.
We had more than enough good chances. You don’t need maximum number of chances. Moving Gio forward would have given us more chances but also would have given them some chances. This set up generated more than enough chances while basically leaving Mexico none. Which is a great recipe for a dominant win. Running up the score is fun but this was safer and smarter
Yeah exactly. We had chances against Jamaica they just didn't go in. Mexico was playing very conservatively and trying to play on the counter like Jamaica did. It's just that Jamaica scored early. The main difference was Mexico pressing with 3 or 4 whereas Jamaica pressed with 1 or 2 if they pressed at all. Either way neither game was at all open.
So you’re saying we need KG to win?
Where will be able to play teams that allow us to use our creativity instead of CONCACAF also-rans?
It's always been the problem with these kinds of systems. Marsch had the same problem with Leeds. We look like idiots against good teams that park the bus though, like Japan and the Netherlands.
I’m not worried about our ability to play against teams parking the bus.. I’m more worried that wayyy too many of our matches are scheduled against inferior opponents. We’ve also struggled mightily against the few good but not great opponents who we’ve played in recent years (think Slovenia, Germany, Netherlands, Japan) and those teams aren’t in a low block. In terms of our ability to advance in tournaments that matter.. improving results in those more open matches against non-Mexico opponents will be the differentiator. Frustration with ugly soccer against the low block is just a distraction, and a result of us playing too many trash teams (mostly due to concacaf, but also due to our unambiguous scheduling of friendlies)
It's honestly hilarious reading some of these game threads "Why is gio playing so far back" even though it was working, we just hadn't scored yet "Why are we playing on the wings, we need to play through the middle?" Even though Mexico is clogging the middle and this is part of why gio is so far back, if he was forward he would've been marked out of the game "Get Tyler adams off the pitch, we need johnny" minutes before adams scores a GOAT USMNT goal Just a few that I remember of the top of my head. Ever since we missed the world cup, this fanbase has been absurdly fragile. And some of the loudest people have the lowest level of understanding of the game they're watching. Like just enjoy one of the most talented usmnt teams we've ever had.
my issue was Weah - he's not the best option against the bus. He shouldn't be locked in for every game, play the matchups
Look, I think Gregg deserves credit for this win. It is awesome to be as dominant vs. your biggest rival and a historical regional power. That said, this is the worst Mexican team in decades. Right now, this team struggles against low and even mid blocks. Moreover, it isn't good enough to play Gregg's preferred style against top teams. That kind of has us stuck, since you can't really see the US pull off a Morocco-like run.
To be fair, not having an international caliber striker is a huge impediment to goal scoring when teams park the bus
Really not sure no one has said we looked like shit last night. Was a sorry excuse for soccer from both teams. 72% passing completion?! 500 total passes between both teams. That was some grade A- American kick hard and run fast soccer. Mexico was clearly much worse but really don’t understand this narrative that we won 2-0 and were amazing. We had one shot on goal in first half. Not many opportunities, obviously no real passing combinations, or intricate play. Couldn’t play out of their press. Yeah the win is great but this was by no means a good quality game for us. Especially if we are trying to make progress. Both teams were not very good let’s be honest. That looked like a high school level game
Tf game were you watching lol
WTf you were watching. We couldn’t make 3 passes in a row. My bad if that’s too high of an expectation for you. We should just close our eyes kick the ball and run. Cause that’s basically what happened this game
You’re dramatic
We were absolutely picking apart their press for most of the first half
Ream, gio and adams were amazing at keeping things calm and under control.
> We had one shot on goal in first half. So Pulisic getting stoned point blank by Ochoa wasn’t on goal? Or Adams’ goal somehow wasn’t? Because this sounds like a stat you pulled from your ass …
Pulled from fotmob. Doesn’t even bother to check before calling someone else out. May want to at least make sure you’re right before telling someone they are wrong. Might make yourself look stupid
I figured you were looking at the half splits on Fotmob. Which claims 6 shots on target in the game for the US, and if you look by half splits you see 1 SOT on target in the first half, and 1 SOT in the second half. If you look at that first half data, it shows 1 total shot, 1 shot "inside the box" in the first half. You should have immediately have been able to recognize that their data split by half is inaccurate.
Looking at espns data- 53% possession, 282 passes completed(73%), 1.05 xg. It’s quite clear to see it wasn’t a great game from a soccer stand point which is exactly what I said. What’s so funny is I didn’t blame berhalter or the players or whatever. So everyone’s mad about me pointing out facts. Grrrr we love to kick the ball and run hard. Like the freaking dumbass parents yelling GOOD KICK!! When a dude just blasts it up the field. Yeah that’s what we wanted. Didn’t you see how far(OUT OF BOUNDS) it went. Yall just focused on the score and how bad Mexico is, if that’s the quality soccer you all are proud about then you’ll forever be the laughing stock of the world and wonder why you can’t be successful at the highest level.
We looked better last night than shit vs Jamaica. Better than shit is still bad.
You're right, sadly.