USMNT - Greg Berhalter Takes Over

[NailstheCusefan12]

Berhalter decides to sit Trapp right on top of the defense as an obvious release valve and he continuously makes some of the worst off the ball movements I've seen. Cutting off teammates passing lanes, collapsing his triangles, taking awful angles trying to find space.

It's rare to see a professional this lost on the pitch. It's almost comical.

I miss Tyler Adams so much. He needs to get healthy. (Even though Gregg would just play him with Trapp and bench Morales)

 

[NailstheCusefan12]

I watch a ton of Bayern games and lower level Bundesliga coaches always sounds like Berhalter does. He wants this team to play out of the back and beat pressure with passing and skill and it’s not working. Plenty of teams try to do the same thing against Bayern and don’t have the skill or ability and lose 5-0. It’s not a perfect comparison but how can you ask this team to play out of the back and throw Wil Trapp into the 6 role? Incredibly frustrating and we learned nothing from the Gold Cup Final.

 

[crv1728]

Berhalter decides to sit Trapp right on top of the defense as an obvious release valve and he continuously makes some of the worst off the ball movements I've seen. Cutting off teammates passing lanes, collapsing his triangles, taking awful angles trying to find space.

It's rare to see a professional this lost on the pitch. It's almost comical.

Good insights. Trapp can't be the US's best defensive central midfield option, can he? I just have not seen anything positive from him tonight.

 

[ForCuseSake]

“Berhalter is trying to paint the Sistine Chapel with crayons right now.”

— Alexi Lalas

 

[DeGrozz]

Seems like the soft press is leaving our midfield too stretched. Hopefully we drop our forwards back 10 yards, congest the midfield, and try to catch them on our counter -- time to bring it back to old school.

We are clearly out-manned here and weak left side is being exposed. I hope we come out in a defensive 3-5-2 against Uruguay. A little extra cover and less defensive responsibilities on an offensive minded Dest might play better to our strengths.

Not sure if Reggie Cannon is having a good game or just not being challenged.

 

[NailstheCusefan12]

Seems like the soft press is leaving our midfield too stretched. Hopefully we drop our forwards back 10 yards, congest the midfield, and try to catch them on our counter -- time to bring it back to old school.

We are clearly out-manned here and weak left side is being exposed. I hope we come out in a defensive 3-5-2 against Uruguay. A little extra cover and less defensive responsibilities on an offensive minded Dest might play better to our strengths.

Not sure if Reggie Cannon is having a good game or just not being challenged.

I think Cannon/Dest would be best in a 5-3-2. Get Trapp out of the way since he keeps dropping into the way and messing with Zim and Long. Add another CB and let Dest and Cannon get forward on the wings and use their pace and athleticism and not get left on an island.

 

[ForCuseSake]

Trapp follows up another crap pass with a lazy effort to track back.

 

[ForCuseSake]

Please take Zardes out now.

 

[ForCuseSake]

What the hell was Steffen thinking?!?

Clear the feckin ball!

 

[DeGrozz]

Not if we need to play the ball to his feet like that!

Edit: LOL - Three minutes later he lays off a hospital ball at the top of the 18.

Bump.

I've been saying it for 2 years. Steffen is not a modern goalkeeper.

 

[NailstheCusefan12]

I haven’t been sold on Berhalter from day one. When are we allowed to have a conversation about him leading us into WC qualifying?

 

[Orangezoo]

Embarrassing .. friendly or not.

 

[ForCuseSake]

Yikes.

Don't agree with the commentary questioning Pulisic giving the rookie striker a crack at that PK.

BFD.

 

[DeGrozz]

Reporter: What happened tonight?

Will Trapp: Well, I have this unique ability to take myself and a teammate out of a buildup at the same time...

 

[ForCuseSake]

The second time watching the Fightin Berhalters against El Tri and they look timid AF.

I know Mexico has more talent but I wish the US played with a sliver of swagger.

Maybe swagger isn’t the correct word but they just looked ball-less.

 

[Alsacs]

I haven’t been sold on Berhalter from day one. When are we allowed to have a conversation about him leading us into WC qualifying?

I hated the hire from day 1.
Berthalter does nothing to inspire faith the USMNT can compete and win against any nation equal or better talent.

 

[IthacaMatt]

Berhalter decides to sit Trapp right on top of the defense as an obvious release valve and he continuously makes some of the worst off the ball movements I've seen. Cutting off teammates passing lanes, collapsing his triangles, taking awful angles trying to find space.

It's rare to see a professional this lost on the pitch. It's almost comical.

Trapp was terrible. McKennie was pretty bad, too. Dest had a bad game, too. Zardes can't play against anyone decent. Is Altidore hurt again?

The problem with this game is that Berhalter seems too stubborn. He's trying too hard to make them play a certain way, regardless of whether that's the right strategy at that moment in the game or not. You have to mix it up. Zardes isn't a target guy, but you have to play it into different places, to make the defense adjust. They just kept playing backwards, even when there was open grass in front of them.

Speaking of failing to play it forward, how many damn times did McKennie get the ball within 10 yards of goal and look to knock it away from goal to somebody else? The damn goal is right there in front of you! Shoot it once in a while from INSIDE the box, not just from 30 yards away!

That was truly awful.

 

[IthacaMatt]

Seems like the soft press is leaving our midfield too stretched. Hopefully we drop our forwards back 10 yards, congest the midfield, and try to catch them on our counter -- time to bring it back to old school.

We are clearly out-manned here and weak left side is being exposed. I hope we come out in a defensive 3-5-2 against Uruguay. A little extra cover and less defensive responsibilities on an offensive minded Dest might play better to our strengths.

Not sure if Reggie Cannon is having a good game or just not being challenged.

We should play a 3-5-2 against the better teams. We are weak at the back, don't have enough control in midfield, and none of our candidates to be the lone striker are frankly good enough.

The 3-5-2 addresses ALL of those issues. An extra center back, an extra body in midfield, and a partner for the guy at the top.

 

[Shrmdougluvr]

I don't worry too much about any result right now because we are building for 2 to 6 years from now, and with the exception of Altidore, all of our better players should peek during that time frame. Also, we have guys like Richards, Llanez, Ferrera (sp), Reyna who look like they are going make great pros and will be a major step up over current nationals.

The system thing is tough. We play a bunch of teams that bunker, a bunch that try to bludgeon, and some that just plain out class us. That means our system needs to be adaptable to any of those opponent-types.

I wanted to see something like Simeone's Atletico system since they seem to dominate weaker squads, and punch up against Barca and Real. But I don't know if that type of system can be deployed with a part-time team like the nationals.

 

[orangenauburn]

We are going to waste the prime years of some of the best potential we have had ever with this, aren't we?

 

[Forza Azzurri]

Seems like the soft press is leaving our midfield too stretched. Hopefully we drop our forwards back 10 yards, congest the midfield, and try to catch them on our counter -- time to bring it back to old school.

Disagree with this. Berhalter seems hell-bent on getting us to break our bunker-and-counter mentality, regardless of the short-term consequences for results. I applaud that. He has a full year to get it done. I hope he stays with it. And I hope that the younger generation has the talent to be able implement it. Klinsmann came in with a lot of fanfare about wanting to do the same thing and then discovered he wasn't working with Lahm and Ballack and Lose and Podolski...Bradley, to his credit, never tried to play that way because he knew the US did not have the skillset to be able to do so.

Agree 100% about Steffan. If you are going to use your keeper as a release valve, he has to be competent with his feet and Steffan is awful. His turnover rate had to be 75% plus. He was directly responsible for the 2nd Mexico goal missing Morales by 2 yards on a 5 yard pass.

I also agree about Trapp. His give away triggered the counter that led to Mexico's 3rd goal. He had another really rough night.

I disagree wholeheartedly with most of the comments from the peanut gallery. There is page after page about less Bradley, less Altidore and more youth. Well, the board got its wish with lots of youth against an experienced A-/B+ Mexican side and got its head handed to it. And you want to fire the coach for not getting a result with the team we put on the field? Really?

Dest got torched on the first Mexican goal and Chicharito, Mexico's all-time leading scorer, was left unmarked in the penalty area.

Morales got undressed by Lozano on the 3rd Mexican goal.

Youth will take its lumps. It is part of the growing process.

As for the formation change, Berhalter has enough on his plate just trying to teach this team how to play the ball out off the back and work it up the field in the limited amount of time he has at his disposal. And you want him to implement a formation change on top of that?

I could care less about results right now. For the first 15 minutes the ball movement was very good. Then we got very static as Mexico adjusted and their press started working and ours stopped working. Now we need to figure out how to make those same adjustments on the fly.

I hope we see more of the same against Uruguay.

 

[jordville]

And here it is...

 

[NailstheCusefan12]

I hate to sound like the guy at the hockey game who screams shoot every time they cross the blue line but I can get away with it when I echo the sentiment of a former USMNT player.

 

[Alsacs]

Well a draw is a result so good job tying the match.
I am not a fan of Jordan Morris for the MNT but he got the goal atleast to shut me up.
Uruguay played very defensive so this being a USA B team they did well.

 

[Forza Azzurri]

Well a draw is a result so good job tying the match.
I am not a fan of Jordan Morris for the MNT but he got the goal atleast to shut me up.
Uruguay played very defensive so this being a USA B team they did well.

Honestly not sure what, if anything, I can take away from this result.

If you have every watched Uruguay play meaningful matches, they are very much a blue-collar team that happens to have some of the best talent in the world. They are typically very compact, play very hard, very physical and do not give you an inch and then counterattack with breath-taking quickness and eye-popping talent.

It looked to me as if they were sleep-walking through this match.

Since, as you alluded to, they sat deep and did not press, there was little pressure on Yuell at the 6. This allowed him to get involved and I thought he did a nice job distributing the ball although he also had some bad giveaways. I know we say that LB has always been a problem, and it has, but finding a 6 who can both defend and distribute under pressure is critical in Berhalter's scheme and, so far, I don't see one on the roster.

I thought Morris played very well on the left flank and, overall, was our best player. Some really good individual efforts to get free and make things happen. Especially the one sequence, where he turned the defender nicely and delivered a cross to Boyd right on the doorstep that Boyd completely flubbed. Right place, right time on the goal.

I thought Ream stepped in nicely and his being a left-footed left center back certainly helped with distribution.

Overall, I thought there were some nice 1-2 touch combos both in terms of getting into the final third and in the final third but not nearly enough to really create difficulties for an Uruguay defense when it was setup in it its 4-5-1 defensive alignment. Had Uruguay decided to press high and hard, like Mexico did, I think it likely would have been another 3-0, 3-1 game...

It will be interesting to see what Berhalter does for Concacaf Nations cup where results become more important although I doubt that either Canda or Cuba will press us the way Mexico did. If they do, will he look to play more by passing lines or will he continue to insist on the line-by-line build up that he has been looking to implement in these friendlies.