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jarntt
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My thoughts on what we need to do to take that next step forward. First off I think we are closer than everything that I’m hearing and reading this past week to being what many hoped. No, not winning the World Cup but being good enough to go a little deeper. It’s hard to play an entire match down a man and we IMO outplayed Uruguay for a large part of that next match. It was a very disappointing tournament on home soil but if Weah doesn’t get that red card we move on at a minimum.
the two positions we need to solidify are striker and Tim Reams center back spot. I really have been impressed with Balogun as the striker. He just gets involved and is a threat even if he doesn’t score. All of these other guys just seem invisible for 95% of the match but he gets involved in counters and has shown some ability to make things happen 1 v 1 and seems to get into space where he can be a target in the box. If he keeps improving it will be huge for us. When he plays versus when someone else is on the pitch it is evident. When he went out of the Uruguay match do to injury the change was obvious. The other spot is center back next to Richards. Ream played very well against Uruguay and has been better since he started playing regularly in the Premier League but he is older and slower and 2 years from now would just be an obvious liability. I hoped that guy was Miles Robinson and he was playing better and better before his injury but we really haven’t seen him since and he too is at a point where I’m not sure how much improvement can be expected from 27 years old to 29 years old. Someone needs to not only win the job but earn the job. Yes we have a lot of other positions where we aren’t great, but we are at least ok at all of them. For example What Dest lacks defensively he can make up for offensively and he is only 23. Turner isn’t great but he has been ok. He was better when he was playing regularly for his club team and I think that will happen again before the World Cup even if it means coming back to the US to play. We do also need to improve our depth. When other countries are bringing players who start in Europe off of their bench we are bringing some guys who couldn’t really make a top roster in those leagues.
the biggest and first issue to address is Berhalter. It’s time to move on. I think it is telling when Marsch comes out and says what he did. I wouldn’t be shocked if we make a run at Klopp. No we won’t pay him the $15 million he was making at Liverpool, but maybe we pay him the $5 million that Southgate is making as the England manager and possibly more than that and maybe that’s enough. I see some talented players who still don’t seem to make the sum of their parts better than their individual abilities. Two years is a long time for a young team to show improvement. I still feel this team is moving in the right direction even though they aren’t good enough to put out quality efforts on off days.
the two positions we need to solidify are striker and Tim Reams center back spot. I really have been impressed with Balogun as the striker. He just gets involved and is a threat even if he doesn’t score. All of these other guys just seem invisible for 95% of the match but he gets involved in counters and has shown some ability to make things happen 1 v 1 and seems to get into space where he can be a target in the box. If he keeps improving it will be huge for us. When he plays versus when someone else is on the pitch it is evident. When he went out of the Uruguay match do to injury the change was obvious. The other spot is center back next to Richards. Ream played very well against Uruguay and has been better since he started playing regularly in the Premier League but he is older and slower and 2 years from now would just be an obvious liability. I hoped that guy was Miles Robinson and he was playing better and better before his injury but we really haven’t seen him since and he too is at a point where I’m not sure how much improvement can be expected from 27 years old to 29 years old. Someone needs to not only win the job but earn the job. Yes we have a lot of other positions where we aren’t great, but we are at least ok at all of them. For example What Dest lacks defensively he can make up for offensively and he is only 23. Turner isn’t great but he has been ok. He was better when he was playing regularly for his club team and I think that will happen again before the World Cup even if it means coming back to the US to play. We do also need to improve our depth. When other countries are bringing players who start in Europe off of their bench we are bringing some guys who couldn’t really make a top roster in those leagues.
the biggest and first issue to address is Berhalter. It’s time to move on. I think it is telling when Marsch comes out and says what he did. I wouldn’t be shocked if we make a run at Klopp. No we won’t pay him the $15 million he was making at Liverpool, but maybe we pay him the $5 million that Southgate is making as the England manager and possibly more than that and maybe that’s enough. I see some talented players who still don’t seem to make the sum of their parts better than their individual abilities. Two years is a long time for a young team to show improvement. I still feel this team is moving in the right direction even though they aren’t good enough to put out quality efforts on off days.
