What happened to the USMNT's this weekend in their matchup against the Netherlands?

Saturday morning, 10 o'clock. I was joined by 13 million of my best friends in watching the United States take on Netherlands in the knockout round of the World Cup. It didn't go well, but boy, it could have been different early. Christian Pulisic, not gifted a chance, a beautiful ball headed in by Tyler Adams, gave him a great opportunity. But the Dutch keeper, who's about 47 feet tall, and he's like a building. Only? It's like 6'8". Wow.

Ridiculous. And he made a great save, and seven minutes later it was 1-0 Netherlands. Mike Tocorsi of the Sporting News joining us now on the Adam Gold Show at TSN. Mike on Twitter. All right, sir, where did it go wrong?

3-1 Netherlands. Well, I think it started to go wrong right where you said. I mean, you technically could say it went wrong with the idea of putting Jesus Ferreira in the starting lineup, and the reason for that. Right. I mean, there's a logic behind me saying that because what that what that that decision demanded absolute perfection.

And I don't mean just from Jesus, I mean from the whole circumstance. I mean, you couldn't have bad luck or a bad play. Like, as soon as you go down 1-0, he's useless. I mean, in a regular game against Canada, maybe not, but against Netherlands, he's not scoring, and you're not going to be as effective in the press when you're down 1-0 because if they get in trouble, they're just going to play it long. They don't care. They got a lead. Right.

So it just changes the chemistry of everything when you go down. So it was a mistake to start him against a team of that quality, against a defender like Virgil van Dijk. It didn't make sense.

And I understand they didn't have Josh Sargent. So your next best and that Haji Wright had not played well, especially in the in the prior game, the Iran game. So your best solution at that point was, okay, we don't have the setup we want. So let's just get our best guys on the field.

And either put Gio Reyna in the middle as the false nine or put Tim Waya and then move Reyna to the right. And that was those were the two choices. And he chose the bad one. He chose to go with Jesus. And then, you know, they just made some bad decisions.

And I think they were tired, Adam. I mean, Tyler Adams didn't even run on that play. And that's just like totally antithetical to who he is as an athlete and as a competitor. Yeah, he he he was he was caught pressing up. And then when Memphis to pay took off, he was not he could not catch up and he probably didn't have it in him to catch up. And maybe, Eunice Musa was supposed to pick the man up. But that didn't happen either. You've heard we've all heard coaches say this, the first thing that goes when you are tired is your is your thinking. And maybe they were just at that point they were they had to be gassed.

And really, we could we can fold this back to the previous three games. And the World Cup is such a condensed format that Adams Musa didn't and McKinney didn't. But Adams played every second of the first three games and they had no other options in the midfield.

Luca de la Torre, who is probably a good midfielder, but not a not a replacement for Tyler Adams. He never played. Now, I know he was injured before the World Cup, but he was on the roster. He never featured.

We only saw Kellen Acosta at the end of games to help see it, see it out or get provide something. But there were no midfield options for them. There's also no option for Anthony Robinson, who saved his I hate to say it worst for last because he wasn't good against the Netherlands either.

And I love Anthony Robinson. Jedi is excellent, but I mean, he wasn't great either the last couple of matches. Yeah, I think it when it comes down to I mean, they could have played Brendan Aronson in Weston McKinney's position if they if they thought that that would be an upgrade or or, you know, an upgrade with a tired Weston or something like that. But that was their only option, really. And they were so built on that midfield, the MMA midfield, yeah, that Gareth Stockgate even talked about how really difficult it was to play through those guys.

And so he tried to continue to ride that. And, you know, let's not forget that, you know, that midfield is built to be a wall defensively. There's no great creator among the three of them.

They have great energy. Weston can get into the box and score on occasion. It didn't happen in this World Cup, but he has. Musa is totally a ball possessor. He's at this point, he's not a great creator. He's you know, he's not a great defender. He but you get him the ball and you're not getting it away from him.

And that's what he does. So that's why they were so good in games one, two and three, right? And one when they fell down again, that that that was part of it. But two, I mean, if you looked at it, I mean, who got a ball through the midfield at all against them in the first three games? It never happened, right? Iran couldn't Wales couldn't even England with Bellingham out there.

Yeah, couldn't do it. But they, you know, 10th minute boom, it goes right through the middle. I mean, it was totally again, it was totally antithetical to who they were as a team. And so it's just, it's one of those things. I mean, this is where the program is. And people want it to be better.

They want it to be magic. And but this is where it is. And this is part of having what I wanted to write about this, but never got the opportunity, the last generation between Michael Bradley, Josie Altidore, Clint Dempsey, that group, and this group, the ones we have now Polisic, McKinney Adams, etc. There was nothing. I mean, there was nothing. There were no players that were helpful in a World Cup scenario. There were some solid make MLS guys who could, you know, who were good solid players, like maybe a Sebastian Legit or somebody like that. But there was there were no World Cup level players. And that's, that's why we didn't qualify in 2018. And that's why I tried to tell people this team wasn't ready to be great. I don't care how many guys Yeah, I do care how many if you got 20 playing at the at the Chelsea inter level or whatever. Okay, but we have like, seven or 10. Yeah, it's not the same. I 100% agree.

And it gets me to I have two more questions about this. Going forward, as a as a fan of teams that have not been good. They're better. I'm like, as a Mets fan, when you're going through a time where all right, we stink. So here's what I'm going to do.

This is how I will make this interesting. Let's see who I kind of who I can identify that will be part of the future success. And I don't think the United States stinks. I think they're one of the top 16 countries in the world playing soccer.

I believe this is where they belonged. I'm glad they got through because anything short of that was a failure. So I consider this World Cup a success. They played the number nine team in the world in the FIFA rankings, and one that had maybe the easiest group to negotiate. Senegal without Saudi Omani was not going to be that much of a threat.

Qatar is terrible. So it was they had the easier group. They were fresher when we when they got there. How many of this group the core players of this group? Can you say four years from now they're going to be in our top 11? Well, I think it's really a better question.

How many won't? I mean, because we just take out the central defense. Walker Zimmerman's 30, 20, 29 years old, I think. I mean, at 33, one would hope he would have younger, fresher players. Tim Rehm, of course, is too old.

My favorite player at this World Cup, Tim Rehm. He did a great job. He really did. He had he had a shaky game four as well.

Turnovers that he had never imagined in the first three games, but did a great job. But he won't be there. No, but everybody else.

I mean, who else? You're not gonna throw any of those guys aside. They're only 22 years old, whole team. They're all right in the prime of their are on their way to the prime of their careers in 2026.

This is why it's promising for 26 beyond just being here, which is a help. But you have this whole core group that will now have been in a World Cup. And then you have the next generation and hopefully in that group, there are some significant players, especially in central defense or the ones who missed this one, particularly Chris Richards, maybe Miles Robinson. Yeah, he'll be around 29 by then.

So I'm not sure, but definitely Chris Richards could be. So the guy that those are the guys that I think will will make the difference. For me, what turns this team from a round of 16 team into a team that's a serious threat to get to the semifinals or something like that and see how it goes is this next group that the guys that are 18, 20, 21 now that played the qualified the U.S. for the Olympics and the U-20 World Cup next year, the Olympics in 24. How good are they? How good can they be?

How much can they help? If they're special, then then it can be a great team in 26. And maybe finding somebody who will play Gia Reyna. Look, he's playing. I realized maybe he wasn't 100% fit.

I don't know the issue. But if he put him on to start the second half, then he probably should have put him on to start the game. But you know, even but when he came on, I just thought he was he was OK. I didn't think he I didn't think anybody was great in the game.

And that might have been just situation. So I'm not basically looking at Gio and say, well, maybe he's not that good. I think he's a wonderful player and he's playing Champions League matches for Dortmund.

So if you can play in that tournament, which is, I think, probably a better brand of a higher caliber of soccer, maybe not quite the pressure that a World Cup is, depending on the country, then you probably should be on the field for this. Is Greg Berhalter the right guy to take them to the next level? Or did he do his job and they should find somebody else? Well, one, he did his job for sure.

Yeah, I've been thinking a lot about this. Multi-cycle World Cup coaches often don't work out well. But is that just, you know, is that just one of those things people say?

Because, you know, because you have the obvious examples when it hasn't worked. I mean, England and France will play Saturday in a quarterfinal. That's the Titanic showdown. And both of them in a quarter in a quarterfinal game are on multi-cycle coaches. Not they chose to stay with the coach. And and Gareth Southgate at this point, this is his record under the last three tournaments, semi-finals at the World Cup, final at Euro 2020.

And now he's in the quarters here. So I mean, I don't know that you necessarily have to change. I know that the negativity around Greg is really toxic. And yeah, I'm not, you know, and I'd really like to see that shut down. And what bothered me was that there's so much of it. That's all I felt through media, the social media in particular, after they qualified for the round of 16.

And it like he did exactly everything you could have wanted him to do. And they're still critical. So that's a problem. But honestly, I thought about this this morning, I came up with this, I would ask two people.

And I know this sounds weird. But I would ask two people as Christian Pulisic and Tyler Adams, team captain, team star, right? Is he the right guy? You guys have both played for other coaches around the world? You know, are we tactically sound enough fit enough? Because he's got you know, and that's the question because he's created a great atmosphere. And what people who think they know sports don't understand at all, is how building a culture is the single most important thing a coach does not throwing the challenge flag or calling time out or the number one thing is how do you build culture? Do the players want to be there? Do they want to play for each other? Do they want to be there? Do they want to play for you? And do they want to play for your organization, which in this case is the United States, though, that's the number one thing that any coach does. And it's, it's completely misunderstood by the public, the public thinks it's all tactics and strategy.

That stuff is essential. But there aren't that big of differences between the various coaches, you know, the very best of the best a pep Guardiola or somebody like that, or, or clop or whatever. Yeah, but you get down to where Greg is.

And it's, you know, there's a lot of similarity. And so it comes down to do the players want to play for you? And, and that and that I think that's, that's a no doubter at this point. But do they think to those guys in particular think that we need a change of direction to move forward? And if they said yes, then I do it. Because they're going to be there in four years, as long as they're healthy.

So I would want to know what they think. Before we let you go. I was actually listening to Grant Wall's podcast today, which I don't know if you you're a listener, but I do religiously. And Grant said on the, the postmortem, that in 2015, pep Guardiola, basically had conversations and was interested in the job of coaching the men's national team for the United States. He took a year off, he was living in New York, and he thought maybe, maybe that's it.

I don't think they're getting pep now. But that's, that's another story all together. Mike to course he had TSN Mike on Twitter from the sporting news. I appreciate your time, man.

I'll talk to you soon. Thanks, Adam. You got it. Mike's course he of the sporting news. Look, I loved I was in. Yeah.

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See additional terms at one peloton.com. And good save. Could he have done more with it?

Yes. I don't think he realized he had a probably another another half second to kind of look and see what he could do. He could have just chipped and and beaten or just elevated a little bit more. And it's a goal and it's one nothing U.S. and that's a different game at that point. And then seven minutes later, it's fine. Matt Turner and as a to pay at the top of the 18 to pass back across the goal right before the end of the half was a gut punch.

And then after they lucked into a goal, you get the momentum and maybe you can force the issue a little bit like, well, the four minutes later, three minutes later, but goal. That's tough. That's that. Yeah. The Netherlands was clinical, absolutely clinical.

That's where that's where we are lacking our ability to to create possession, create chances from the possession and then finishing those chances. That's where we lack Peloton's best offer of the season is here. Get up to six hundred dollars off Peloton bike, bike plus or tread packages.

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