Big World Cup matchup this weekend!

There is certainly no Killian Mbappe or Lionel Messi in this NFL draft, but those two men will square off in the World Cup final on Sunday. Eric Winolda, a three-time member of the United States World Cup team, one of only three people along with a former NC State Wolfpack member Tab Ramos to play on three World Cup teams. He joins us, Sirius XM counter-attack, a staple on my ride home every day. I appreciate your time, Mr. Winolda. How you doing? I'm doing okay.

I apologize for being a little late to you today, as you can imagine. The World Cup makes everybody crazy, so we're still living it. We're into extra time right here. Let's start with what we're going to see, what we think we're going to see on Sunday.

In some ways, it's a changing of the guard. Would a win... I don't want to get historical first. Let's start with France versus Argentina. France is loaded at every position. I don't think the same thing about Argentina.

How do you see this? Well, I mean, first and foremost, let's go back to that changing of the guard. You don't want to go there? No, I want to get there next because I do want to talk historically. I want to get there next. I did a poor job of starting this.

No, you're doing fine. The tactical, the matchups, all that stuff that we love so much when it comes to analyzing games and whatnot, they actually come to the forefront because what we've seen with this French team is a couple of teams that have been able to figure out how to keep Kylian Mbappe at bay. And that's England, of course. And then what we saw with Morocco, it's a very familiar foe and Hakeem and then, of course, Walker did a great job. And I think Southgate at England and phenomenal job of putting together a plan that was going to force France to beat you in a different way. That's really what was England's plan.

And he should be commended on that. But the other reality here, if we're looking at the Argentine team, is this is a team that's trying to finish destiny here. I mean, it really is become a story about Lionel Messi, about can he get to the finish line?

He's been phenomenal in this competition. Everyone, it just seems like everyone wants to see this happen so we can just stop the debate. Who's best?

Messi or Ronaldo? I'm already on messy side, even with all of her and all those antics. I just think everybody wants to see that happen. And the bottom line is, can this Argentina side shut down in Bobby with Molina, who has been phenomenal in this competition going forward. But guess what?

You might want to stick around a little bit, not venture too far out of position because this guy's good. So the tactics really come into play. And I think that Argentina has proven that they, they played multiple systems. They figured out different ways to, to go up against their opponents. I thought the, I thought the Netherlands game was, was a terrific example of that. So it's yet to be seen how they'll tactically address the game, but it really is for me going from my gut.

I just feel like the world wants to see messy touch the cup and it's all pointing in that direction. You know, with that, you have to say France and the shells that they've done a great job and they deal with all kinds of adversity and a bunch of injuries. Rabio had to sit this one. They had, they had the flu. They're calling it basically the flu hit the team. And it actually, the FIFA's report said, it's a cold.

That's what it was called. But the, the reality is, is that they've done a great job of, of navigating through this competition, but they haven't really gone up against the likes of what Argentina is. So it's a great final.

That's what everyone needs to know. This is one of the all time classic finals with the exit of probably the greatest player to ever play the game with the, the new young buck who has already won a world cup. And that's the only reason why we're not calling nephew the greatest of all time. He's never won this thing. And he got them Bobby who could possibly walk away with two trophies before he's even 22 years old.

Yeah. And if Eric Winolda is joining us here on the Adam Gold show, if in Bobby wins another one, that's two in a row. The first, the last time anybody won two straight, it was Brazil in 62 and 58. That was Pele. And that's who is the comparison for Lionel Messi. So historically speaking, where does this put Messi versus Pele if he is able to win just the one. Wow.

See, that's it. Hey, I hate these kind of ideas, man, because you know, when we're going on pure talent and we're going on, on just, just, just as, as the best player of all time, I think messy, messy was better. I think what, what we get confused with sometime is when we, when we talk about a player like Pele or maybe a Wayne Gretzky, somebody that completely transcends their sport and, and they become the beacon of, of, of what everything the game represents. So Pele it was a different time.

You know, if you talk to those guys in the fifties, they'll tell you that if you headed the ball the wrong way and you caught the laces, you were going to get stitches. So obviously the ball that they played with the shoes that they had on their feet, the technology, all of those things factor in. But you know, where do we compare these two?

I would just rather celebrate them both. If the debate is now moving from messy and Ronaldo to messy and Pele I'm fine with that. Maradona is, is, is the one that he's really chasing. And it's, it's it's a guy that, that won a world cup, took him to a world cup and lost. So, and, and the debate has always been until messy actually touches the trophy.

He cannot surpass Maradona in the eyes of the Argentine people. But I think we're there. I think we're there. And if he loses this game, man, we're going to keep talking about this for decades.

So I hope he wins. It gives you stuff to talk about you and Tony Niola on, on counter-attack on Sirius XM. Eric Winold is joining us here on the Adam Gold show.

All right. I want to move to the U S men's national team and the drama between Greg Berhalter and Gio Reyna. And Berhalter was speaking at a moral leadership conference, which to me is ironic here that we're talking about moral leadership. And he basically called out Reyna. He didn't use his name, but for those people who have followed the story and all the reporting around it, he was talking about Gio Reyna nearly being sent home from the world cup for, for not behaving properly in practice and whatnot. Um, how do you, my bigger problem was that he told Reyna before the world cup that he was going to play a very limited role.

I don't know why you would do that. Um, what's your, what are your thoughts on Berhalter V Reyna and how this whole thing played out? Well, unfortunately I inserted myself into this, uh, this mess very early on, uh, when I was hearing reports, uh, about what had happened. I had heard that he was very disappointed, devastated in his words, um, that he was not going to participate. So, I mean, I'm with you, I don't understand the logic between or around telling a player upon arrival, sit them down before they even take the ball and say, you're not going to play.

And then expecting a 19 rolled to handle that perfectly. That that's the, and to be disappointed and to be, and to show up at practice. I mean, I look, I'm just, I'm just saying that there's a question is professionalism. If you've just worked your whole life for this moment, you're going to play in a world cup and you've had some injuries and we all know the history and you finally walked your way back into that spot where you can really contribute to a national team.

And the first thing you do as a coach is you tell them, Hey, by the way, you're not going to play, but I want you to have a good attitude that that doesn't work. Um, and it is ironic that it wasn't a leadership, uh, uh, symposium because I thought that that was poor leadership. I think, I think what, um, what is really unfortunate is that we didn't get to see geo play in this world cup. Uh, it could have clearly been handled better. Uh, I think everyone is willing to move past, uh, you know, all that, what has happened, uh, but we certainly should accept it. This is a scenario that, that they've got this completely wrong. Uh, you know, I, you know, I, I, unfortunately, when I said, uh, you know, my inclusion on all of this was very early on in the competition, you know, when I, when I said I won, fortunately the manager has been untruthful with the media, uh, saying that he's still hurt and the player has refuted that and that's caused a rift, man. You would, I'll tell you, Adam, it's almost like the people don't are challenged with the English language. They need to understand there's a very big difference between pointing it out when someone is untruthful and calling somebody alive. If it's factual that the, that this is actually what was said and it is, it is not true, uh, that, that is not taking a shot at somebody that's just pointing it out. So, I mean, a lot of people were angry with me for, uh, especially, uh, those, those two guys over at that other wide leader that, that think that I did this for, for reasons of, uh, uh, personal gain.

I gained nothing from it. My heart is bleeding, uh, for, for geo and, and the reasons why he didn't play, which I don't agree with, but, uh, I certainly didn't want to be included in this story. I never did, but I, unfortunately, uh, what was, was one of the questions that our national team manager had to answer prior to the Iran game.

And if I apologize for anything, I'm, that's that I, that our coach had to, uh, had to answer that question because this entire situation is that that was unfortunate and it did have a massive effect on our team. And this team needs goals. Gia Reyna, while he'd maybe not be a big goal scorer, he is a creative offensive player. Uh, you scored 34 and we'll close on this at the time of your retirement from U S soccer, you were the all time leading goal scorer. Landon Donovan has since become that Christian Polisic has 22. Uh, where did the goals come from four years from now where the, when the U S or two years from now, if they do host Copa America, which is, uh, very possibly going to be a big deal.

Uh, where did the goals come from in this system? Right. Well, look, it was there, hopefully there's a change of the guard. I think that there'll be someone else managing this team. Uh, I think that it's gone so far that it needs some new life there. Uh, but the talent is there.

And I think the major criticism that we've had, um, which is still a repeat of history here. I mean, you forgot Clint Dempsey in there. Oh, I'm sorry.

Yeah, no, it's okay. He's in my opinion, he's pound for pound, the best soccer player that we've ever had. And, you know, and I've had conversations with him about this and you know, he's a guy that played in the midfield, uh, more than he played up front and I'm in the same boat. And so you, you look at our spats and you say, all right, well, how many goals did you score for the midfield? I scored zero out of 50 some odd games from the mid field.

I scored all my goals as a forward. What we keep having here is coaches who overthink this thing, and they don't put the players in offensive positions because they get too pragmatic and they think they've got to play defense first, where the goal is going to come from. Whenever we have a manager who lets takes off the shackles and lets these guys run, we have the ability to score a lot of goals, but we spend so much time figuring out a way that we can not lose the game that we've forgotten how to win. So I, I think when we get past that and we stop calling ourselves underdogs and we address the games, uh, for what they are, I, and I've been through this and we play against, we play against teams that, that we can, we can have our opinions of them, but you know, like the Netherlands, for example, that was a game that we could have won. Certainly a team that we could have beaten, but we chose to play, um, inappropriately, let's just put it that way. And I'm not going to put names on that, but I just, I was very disappointed with that starting line up. And we essentially played with a guy that was supposed to score goals that is a converted 10 that turned into a nine.

And then somebody decided to call him a nine and a half, but nine and a half. And so it's, uh, it's, it's unfortunate that we, we bowed out the way we did, but I hope we can fix it in the next four years. And by the way, you mentioned the Copa America let's win the Olympics. Yeah, that would be nice.

Yeah. Why don't we do that? We have enough young talent, uh, to really dedicate and put our energy and our resources into winning the gold medal. This team could do that. We're so caught up in the, in the Copa America and say that we need that.

We need that. No, what we need to be also is to be in a major tournament against multiple countries that gives you the feel of the world cup. It's not the world cup, but it's going to feel like the world cup. And you win that trophy. You've built a culture of winning within a major tournament. And that's, that's what we need right now. And if we can get that culture, we get that positive feeling, all these Americans that don't know the difference between the Olympics and the world cup.

Anyway, they'll probably be more excited about us getting the gold medal and then touching the world cup. So I think that's, that's a big part of it. We need to figure out how we change the perception of reality before we worry about reality. Eric, what do you think about the worry about reality?

Eric, when all the, I appreciate your time, serious XM counter-attack with Tony Miola. Thank you very much for those people want to listen. It's coming up in a little bit. I appreciate everything. And we'll talk again soon. I hope so, man. Thanks. Take care.