18 Comments

The US had a possession/shots advantage BECAUSE they were 1-0 down after 7 minutes. Canada was happy to contain the US, and they did it with ease. The stats are meaningless in the context of the score line. Canada was in control of the score for 83 minutes (plus stoppage time).

There was one decent chance for the US, McKennie's header from a corner. That's weak.

Canada gave us one full Fonz as a head start - good for them!

Expand full comment

I believe Zardes has a role on the roster but don’t understand giving him the start. Do you feel Zardes earned more starts?

Expand full comment

Zardes flat-out gave the ball away more times than he did anything positive with it. He should’ve come off at halftime. Turner has done enough for the US to excuse one (admittedly huge) mistake. The goal kick that effectively cost the game was short, in the middle of the park, and to *nobody*.

Canada’s really good. This US team cannot afford to get behind *anyone*, let alone a good team. Their inability to break teams down is a *glaring* weakness. If you can’t do that, you MUST create chances from set pieces. If you think Canada gave possession away after they got ahead, just wait. Because forget whether Panama and Costa Rica can get ahead of the US. They will bunker and park the bus coming out of the *tunnel*. Oh, and the other game in the last trio? At Azteca. Honduras is an absolute MUST win now.

Christian needs to understand he’s a marked man by everyone in CONCACAF. Every opponent head is on a swivel making sure they know where he is. Whenever he gets the ball, he’s swarmed. He’s not going to win 1-v-3 matchups, which is what he tried to dribble through again and again today. Grant’s right - if he stays on the wing more often it’ll open up space for others inside, or at the top of the box.

Expand full comment
founding

As a USMNT fan who attended the game — disappointed in the result but have to give Canada credit for hosting a great WCQ:

- weather was lovely / both teams quickly adjusted to turf so site was a non-issue after all the handwringing

- Canada did a great job staging the game in a blue collar suburb of Toronto with a loud noisy crowd (99%+ pro-Canada) yo build a home field advantage despite 50% attendance limit

- Canadian fans absolutely lived up to reputation and were as kind and polite as could be to a southern rival

Unfortunately for the USMNT their strength as hosts was matched by their quality on the field.

Great WCQ away experience despite the L.

Expand full comment

My critique of our team has been speed of play. It is very difficult to break down a low block with dribbling because it’s always against 3, and 2+ touch passing.

What do we do instead? - 1-touch play, driven diagonals to crosses from the end line - these seem to me to be the best team tactics against the defense we faced. We’ll meet the same defense against Panama. If the next two games run true to form, that game will decide our fate.

One of the tactics seemingly used today was withdrawing Zardes. Doing that should open penetrating runs from the wings. Where were they?

Lastly, I saw Turner own the goal, but Grant is right, it was a stunning sequence of errors!

Expand full comment

Set pieces were a bit better but still subpar.

Expand full comment

To the extent that the USMNT has a style, it's an old-school continental, possession based style that (i) is very hard to implement in these short national team camps and (ii) doesn't play to their strengths. *It's so frustrating to watch this team kick the ball back and forth 30 yards from goal for hours with no attempts on goal.* Compounding this is the very strange choices of players and the poor timing of substitutions. The most dispiriting thing here is that GGG doesn't seem to be learning anything from this - it's the same problems game after game after game.

Expand full comment

And another thought on player selection: I noted in a discussion with my son prior to this set of qualifiers that I would have called in Dike or Pefok to give us a physical presence at the #9. With the roster as selected, I did not see a Plan B for attacking an opponent. Sargent might be another capable of this role and be able to withdraw better.

It’s just a matter of providing our opponents with a different challenge.

Expand full comment

I think the team is deteriorating, rather than improving. We just can’t close out

Scoring opportunities, and we get very few of them. I don’t think this team would do better than break even with Salvador, if we played them 10 times. This ain’t no “ golden age” or “ golden moment.” It is the same failure. Just different players .

Expand full comment

Is it on the players that they keep coming out flat? Or the coach? It doesn’t seem to matter all that much if they are home or away.

Expand full comment