Lets hope, ladies!
Well, that was frustrating. But I think the US has found its long-term coach with Burhalter. Gone are the days of frazzled defenses and isolation striker play. Burhalter has a philosophy that will work at this level. We need some taller defenders, though. You can’t lose 90% of contested headers and beat a team like Holland.
The important thing is that we made it farther than our neighbors to the south
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Did yiu guys know how many few P5 schools have Men’s Soccer Teams?
The Big12 & SEC have a combined ZERO and even the PAC 12 only has 6.
Soccer never will grow unless we increase the talent pool- right now, very few High School Boys have incentives to play soccer because the programs/scholarships at the next level are very few.
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Title IX basically guarantees that MSOC will never be a major school sport. It’s also why the USWNT plays like a godless killing machine.
Realistically, Men’s Soccer in the US is going to have to develop outside of the school system. Every other country in the world develops players through a system of academies and development clubs. US Soccer could do that, and with the MLS academies and USL Pro, they’ve been relatively successful given that they’ve basically had to build a ground-up development system. But if we want to compete with the likes of Germany and Spain and France, we’re gonna need a lot more money.
Kids sleep under NFL blankets from the time they’re 4 years old. There are already club programs in the major cities. My daughter plays for a major one in NH.
The real issue is until kids start wearing Breakers and Revolution and LFC pajamas the best athletes in our country will be playing football.
We’re literally field top 20 international selections in soccer utilizing second-tier athletes. Not a small feat. The guys playing on our national teams were not the best athletes at their high schools. They were great athletes that played soccer. But not the “best” athletes.
When our best athletes decide soccer is cool then things will change. And we have the best athletes in the world.
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I think this is what’s happening.
Since 2005, the MLS has expanded from 12 to 29 teams.
The MLS needs to take on the void of the nonexistent Men’s P5 Soccer programs (zero in Texas BTW).
They need to sign American high school kids during their underclassmen years and start putting them in training camps durung breaks in the school year.
Then, when they graduate high school they seamlessly become full time members of their MLS squad.
US soccer has to create a bigger talent pool. Right now, I think they are gettimg virtually zero of the African- American community to commit to playing.
Start offering them contracts while thet are still in high school and we might be able to tap into the talent pool of more American demographics that would typically play other sports
I’m no soccer expert but I definitely recognize piss poor defense when I see it… And I saw it in this match.
Now Holland… Those dudes can play some D…
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