USMNT Head Coach thread
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Anonymous
Not disputing that the players should play in Europe (obvious to everyone with a brain, including US soccer), but we would have been better off if he had stayed. He lost control of the team completely and did not do a good job cultivating the infusion of new blood into the team. That alone would have helped with the player issues alluded to above. The fact is that there are some political aspects to his job and he should have just kept his big mouth shut on player movement to Europe. That he couldn’t do that is another strike against him, but not the only one. That was the least of the problems he left. I don’t know why anyone would keep trying to defend the indefensible on this other than the pure dogma that foreign = better at any cost. Really sounds just like a bunch of soccer moms wowed by the new Brit running a soccer clinic down the street. Man, he must be a soccer genius with that accent.... |
Anonymous
| First comment should have read “we would NOT have been better off had he stayed” |
Anonymous
| It sounds more like we overly scrutinize anything foreign and bend over backwards to excuse American mediocrity. But what do I know, I don’t want to resort to making cracks about soccer moms and posh British accents. That only dumbs down the conversation. |
Anonymous
| Five years is more than enough time to make a positive impact. Rather, our German coach ran the team into the dirt with the wheels falling off the bus as he was thrown out the door. Jurgen’s record here is what it is. Mediocrity indeed. And that’s paying the word mediocrity a compliment. |
Anonymous
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Jurgen’s record doesn’t fit your narrative.
Klinsmann compiled a 55-27-16 record during his tenure. In 2013, he led the team on a record-setting 12-game winning streak, the longest in program history. The 16 victories and .761 winning percentage in 2013 are all-time U.S. MNT records for a calendar year. In 2014, the team advanced out of the “Group of Death” and reached the Round of 16 in the FIFA World Cup. Most recently, the MNT finished fourth in the 2016 Copa America Centenario held in the United States. |
Anonymous
Actually, my “narrative” fits exactly. Found success early in his tenure (2013) and then ranked in 2015/2016. You think 4th in the Gold cup is a good result? Arena never finished fourth. I think he had three Gold cup titles in his first stint. As stated, the wheels were falling off the bus when he was ditched. The team was in disarray (from multiple accounts) at the end and Arena couldn’t turn the ship at the end of the failed WC bid. Do you have any original thoughts on Jurgen’s five years or are they all copy and paste jobs as shown above? |
Anonymous
| Tanked not ranked. Autocorrect. |
Anonymous
Do you not know what the Copa America is? |
Anonymous
That’s your defense of Klinsmann?? Pretty weak. |
Anonymous
| I don’t need to make an argument based on conjecture. Just because you’re aggro doesn’t prove your point. He led the program on its longest winning streak and a record calendar year. You’re not an analyst, you just don’t like Germans. |
Anonymous
| Yes, call someone who makes a valid argument xenophobic. That seems to be the canned response on those forum anyway. |
Anonymous
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Klinsmann, for all his faults, was right about one thing: US Soccer -- especially the men's NT -- needs a divorce from MLS. The interests of the two organizations are at odds, and as long as MLS' interests get the upper hand, we won't have any decent player development or get consistently decent results in international play. Whether Klinsmann was better than Bruce Arena is irrelevant. Both of them had to work with that handicap. The US needs a system of player identification and development that's not tied to the restrictive, cartel-like rules of MLS (which are unique in the world and uniquely handicap American soccer). The US needs a strong federation that provides strong backing for clubs to develop players and get the full value out of them instead of having to share it with a cartel, and protects communities like Columbus from blackmail by greedy owners - something else you don't see anywhere else. The US needs a federation that supports and encourages players who want to compete at the highest levels (which means Europe) instead of helping lure them back into the Retirement League where the level of competition is much lower. This isn't about whether a foreign coach is better than an American or vice versa. It's about rigging the system to favor an average coach who gets decent results in a mediocre competitive environment because he's their buddy and he won't rock the MLS boat. It's also about rationalizing that decision by pretending he's just an American version of Pep Guardiola because he knows how to get the best out of a so-so player like Gyasi Zardes in a mildly competitive environment. |
Anonymous
Nobody cares about Arena's gold cup record. His last two stints with the USMNT ended up with his team finishing dead last in the WC group in 2006 and failing to qualify for the WC in 2018. Klinsmann actually coached young German team to WC semifinal in which they lost to the eventual champion, Italy, in overtime and had USMNT advance from the group that included Germany, Portugal and Ghana. And some of the USMNT players stated publicly that they would have qualified if Klinsmann was not fired. |
Anonymous
This was the most important thing Klinsmann did; he publicly challenged the biggest flaw in our soccer system. The USSF fired him and failed to qualify for the WC. They now look for a "yes man" who would not be challenging the status quo. |
Anonymous
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Arena’s first stint record was better than Klinsmann, by the numbers and specifically 2002 WC performance. You can not credibly argue Klinsmann’s results were better than Arena in his first stint, they’re just not.
There are many more, public references of players who had bad things to say about Klinsmann. So what that someone said he wouldn’t have lost WC qualifying this time around. The team was a mess and the losses that came at the end of his run weren’t inspiring in bolstering that idea, to say the least. The fact remains that he did nothing in the five years he had to make the case that a foreign manager is better than an American, even if I concede that Arena’s 98-06 results are equivalent to Jurgen’s (they’re not, Arena’s were better). His recognition that our top players should play in Europe does not count as a single point in the case that he’s the better manager of the team. One view posed above is the conspiratorial notion that the selection of a Berkhalter is rigged. Another, simpler explanation is that they are gun shy to target another foreign head coach after the mess that was left by the last one. |