There were so many American U-23 players who were not cleared to play Olympics that it is difficult to take this that seriously. Our real U-23 team is the USMNT. If you do not see the potential there then you have been dooming and glooming too much to pay attention.

Anonymous wrote:threads like this are annoying because every soccer wannabe/crackpot comes out of the woodwork to decry that our system is hopelessly flawed.

they lost to Honduras. Less humiliating that losing to Trinidad and Tobago and sitting out the World Cup, but a good sign the system is hopelessly flawed

Anonymous wrote:threads like this are annoying because every soccer wannabe/crackpot comes out of the woodwork to decry that our system is hopelessly flawed.

Well, it's not shown itself to be super successful and the experts agree.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Men?
I saw a bunch of boys out there. No offense to any one of them but they were not the best of our best.

Those guys are overseas playing for the club unable to be released for a concacaf qualifier. You all complain about US soccer but when we finally have some exciting good players that are playing at the highest level you complain they are not here in a qualifying tournament.

Oh wait its the Olympics

Olympics or World Cup ?

Take your pick. If you want the best qualify most developed player pool ready for the next World Cup then who cares about the Olympics. No one takes the Olympics seriously anymore. Its not what it once way, not even close

Europeans do not take men Olympic soccer seriously but other areas/countries do. We are not at the level of European soccer. We need to take what scraps they leaves around.

It’s not a question of the Olympics or the World Cup. You should qualify for both... not play a friendly against the 2nd team of a mid of the pack European national team.

So you are saying Pulisic and others that are under contract with European clubs (the same clubs you recognize are the top of the game) should return to play a Concacaf qualifier ?
Im sure their Euro employers wont take kindly to that

threads like this are annoying because every soccer wannabe/crackpot comes out of the woodwork to decry that our system is hopelessly flawed.

Anonymous wrote:Awful.

It's the feeder system here. The best kids don't even make it into our system in the first place. Pay-to-play and politics has been at the heart of US soccer and US Youth Club soccer for DECADES. I see it all around me. The same rosters. The kids with great potential in their youth walking off after the Clubs focus on 10-15 kids out of 100 kids in an age group. Ignore the rest.

Coaches that understand very little about development---or if they do they need to show 'wins' from the earliest ages or get canned...so they go with the biggest, most physical kids before these kids have even hit puberty.

so who subsidizes youth soccer in your ideal world? Do we rely on MLS clubs like Europeans who rely on local clubs? What about kids who don't live in MLS markets and the girls are probably just left out. Pay to play exists because we have a massive pool of players who want to play and can afford club dues and we have no realistic alternative funding structure

Anonymous wrote:Men?
I saw a bunch of boys out there. No offense to any one of them but they were not the best of our best.

Those guys are overseas playing for the club unable to be released for a concacaf qualifier. You all complain about US soccer but when we finally have some exciting good players that are playing at the highest level you complain they are not here in a qualifying tournament.

Oh wait its the Olympics

Olympics or World Cup ?

Take your pick. If you want the best qualify most developed player pool ready for the next World Cup then who cares about the Olympics. No one takes the Olympics seriously anymore. Its not what it once way, not even close

Europeans do not take men Olympic soccer seriously but other areas/countries do. We are not at the level of European soccer. We need to take what scraps they leaves around.

It’s not a question of the Olympics or the World Cup. You should qualify for both... not play a friendly against the 2nd team of a mid of the pack European national team.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Awful.

It's the feeder system here. The best kids don't even make it into our system in the first place. Pay-to-play and politics has been at the heart of US soccer and US Youth Club soccer for DECADES. I see it all around me. The same rosters. The kids with great potential in their youth walking off after the Clubs focus on 10-15 kids out of 100 kids in an age group. Ignore the rest.

Coaches that understand very little about development---or if they do they need to show 'wins' from the earliest ages or get canned...so they go with the biggest, most physical kids before these kids have even hit puberty.

The OP understands what went wrong with the Olympic qualifying campaign. If you think we don’t have the players to qualify and do well in the tournament itself, you have paid no attention to US men’s soccer over the last few years.

DP. I agree with the PP. Sure our best U-23s were not playing, but were are a huge country with plenty of soccer participation, and should still have been able to field a team capable of qualifying, regardless of the availability of the players under contract in Europe. The approach of picking athletes and teaching them soccer doesn't work, as evidenced by the play last night. Their touches were terrible. They couldn't string passes together. Balls were passed out of bounds. Poor decisions. Frankly, it's exactly what most of us parents see in youth soccer - focusing on the wrong things and picking players for their speed and strength, not for soccer IQ, technical strength, and above all - heart.

Yes speed of play and passing/receiving ball was typical of our system. It’s a total failure from youth level, player development, coaching(tactical awareness, strategic planning and understanding how to select players for a team) and upper federation management. You can find fault in all the way through. The thing that gets me is the arrogance. They act like they are at a world class level and they are not even close. In countries with world class soccer they make changes to the coaching/management after failures. We keep the same people and the same system. The people in charge of selecting player, coaches, negotiating with leagues, scheduling friendly, etc are bad. Now they need to be held to accountable.

Both goals were the result of being unable to keep possession. The first goal was set up by a long clearance. The defender was in the box but not under pressure. He does not pass the ball to an open US player and build but just kicks it long right to a Honduras player. The Honduras player receives(that is the only thing you can call it) the ball with no US players around him. He has all the time and space he needs to put the ball back in to the box for a goal. The other goal speaks for itself.

Men?
I saw a bunch of boys out there. No offense to any one of them but they were not the best of our best.

Those guys are overseas playing for the club unable to be released for a concacaf qualifier. You all complain about US soccer but when we finally have some exciting good players that are playing at the highest level you complain they are not here in a qualifying tournament.

Oh wait its the Olympics

Olympics or World Cup ?

Take your pick. If you want the best qualify most developed player pool ready for the next World Cup then who cares about the Olympics. No one takes the Olympics seriously anymore. Its not what it once way, not even close

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Awful.

It's the feeder system here. The best kids don't even make it into our system in the first place. Pay-to-play and politics has been at the heart of US soccer and US Youth Club soccer for DECADES. I see it all around me. The same rosters. The kids with great potential in their youth walking off after the Clubs focus on 10-15 kids out of 100 kids in an age group. Ignore the rest.

Coaches that understand very little about development---or if they do they need to show 'wins' from the earliest ages or get canned...so they go with the biggest, most physical kids before these kids have even hit puberty.

The OP understands what went wrong with the Olympic qualifying campaign. If you think we don’t have the players to qualify and do well in the tournament itself, you have paid no attention to US men’s soccer over the last few years.

DP. I agree with the PP. Sure our best U-23s were not playing, but were are a huge country with plenty of soccer participation, and should still have been able to field a team capable of qualifying, regardless of the availability of the players under contract in Europe. The approach of picking athletes and teaching them soccer doesn't work, as evidenced by the play last night. Their touches were terrible. They couldn't string passes together. Balls were passed out of bounds. Poor decisions. Frankly, it's exactly what most of us parents see in youth soccer - focusing on the wrong things and picking players for their speed and strength, not for soccer IQ, technical strength, and above all - heart.

Thanks. And the fact they have to go to Europe is another indication that we have failed consistently since the 1980s. I mean—wtf??? 41 years since soccer took off in this country and our men still couldn’t qualify for the Olympics?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Awful.

It's the feeder system here. The best kids don't even make it into our system in the first place. Pay-to-play and politics has been at the heart of US soccer and US Youth Club soccer for DECADES. I see it all around me. The same rosters. The kids with great potential in their youth walking off after the Clubs focus on 10-15 kids out of 100 kids in an age group. Ignore the rest.

Coaches that understand very little about development---or if they do they need to show 'wins' from the earliest ages or get canned...so they go with the biggest, most physical kids before these kids have even hit puberty.

The OP understands what went wrong with the Olympic qualifying campaign. If you think we don’t have the players to qualify and do well in the tournament itself, you have paid no attention to US men’s soccer over the last few years.

DP. I agree with the PP. Sure our best U-23s were not playing, but were are a huge country with plenty of soccer participation, and should still have been able to field a team capable of qualifying, regardless of the availability of the players under contract in Europe. The approach of picking athletes and teaching them soccer doesn't work, as evidenced by the play last night. Their touches were terrible. They couldn't string passes together. Balls were passed out of bounds. Poor decisions. Frankly, it's exactly what most of us parents see in youth soccer - focusing on the wrong things and picking players for their speed and strength, not for soccer IQ, technical strength, and above all - heart.

Anonymous wrote:Awful.

It's the feeder system here. The best kids don't even make it into our system in the first place. Pay-to-play and politics has been at the heart of US soccer and US Youth Club soccer for DECADES. I see it all around me. The same rosters. The kids with great potential in their youth walking off after the Clubs focus on 10-15 kids out of 100 kids in an age group. Ignore the rest.

Coaches that understand very little about development---or if they do they need to show 'wins' from the earliest ages or get canned...so they go with the biggest, most physical kids before these kids have even hit puberty.

The OP understands what went wrong with the Olympic qualifying campaign. If you think we don’t have the players to qualify and do well in the tournament itself, you have paid no attention to US men’s soccer over the last few years.

Awful.

It's the feeder system here. The best kids don't even make it into our system in the first place. Pay-to-play and politics has been at the heart of US soccer and US Youth Club soccer for DECADES. I see it all around me. The same rosters. The kids with great potential in their youth walking off after the Clubs focus on 10-15 kids out of 100 kids in an age group. Ignore the rest.

Coaches that understand very little about development---or if they do they need to show 'wins' from the earliest ages or get canned...so they go with the biggest, most physical kids before these kids have even hit puberty.

Ha love it

I know the Olympics is not a big deal for major soccer power nations but the US is not a major soccer power. This was a failure of the coaching and US soccer(including the MLS). They need to get their act together.

Honduras was not a strong team. Their player do not even play in the MLS. They play domestically or in the USL. The MLS would not release players for the qualifiers, the best US u23 players played a meaningless game against 2nd and 3rd team players of Ireland in a friendly, coaching was bad, player selection seems random, etc.

It’s not like US soccer/MLS can afford to throw away the free publicity the Olympics would have generated. I am sure the MLS would have got a ratings boost.