America starting to become a big player at football?

Peaknutt

Peaknutt

Striker
More and more USA internationals starting to seep into the squads of big clubs:

Pulisic at Chelsea
Weston McKennie at Juve
Reyna at Dortmund
Adams at Leipzig
And now Sergiño Dest off to Bayern

Slowly but surely they are starting to become relevant.
 


Peaknutt said:
More and more USA internationals starting to seep into the squads of big clubs:

Pulisic at Chelsea
Weston McKennie at Juve
Reyna at Dortmund
Adams at Leipzig
And now Sergiño Dest off to Bayern

Slowly but surely they are starting to become relevant.
Click to expand...
It's a slower pace but the standard is certainly getting better
 
More and more MLS franchises are setting up every year and more and more money is getting pumped in. They've also spent a lot of time examining the way coaches teach kids in Europe and are applying their methods. They'll get there eventually. I can't ever see 'soccer' replacing Gridiron Football as the national pastime though.
 
sonofagun said:
More and more MLS franchises are setting up every year and more and more money is getting pumped in. They've also spent a lot of time examining the way coaches teach kids in Europe and are applying their methods. They'll get there eventually. I can't ever see 'soccer' replacing Gridiron Football as the national pastime though.
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American football, what a boring game.
 
Peaknutt said:
More and more USA internationals starting to seep into the squads of big clubs:

Pulisic at Chelsea
Weston McKennie at Juve
Reyna at Dortmund
Adams at Leipzig
And now Sergiño Dest off to Bayern

Slowly but surely they are starting to become relevant.
Click to expand...

Never seen any of them in the NFL mind
 
Peaknutt said:
More and more USA internationals starting to seep into the squads of big clubs:

Pulisic at Chelsea
Weston McKennie at Juve
Reyna at Dortmund
Adams at Leipzig
And now Sergiño Dest off to Bayern

Slowly but surely they are starting to become relevant.
Click to expand...

This is really just a reflection of Pulisic breaking the ice to where teams don't just stereotype anyone with an American passport as being an unskilled but athletic balloon chaser. The last generation of American players (e.g. Dempsey, Donovan, Michael Bradley) was decent but didn't have the already-extant reputation so didn't get a lot of attention - keepers were a different story. The national team made the knockout rounds at two successive World Cups. It's really the guys who are 26-30 now (the Altidore cohort) who were really weak interrupting what has been a longer-term rise in standards.
 
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Peaknutt said:
More and more USA internationals starting to seep into the squads of big clubs:

Pulisic at Chelsea
Weston McKennie at Juve
Reyna at Dortmund
Adams at Leipzig
And now Sergiño Dest off to Bayern

Slowly but surely they are starting to become relevant.
Click to expand...

2 of them will start. More American players getting decent moves but standard is still very poor
 
Banks said:
2 of them will start. More American players getting decent moves but standard is still very poor
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Well, bear in mind that the oldest of those guys turned 22 last month. Reyna's 17. Still a lot of growth to be had in terms of skill and playing time. It'll be interesting to see what comes up behind them in Reyna's age group. Still a long way to go, but youth development is really improving and MLS clubs are much better at integrating the youngsters into their teams - see also Davies; same story, different passport.
 
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SYB_DC said:
Well, bear in mind that the oldest of those guys turned 22 last month. Reyna's 17. Still a lot of growth to be had in terms of skill and playing time. It'll be interesting to see what comes up behind them in Reyna's age group.
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At 22 you should be showing ability. Reyna is still young but the rest aren't exactly.

As I said in a previous thread England are QF fodder. Pulisic isn't as good as Sancho and had to leave Dortmund and he is their best prospect.

There best prospect isn't as good as a QF national team winger who hasn't even done it for England yet. They are still miles behind the big boys there miles behind England for a start
 
SYB_DC said:
This is really just a reflection of Pulisic breaking the ice to where teams don't just stereotype anyone with an American passport as being an unskilled but athletic balloon chaser. The last generation of American players (e.g. Dempsey, Donovan, Michael Bradley) was decent but didn't have the already-extant reputation so didn't get a lot of attention - keepers were a different story. The national team made the knockout rounds at two successive World Cups. It's really the guys who are 26-30 now (the Altidore cohort) who were really weak interrupting what has been a longer-term rise in standards.
Click to expand...

I think Landon Donovan was a great little player as was Clint and our Claudio of course
 
Banks said:
At 22 you should be showing ability. Reyna is still young but the rest aren't exactly.

As I said in a previous thread England are QF fodder. Pulisic isn't as good as Sancho and had to leave Dortmund and he is their best prospect.

There best prospect isn't as good as a QF national team winger who hasn't even done it for England yet. They are still miles behind the big boys there miles behind England for a start
Click to expand...

The US national team is going to be a total mess until they get the back line and keeper sorted out, which they're nowhere near doing. Nothing Pulisic can or should do, or his skill level relative to Sancho, changes that. But the trend is definitely upward: the talent pool overall is better than it was 6 or 7 years ago, and the system seems to have cleared away a few of the prior hurdles to development. MLS clubs now have actual functioning academies, for a start.
 
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Banks said:
At 22 you should be showing ability. Reyna is still young but the rest aren't exactly.

As I said in a previous thread England are QF fodder. Pulisic isn't as good as Sancho and had to leave Dortmund and he is their best prospect.

There best prospect isn't as good as a QF national team winger who hasn't even done it for England yet. They are still miles behind the big boys there miles behind England for a start
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Think you'll find the SMB has decided Sancho is "bang average" actually marra. :lol:

Though not sure Sancho is their *best* prospect given the absolute state of that Norweigan unit they play down the middle. Born in Leeds him too, we should have nabbed him.
 
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SYB_DC said:
The US national team is going to be a total mess until they get the back line and keeper sorted out, which they're nowhere near doing. Nothing Pulisic can or should do, or his skill level relative to Sancho, changes that. But the trend is definitely upward: the talent pool overall is better than it was 6 or 7 years ago.
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As England have found if you can't create world class central midfielders you will struggle.

They have plenty of atheltic ball winners but nobody with any genuine class
 
Banks said:
As England have found if you can't create world class central midfielders you will struggle.

They have plenty of atheltic ball winners but nobody with any genuine class
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Consider what "struggle" looks like relative to expectations for the two countries right now. Five years ago it was big news for an American outfield player - any American, at any club - to play in a Champions League match. The squad isn't remotely there yet, but you're talking about a place where the sport wasn't played in large numbers until around 25 years ago, and it's still much more popular as a youth sport for girls. It's going to take a while.
 
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Banks said:
At 22 you should be showing ability. Reyna is still young but the rest aren't exactly.

As I said in a previous thread England are QF fodder. Pulisic isn't as good as Sancho and had to leave Dortmund and he is their best prospect.

There best prospect isn't as good as a QF national team winger who hasn't even done it for England yet. They are still miles behind the big boys there miles behind England for a start
Click to expand...

Hmm I wouldn’t say pulisic was miles behind sancho. Sancho has looked pretty average every time I’ve seen him. Now I’ll admit here that has only been in an England shirt so he may be awesome for Dortmund, but in an England shirt he’s been quite underwhelming
 

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