***Official Soccer Thread***

[POND_OF_RED]

Creating a new thread for soccer discussion since the Euro’s are done.

Most leagues are in preseason and Sporting KC are currently in a battle for the best record in the league to win the shield. We just sent Busio who’s a young Sporting youth academy player and possible future American star to Venezia to compete in the top division in Italy for a 6.5 million dollar transfer fee with up to $11 million with incentives and a 20% future sell-on rate if they sell him to another team. Not to mention another past youth academy player from Lee’s Summit and another possible World Cup starter Erik Palmer-Brown looks to be joining him at Venezia soon as well. If you’re looking for an Italian team to start rooting for with your new Paramount+ subscription they would be a good candidate with some local flavor.

The U.S has built a little power shift in the CONCACAF region with their wins over Mexico lately in Nations and Gold Cup finals and look to be in really good shape heading into the World Cup qualifiers next month.

Messi looks to be on the move as well. Let’s hope it’s not a worthless one to PSG for everyone’s sake.

Ok, CP feel free to remind me how gay soccer is now. Don’t care. Sporting is kicking ass and so is the USA. It’s a good time to be following along. Discuss…

Spoiler!

[POND_OF_RED]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

Now watch Pochettino end up being a disappointment and the US ends up hiring Marsch from Canada post-2026 World Cup.

I'll remember this one.

I’m glad you finally realized it would take a much bigger collapse for us to come calling to Canada at least. Hopefully you all can take advantage of the automatic bid and finally get your first World Cup group point in a couple years.

[New World Order]

Originally Posted by POND_OF_RED

I’m glad you finally realized it would take a much bigger collapse for us to come calling to Canada at least. Hopefully you all can take advantage of the automatic bid and finally get your first World Cup group point in a couple years.

They've lost every single world cup game they've played in (which is a grand total of 6).

2 World Cup appearances in their history is absolute trash. Their performance in those world cups is even worse

[Hark Clunt]

what a great hire. we're so lucky chelsea is run by absolute idiots and they let him go. if you only count the 2nd half of the prem season, poch actually had chelsea as the 3rd best team. of course they gave him no time to keep building though.

[KC_Connection]

Originally Posted by New World Order

They've lost every single world cup game they've played in (which is a grand total of 6).

2 World Cup appearances in their history is absolute trash. Their performance in those world cups is even worse

Almost like Canada is a small country with none of its top athletes who play soccer and with effectively no funding that goes to soccer (the federation itself has been close to bankruptcy in recent years and they couldn't afford to even hire their current coach without being subsidized by Canadian MLS teams).

And yet, despite their much smaller talent pool and limited resources, they're still ranked ahead of the USA in ELO right now. What does that say about the American program?

[KC_Connection]

Originally Posted by POND_OF_RED

I’m glad you finally realized it would take a much bigger collapse for us to come calling to Canada at least. Hopefully you all can take advantage of the automatic bid and finally get your first World Cup group point in a couple years.

Canada coach Jesse Marsch, a former candidate for the U.S. men's national team coaching role, has insisted he has "no interest" in replacing Gregg Berhalter as USMNT boss.

Berhalter was fired Wednesday after the USMNT's poor showing at the 2024 Copa América, in which the hosts failed to get past the group stage after defeats to Uruguay and Panama.

"I'm not leaving this job, I have no interest in the U.S. job," Marsch told a news conference Friday ahead of Canada's Copa America third-place playoff against Uruguay in Charlotte, North Carolina.

"And to be fair, unless there's a big shift in the organization, I don't think that I'll ever have any interest in that job in the future. So I'm really happy here, I couldn't be happier actually in terms of what it's like to work with the leaders in this organization and what it's like to work with this team."

Those comments speak volumes, don't you think?

[POND_OF_RED]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

Those comments speak volumes, don't you think?

They really do. He sounds like he actually thought he had a chance to get the job during the search and he’s still super bitter that he didn’t get a chance. I’m glad he was able to land on his feet somewhere after he fizzled out at Leeds, but he was never going to be the answer for the USMNT. Not during such a critical time for the future of the sport in this country. A lateral move from Berhalter to Marsch would have never solved anything. Like I said when you originally posted this nonsense- the USMNT needed to make a big splash and Jesse Marsch is nothing more than a skipping rock on a small puddle. Never dreamed it would work out this well, though. Poch was definitely the best available candidate and somehow the USMNT didn’t **** it up.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by |Zach|

Man you guys are still blaming MLS even after there were not many players on USMNT. It never ends. lol

Yes, because for decades us soccer leadership was in lockstep with mls leadership and they were more interested in growing mls than building the best national team. Jurgen had his flaws as a coach but he was absolutely right about the awful decision to blackball players overseas. It took an embarrassing exit to fix that shit but then instead of bringing in the best possible coach we brought in an MLS guy and then we rigged the system to keep him after an "unbiased" coaching search. Internationally experienced players for an MLS coach.

And we still feel the impact of that shit show. We didn't have veterans because our talent development in the prior generation was atrocious. Our best guys were young and raw but that's really bad when your most experienced vets are so bad they aren't even being considered. I've heard this be called the Lost Generation

And don't even get me started on pay to play which looms especially large in a sport that costs nothing to play and when we have to compete internationally with countries who don't do this

[|Zach|]

Originally Posted by chiefzilla1501

Yes, because for decades us soccer leadership was in lockstep with mls leadership and they were more interested in growing mls than building the best national team. Jurgen had his flaws as a coach but he was absolutely right about the awful decision to blackball players overseas. It took an embarrassing exit to fix that shit but then instead of bringing in the best possible coach we brought in an MLS guy and then we rigged the system to keep him after an "unbiased" coaching search. Internationally experienced players for an MLS coach.

And we still feel the impact of that shit show. We didn't have veterans because our talent development in the prior generation was atrocious. Our best guys were young and raw but that's really bad when your most experienced vets are so bad they aren't even being considered. I've heard this be called the Lost Generation

And don't even get me started on pay to play which looms especially large in a sport that costs nothing to play and when we have to compete internationally with countries who don't do this

Pay to play is absolutely a problem but blaming MLS for that is silly.

I was told once we get MLS trash out the US was really going to thrive but all they have done is is underperform meanwhile some of our best results in our history have been achieved with an MLS heavy core of players.

Hey things change and systems evolve I want the best players regardless of league but you guys still blaming MLS for everything is so disingenuous.

[New World Order]

Originally Posted by KC_Connection

Almost like Canada is a small country with none of its top athletes who play soccer and with effectively no funding that goes to soccer (the federation itself has been close to bankruptcy in recent years and they couldn't afford to even hire their current coach without being subsidized by Canadian MLS teams).

And yet, despite their much smaller talent pool and limited resources, they're still ranked ahead of the USA in ELO right now. What does that say about the American program?

Canada is not a small country. It’s bigger than the US.

It’s just no one wants to live there.

We’ve gone over this, our history trounces yours. In fact, it’s not even close. We were in the round of 16 in the World Cup, how did you guys do?

[Garcia Bronco]

Originally Posted by New World Order

Canada is not a small country. It’s bigger than the US.

It’s just no one wants to live there.

We’ve gone over this, our history trounces yours. In fact, it’s not even close. We were in the round of 16 in the World Cup, how did you guys do?

You're nuttier than a maple log from Tim Hortons. The sarcastic post was obviously referring to population size, not landmass. And event then the landmass is only 1.6 percent larger in area.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by |Zach|

Pay to play is absolutely a problem but blaming MLS for that is silly.

I was told once we get MLS trash out the US was really going to thrive but all they have done is is underperform meanwhile some of our best results in our history have been achieved with an MLS heavy core of players.

Hey things change and systems evolve I want the best players regardless of league but you guys still blaming MLS for everything is so disingenuous.

I think the next cycle we will get a better read on the mls impact. Our young guys will become veterans and will replace the "lost generation" veterans. We won't have berhalter, an MLS holdover. That helps a ton.

Agreed that from there it's probably not nearly enough. And that there are also bigger problems biggest being our youth development programs. That has nothing to do with mls and I hope people don't think that this divorce by itself is a fix all

[Fansy the Famous Bard]

Me coming here to talk Soccer. Seeing the discussions in the thread and realizing it was a mistake.