International Football General Chat

[kurtsimonw]

6 minutes ago, maqroll said:

He's employing a scorched Earth policy on his way out the door, slagging off American fans for not understanding the sport

People I know predicted that would be the attitude he took. He's taken the US backwards. Maybe they'll upgrade on him by bringing in a manager that actually has a tactic, like Tim or McLeish.

[BOF]

2 hours ago, kurtsimonw said:

People I know predicted that would be the attitude he took. He's taken the US backwards.

This article disagrees that he has taken them backwards, although he's certainly not blameless either.

Quote

US fans wanted Jürgen Klinsmann out but they may come to regret his exit

The German coach had many faults but he leaves the game in America in a much better place after his time in charge

The end came on Monday, in a terse press release from US Soccer, with a couple of nice quotes tacked on. Jürgen Klinsmann, the manager hired to great acclaim in 2011, was out of a job. Two bad losses – to Mexico and Costa Rica – in World Cup qualifying proved too much for USSF President Sunil Gulati to stomach. It is thought that the LA Galaxy coach, Bruce Arena, will return to the job he held from 1998-2006.

Many American fans are likely to cheer Klinsmann’s departure – just as many of them welcomed his appointment in the first place. The sunny former Germany star had charmed many five years ago when he promised to raise the level of the players and the competition. By 2016, his act had grown tired – many fans saw a man who refused to accept blame for mistakes, and many of his players seemed to quit on him.

The volatile politics in America also played a role, even though many fans will not admit it. As the recent presidential race signaled an inward turn for the country, many fans had become distressed with Klinsmann’s perceived focus on German-American players. This attitude was seen up and down the development ladder, and parents at the youth and ODP levels seethed, feeling their children would never get a fair shake under Klinsmann’s regime. Their discontent was vocalized when one of the biggest stars in the women’s game, Abby Wambach, criticized the immigrant members of the squad, drawing some angry rebukes – but in hindsight, she was merely expressing a current coursing the nation as a whole.

As a result, in the past year, every misstep Klinsmann made was magnified. One prominent blogger maintained a list that purported to make the case that the manager was the worst ever in American history. (In fact, Klinsmann finishes with the second-best record as coach, behind only Arena. John Kowalski, who coached only two games in 1991, can’t really be counted.) Some journalists actually called for his firing, which Klinsmann rightly called disrespectful.

Klinsmann is hardly blameless, of course. He alienated a good number of players with his tactics and selections. He was also more than happy to hang some of them out to dry in public: his treatment of Landon Donovan in the run-up to the 2014 World Cup was particularly tawdry.

The German did not always distinguish himself behind the scenes either. His development work in the USA was mediocre at best: his hand-picked coaches blew two chances to qualify for the Olympic Games, and the entire development pyramid in the nation can fairly be called a mess. His penchant for going off script exhausted the rank-and-file folks over at South Prairie, who saw a much more controlling and demanding boss than Klinsmann’s sunny public façade suggested. And, yes, Klinsmann’s side lost some real stinkers.

Despite those caveats Klinsmann leaves soccer in America in a better place than he found it. Klinsmann’s program got big wins: beating Italy, Germany and Holland. His team finished a respectable fourth at the Copa Centenario – it is no shame to lose to Argentina, after all – and got out of the Group of Death in Brazil. He won the 2013 Gold Cup. And he got the USA’s first-ever win at the Azteca, snapping a long record of futility.

Klinsmann also brought real wattage to the American game. For the first time, ever, the Americans had a true international superstar at the helm, and that paid off in ways difficult to measure. Excitement around the program surely shot up among casual fans; with that came added expectations – something Klinsmann actively courted. For the first time, American soccer players were put under real pressure, just as all other sportsmen are. To say that was a sea change might be selling it short.

Klinsmann also greatly expanded the player pool, with teen star Christian Pulisic just the latest gem to be unearthed (the Dortmund forward was also coveted by Croatia). Key players to emerge under Klinsmann include Fabian Johnson, DeAndre Yedlin, Julian Green, Bobby Wood, Jordan Morris and Aron Johansson. For all the hand-wringing that has accompanied Klinsmann’s selections, a look at the massive number of names that he brought into the program shows a manager with a catholic eye, willing to take chances on guys from every league and every level.

Which brings us to the one thing Klinsmann had little control over. The simple truth is, despite the fact that he looked at 70-odd guys over the last year, his talent pool is actually weaker than it ever has been.

American goalkeeping, once an international strength, has dried up, with Tim Howard injured and Brad Guzan simply useless. There simply isn’t much top-caliber talent in the pipeline, the excellent Pulisic aside. Clint Dempsey, sidelined with a heart ailment, was a killer omission as the Hex started. And certain players – Jermaine Jones, Kyle Beckerman, Guzan – are starting to look very old. (This is reflected in England as well: only one player, Lynden Gooch, is getting steady and significant playing time, and that at one of the worst clubs in the Premier League.) MLS’s defenders will point to Michael Bradley and Jozy Altidore at Toronto; but the fact remains that the domestic league is several notches below the best competitions in the world.

Whoever takes over the job will have to deal with that problem first. He will also have to try to repair a fractured and fractious development pyramid that simply wastes too much talent. And, he will have to guard against the USA’s national team becoming a club again, an insidious notion Klinsmann wisely smashed.

But the fans got their wish Monday afternoon. Like many in this nation after the presidential election, they may live to regret it.

 

[villa4europe]

its in a better place than he found it but not in a better place than it was in 2014, dont know if the yank discovery of football in brazil was exaggerated but he hasnt pushed on

and i may also be wrong here but the reliance of foreign talent or talent playing abroad would mean almost the admittance that the MLS isnt producing enough talent and the standard of the league just isnt good enough and they're never going to agree with that reality

name a really good american player? and by that i mean good enough to be a first teamer at a CL club, have they had one in the last 10 years? pulisic will do it

[BOF]

How much was Klinsmann in control of though?  I mean Gareth Southgate won't be responsible for discovering and developing the next generation of footballer.  He cherry picks the best from what's already at the top.  Now I know you can't compare the structures within the U.S. and England, and I've no doubt Klinsmann's brief would have been a lot broader and would have included elements of developmental programmes etc.  But surely he's a bit of a scapegoat here?  The failure of the U.S. to find quality youngsters is not solely down to him, and I wonder how much of this whole sacking is a reluctance from the powers that be to look at their own failures.  Which you would think doesn't bode well going forward.  If you won't admit your mistakes then you will repeat them.

[villa4europe]

they gave him a lot of power i thought and he was responsible for the structure

agree about him being limited with the quality at his disposal, like i said that comes with admitting that they arent good enough though which the americans are never going to do, if you look at the mexican national team they have 12 players playing in europe, costa rica have 9, usa have 12 but 3 of them havent kicked a ball for their club this season, if you look at the CONCACAF champions cup / CL the usa have had 2 winners in its history (ranked 8th), mexico have had 40, costa rica 6, since the CL inception there mexican teams have won all 8, usa have had 1 finalist

i dont know who takes over next or where they go, they'll probably drop to where they belong and where they've been for a long time, battling to be the 2nd best team in the region, is klinsmann paying for making them the no 1 team and then not being able to maintain it?

[BOF]

Well you made an interesting point that they're better than when he took over, but not better than where he had them at their peak.  So maybe it's just that he served his time and they need a change.  As happens with all managers.  The problem the U.S has; and will always have; is that it has 3 other sports vying for the talent coming out of college, not to mention an enormous track & field contingent too.  Not that it's an excuse, as with 320 million people you'd think there's plenty to go around.  They need to be honest with themselves though, and concentrate on the next generation.  The way the likes of Belgium have done recently and Switzerland before them, and completely transformed their prospects with resources dwarved by the USMNTLMNOPQRST.

[kurtsimonw]

 

2 hours ago, BOF said:

How much was Klinsmann in control of though?  I mean Gareth Southgate won't be responsible for discovering and developing the next generation of footballer.  He cherry picks the best from what's already at the top.  Now I know you can't compare the structures within the U.S. and England, and I've no doubt Klinsmann's brief would have been a lot broader and would have included elements of developmental programmes etc.  But surely he's a bit of a scapegoat here?  The failure of the U.S. to find quality youngsters is not solely down to him, and I wonder how much of this whole sacking is a reluctance from the powers that be to look at their own failures.  Which you would think doesn't bode well going forward.  If you won't admit your mistakes then you will repeat them.

I don't imagine they're sacking him because of an inability to find good, young players, though. I imagine they're sacking him for struggling to get through the preliminary group, not picking up a point, including a hammering, in the current qualifying and clearly not having a clue in regards who or how to play. 

If they are sacking him because of failures at youth level, I can somewhat understand. I know personally if I have 2 jobs to do and I pay someone else to do one of those jobs for me - I'd be pretty pissed off if he fails at it. I'd rather not pay him and just fail myself. I get that youth level isn't all about results, but the young US teams have mostly been pretty shocking over the past few years and you'd have thought there would have been something there by now.

[BOF]

5 minutes ago, kurtsimonw said:

I don't imagine they're sacking him because of an inability to find good, young players, though. I imagine they're sacking him for struggling to get through the preliminary group, not picking up a point, including a hammering, in the current qualifying and clearly not having a clue in regards who or how to play. 

If they are sacking him because of failures at youth level, I can somewhat understand. I know personally if I have 2 jobs to do and I pay someone else to do one of those jobs for me - I'd be pretty pissed off if he fails at it. I'd rather not pay him and just fail myself. I get that youth level isn't all about results, but the young US teams have mostly been pretty shocking over the past few years and you'd have thought there would have been something there by now.

Yeah I may be reading too much into it, because to me the narrative seems to be that he didn't get U.S. football to the place they want to be (i.e  from grass roots upwards).  But if it's just that he hasn't done the business with the senior side then that's understandable.  Especially if, as you're saying, he was Tim Sherwooding his way through choosing his team and his tactics.

[VillaChris]

14 hours ago, maqroll said:

He's employing a scorched Earth policy on his way out the door, slagging off American fans for not understanding the sport...most hardcore American supporters know plenty, and he's enjoyed fantastic support home and away, so the backlash should be interesting. **** him. 

Bit baffled by that...he's lived in America the past 20 or so years even commuting while he was Germany manager so he's as qualified as most to know the psyche of American soccer fans.

[VillaChris]

I looked at the last US squad and I have to say it looked very uninspiring....I joked on one of the threads he's still calling up Damarcus Beasley who's close to 40 and still the likes of Jermaine Jones are getting called up who are well past their best now.

Is that all Klinsmann's fault? Of course not, he can't be blamed for the younger players like Julian Green warming the bench in Europe. Maybe he should've shown a bit more faith in some of the MLS players...yeah the standard isn't great but it should be enough to get US comfortably through the HEX.

Edit: I maybe give Klinsmann a hard time but it's probably a bit due to this odd perception in England that he's some superstar coach on account of getting Germany to the world cup semis on home soil and getting US out of the groups at the world cup.

We saw the fawning in the media when he was linked to the England job. From the Spurs fans in the press I suspect.

Edited November 22, 2016 by VillaChris

[kurtsimonw]

He gets a lot of credit for the German setup... which was put in place before he was involved. And for calling up young players... which were actually called up by Voller before him.

[Villaphan04]

i personally think that he was a manager that we needed(to bring about some form of change in the youth system). He brought in several players who would probably have not been thought of in the pool of players( most of the German-Americans). Granted, most young Americans are not playing football but rather American Football, Baseball, basketball etc so the best athletes are not going to be playing for the national teams. 

His tactics recently did show that he had no real inclination into what he envisioned as "Playing the American way"

[HanoiVillan]

Home countries’ FAs seeing red over poppies could have been avoided

'Whisper it – you have to, beneath the barrage of furious indignation, bad temper, even declarations of “war”, from the prime minister down, over our gentle symbol of peace – but Fifa has a point about poppies. World football’s governing body, which Fifa still is, tried to articulate this as it unveiled the fines levelled at the football associations of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, for framing their November World Cup qualifiers as Armistice Day events.

“It is not our intention to judge or question specific commemorations as we fully respect the significance of such moments in the respective countries, each one of them with its own history and background,” Claudio Sulser, the chairman of the disciplinary committee, explained. “However, keeping in mind that the rules need to be applied in a neutral and fair manner across Fifa’s 211 member associations, the display, among others, of any political or religious symbol is strictly prohibited.”

Fifa did, to be fair, try to make this case beforehand, when it respectfully asked the home countries not to drape their football matches in poppies or other collective remembrance of war. However cherished a symbol the poppy is, and apolitical – not, incidentally, an assessment with which everybody agrees, including West Bromwich Albion’s James McClean, who is from Derry and has refused to wear it – Fifa was emphasising that its rules have to apply to all countries of the world. As Fifa’s general secretary, Fatma Samoura, who is from Senegal, pointed out, tragically many countries, including her own, are still or have recently been riven by bloody conflict and do not have our modern luxury of distance from it.

The International Football Association Board (Ifab), the rule-making body dominated as ever by the home countries themselves, has always sought to enable the sport to be free from political divisions rather than a vehicle for them. The rule is interpreted broadly, because it would be unworkable to judge every symbol for the sentiments with which it is freighted in its own country. One country’s remembrance might be a provocation to another. The principle is to keep the subjects of war and religion out of football, no matter if countries strongly believe they are only respecting those who died and not being political about how it came to happen. Of course it grates that Fifa’s matches are surrounded by branding for McDonalds and Coca Cola while the poppy is out of bounds – but the English FA takes the junk food dollar too, so that is not an argument here.

In return for its request and explanation, Fifa was met by the “poppy war”. The home FAs could not find it in themselves to accede. They became defiant over the delicate flower. Martin Glenn, the English FA’s chief executive, revealed they had obtained a legal opinion which advised they had a “rock solid” case – another odd formulation for the flower which grew in the mud of military carnage. Such aggressive legal posturing, and now the response that the FA will appeal, makes it look as if they really are preparing to march to the court of arbitration for sport and fight a case over whether Fifa and Ifab are entitled to consider the poppy political. Presumably, if the FA were to do that and win, that could lead to all 211 countries taking their chosen gestures of pre-match and armband remembrance to Cas, forcing Fifa to do exactly what Sulser is explaining it cannot: untangle the precise meaning of each one.

In the poppy war the easiest attack was, of course, the one Theresa May served up at prime minister’s questions, when she answered a dolly question on the issue by saying Fifa should “get its own house in order”. Damian Collins, the Conservative chairman of the culture media and sport committee, who was industriously busy on poppies as on so much else, also questioned Fifa’s right to make this ruling as, he said, they had not stopped the 2m Swiss franc payment from the former president Sepp Blatter to the former Uefa president Michel Platini, which has led to both men being banned from football.

These barbs at Fifa’s corruption are non-sequiturs barely worth unpicking, particularly as Collins is always responding to scandals by insisting Fifa and the FA should indeed enforce their own rules. As for May and other politicians, if only they could see how it looks, speaking scathingly in parliament for a symbol they argue is apolitical, calling on Fifa to get its house in order, when they appear from Europe to have plenty else to be getting on with in their own House.

Fifa, of course, has indeed been mired in financial corruption for years, with the men around its top table trousering millions, but there is a large part to its history which can be considered admirably successful. Founded in 1904 at the beginnings of European football, after the FA and Ifab, Fifa has overseen football’s phenomenal worldwide growth, despite so many wars and other horrors. The British set this principle of keeping politics and religion out of sport and the English Fifa president from 1961 to 1974, Sir Stanley Rous, was absolute in his interpretation of it. Previously as FA secretary, Rous led England back into Fifa in 1945 from self‑imposed isolation, because he viewed the spread of international football as inevitable, exciting and as an arena for friendship.

The late 1940s were the years in which crowds were the most populous ever in domestic football, as people flocked back to normality, to civic pleasures, from the hardships of war. In those years and for decades afterwards all the home countries’ players, and everybody in the crowds, had either fought, lost friends and family, suffered or knew people who had suffered in the war but football matches did not have to be events of remembrance then. People seemed to want them to be separate. And it was always kept that way, it seems, until the friendly played in November 2011 when a poppy was sewn into an armband on the players’ sleeves for England’s friendly against Spain, 93 years after the end of the first world war, 66 years after the end of the second. Fifa should perhaps explain publicly why it has changed its mind but it grates a little that this 2011 agreement is now cited by the FA as some sacrosanct precedent.

Fifa’s request to the home countries was not to make an issue of wearing poppies because the sport is played in a volatile and war-stricken world. The FAs refused and Fifa has now responded as promised, just as it sanctioned Iran for religious ceremonies held at its match against Korea in October. Are the home FAs really now going to stomp to court, brandishing QCs’ opinions, to have a proper fallout over the poppy?

One wonders how difficult it would have been to see Fifa’s point of view on this one and show some understanding that this rule might just be appropriate given the complexities of the world. The home FAs could have shown some leadership, appreciation of the peace we are privileged to enjoy and maybe demonstrated remembrance in some other way – perhaps, for example, at the Cenotaph.'

https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2016/dec/19/home-countries-fa-seeing-red-fifa-over-poppies-could-have-been-avoided

David Conn making good points as usual. 

[StefanAVFC]

I 100% agree with the above FWIW.

I hate what the poppy has morphed into. It's a political thing now, way past just a simple mark of respect.

[John]

New leadership same FIFA. This is the latest in the battles between FIFA and the home nations and England in particular. FIFA resent the influence that England has had on the game in the past and have seen this along with not giving us another World Cup since 1966 as a way of demonstrating that they now call the tune,

I like Harry Redknapp's idea of not paying the fine at all but FIFA were never and will not now back down on this having drawn a line in the sand. I would pay this fine and future ones they dish out for the same reason to FIFA in sacks of pennies.     

[rodders0223]

Quote

One of Serbia's top football clubs, Partizan Belgrade, has condemned racist chanting during a match that reduced one of its players, Brazilian midfielder Everton Luiz, to tears.

He suffered monkey chants and other abuse from fans of rivals Rad Belgrade.

"I couldn't hold back the tears because I was racially insulted from the stands for 90 minutes," said Everton, 28.

A Partizan statement backing him said "we strongly condemn the perpetrators of this insane act".

At the end of the match Everton made a crude gesture at the Rad Belgrade fans, prompting some Rad players to confront him. A brawl broke out, but staff from both sides managed to separate the players.

Rad supporters also brandished a banner insulting Everton. Rad, playing at home, lost 0-1 to Partizan.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-39028982

 

About time Serbia were kicked out of European Football. I remember that game against the England U21s, absolutely disgusting. Not many things have made me literally rage watching football but that was one of them

[maqroll]

Emphatic return to the national team for Bruce Arena, and a big response from the players-

 

[maqroll]

Villafana ^^^

[Jarpie]

Finland lost again, and even as armchair watcher I can see exactly where the problem is with tacticts, they try to play too fancy when they should be playing more direct and simple because the skill-level just doesn't cut it.

[sne]

Can't say I'm overly sad about Holland currently losing 2-0 to Bulgaria  (after 30 mins)

On a side note, did you guys know that Bacuna has a younger brother named Juninho currently playing for Groningen?

With a name like that he must be good, right?

Edited March 25, 2017 by sne