Featured, September 2018, USMNT

Creativity still an issue, but the US find a way to beat Mexico 1-0: TYAC Analysis

 

The USA collected its first win over Mexico in over three years Tuesday night in Nashville.

NASHVILLE

The United States played its second match of the 2022 World Cup cycle Tuesday night in Nashville, with a familiar foe on the opposite touchline in rival Mexico.

The 68th meeting between Mexico and the United States- and the first since a riveting US draw at Estadio Azteca last summer, when all was well, Bruce Arena got his tactics and changes all correct and the US were well on their way to qualifying for another World Cup- proved to be a largely uneventful affair.

It wasn’t attractive soccer. Two nations playing young sides under interim managers can either produce free, open soccer or cynical, tentative football and sadly for the 40,194 fans who made their way to Nissan Stadium Tuesday, this was mostly the latter.

That said, the US did find a goal, from Tyler Adams in the 71st minute, and a victory, 1-0, the federation’s first over Mexico in nearly 4 years.

Here are five thoughts on the 1-0 win for the United States.

The US continue to lack a creative presence in the center of the pitch

Weston McKennie is an excellent positional midfielder, smart passer and moves well off the ball, or at least that’s a big part of his allure at Schalke. He’s struggled to show the same bite and influence as an international, which might be more about who is playing around him than it is about him trying to do too much or being too tentative.

Tyler Adams is absolutely capable of playing line-busting pass.

He also makes outstanding runs off the ball and gets himself into marvelous positions, especially when he starts in deeper positions while his team is in possession. He did more of that in the first half Tuesday night, but for whatever reason, his teammates didn’t find see him or get him the ball.

Wil Trapp had a tough night, caught between his obligations as an outlet for a CB pairing with a distribution problem and between coming to help the US when they won the ball and looked to build in attack. This is the concern about him as an international: that he’s not decisive enough to play as a pure 6 or 8, so he ends up stuck in between, without the foot speed necessary to recover.

Whatever the case, the US were too deep throughout the first half and did little to alleviate the problem after the break. The US lacked tempo, imagination and anything on an overlap. The stolid central midfield coupled with Dave Sarachan’s mystifying decision to play Timothy Weah wide instead of inside where his bravery and imagination were desperately needed, led to another toothless evening from the US attack.

It’s wonderful that the US has kept its shape and stayed more compact under Sarachan. But there’s a difference in being proud of that in Lyon, France against the eventual World Champs and taking plaudits and laurels for it at home against an experimental Mexico side. The U.S. should be able to score goals at home. It’s concerning that they continue to struggle to even create chances, let alone tickle the twine.

That said, Julian Green had perhaps his best game in a US shirt

Four nights after looking a step off the pace against Brazil, Julian Green put in a qualify shift for the national team in Nashville against Mexico.

Green replaced Weston McKennie in the first half following McKennie’s exit with a leg injury (status unknown but he did walk off on his own will) and his impact was near immediate, as he collected a pass from Tyler Adams and played it off quickly to Weah for an American shot on goal.

Green was dutiful defensively and when the US did win the ball, he was the only American player consistently willing to take on defenders one-on-one, test Mexico goalkeeper Hugo Gonzalez from distance, and play clever balls for teammates running into space. His gorgeous cross for Gyasi Zardes around the hour mark deserved to be converted into a goal, and an earlier slicing pass to Weston McKennie also nearly paid dividends, only to see a late Mexican tackle save the day.

The US goal was wonderful- and Matt Miazga deserves an assist

The goal came on another textbook late run by Tyler Adams, who ran right onto a beauty of a ball from substitute fullback Antonee Robinson.

But the assist on the goal clearly should go to Matt Miazga, who had another fine game defensively and didn’t lose control when baited by Mexican starlet Diego Lainez around the 66th minute.

The Lainez-Miazga stare down conjured up memories of the famous Oguchi Onyewu-Jared Borgetti faceoff from World Cup qualifying in 2005, only this time, it was Edson Alvarez who intervened for Mexico to defend Lainez’s honor after Miazga clearly poked fun at the Mexican winger’s height.

Miazga took a vicious bump from Alvarez, but unlike conflicts past, opted to walk away. Given that Miazga was clearly irritated and on a yellow, this was a great moment for the Chelsea FC product.

Even more critically, Mexico didn’t keep their cool, as moments later Angel Zaldivar slid studs up into Wil Trapp in a vicious challenge, resulting in a deserved straight red card.

The Adams goal came minutes later.

Miazga-Lainez gave us an Onyewu-Borgetti moment.

Speaking of Matt Miazga…

All told, this was an immense two games from Matt Miazga, who was a completely different player than we’ve ever seen in a US shirt against both Brazil and Mexico. Yes, he lost Roberto Firmino back shoulder on the first Brazil goal Friday night. But that’s a sin committed by defenders across the world, and Miazga’s response to that was to play nearly 150 minutes of nearly flawless soccer thereafter.

With John Brooks healthy and playing the best soccer of his career, the US suddenly- even if only for a moment- appear to have a high-level European quality CB pairing to build from moving towards the Gold Cup.

What’s more, Miazga plays with fire and an edge, something the US lacked at times late last cycle, and Tuesday night, his stare down with Lainez gave the USA-Mexico rivalry another memorable moment.

It’s time for the US to hire a full-time manager

We’ve made the argument elsewhere at TYAC that the United States initial decision to retain Dave Sarachan made little sense, but that Sarachan, a consummate professional, has made the most of the opportunity he’s been given, giving senior debuts to a host of young players and fielding lineups that average 23 years in age for ten months.

We’ve even advanced the argument that new GM Earnie Stewart placing Sarachan in charge of the U23’s would make sense, given the rapport Sarachan has built with many of the players and the number of evaluations he’s had through camps and friendlies.

That said, there is a spoliation date on Sarachan’s value, and in our view, US Soccer has reached it.

Every evaluation now matters.

Further, as Bruce Arena acknowledged in the aftermath of the failure in Couva, the US “going young” and bringing in a young generation of players was inevitable in 2018. The only question was which manager would have the chance to evaluate those players, build rapport with those players, get an idea about what system to play with those players and what combinations work and don’t work.

Thus far, the only answer to that has been Dave Sarachan, and unless the US hire Greg Berhalter manager in January and he and Sarachan spend a camp exchanging notes, it’s hard not to evaluate many of these observations as “lost” evaluations.

The US is no closer to installing a new system, and without a manager to make that type of choice, these evaluations lose the added value of being auditions with a specific endgame in mind. The best managers are constantly tinkering, evaluating, seeking out personnel combination and formations. The US don’t have a manager, so they can’t do any of that. All they can do is give caps to a young team and, perhaps, put something of value on video- though that too is sanitized because the video may not be consistent with the system and vision of the new hire.

A year’s worth of lost evaluations in the name of “deliberate speed” is foolish, and come January, US Soccer will have lost a year.

Further, the US are a team that have significant personnel questions, even as they transition to a new generation. Chief among them: who creates in the midfield? Who scores the goals outside of Jozy Altidore, Bobby Wood or Christian Pulisic? These are vital questions that will determine the success of the coming World Cup cycle. Why would you want an interim manager solving them when you could be giving repetitions to the real manager?

You would expect the US Federation to have a sense of urgency after failing to qualify for the World Cup. At this point, nearly a year later, they do not.  That’s disappointing.

Neil W. Blackmon is co-founder of The Yanks Are Coming. Follow him on Twitter @nwblackmon.

Written by: Neil W. Blackmon on September 11, 2018.
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