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2023 Women's World Cup - USA team thread

LaJollaCreek

LaJollaCreek

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Tom McAndrew said:
I doubt who is the captain is all that important. All of these ladies are elite, have been stars in youth, US national teams, college teams, pro teams, and with the USWNT. If they are dependent upon who is the captain of the squad, they never had a chance to win, IMHO.

To me, the problems are complicated. To some extent they are a victim of injuries. Mallory Swanson was on pace to be their top scoring threat, and ended up suffering a torn patellar tendon in a friendly against Ireland in April. They've replaced her with folks that don't have near the experience that Swanson did, and not surprisingly, they're having real trouble scoring goals. Becky Sauerbrunn's injury may be an even bigger issue. She was the USWNT captain, and an absolute rock on defense on the back line. Julie Ertz (who was questionable just 6 months ago, as between an injury then a pregnancy had not played in more than a year) is their best defensive MF. To compensate for Sauerbrunn's absence, Ertz was moved to CB, and the midfield has been an absolute mess throughout the WC for the USWNT. A strong case could be made that the best lineup tweak to make to improve the play of the team is to move Ertz to MF, and use one of the other players at CB (with the acknowledgement that doing so would weaken your back line). Lastly, Catarina Macario's torn ACL in June of 2022 really has impacted the team. The plan was to basically build an offense around her, as either an attacker or an attacking middle. As with the two others listed above, the USWNT hasn't really come up with a good replacement for Macario.

You have to play with the ones you have, so if you focus on just the current roster, the main problems have been at MF. As mentioned above, Ertz was moved to the back line. Lavelle is their best middle, but she was out due to injury for several months before the WC. That's why she was a sub in the first two games. And while she started the third game, she ended up getting a yellow card (a harsh call which I disagreed with), and since it was her 2nd yellow she'll miss the R16 match against Sweden. Other than moving Ertz up to the MF, I don't have many answers for the mess that has been their MF. That's where the team is falling apart. Horan is a very good player, but her game is size and strength. She has trouble with quick opposing middies. Her weaknesses were minimized when Ertz was cleaning things up in the midfield (in past years), but they kind of were exposed by Portugal.

The attack has been unimpressive, but they haven't gotten the ball in great situations. For example, Portugal kept 5 field players back even when they had the ball in their attacking third. So even if the US backline made a great play and started a quick counter, Portugal had numbers to snuff out the attack. And since the US MF was such a mess, most of their efforts have been long passes over the opposition's back line. Those work when you're vastly superior to the other team, but aren't all that effective against well coached teams. Smith has talent and speed on the outside, but she tends to hold the ball too long. Morgan is one of the better attackers out there, but she's being constantly marked, so most of her best plays have been in taking passes and playing them to teammates. Rodman has been OK on the other side, but too often she's getting the ball in less than optimum situations from the middies, and/or hasn't been all that effective in centering the ball.

Coach Andonovski hasn't done a lot to inspire anyone that he can correct things in time for the Sweden match. We'll never know how much the problem is him and his staff in terms of the team they assembled and their coaching versus how much the problem is the aforementioned injuries which caused major changes to the expected team.
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Agree on most of it, but this team thinks they can out athlete everyone. Portugal won the possession battle with a back 5 because the play from the midfield was non-existent. They bypassed the midfield for the majority of the match. That has zero to do with the Captain, but a very poor tactical coach is being exposed. I cannot even count how many long balls they tried to play against Portugal and the possession stats back that up. There is no build up play as they aren't patient and they were so poor in possession when they did try. Sloppy passes and bad touches were constant.

He could try another CB and move Ertz back up to the CDM maybe? If they are going to play 5 in the back, Morgan needs to move them around by either checking back, swapping out wide, and basically drawing people to open up space to open it up for others. Instead she sits on the shoulders of the CB waiting for a ball over the top. There are things the HC could do and the injuries did hurt and Swanson in particular, but this team has no real plan of attack as you said.

The other to note is other countries are now catching up to the US and other squads. The #2 team in the world in Germany packed their bags and went home already. So the casual fans that don't really watch and see regular news media trying to make this about other issues just eat it right up.
 
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LionJim

LionJim

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LaJollaCreek said:
Agree on most of it, but this team thinks they can out athlete everyone. Portugal won the possession battle with a back 5 because the play from the midfield was non-existent. They bypassed the midfield for the majority of the match. That has zero to do with the Captain, but a very poor tactical coach is being exposed. I cannot even count how many long balls they tried to play against Portugal and the possession stats back that up. There is no build up play as they aren't patient and they were so poor in possession when they did try. Sloppy passes and bad touches were constant.

He could try another CB and move Ertz back up to the CDM maybe? If they are going to play 5 in the back, Morgan needs to move them around by either checking back, swapping out wide, and basically drawing people to open up space to open it up for others. Instead she sits on the shoulders of the CB waiting for a ball over the top. There are things the HC could do and the injuries did hurt and Swanson in particular, but this team has no real plan of attack as you said.

The other to note is other countries are now catching up to the US and other squads. The #2 team in the world in Germany packed their bags and went home already. So the casual fans that don't really watch and see regular news media trying to make this about other issues just eat it right up.
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Regarding your first paragraph re poor midfield play, what sort of fix could USWNT have at the moment? Or will this midfield weakness persist?
 
LaJollaCreek

LaJollaCreek

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LionJim said:
Regarding your first paragraph re poor midfield play, what sort of fix could USWNT have at the moment? Or will this midfield weakness persist?
Click to expand...
Move Ertz back up would be one move possibly. Not having Rose is going to hurt in this next match, no way around that as she can hold the ball. The biggest thing overall is not immediately going to the long ball. There needs to be better movement all over and stopping the sloppy passing and touches.
 
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manatree

manatree

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BobPSU92 said:
www.espn.com

Equal pay explainer: How much money USWNT can win at Women's World Cup

The USWNT's equal pay fight has been at the forefront of previous World Cups. Where do things stand and how much can the team earn if they win again?
www.espn.com www.espn.com

o_O
Click to expand...

Just a few thoughts on this. First off, I believe that any player should get as much money as they are able. I also feel that the USWNT had a legit complaint with the disparity in support such as training facilities, travel,arrangements, etc. However, regarding the actual pay, there was a lot of smoke & mirrors and apples to lug nuts comparisons.

People seem to forget, and articles like neglect to mention that the portion of their lawsuit regarding equal pay was dismissed when the judge ruled given the evidence presented, the women had actually earned more “on both a cumulative and an average per-game basis” than the men’s team during the years at issue in the lawsuit. The judge allowed their claims of unequal treatment to continue. USSoccer then agreed to a $24million settlement.

The biggest issue was that the women’s CBA routinely accepted a lower, but guaranteed salary, and more benefits while the men’s CBA was for a higher, but not guaranteed salary and less benefits. In fact, at one point, USSoccer actually offered the women the exact same contract terms as the men, but the,women refused it. So, for example, during the depths of the pandemic when neither team was playing, the women got paid while the men did not.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/sports/soccer/uswnt-equal-pay.html

https://www.npr.org/2020/05/02/8494...sses-u-s-womens-soccer-team-s-equal-pay-claim

A constant talking point from the women was that USSoccer needed to step up because the women could not earn as much playing for their clubs as the men do. That was always a ridiculous point. An employer pays you for the work you do for them, not for the work that you do for someone else.

Another overlooked tidbit in the whole equal pay discussion, is that while the FIFA prize money for the women is a lower total dollar amount, it is a much higher percentage of the revenue for the women’s tournament than the men’s. One could easily argue that FIFA should be paying the men more than they are currently.

Ironically, the new joint, men’s & women’s CBA is STILL unequal as the women get paid parental leave, insurance, and disability benefits that the men do not. Scroll all the way down to the bottom.

https://www.ussoccer.com/stories/2022/05/cba-fact-sheet



I’m glad that the women are getting paid more money. I just hope that they get their game in gear come Sunday.
 
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Tom McAndrew

Tom McAndrew

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interesting. Morgan out and Rapinoe in in the 99th minute. I hope it works, but if I subbed anyone on attack I would have brought in Thompson
 
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Tom McAndrew

Tom McAndrew

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PKs -- USA kicks 1st

#1
Sullivan for USA - √
Folfo for Sweden - √

#2
Horan for USA - √
Rubensson for Sweden - √

#3
Mewis for USA - √
Bjorn for Sweden - X (she kicked it over the crossbar)
3-2, USA

#4
Rapinoe for USA - X (she kicked it over the crossbar)
Jakobsson for Sweden - X (nice save by Naeher)
3-2, USA

#5
Smith for USA - (she kicked it wide)
?? for Sweden - √
3-3

#6
Naeher for USA - √
Ericksson for Sweden - √
4-4

#7
O'Hara for USA - X (hit the post, and had the GK beat)
Hurtig for Sweden - √ (great save by Naeher, but VAR gives her the goal)

Sweden wins 5-4

Ugh
 
BobPSU92

BobPSU92

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F*ck U.S. Part of me is glad that rapinoe missed.

This team said the right things but just didn’t play well enough the entire tournament. Not a good team.

Moving on. Premier League next week, then “college” football.
 
Tom McAndrew

Tom McAndrew

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so close -- hard to tell for sure if the entire ball crossed the line, which it needs to do to be a goal




 
BobPSU92

BobPSU92

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Does the USWNT fire the coach, maybe before the flight home?
 
BostonNit

BostonNit

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All things considered though, I thought we played a pretty good game and deserved to win in regulation. But occasionally you run into a goalie who is in the zone and Sweden's goalie with several point blank saves was the difference.
 
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