are you able to explain the USA tactics? They seem to play a more skilled game than in the past. The other teams in CONCACAF seem to play the more physical game
Some of Gregg Berhalter’s concepts I quite like in theory. But in practice, I’m still not entirely convinced we have all of the type of players to successfully bear as much fruit with it as might be hoped for.
Berhalter likes to have his team play out of the back (the ‘keeper and defenders are expected to advance the ball primarily through passing it on the ground instead of launching hopeful long-balls forward). Maintaining possession is prized from the back through the midfield.
He also clearly likes to have his outside fullbacks get high up into the attack. That helps us at the moment because we currently lack production from the striker/central forward position.
There are times when it seems like they are to attack quickly and then other times when it seems they really slow down things just to maintain possession (perhaps too slow). Berhalter prefers his team to dominate possession of the ball more than I’ve seen from previous coaches. However, this manager has also talked about wanting more “verticality” out of his team—a more direct and quicker play into the attack. He likes to have players who have some pace and can stretch the backline of the opponents and open up space for the midfield. So, the attack has not fully looked consistent under his tenure so far, but I’d say he does want to see possession turned up the pitch with decisive passes and off-ball movement from forwards who stretch the defense of the opposition. The question has always remained, though, do we have the type of players that approach best fits with?
When the opponents have the ball, Gregg wants his team to press (pressure the opponent with the ball) fairly high up the field in the opponent’s half. This has a risk and reward to it. It can cause your opponents to play more quickly than they want, thus forcing mistakes and turnovers (which has resulted is a few goals for us in qualifying). But, it can also fatigue your players a bit more quickly. Plus, applying the press really only works well if the entire team is moving in concert with each other, shifting around to cover for zones on the field that inevitably get vacated by teammates who go to pressure the ball.
Berhalter also seems to be very detailed with his instructions and expectations for each player, to the point that some guys (especially when still just learning his system) were visibly thinking too much during the run of play at times. I think a lot of the guys know enough by now what is expected of them. We indeed are playing a more technical style these days due to the higher caliber of players we now are producing and bringing in and because Gregg’s tactical approach requires it. The biggest problem the manager and the team still face, however, is a general lack of creating threatening chances on goal (interesting side note:
lack of goals seems to somewhat follow Gregg’s managing career). Part of that is the problem we have at central forward, and I think part of that is on the manager to figure out with the talent he does have.
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