OT: U20 USMNT upsets France U20 in come from behind win at U20 World Cup
This was a great game, US went up 1-0, fell behind 2-1, and finally came back to win it 3-2 in the last 20 minutes. It wasn't the senior team, but our young guys looked good, and beat a pretty good French squad. Hopefully some of these guys, like Soto, Weah, Ledesma or Richard will go on to represent the USMNT at the World Cup in a few years. I'm excited for the future of US soccer.
We were missing 4 guys on yellow card accumulation (including Alex Mendez) also against the best team in the world. Unbelievable game. There is hope in the future.
Hopefully can actually qualify for the Olympics next year.
Any word on game time of their next match?
Can I show you how to Google that?
i can show you how to yahoo to google that.
No word on game time, but it's against Ecuador on June 8th. My guess 11:30 eastern or so. Winner of that game takes on winner of South Korea v Senegal, on June 11th, and after that is the Final on June 15th, vs winner of Ukraine / Columbia / Italy / Argentina / Mali.
It not being the senior team is probably why we looked good...can't wait for the next generation at all positions.
I love the potential of the U20 squad, and they showed it today against a strong U20 opponent. That bodes well for the U20 World Cup. They have a chance to be one of the best U20 teams in recent history, at least the best since I've been following U20 competition. U20!
But how old are these guys?
0-19.9 is a good guess...
It's open to players born between January 1st, 1999, and Dec 31st, 2003. Our squad is mostly 18 and 19 year olds. Two guys are 17 and 3 are 20.
Complete squad info here
: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_men%27s_national_under-20_soccer_team
Weah(19) , Richie Ledezma (18) and Sebastian Soto (19) all looked good, and look to be contributors on the senior team soon. (Weah already has played on the senior team)
Apparently Chris Glostor (19) and Alex Mendez (18) are good names to know too
Paxton Pomykal (19) is already a very good player in MLS, and had been the best player on the US team so far (although he was rested vs Qatar). He was banged up a little early in this game and didn't influence the game as much as usual. He should be regular call up with USMNT before too long.
It's amazing how much more fluid and skilled on the ball the youth teams look, hoping to see that translate in the next cycle on the senior side
It's night and day. And from all indications, this is the talent pipeline opening up. Every MLS team will have an academy soon, and talent recognition will just continue to improve. We're finally seeing the waking giant translated onto the field. Before it was reliance on individual great players to pop up. This team is now full of professionals, and it's really deep too.
Humblebrag alert. I got to watch basically these exact two teams play to a draw in a friendly a few months ago. The US came back from 2-0 to tie on te last play. Tab Ramos has done a great job with them and the fact that when have three young players that play with PSG Ajax and Barcelona (Weah Dest and de la Fuente) would be unheard of. It always seems like our future is bright but the talent is there like never before.
I'm fully behind your comment, except it would be a stretch to suggest Weah and de la Fuente play for PSG or Barcelona. Weah is on loan to Celtic because he couldn't get playing time at PSG (although he's only 19), and de la Fuente plays for the youth team at Barcelona, and has only played 1 game so far on the reserve team, Barcelona B, which plays in the Spanish 3rd division. Hopefully all these guys become key contributors on their respective teams, but they haven't done so yet.
Last year, Weah played a few Ligue 1 games for PSG. The fact that we have a 19 year old playing Ligue 1 games for the number 1 French team is unprecedented. The fact that these kids are just in the systems they're in should give us excitement. Sorry my words didn't match exactly what I said. But I would say that Joe Milton plays for Michigan. So we don't always need the "Exact Sentiment for Every Word that We say Police" here all the time.
Well, I kind of see his point. Weah appeared in three games for PSG in 2017-18 and two in 2018-19 so we have to use "plays" loosely here. Also, he was loaned to Celtic midseason.
Still impressive for a kid that young to be even on the squad though.
Although what Weah has accomplished so far at PSG is impressive, and unprecedented as you say, we US soccer fans have a long history of anointing the next great American soccer player player prematurely, as we've done numerous times over the years with Jovan Kirovski, Freddy Adu, Julian Green, Juan Agudelo etc. These players were hyped based on potential, and with very limted actual accomplishments. When they flamed out a new starlet was found and dubbed as the next sure thing by the media. My attempt in my post was to distinguish hype from actual accomplishment. Let's hope this generation turns into Christian Pulisics and Josh Sargents instead of Jovan Kirovskis and Bobby Conveys.
..
(Waves tiny US flag)
saving the big flag for 2020?
Weah is controlled by PSG. And good international experience across the lineup.
Feels like this should get a lot more media coverage. Maybe I'm just not following the right people.
The future is really bright. Alot of young talent currently playing in Europe. I'm very curious to see how Pulisic will handle the Premier League playing for a big-time club Chelsea
I feel like I’ve seen this movie before and it generally ends with me being disappointed. In my opinion, US soccer is a mess for a few reasons:
1. The program (and fans) has never developed their own culture and instead desperately try to emulate our European counterparts. Everytime I hear a soccer fan call out someone for calling it soccer and not futbol I cringe.
2. The youth development system is anticompetitive and devoid of our country’s best athletes.
3. It’s the only professional sports team in America that doesn’t fit with america’s general style of play. In virtually every other sport our culture consists of speed, power and aggressiveness. US soccer in the other hand is slow and passive.
Completely agree. While the entire strategies of football, basketball, and hockey are devoted to devising ways to get behind the defense, in soccer it's illegal to be behind the defense.
Also, I think that soccer would be very exciting if they adopted either hockey or basketball substitution rules - instead they use baseball substitution rules. This means that everyone off the ball is conserving energy all the time and standing around since they have to play the entire game.
Can you imagine how fast paced and exciting soccer would be if you could change guys on the fly the way you do in hockey?
Before the soccer elite negs me to Bolivia remember this - in both international basketball and international hockey, the other countries that play the sport felt perfectly ok with devising their own tweaks to "North American rules" to make the game work better for them and their fans.
There is no reason Americans couldn't do that same to soccer make the game exciting.
Not an expert, but I Respectfully disagree, though this has been our problem in our past.
1. I think we are starting to see effects of better youth organization. Consistency in our national youth team coaches and approach probably have something to do with this. The MLS youth academies getting better probably have a lot to do with too. I think this generation is when we see that move to the senior team.
2. I think identification and training of younger players are vastly improved and its starting to see results (Pulisic, Weston Mckennie, Weah, Miazga, etc)
3. The American teams have generally relied on being stronger and faster than other teams, and hoping that eventually something good would happen because of it. We couldn't compete on an international level that way. The younger players now are generally more skilled across the board and I think the team will be better for it.
That is great. Sounds like there is hope for the future of Team USA soccer. Really hope they can qualify for the next World Cup.
