Unfiltered Soccer with Landon Donovan and Tim Howard
USMNT Advance in Nations League, Aguirre Assaulted, Pulisic to Premier League?
Tue, 19 Nov 2024
On the latest edition of Unfiltered Soccer, Landon Donovan and Tim Howard share their instant reaction to the USMNT’s 4-2 Nations League win over Jamaica. Is Pochettino’s system beginning to take hold? Should the U.S. be playing with a back 3? And was it odd to see Gregg Berhalter taking it all in from stands?? Plus, with Christian Pulisic in the form of his life, we wonder if a move back to the Premier League might be in order. Some say perhaps while someone on this pod says “the grass is rarely greener.” Finally, Tim explains why he still believes Zack Steffen should be in the national team picture, Landon explains why he’s got no use for Mexican Football Federation’s statement condemning Honduran fans and both guys explain their position on the country vs club debate. New episodes of Unfiltered Soccer with Landon and Tim drop every Tuesday. Subscribe to the show on YouTube and follow on all your favorite podcast platforms. For bonus content and to send your mailbag questions in to the show, follow on all social media platforms @UnfilteredSoccer. (www.flowcode.com/page/unfilteredsoccer). Unfiltered Soccer with Landon Donovan and Tim Howard is presented by Volkswagen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What were the key moments in the USMNT vs. Jamaica match?
It's very rare when I'm in my house where I say, oh my God, what a goal.
He finishes with his left foot and he almost kind of like skip hops to the right. Inching closer to my record really fast here. Unfiltered Soccer presented by Volkswagen. Welcome into unfiltered soccer with Landon Donovan and Tim Howard. We are your co hosts and we're coming to you not live but after the US men's national team versus Jamaica second leg.
We decided we'd watch the game and give you our thoughts and when we go back to the rest of the show later on that was recorded this morning so LD interesting game.
Interesting game, bud. It's been a long day. Reminder for everyone, follow us on social media, Unfiltered Soccer. Subscribe, show love on YouTube. Make sure you follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify. If you like what we're doing, leave a comment. As Tim says, if you don't, leave a comment anyway. We can handle it. We're fine. Email is feedback at unfilteredsoccer.com.
We have mailbag questions that came from you guys this week. Great questions. Keep them coming in. So Yeah, interesting game. I'm glad, Tim, it happened the way it did. Let me explain that. So we score early. We're all over them early. It's 3-0 at halftime. I don't get on Twitter, but I'm sure if I did, everyone would be talking about how we're the best team in the world.
We're going to win the World Cup, etc., etc.
Yeah.
Settle down. Second half was a little sloppy. Still a lot of chances, but giving up two not great goals. And honestly, you know, we talked in the first episode about goalkeeping, defending, midfield, strikers, depth. Where's our squad at? And honestly, it all played out exactly the way we think of it as. Goalkeeping, still a little suspect. Defensively, not great. Midfield was awesome.
Christian was... Outstanding, attacking, still TBD on a nine, even though everyone's going to go crazy and say Ricardo Pepe's now the nine. And then the depth was not great. And that's kind of the way it unfolded today.
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Chapter 2: Is Christian Pulisic ready for a move back to the Premier League?
He's like, no, we're not sitting off against Jamaica and trying to tactically defend them. It's like, no, go after them. And we went after them. And so those two things are a sign of Pochettino immediately having his stamp on this team. And then the other thing, just tactically, they used Christian. He's used Christian now in a really interesting way. And I really like it.
He's basically, when we have the ball, Christian has the freedom to float and go anywhere he wants. And tonight, I don't know if it was by design, But tonight, he veered left way more often than right. But he did join on the right a few times. But between Weah, him, Weston McKinney, Anthony Robinson was on this side. Pepe would come over. All the numbers were on the left.
And they just killed Jamaica and made it really hard. And then on the goal, obviously, when it switches back, he's in a great spot to make a vertical run, which he's really good at and scores the goal. I like the way Pochettino's using him so far, and you can see that freedom and the form Christian is in right now have made him... almost unplayable.
And tactically he prefers the profile drifting left and he kind of dances on the ball and he drags people with them. Look, I think the midfield is stout enough and robust enough to kind of handle it when he drifts away from the middle. And my, my final takeaway, as you said, we're putting a bow on this is, and I, and this can't be understood because it's going to sound basic.
We, we all and Pochettino would prefer to dissect all of this and having one for two, having one away from home, right? And I know that sounds simplistic, but it's true. When you're not getting results, in fact, let me speak to where he was at Chelsea. He had ideas at Chelsea, but he wasn't getting the results, right?
And when you're not getting the results, the pressure, the scrutiny, it comes on, even when you're doing the right things. And by the way, by the end of his tenure at Chelsea, at the end, they were playing really well. Right. But he didn't get enough results. And so when you look at when you look at this U.S. team, we can dissect things and we can break it down, which we are and everybody will.
The fans and the coaches and pundits alike. But it's much better to do it from this lofty perch than having lost and going, oh, boy, we got to change something. So speaking of Greg, Greg Berhalter was at the game with Bruce Arena. Right. How do you feel about this? It feels a little bit too early.
I mean, Greg's my guy, but it feels a little bit too early. Yeah, it's like you got a girlfriend, you dump her, then you all have mutual friends and she shows up at your birthday party and you're like, what are you doing here? It was a little bit weird. Look, Bruce and Greg have a great relationship. Greg was an assistant coach for Bruce, played for Bruce. Yeah. It was interesting.
I don't think I would have been there, but you know what? Give him credit. At least he's showing up and I'd be curious how everyone else felt about it.
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Chapter 3: What are the implications of Aguirre's assault during the match?
Chapter 4: How does Pochettino's coaching style affect the USMNT?
Yeah, well, it's interesting because I'll answer that question. After the 2014 World Cup, I took a year out from the National Team as well. Oh, that's right. In our comments, I'm going to get slaughtered for that because on one hand, I said I'm always available.
Except for that year.
Listen, I got divorced. Life was hell, and I needed to see my kids. So that was my reasoning. And I appreciate anybody who has those comments and gives me heck for it. I'm okay with it. On the outside, it was nothing. I think as players, you understand. I think as players, certainly myself and some of the other top players, you're like, damn, I kind of wish I was Landon.
I could use a break too, right? There was no hate. And also, by the way, you, myself, I could probably name on that team, four other players, five other players who probably deserve the right to say, Hey, I need to exhale here for a second. Give me the problem is Juergen Klinsmann, which we can touch on in many more episodes. Isn't a great coach.
Um, I've got a big problem with him as a person and yes, he holds grudges against players. Um, But that's his prerogative. And thankfully, we somehow got through it. But no, from our end, from a player standpoint, there was no beef. We were just delighted to get you back healthy, fit, and ready to rock and roll.
And by the way, I think we're ahead of our time because you know what people are talking about in 2024? Mental health. Taking a break. Having a balance. So I'm just putting it out there as we were progressive and ahead of our time.
Well, another guy who at some point here is going to need a break is Christian Pulisic. He's been playing a lot of soccer, and he's like us from a young age. There are some reports out of Spain, and I think verified a little bit, that I believe West Ham, Liverpool, United, Man United, all interested in him. Thoughts? Back to the premise for Christian?
Yeah, somewhat awesome, but precarious position. I mean, there's a lot of paper speak in England, if you don't know, and agents, I'm not necessarily throwing his agent under the bus, but agents have a lot of power in the media. I think for Christian, it's a tough position
decision um because he was in england at chelsea i thought he i thought he did some really good things at chelsea they were a little bit of a mess to be honest at the time when he was there got to short end of the stick he left he's then gone to by the way it's not like he's gone to like a kind of you know a wishy-washy club he's gotten one of like the most world-renowned clubs in the world ac milan doing brilliantly a star player for them you know when he was at dortmund he was playing really well really highly thought of so
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