Five Big Takeaways from the USMNT's Win Against Haiti 🇺🇸🇭🇹

Happy Monday. In this edition of The Raven, Rog looks at the biggest plot points and questions as Poch's squad prepare for the Gold Cup knockout stage. Sign up for The Raven here.

How you feeling about our G-League USMNT team? The good news, our boys have rebounded from that dark, flaccid run of four straight losses, by piecing together three straight wins and topping their Gold Cup group. The counter-argument is, we clipped a truly ragged Trinidad and Tobago team, scraped by a weakened Saudi Arabia, and were in a fist fight with 83rd-in-the-world Haiti. A caller on our post-match live taping of The Deuce asked Clint Dempsey if he has seen progress and if he believed the score would now be different if we faced Türkiye or Switzerland again. The knockout round will be the moment of truth. Are we progressing or did we just drop down several weight classes in terms of quality of opponents? 🍻

📺 WATCH HERE: Clint Dempsey breaks down what he saw last night, and what this U.S. team needs to work on to thrive in the knockout rounds:

Make no mistake, this was a tough watch. This shorthanded team lacks creativity and a ruthless edge. The strangest reality is this: the majority of these players have been gifted a Willy Wonka Golden Ticket to audition for a World Cup on home turf they would never have thought was possible. Yet, the attacking football is so deferential. Bar Malik Tillman, we appear low on alphas. Last night, Quinn Sullivan attempted to take opponents on in flurries, but few others seized their chance to enforce their will upon the game and make themselves impossible to deny. Our football is to belief, hope, and optimism what Olive Garden is to authentic Italian cuisine.  

ii. Hot Tillman Summer ☀️🕶️

If this summer is the one that etches Malik Tillman as a bona fide World Cup starter, all would not be lost. The 23-Year-Old German-American has three goals in three games, but it is the quality of his finishes which have set our pulses racing. Look at the way last night he instinctively elected to go back across the goalkeeper with this header. Just Assassins Creed Shadows level of clinicality. Pochettino so desperately wants to discover “his” players he can rely on. Tillman has been that, and may emerge as the one player Poch has from this summer who can challenge the absent big names, and get more out of them. 

iii. In Goal: Is It Time for Next Matt Up? 🧤

Matt Freeze had experienced two shuts outs. He had also only faced one shot on goal. Last night, under the first hint of pressure, he went “Black Hawk Down”. Tim Ream did his goalkeeper no favors with the tricky bouncing back pass, but Freeze was caught in two minds, between smashing the ball clear, and following tactical instructions to play the ball out of the back, and this self-inflicted wound ensued. Herc Gomez tweeted: “This is easily the worst generation of American Goalkeepers in #USMNT history. Matt Turner has international experience and needs games, but can’t get them at the Gold Cup? Might as well report to his new club team. Get a head start on winning a spot.”

iv. Patrick Agyemang Is the Pineapple on Pizza of U.S. Strikers 🍍🍕

Clint Dempsey always tells me you can’t argue with numbers, and gent has scored five goals in nine U.S. games. GFOP @Owenwise16 wrote on our insta: “Seen enough, send Agyemang to Madrid.” But the young striker remains so raw, clumsy and uncalibrated, he is dividing opinion amongst the U.S. fanbase. Take these two comments last night from our livestream chat:

David Meyer: “Agyemang… is not your prototypical well-polished forward that's why some folks are flummoxed, but you can't deny his goal rate, and how his size poses headaches for defenses.”

R Baranski: ”Agyemang really has four goals: I know he gets credit for Luna’s but no skill or effort of his went to that. His passing accuracy is bad, he’s indecisive, he’s not fast when he needs to be, etc.”

I admire him so much – his story of perseverance from D3 college to international football is inspiring. Let us be clear what we believe he is auditioning for: When all our gents are fully fit – which is a hypothetical – the No. 3 slot behind Balogun and Ricardo Pepi is the one up for grabs. Enjoy Big Pat. Cult hero in the making. My son calls him the most Everton-looking striker the U.S. have had in a while. All hail “American Beto.”

More: Clint Dempsey breaks down the USMNT striker depth chart.

v. Yes, the Lack of Attendance at These U.S. Games Is Heartbreaking 💔

CONCACAF’s decision to play this game at an 80,000-seat stadium was a choice, but the U.S. just played in Austin, and turn out was meager. Whatever the Savannah Bananas got going on, our U.S. team is experiencing the opposite. Contrast our attendances to the scenes at the Club World Cup, where Boca, Flamengo and even Wydad and Urawa fans are creating intoxicating spectacles on our shores – and project that forward in terms of what the next generation of American football fans are feeling and thinking… it is then you sense the amount of work we have to do to compete for their hearts and minds.

The U.S. men’s national team used to be the pinnacle of American football fandom, but now fans have real choices for their emotional bandwidth and their money. In Brazil 2014, there were 200,000 tickets brought by U.S. supporters – the most outside of the host country. Fast forward to the present day inertia around this program and even our most diehard fans are at risk of losing interest at the worst possible time. That support cannot be taken for granted. It can, and needs to be rebuilt.

vi. The Knockout Rounds Will Be Our Moment of Truth 🇨🇷🇺🇸

On to 54th-in-the-world Costa Rica in Minneapolis on Sunday night. Mexico topped their group too and can only collide with the U.S. in the final, if we both get there. Here is the good news, the Ticos will be down four starters. Key amongst them, hot striker, Manfred Ugalde, who has three goals in the tournament, and midfielder Carlos Mora are suspended. I will break this down with Herc Gomez on Friday (send in your questions and comments for us at meninblazers@gmail.com) and then go live with Clint Dempsey immediately post-game Sunday.

-Roger Bennett

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