pulisic Page 4 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Tis but a glimpse
It’s not official yet. The USMNT still has to dot the i’s and cross the t’s and all that. Which means they have to manage to not lose to Costa Rica by six goals or more on Wednesday. Quite frankly, the more impressive feat than qualifying for the World Cup would be losing by six in Costa Rica, and e...
Gregg Berhalter and USMNT are good enough
In the end, Gregg Berhalter did everything we asked, what most USMNT fans asked. He didn’t treat the trip to the Azteca as something to just get through. It wasn’t just a lottery spin. It wasn’t about keeping the powder dry for Sunday. Berhalter looked at the Mexico squad, looked at his, and thought...
Gregg Berhalter drops the ball on USMNT roster
Expected, disappointing. Two words that best describe my reaction to seeing the United States Men’s National Team’s roster for the final trio of octagonal World Cup Qualifying matches, beginning next week. Outside of the core, can’t-miss players and super-subs, which any soccer fan with a brain coul...
With Weston McKennie done for the season… now what?
For as much excitement as this batch of the USMNT has generated, most of that has been tempered by the fact that A) they’ve rarely actually played all that well together and B) they’ve rarely all been together and in anything near top form. There will be those, the most rose-colored glasses-adorned ...
Where does the USMNT stand in World Cup Qualifying?
Call this the Idiot’s Guide to World Cup Qualifying. The diehard American Outlaws probably know this information by heart. Casual fans may know some. Most general sports fans in America will only tune in to soccer should the United States men’s national team make it to the World Cup, meaning it’ll b...
Everton completely change gears, hires Frank Lampard
When you become a club that’s as much of an underground circus that Everton Football Club have become, your list of possible managers shrinks. You can really only get the desperate or those with nothing better to do, or possibly those who would work nowhere else. Everton have let Duncan Ferguson, wh...
OK, maybe it’s time to have a talk about Gregg Berhalter
The natural inclination is to arm the nukes to drop on USMNT manager Gregg Berhalter after his comments that the U.S. “dominated” Canada, despite losing 2-0 and managing just three shots on target. The initial reaction is that he’s completely deluded, doesn’t know what he’s watching, and all while h...
So where are we with Christian Pulisic?
It may feel like the USMNT’s qualification process has been going on for about 32 years. Which is what happens when you cock-up the last one and everyone has to wait eight years between World Cup appearances (hopefully). Still, it’s important to stress that the U.S., if it can manage two wins in the...
So this Romelu Lukaku thing is a problem, just not in the way we thought
Back in August, I wrote this. And it sure seemed that way, as Chelsea utterly destroyed Arsenal, spearheaded by Romelu Lukaku. These were the defending European champions, who had just added the best striker from Italy in Lukaku the previous season, and he seemed like the final piece for Chelsea to ...
2021 was an incredibly fun year for the USMNT, let’s never do it again
As stated many times before, what the USMNT attempted, and really accomplished, in 2021 is unheard of in international soccer. Turning the entire roster over to children at once just isn’t done. Usually, teams are trying to blend generations, mixing in the aging vets (around 30) with those in their ...
This will be good for Barcelona
I’m sure Barcelona, both their fans and the club itself, are tired of signs and symbols of how far they’ve fallen. Must get repetitive. Blockin’ out the scenery breakin’ their mind by this point. But their last Champions League game of the season was one of the harshest yet....
Maybe it’s Mexico that needs to look in the mirror
The big story out of the US’s demolition (at least in the 2nd half) of Mexico was the US stuffing Memo Ochoa’s words back from whence they came. Ochoa had claimed before the match that Mexico “was the mirror that the US wants to see themselves,” which led to Pulisic writing “Man In The Mirror” on hi...
After the latest Dos Á Cero, it’s time to be excited about the USMNT again
Not getting too crazy about the U.S. men’s soccer team, not getting too crazy about the U.S. men’s soccer team, not getting too crazy about the U.S. men’s soccer team, not going too crazy about the U.S. men’s soccer team…...
The U.S. needs to beat Mexico tonight, so it better act like it
There isn’t one crescendo to World Cup qualifying, but the U.S. hosting Mexico tonight is just about as close it gets. They’ll play again in the spring of course, and both have other matches to negotiate. But this is one of the games that gets highlighted as soon as the schedule is announced, and ev...
This is what it can be
It is hard to remember in the moment, especially when that is the first moment of a qualifier like last night against Costa Rica and the USMNT is giving up yet another stupid goal before coming back for a 2-1 win and you haven’t even cracked that beer that you’re firing against the wall, that this w...
The USMNT can’t live without Tyler Adams
When this World Cup qualifying cycle began, we had hoped that the U.S. would surprise us and break new ground on what they could do. And they’ve done that, we just didn’t know it would be showing us how bad they can play at times. ...
We said depth would be the main thing
If it feels like World Cup qualifiers are boomeranging right back into your consciousness after not much of a break from the last ones, you’re not alone. This is the normal calendar, you just had a year off from it thanks to the pandemic, but just wait until qualifiers are crammed into January and F...
They’re still Manchester Damn City
It’s a little surprising, just a bit, how a team that cantered to the Premier League title and was a Champions League finalist just a few months ago can somehow fly under the radar. But with the noise of Cristiano Ronaldo and his rape accusations landing across town, or Romelu Lukaku giving Chelsea ...
Your 2021-2022 Champions League Guide
Despite the attempt to kill it from Europe’s leading clubs last spring (and UEFA’s eventual success in doing so in the coming years), the Champions League returns today in its usual form. While it has become the nexus point in all that’s wrong with soccer and has certainly widened the gap between th...
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times
At halftime last night, you could forgive any USMNT fan for thinking they had never left 1997. I know I did. Here we all were, too late on a school night, watching a US team getting paddled in Central America with the crowd going nuts and the American manager looking utterly clueless and his players...