Post-match: USA vs. Brazil - June 12, 2024

Weah vs Aaronson in club play? What's the relevance? It's tournament time. And Aaronson has the superior numbers at international level.

 

A couple stats from last season for Aaronson and Paredes:

Paredes fouled 3.13 times per 90 minutes (99th percentile)
Aaronson fouled 1.75 times per 90 minutes (85th percentile)

Paredes dispossessed 1.04 times per 90 minutes (29th percentile)
Aaronson dispossessed 2.28 times per 90 minutes (6th percentile)

 

Actually there was a fair amount of overlap in how their teams deployed them. On average Paredes was asked to play wider. And there were some games where he was deployed more defensively. You're never going to get an apples to apples comparison.

The stats confirm what my eyes told me. Paredes quickness leads to a tremendous amount of fouls drawn (he is like Beasley in that regard). Aaronson draws a lot of fouls too. And related to that quickness Paredes is more difficult to muscle off the ball even though I would guess he weighs about the same as Aaronson. Paredes also excels at the give and go. Aaronson tends to dwell on the ball longer.

 

And the best tie against Brazil ever!

 

That's nice but has little to do with the positions the players play.

 

It was the best of ties, it was the worst of ties?

 

Yeah I would’ve taken Paredes to the Copa because I think he needs the experience (much like Tillman and Scally). I would’ve taken him over CCV or LDLT.

 

Jumped from page 6 of the thread to here -- a couple comments;

1. Scally played well, but I seem to recall him rarely being on Vini,Jr by his lonesome, there was always a second US player nearby. Not always on Vini, Jr, but there to take away an option. Smart move by the coaching staff to do that.
2. Turner is an outstanding shot blocker....surprised to see the negativity on the bicycle kick. Yes, his turnover may have led to it, but the guy was inside the 6 yard box (or nearly so) and Matt was tracking the ball from the opposite side....the issue on that goal was that the defense lost track of the Brazilian player, not that Matt didn't block a shot that was taken from 15-20 feet away. I would consider that a shot that you hope a goalie can save not that you expect a goalie to save. Matt made a number 'hope you can save' saves in this game. More than is ever reasonable to hope can be saved.
3. I like Musah's composure in dribbling at times into space that was available in the middle of the field - almost always bypassing Brazil's first line of defense.
4. Agree totally that the intensity was much better.

 

One topic I haven't seen discussed yet was whether or not he free kick routine which helped Pulisic to score his goal was a set play designed by the coaching staff?

If yes, then Berhalter and his staff should get credit for designing it....

 

You'd expect him to do better than contribute to 2 of the 5 goals Rangers scored in the summer of '22 in his first starts for the team in official matches ever?

 

Nothing justifies threats or any kind of online harassment, period, for sure. That's completely separate from the other reality that her player ratings literally made no sense, whatsoever, and were either produced by someone who knows nothing of the game, didn't watch the game, or had an axe to grind specifically w/our team.

But yeah, I have no idea why the above would lead to people harassing her. It should lead to people ignoring her, and not reading her pieces, harassment is not justifiable, ever.

 

It’s a larger sample of data against quality opponents. Tim Weah played the toughest average competition last cycle (avg rating ≈ 29th ranked team) while Brendo’s average minute came against the 47th ranked team. Tim has a more impressive resume against good teams with G+A against:

Colombia x2
Mexico x2
Morocco

But sure, Brendo has caked up in games where he played in an attacking position (think of all the games where he didn’t start in an attacking position for the US, there are so many) against the weak sisters of the poor.

 

I’d expect Malik to do better against the weaker competition of the CL qualifying rounds than the stronger competition of the actual competition (what those rounds qualify teams for).

 

Mexico aren't a good team. You can only play what's in front of you. Aaronson has had a number of his minutes in central midfield. Weah has the larger sample size, which includes a lot of nothing in the way of G/As.

Aaronson has g/a's against:
Canada(better than Mexico)
Switzerland
Morocco

He has demonstrated quality against good competition.

 

Folks, I am quite pleased with the match but I also feel we cannto read too much into it.
We came in with something to prove and we mostly did that and that is a very good thing. But it is not unusual for any team to play one match well and fold in the next. We are still very fragile and should something go wrong in any of the group matches we could just collapse. Of course it could go the other way as young players often ride their intensity through several matches. And "several" matches from now would be at least the quarters.
This tournament is very hard for me to judge even what could happen. We have a sampling of some of the best teams in the world, but some of them are in a bit of a downturn, and we have a number of lower level teams from both feds. We are kind of in the upper middle on paper. But matches are not played on paper, at least not yet.
I now think we get out of the group and are competitive in the knockouts but we have such a Dr. Jekyll Mr. Hyde personality that it is hard to say which team plays on a given day. So anything between a semi-final appearance and a wipeout where we score zero and let in 10 or more is possible.
At least this last match has made me anticipate the Copa. with optimism instead of the pessimism I have had for the last few years.
We will just have to see what happens.
But it will, probably, be a fun ride.

 

You can straight swap Aaronson for Weah or on the left, he’s played there with US before, or sub Paredes on the left and move Puli over to the right for Weah.
They’re both options to come in at wing, and if Paredes weren’t going to the Olympics they would be in direct comp with each other for that role. And Haji is probably picked ahead of both of them.

 

Great stat find there, and that jibes with what I see is Paredes’ calling card. He can get a defender wrong footed one v one and get fouled in good spots. I still question his final ball/cross and shooting prowess, but he is borderline elite in this very specific aspect of the game.
I know it’s MLS, but he drew a lot of fouls and pens running at defenses when the double didn’t come, at 18. It’s cool to see that skill is transferring against tougher competition.

 

Would go with Haji and Balogun ahead of either player and use Pulisic and Aaronson on the right. If Paredes weren't going to the Olympic's, then backup left back would be the logical place for him in the Senior team.

 

Totally unrelated, she is 100% an El Tri fan.

 

Oh, f*cking Tim. SMH

 

Not much to add. Great to see the team bounce back after the stomping they took from Colombia. They need to consistently bring their "A" game. Failure to do so at Copa will be punished mercilessly.

 

I had a close-up view of LD at San Jose and I don’t ever remember him giving less than 100%. He had good and capable teammates like Ronnie Ecklund, Brian Ching and Dwayne DeRosario, and he didn’t have to be “the man” on every possession.

 

Sure. And McKennie with as few goals (zero?) was an attacker because he was a mezzala but that changed a bit too as Allegri realized there was a special way to use his minutes and that led to a lot of assists.

as for most of Brenden's minutes coming in the second half of the season, that was after the 2 starting 9's left and he was playing with bench 9's when playing as a mid in the 352 - call it CAM if you want.

 

To be fair, her ratings sucked. There's just no other way to put it. A clueless writer.

 

It would be interesting to factor in number of goals scored by Lille and Berlin. Berlin scored 33, Leeds scored 48 goals (22/23). Juventus scored 54. Lille scored 65 (22/23)

I.ow, Tim played for teams that scored 119 goals over 2 years and Brenden played for teams that scored 81 goals - basically Brenden's teams scored at a rate of 80/120 or 2/3rd's of rate Tim's teams scored at. If you adjust the figures for that ratio, Tim is still a tad ahead on goals and they are even on assists which meets the eye test for me. Aaronson's only real drawback for me is that he has to improve his shooting. I'm not concerned about physicality.