Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Why aren't we good?

I am replying to the Con Artist formely known as the Son of Prince's article about our the inherit flaws of our national team system. I believe he has some good points. We don't have the great players like the other countries have all around the world. Italians have Sebastian Giovinco, Brazil have Pato, and of course Argentina has Lionel Messi. This is the reason why all these countries are the best in the world because they have the players with the individual talent to take over games for club and country. Meanwhile we have talented players but like aaron said they have not shown their greatness that they have yet and I have an idea about why this is so.

Most of these young players for us have the talent and ability to do big things and they usually take over their youth games and most of these players are identified by the youth national team or other bigger clubs around. When they get to these places, they are taught how to play the game with grit and determination and not necessarily to enhance the skills and abilities of the talented players. I mean they are worried about what testing they are going to do for fitness and all that. Even with MLS training, most of the teams train in short sided settings in which they play only one and two touch games and that doesn't help to make the player's game much better. These young players game continues to be bogged down and they forget what has gotten them there and all they know is playing one and two touch and being afraid to take guys on because they are taught not to take them on.

Also the final point I have about the young players are that they should ply their trade in Europe than being in the MLS because I believe that the American game is kinda about politics and all about helping the veterans than growing the youth. It takes them four to five years to finally play and then they might be a bust by then. I remember a player that I played against when I was in 16 and I played against Guillermo Gonzalez and he was one of the best players on the team and then once he decided to play in the MLS, I can say that I don't know what he is doing right now. I know he doesn't play for the Galaxy anymore or even in the MLS. The vets don't want young kids to a) take their spots and b) just plain embarrass them. I believe that the youth academies in Europe would be great starting points for players than in the MLS. Kenny Cooper for example, even though he is in the MLS now, he started out in Manchester United in their reserve squad and I believe that he is one for the future and he is eventually going to go back to Europe. I don't know what is the sure fix but I don't know if the MLS "development" plan is working well for our players. So no wonder you have one of the dutch coaches saying that we have no impressive players on our team. I mean as far as I'm concerned they are a pretty good judge of talent aka Sneijder, Robben, Van der Vaart among others. So I would listen

2 comments:

A West said...

i think one of the U.S.'s biggest problems is the whole politics system where it's who you know, not how good you are. also, from a young age, in our rec and challenge systems, creativity is often stifled in place of structure and order.

A West said...

i just read this in a goal.com article. they were talking about marvell wynne; how he had a good tournament and a bright future ahead of him:

"The Toronto FC wingback is raw, sure, but has the physical gifts -- speed! -- to be a defensive monster"

HE'S RAW!

Those darn imaginary readers