Soccer peeps - how would you deal with Pulisic’s absence?

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It's nice to see that Ronaldo still has a pulse, but centering one's tactics around an over-the-hill legend used to feasting on fourth-tier defenders in a fourth-tier league remains a bad idea. A brace against Uzbekistan does not change that.

FWIW, I feel similarly about Messi and Argentina's approach, though the early returns are more promising for them.

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truly one of the games all time greatest players and he's having perhaps his finest WC hour at age 38.

He's got 4 goals already and damn near had 5!

Meanwhile Christiano has yet to get off the snide.

FWIW, I saw NY Cosmos era Pele so that's kinda my standard for ageing soccer GOATS.

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I need to watch their games more but I just don't understand that part.

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"F--- everyone who isn't us."
#Team128

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which tends to mess up their defenses and then Messi collects easy assists bc the opponents D is out of place (ie he drags 2 defenders with him and then passes to the open guy behind them).

I just watched a video last night on what makes Messi so successful:

- from Pep “Watch his head, he’s constantly surveying the whole field, even when he’s walking and not part of the play”

- Some math professor claims Messi is the most efficient player the game has ever seen and then shows a video snippet how 3 defenders were on him and then Messi cuts across them making them all equi-distant from him (giving him more space with the ball).

- A defender being interviewed said he was tasked with marking Messi but stated something like “he felt like the whole game he could never put a hand on Messi. Bigger players were easier to body up, but Messi just cuts under your arm and you never touch him.”

- Moreover, I’ve seen a few videos/ studies that talk about how Messi walks more than any player on the field, but he ALWAYS “just happens” to be in the right place at the right time. If I had to pick one aspect of Messi’s game, it would be this last bullet point. Messi just seems to know where the ball will be, or where open space on the field will be, before anyone else on the pitch.

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This is easier to do in soccer than, say, football, but Messi is the most effortless great player I've ever seen in any sport. His heart rate on the pitch mostly looks to be on the level of some cubicle-bound putz working an office job. But as noted, he's always plotting, lurking, waiting.

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The US vs Australia match was a lot of fun.

Our seats were at midfield in the lower bowl about 10 rows up. I dont think I could have picked better seats. We had VIP hospitality passes and got free food and drink from the hospitality area where we stopped by before the game and at halftime. We also had our pictures taken with some guy named Mike Macdonald, bc wth, why not? Right? He was in our hospitality area and available for pictures. We werent really expecting anything like that but when in Rome …

The game … what can I say?

Mauricio Pochettino has the US playing the best soccer I have seen in my lifetime. Australia was never really in the match. The US team dominated possession and was able to create enough opportunities to create an early lead which they never gave up or put at risk. Honestly, for the 2nd time this WC, the US has played up to their potential and much better than history would project.

I really like Pochettino’s strategy of stretching the field extremely wide and when the defense gets overloaded and confused, then attack upfield quickly and lethally.

I have tons of great pics and even a couple good videos of the 2nd goal. No idea how to share any of that stuff here.

Outside of the match, visiting with old friends was just as great as the movies make it out to be. The weather in Seattle was outstanding. Friday after the match we walked around the downtown Seattle area and had dinner at some random crab/seafood spot. We spent Saturday hiking around Bainbridge Island and had a nice dinner at “The Harbour Public House”. One of the places we stopped for a quick visit was the “Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial” which brought attention to the first Japanese Americans interred during WWII (they had been from Bainbridge Island).

I dont think the weekend could have gone any better.

PS. We also had Pedro de la Vega sitting with us, bc it turns out my old ND roommate is really well connected to the US Soccer community, especially in the northwest. De La Vega is an Argentine National playing with the Seattle Sounders. He has played w their U21 national squad, but was injured last season and not in top form for this WC.

Check out this video of Pedro’s goal, which may be one of the most amazing goals I have EVER seen scored in my lifetime:

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I've heard Seattle has been an incredible setting for WC games.

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We spent of bit of time discussing what might happen next for the US squad this WC. …

The US should win their round of 32 matchup (see Most Likely Opponents at bottom), but the round of 16 could be their first legit big time game vs a dominate world class team (France or Norway). If this theory plays out, hopefully the US will continue to gel as a team and rise to the occasion, but there are much better teams and much better coaches than what the US has faced so far … Those better coaches will have better disciplined teams that may stifle the US’s current strategy.

My only question is how will Mauricio Pochettino adjust his current strategy when his squad finally faces a team with enough discipline to handle his current strategy?

Here’s what gemini AI kicked out for the US’s potential round of 32 matchups (based on the prediction markets and current games completed as of yesterday):

Summary of Most Likely Opponents
If the tournament ended today, the highest-probability opponents for the U.S. from this cluster would be:
1. Bosnia and Herzegovina (or the winner of Bosnia/Qatar)
2. Ecuador
3. Senegal
4. Netherlands or Japan (the highest-profile "landmines" in this pool)

Holland or Japan would give me anxiety. Senegal should give me anxiety, but doesnt. I expect this US team to handle B&H or Qatar or Ecuador without issue.

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Summary: The Shifted Probability Board

Two days ago, the U.S. potential opponent pool was entirely theoretical. Today, because of the massive margins of victory over the weekend (like the Netherlands over Sweden and Germany over Ivory Coast), the field has narrowed significantly.
If the wildcard matrix were locked in right now, the U.S. is tracking toward a highly physical knockout matchup against either Sweden (Group F), Ecuador (Group E), or Algeria (Group J), while the threat of a lower-tier minnow stunting the bracket has drastically decreased.

If you are looking at where the smart money is sitting today, the prediction markets are telling us to prepare for a physical, South American style clash against Ecuador, with Sweden lurking as the primary European alternative.

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guys, but I've really enjoyed pretty much every minute of this world cup I've turned on. I might have just serendipitously chosen good matches, but it's been consistently good and exciting soccer. Germany-Ivory Coast was fun. Egypt-New Zealand was good. Netherlands-Japan was awesome. And Netherlands-Sweden was good until Netherlands broke it open. Oh, and I happened to end up in my Latino-owned barber shop for the Mexico opener, which was really fun (in terms of vibes -- I don't know what the heck they were saying, but I was inferring from context).

And that's in addition, of course, to the US actually playing up to our hopes/expectations.

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Matchday 3 with no drama? At the risk of repeating myself, inject this shit directly into my veins.

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since the Soccerroos seem likely to pack it in and counter.

Still worried about Ream and his lack of speed.

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Clean sheet. Win without Pulisic.

Poch should have made more substitutions earlier, but whatever.

Qualified for the knockout round after 2 games. Maybe win the group depending on tonight’s result, and rest some of the players like Balogun, Dest, Adams, McKennie, and Robinson?

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I can't say the same for Popovich, who got it all wrong for Australia that first half. As a side note, FoxSports has been unsurprisingly awful. Lalas, Lloyd, and Dempsey are annoying, and the game production seemed more interested in celebrities, most of whom I didn't know, than showing the game. Lowe and Henry are great in studio and I like some of the announcers (John Champion, Danny Higginbotham, etc.) but, overall, just not good.

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The contempt those guys have for Lalas, Donovan, and general FOX nonsense is both obvious and hilarious.

FWIW, Fox has done well to upgrade some of their studio talent, but their continued reliance on American dullards and forced narratives has me muting the tv and reaching for a book between games.

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during the breaks. I'm not sure how I never read that book before but thought I should remedy that.

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Are completely unidentifiable half the time. If you're going to spend time showing all these people, can you at least put some names to faces and not just verbally after the camera cuts away.

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She’s a c lister here.

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If Fox were in charge.

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I think the children like it when I "get down" verbally.

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the Polo Grounds

Soccer peeps - how would you deal with Pulisic’s absence?

Ronaldo having a good game. Can Portugal win?

No, I really don't think so

I'm just going to enjoy watching Lionel Messi while I can

Do teams mark him?

They try to, but he goes anywhere he wants on the field

Great summary.

Mark: we need a game report.

Fun. Lots and lots of fun.

Awesome. Thanks for sharing!

Thanks for the report.

Only other initial thought

Update on potential round of 32 matchups

I'm not nearly as big of a soccer watcher as many of you

...And that's the way we like it!

KCandTheSunshineBand

I like Balogun and Pepi both up top…

That sounds like a good idea.

Gritty, determined kind of win.

Good set up by Poch.

My favorite WC subplot has been Henry and Zlatan v. Lalas

I've been reading Confederacy of Dunces

I'm with you 100%. The studio group is awful and the celebs

IIRC they don’t control the video feed, FIFA does

Is Ciera big outside of the US?

Right, which is why we get 3-5 shots of Infantino every day

There would be even more shots of Trump’s cabinet

this is correct