Last week, when Landon Donovan said that if the U.S. lost to Mexico in the CONCACAF Cup, that Jurgen Klinsmann should be fired as head coach, a lot of people (myself included) took it with a grain of salt. This was the same guy, after all, that Klinsmann basically kicked off the National Team when he wanted to come back after taking some time off prior to the 2013 Gold Cup. And it wasn't a coincidence that Donovan wasn't on the squad for the 2014 World Cup, or that he retired shortly after.
But if you strip the obvious bias away from his comments and really think about what he said, Donovan had a point. The U.S. Men's National Team had one objective for this year and didn't achieve it. And, if you think about it, their results since last summer's World Cup in Brazil haven't been the greatest. The most obvious person to blame for that is the man who sets the roster for these games and comes up with the strategy during them. The head coach.
Head coaches get fired all the time, for many different reasons. Just this week, USC canned football coach Steve Sarkisian for an alcohol relapse. And you see college coaches relieved of their duties for ethical issues or NCAA violations all the time. But the most common reason for a coach to turn into a former coach remains performance. And I think we can all agree that the performance of the U.S. Men's National Team in 2015 was subpar.
With qualifying for the 2018 World Cup not getting underway until next year, there was only one thing the U.S. was thinking about in 2015: qualifying for the 2017 Confederations Cup. As the winners of the 2013 Gold Cup, there were two avenues for that to happen: win the Gold Cup again or win a playoff with whichever nation did. Well, the Gold Cup and CONCACAF Cup are both in the past, and it's Mexico that's headed to the Confederations Cup. One mission for 2015. Mission failed.
It's not just the fact that the U.S. lost. It's how. In the Gold Cup, they were completely uninspired. If they'd made the final and lost to Mexico or Costa Rica, OK fine. That's gonna happen sometimes. But they played like they didn't care. "We don't need to win, because we can still go to the Confederations Cup even if we don't." Well, that strategy backfired. Not only did they lose, they lost twice. And neither was to Mexico or Costa Rica. They lost a semifinal to Jamaica, which is inexcusable enough, then they really didn't care anymore and lost the bronze medal game to Panama. All of this on U.S. soil, where they never lose!
If the U.S. is supposed to be the top team in the region (which is definitely a very debatable point right now), they can't be losing at home to the likes of Panama and Jamaica. When World Cup qualifying does come around, losses like that will be the difference between a trip to Russia and the unacceptable scenario of not qualifying. For the record, I think the Gold Cup is more a blip on the radar than anything else and that the U.S. will still easily advance to the 2018 World Cup, but the point remains. If playing in the 2017 Confederations Cup was so important, they should've played with a little more urgency.
And to think that what happened in the Gold Cup is OK is completely missing the point. If the U.S. had won, the CONCACAF Cup wouldn't have been necessary. But since Mexico won the Gold Cup, they had to play a one-off game for the Confederations Cup bid at the Rose Bowl, which is about as close to a neutral site venue as you can get for a USA-Mexico game. The U.S. typically dominates Mexico on home soil (where do you think the "dos a cero" chants came from?), but El Tri, probably buoyed by their Gold Cup win, were the better team on Saturday night. And Mexico, for the record, was playing its first game under a new coach after their previous coach was fired for punching TV reporter.
There are probably people out there who don't think it's that big a deal the U.S. won't be playing in the 2017 Confederations Cup. And they would be wrong. If qualifying for the Confederations Cup wasn't a big deal, why would Klinsmann say that it was the team's primary goal for 2015? In 2009, the U.S. played in the Confederations Cup, upset top-ranked Spain in the semifinals and made the finals of a FIFA global tournament for the first time ever. That was a huge advantage when they returned to South Africa for the 2010 World Cup...and won their group. The U.S. didn't qualify for the 2013 Confederations Cup, so they didn't get to play in Brazil's World Cup stadiums ahead of time. Now they won't for Russia either. That's a big deal.
They also said on Fox Sports 1 on Saturday night that World Cup qualifying in CONCACAF is getting much more difficult. Most experts don't think the path to Russia 2018 will be the cakewalk many American fans probably expect it to be. But these are the same fans who only watch soccer during the World Cup.
In this case, the experts clearly know better than the fair-weather fans that magically pop up in World Cup years. CONCACAF is definitely getting stronger. Assuming the rest of the Hex is Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Honduras and Jamaica, there's not an easy game in there. (It's worth mentioning here that the U.S. lost a friendly to Costa Rica at MetroStars Stadium in New Jersey right after the Mexico game, meaning that they've lost at home to four of those five nations in 2015 alone.) World Cup qualifying is going to be a dogfight. And the U.S. will need to play a whole lot better in 2016-17 than it did in 2015 if it expects to qualify.
Is Klinsmann the only one to blame for the National Team's lackluster 2015? Of course not. A lot of the A-team players took time off at different points and there were some injuries, so he was working new players in and juggling different lineups throughout the year. But that doesn't explain the lack of effort or the questionable gameday decisions. And there are already plenty who aren't fans of Klinsmann's player selection.
A year ago, I never thought I'd be composing a blog post agreeing with the notion that Jurgen Klinsmann should be dismissed as head coach of the U.S. Men's National Team. But it's a suggestion that can't be ignored any longer. Especially when you compare the men's squad to the World Cup Champion USA women, the results from 2015 are completely unacceptable. Not for a nation that wants to be considered among soccer's elite and has always been viewed as one of the region's two dominant powers.
Maybe 2015 was just a down year. Maybe the U.S. will win the Copa America Centenario next year (provided they even have the tournament) and we'll forget all about this. But if 2016 starts the way 2015 ended, a change needs to come sooner rather than later. Because for all the good Jurgen Klinsmann has done for USA Soccer, Landon Donovan may indeed be right. He might need to go in order to right a ship that's gotten very far off course.
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