The attacking play has been decent but not great. Really missing the end product. The defense has mostly looked solid, but there were a couple of situations where they had to scramble to clear the ball. Overall, because of the level of the competition, I'd call this a C- effort so far.
Positives
Jones
Nagbe
Altidore
Zusi (surprisingly solid as a RB)
Negatives
Bradley (pretty much invisible)
Bedoya (not productive but complaining a lot)
Kljestan looks a bit rusty. Birnbaum, Marshall, and Garza haven't made any glaring mistakes, but they haven't been dominant either. Rimando has had nothing to do.
I thought Nagbe and Zusi showed some great promise. Throw Bobby Wood and Christian Pulisic up there with Nagbe and suddenly things are looking much more promising. We'll see if Zusi can defend if he's put under pressure, but it seems to have been a pretty smart move on Arena's part. Almost like putting James Milner at LB. You don't need anything exceptional. Just a good workmanlike performance and someone that can provide decent ball movement from the wing.
Jones and Bradley are huge question marks moving forward. Jones because he's clearly our best option at CM - but he'll be pushing 37 in Russia. Bradley because our captain has almost no impact on the game whatsoever. And of course there is the question about keeper. But it's all really irrelevant. If we can't solve the problem at CM, it really doesn't matter how the rest of the pieces fit.
It's a shame really. Michael Bradley should be in his prime leading this team. But at this point, he's probably the biggest weakness.
When you are paired with Jones at central midfield you just have to accept that you are going to be the guy that has to stay in the deep lying role. I'm not sure if they actually played 4-1-4-1 or if Jones just left him that much (from the 4-2-3-1). Either way, he simply didn't run much.
Even without Jones he didn't run much. US had so much of the ball it was a slower build up. And the times that they looked good were on the counter which was led by the Nagbe and co.
He's been this way for a while now. He's no longer the guy with gut busting runs moving forward. Or the guy that was willing to attack into the box. He stays back for defensive cover and looks for long balls. Ultimately, he's become rather irrelevant - noticeable only when he makes a poor pass. Which is becoming much more prevalent, actually.
First off, I didn't watch the game. But I have been trying to develop my skill of interpreting what happened by looking at distribution maps of games.
Bradley looks like he is playing the role he evolved into at Toronto. He sits deep and owns the middle. His distribution map looks good, though probably it was unexciting to watch. We should start thinking of Bradley as a better Beckerman playing the Beckerman role. He is the time keeper, like a metronome keeping things moving like clockwork. Simple and ever present.
Klejstan, who many said looked rusty, has a pretty decent distribution map. He is all over the place as a #10 should. Klejstan being a good #10 means that Bradley is pushed farther back like a good #6. This makes tactical sense looking at the map.
Nagbe carves out a nice place for himself on the left. His map makes it look like he was a presnece enough that Klejstan and Bradley respected his right to have that space over there.
The real problem is Jones and Bedoya. Jones is all over the place and Bedoya's distribution map is nowhere to be found. Either Bedoya is covering for Jones' lack of positional discipline, thus making his role on the right dissapear, or Jones is compensating for Bedoya's lack of support in attack.
Jones' map tends to drift to the advanced center and towards the left, not so much on the right, so I am going to guess it is Bedoya covering for Jones. If this has been going on for a while, it makes sense why I don't natuaraly gravitate towards liking Bedoya and yet the coaches do. Bedoya is spending his time covering for the mistakes of others instead of carving out his own space.
So why not get rid of Jones and Bedoya. We need a true center midfielder who is willing to just hold his space as a link and not roam all over the place. Dax McCarty? Emerson Hyndman? Perry Kitchen? Bedoya himself and find a new right winger? Does Pusilic play right or left? Can Nagbe play the other side?
If Bruce Arena is better than Klinsmann tactically, I predict we will see experimentation with the exact purpose of trying to figure out this one deficiency.
Like I said, I couldn't quite tell the formation. And depending on the formation, you might find answers.
Jones is both a problem and a blessing. When he is free to roam he's probably the best player on the team. So right now the US is best in a 4-2-3-1 with him floating forward as an attacking midfielder and Bradley staying back. But he's literally the only guy that can (and does) do that.
When Jones isn't playing they could possibly go into a 442 diamond with Pulisic on the right and Nagbe on the left. I believe that Pulisic is on the right with Dortmund, but I recall him on the left under JK.
The problem with finding a replacement for Jones is that Bradley doesn't really play well in a CM pairing. So unless we're ready to drop him, I'm not sure that there will be many options to grow that role. It's a problem.
You put Pulisic on the right and you're set.
It was their first match in a while, a lot of players haven't played together prior, and it was a friendly.
I was generally happy with the quick forward play and aggression in the inner third, especially considering the missing international players.
Many people probably snoozed off in their BarcaLounger on that one. Serbia has 45 times fewer people and had to travel thousands of miles and there were hardly signs of life on our part.
Will we have Pulisic at our next WCQ game?