Questions No. 4 and No. 5 — the final two in the series, will be posted tomorrow. We'll answer all questions the day after that. Thanks for your patience!


When the USA took a nose-dive against Morocco in May, Arena opined that perhaps the players were “over-trained.”

This was an astonishing statement, and one that we were surprised more fans and journalists did not pick up on. Was Arena saying that he had overworked this team? That his guys were tired out? Or that he had the team wound so tight with over-preparation that any zest had been sucked out of them?

Let’s set aside the idea that these guys were “played out” in the sense we have been using to describe the guys from England, France and Holland who have seen so many games for their clubs. Why? Because that would be ludicrous — half the team was in midseason form because of MLS’ schedule; the other half of the USA’s squad were on international teams that didn’t have much significant European club competition in 2006 to worry about. (Beasley might have of course, had he actually played regularly.)

Let’s also set aside some of the calls we’ve heard from fans who, in a stroke of revisionism, would have re-made the roster. Look: All of you who wanted to see Twellman have to keep in mind that Ching and Wolff didn’t even play. We’ve said all along that we wish the USA might have spent a little more time looking at the DeMerits and Simeks of the world, but there weren’t any great strikers (to say nothing of midfielders) left unearthed. The only guys who might have been added were defenders and once you saw Pope on and Jones left off, you knew the score.

But on the concept that the squad Arena did select was subsequently run into the ground? We think that has traction.

First, this team played a series of meaningless friendlies instead of games against quality competition. Part of this is due to the USA’s lack of cachet — we must admit that teams are often unwilling to play the USA in a reciprocity agreement due to the simple fact that the Americans don’t sell tickets overseas. You get around that, however, by opening up the pocketbook — USSF claims to have some $40m in the bank; wouldn’t May and June have been a good time to spend that instead of frittering away games on Venezuela and Latvia? Consider also that when the USA last played quality competition before the 2002 World Cup — and got ripped, by Holland, at Foxboro — the USA came out of that experience with a little more humility and subsequently played well in their opener. Looking back at the 2006 schedule, which games stood out? The USA played seven weak teams that didn’t qualify for the Cup (Canada, Norway, Guatemala, Jamaica, Morocco, Venezuela and Latvia) two awful sides that did (Poland and Japan) and in the one serious road test, got nailed, 4-1 by the Germans.

The squad also spent a great deal of time sequestered in what from the outside appeared to be an increasingly desperate — and dare we say, paranoid? — attempt by the team’s staff to get the squad back on track. What did Cary, N.C. add to this team’s efforts to succeed? In hindsight, not much — unless you believe that the team’s performance against the Czechs could have been worse.

Recall that in 2002, Arena had the advantage and the ability to run his team almost like a club, sequestering them for a great deal of time and prepping them for each individual first round game. He had rising home-based stars and a CONCACAF Gold Cup tourney to work with and he used both to great advantage. At the time, Arena received well-deserved credit for managing the idea perfectly; we were in the Rose Bowl when that team started to gel and saw how effective his touch could be.

This time, he couldn’t do that. The Gold Cup was played last summer, so he had no FIFA mandated time to play in as the Africans did with their 2006 tourney. (And, in some ways perhaps that’s a blessing given how badly Africa has fared.) So, he was left with a bunch of guys who weren’t going to make the squad… to do what, exactly? Build team cohesion? Not to take a shot at Michael Bradley, but when you give this kid a cap over some of the other guys that showed up through 2004-5 and actually helped get the team qualified — well, that cohesion thing goes right out the window.

Then, during the Cup, the USA closed practices to the media seemingly out of fear that the USA’s grand tactics or player lineups would be leaked out. This is odd for two reasons: The first is that there are only about 25 folks (and we’re being generous) who actually care enough to have written about the team every day in the first place. Alienating them is bad for business. The second is that the USA has no secrets to keep. OK, Gianlugi Buffon didn’t know who was on the roster, but you know Marcelo Lippi and his coaching staff did. So did every other coach the USA faced.

It’s well-known what players the team has, what their capabilities are, and the style of game the side plays. The only “surprise,” if one can call it that, the USA had up its sleeve was Dempsey, and that was only because most players weren’t familiar with the guy. Even Dempsey had played against England in Chicago last summer – and the idea that he, or anyone, can come to the World Cup in this day and age is fanciful. (Ironically, one of the charming aspects of the old World Cups, circa 1958-1978, was that players actually could be discovered at them. Sadly, now all that can happen to a player is have his reputation upheld… or have it trashed.)

The bottom line, as we see it, is that USA spent an awful lot of energy doing nothing. They ran around in the heat, played laughable opponents and never seemed to be meshed together as a team. Despite what the always classy McBride says, this team pretty clearly was 1998 redux; it had far too many guys who knew they would play for well over two years and far too little meaningful competition for playing time. The worst thing about this is that the guys the team probably should have been built around — John O’Brien and Claudio Reyna — were always unavailable.

As a result, they came out with no true semblance of an approach. They weren’t flat — they were bereft of ideas. This is why we feel the folks bashing them for a supposed lack of effort are off base — we think this team tried as hard as it could, but effort can’t make up for a lack of skill or flair. The truth is, trying to compensate for that with fitness may well have worn these guys out before they hit the ground. Despite what is admirable fitness (even the USA’s detractors admit there’s something to the training) and the best facilities money can buy, the coaches and the failure to consistently measure themselves against high quality opponents from 2004 on took a heavy toll.

And please: We don’t want to hear that qualifying was hard. CONCACAF won exactly ONE game here in Germany when Mexico beat Iran. Costa Rica, Trinidad and Tobago and the USA combined for a total of two points between them. Fans in America should be thanking Mexico for their performance against Argentina — it may be the only thing that saves the region three places in the next Cup.

The USA must learn from this experience. If (as we hope) more and more Americans migrate to Europe to play, the old way of running the U.S. men’s program necessarily will have to be changed. The USA can no longer be run as if it is a college team or a club. And when MLS comes into line with the rest of the world, then the USA will be able to field its best team instead having to mix and match squads.

It’s easy to say “fire Bruce.” It’s easy to say the guys “crapped out.” The harder thing to accept is that the system has clear and obvious weaknesses that beg for change. Until those changes happen, the USA will never be anything better than second-class in the sport. Let’s hope Sunil Gulati is unwilling to accept that.