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fu elon

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@kDalS1 @CyrilOfMacedon @TheSammahmood_ Then go to college and get a degree? Or learn a trade?

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This sums up why we aren’t World Cup contenders. Hint: it’s not the best athletes trope

[Sam Mahmood @TheSammahmood_]

The U.S. soccer federation is a poor return on invested capital.

I played soccer for 20+ years.

Grassroots.
Academy.
D1 college.
Pursued professionally after.

And I’ll say the quiet part out loud:

The US soccer infrastructure is broken.

In America, we treat playing D1 soccer like it is the peak achievement.

For most families, clubs, coaches, and players, the entire youth soccer machine is built around one goal:

Get recruited.
Get a scholarship.
Play college soccer.

But if the objective is to produce world-class players, D1 soccer is a terrible development path.

From 18-22, some of the most important technical development years of your career, you are preparing for a 3-4 month season built largely around athleticism, direct play, set pieces, fitness, and survival.

Now compare that to an 18-year-old in Spain, Argentina, Morocco, Italy, England, or France.

That player has likely been in a professional environment for years.

Training daily.
Playing meaningful matches year-round.
Competing against grown professionals.
Getting thousands more touches.
Learning how to solve the game under pressure.

The gap is massive.

And it shows.

American players are usually athletic.
They are usually fit.
They usually compete hard.

But at the highest levels, that is not enough.

The biggest difference is technical comfort.

We do not move the ball like Spain.
We do not combine like Argentina.
We do not play with the same fluidity, rhythm, and confidence you see from countries where the game is embedded into the culture from childhood.

That comes down to volume.

Volume of touches.
Volume of street soccer.
Volume of futsal.
Volume of unstructured play.
Volume of high-level training environments.
Volume of meaningful games.

In the US, youth soccer is expensive, overly organized, overly coached, tournament-driven, and too often built around winning games at 13 instead of developing players for 23.

Parents spend thousands.
Clubs charge thousands.
Travel teams fly all over the country.
Showcases become the product.
Recruiting becomes the scoreboard.

But the return on invested capital is poor.

We probably spend more money on youth soccer than almost any country in the world, yet the technical output does not match the investment.

That is a broken operating model.

And like any business, if the output is weak, you do not blame the customer.

You inspect the system.

The US has talent.
The US has athletes.
The US has money.
The US has facilities.

But the foundation is wrong.

We built a pay-to-play, college-recruiting machine and confused it for a world-class player development system.

Those are not the same thing.

Until we fix the grassroots layer, increase meaningful touches, make development less dependent on family income, and stop treating college soccer as the top of the mountain, the US will keep underperforming relative to its resources.

I’m not saying this to trash US Soccer.

I’m saying it because I lived it.

And if we actually want to become a powerhouse, we have to be honest about the infrastructure first.

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@TheSammahmood_ @NumbersMan65 @teal_andrew Your first point is great. But you are behind on the womens side. They applied a similar model to the men and England, France, and Spain have caught up

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@bobwojnowski You listened to the wrong people Wojo. We didn’t play anyone with any sort of attacking presence until last night. Our D and GK were the soft underbelly.

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@DobyRaider @GongR1ght Stfu. Such a reach.

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@TheUnitedGuey @GongR1ght Was also there. It was mostly full. Capacity is 71k. I think they announced 68k. FIFA definitely prioritized money over full capacity

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@Simon_J_Clarke @joedratnol Mostly full but "Category 1" above the team benches definitely not full.

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@fc_mossman Dest as a true winger rather than wingback or fullback is a much less stressful defensive experience.

Will be interesting to see if can Freeman handle Yildiz/Guler vs Turkiye

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@Il_Sindac0 @Lorenz01999 No, he's a fool and a coward

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@marcofm1975 @IFTVMarco According to SkySport Italia 57 players earned their first cap under Mancini. Including young players like Gnonto, Ricci, Scalvini, Pafundi, Calabria, Pobega, Caprari, and Fagioli. He's not perfect, but he keeps an open mind and isn't stuck on the damn 352.

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@ITruth98 I think Mancini is more willing to experiment and call out the broken system. Conte would drill the players and maybe get better results but the underlying rot would persist.

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@dybalexa I disagree that its a step back. Mancini capped a ton of new players while he was in charge the first time and is the only manager in recent memory to not be obsessed with a 352. He seems well aware of Italian footballs systemic issues and has pedigree to address it.

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@dagouassat1 @TonyMellace7 Italy played 6 finals and lost 2 — both to “top” ranked Brazil. You don’t get to erase the 1930’s anymore than Italians can erase the last 18 years.

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@crsxsa @Antonin85422656 In Brasil 😭

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@Watchdog4SA @Hoopss What about the stereo system next to it and the woman's hairstyle? Your "verification" is trash.

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@heat_ball @ade_oladipo1 Typical England fan delusions.

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@PattiBruinsma Your opinion is bizarre. Leading the nation in apg at 9.1 and involved in almost 60% of MSU scoring. Unquestionably the leader of the team. Like it or not.

[JEFF @jeffisrael25]

let me get this straight

a team will not be playing in the FIFA World Cup because they are currently being bombed by the FIFA Peace Prize winner

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@JewishRockyIV @mlbfeeelit Literally no one in Italy cares about baseball and they don’t have a clue a clue what the WBC even is. Of course the team will be filled with Italian-Americans, Italian-Venezuelans, etc….