The United States men's national team had two poor results these past two qualifiers. The US soccer team lost to Costa Rica (3-0) at home and drew (1-1) away to Honduras. One point out of the possible six is utterly pathetic if one wants to be consistent on the standard that the usmnt should be held accountable to. There are a few who feel that Bobby Wood's late equalizer is one of the most important goals in US soccer history for what it means. It means that the usmnt has their fate in their own hands. If the team wins their last two qualifiers against Panama and Trinidad and Tobago in October they will have earned an automatic birth to the 2018 World Cup in Russia. The team played poorly in both games and were fortunate to have even leave Honduras with a point. Which is one of the reasons that many feel that Wood's goal is a historic one. To me, it just demonstrates how much the US soccer program still has to go before it can consider itself an actual contender on the international stage. At this point, they need to demonstrate that they are contenders in their own region. The United States currently sit in 4th place which give the team a chance to qualify via a intercontinental playoff against a team from the Asian Football Confederation. The usmnt plays the team that sits right above them, Panama, and the last placed team, Trinidad and Tobago, for their last two games. Honduras, who is tied with the US on points, sits right behind the US, but will face Mexico and Costa Rica for their last two qualifying matches. The odds are in favor for the US to qualify to Russia. However, it will be done in a dramatic fashion and at the very last minute.
The US team has plenty to work on. They have issues from the back line all the way up to the forwards. They don't have quality fullbacks to play four in the back, which means if they want to be competitive at the world cup (if they qualify) Arena needs to experiment and tinker with a system and formation that amplifies the squad's strength. On that note, Arena was awful in his decision making against both Costa Rica and Honduras. I am purposely not saying tactical, because to this day I have no idea what Arena soccer style consists of other than survive and get by. The midfield can't purposely posses the ball to control a match. It could be that Arena hasn't found the right midfield combination, but to be quite frank the US doesn't currently posses any player that can pass above the 85% completion stat. There is hope. Pulisic, Bradley, Nagbe, Acosta and Zusi (if Arena use a 3-5-2 formation and plays him on the right) are good players that can win games. The forwards are great individual players, however, under Arena, there hasn't been a pairing that has worked well together. Woods, Dempsey, Altidore and Morris can all score goals, but just not at a consistent enough rate with one another on the pitch. A lot of this comes down to coaching and Bruce Arena is going to have to figure it out if he wants to have a positive impact at the world cup. These last two games will certainly be a benchmark on where the state of US soccer is at. Under pressure till the end, the usmnt might provide a very dramatic finish in the qualifiers that it will diminish Wood's "historic" goal as a casual last minute goal the US got in Honduras.
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