NOAH DAVIS - So Jurgen “The Savior” Klinsmann wants to play an attacking style.
That’s great. It really is. How much fun would it be to watch an American squad that presses the initiative, attacks the goal, and generally takes the game to its opponents?
But wanting and doing are two different things.
Alexi Lalas is the champion of the “Has a coach ever said he’d play a defensive style?” line of thinking. And there’s some truth to that argument. No manager is going to start off a press conference talking about staying compact and eeking out wins with unattractive soccer. (Well, maybe no one other than Bob Bradley.)
Klinsmann does seem to want to play aggressively. He’s a forward with an attacking pedigree. Landon Donovan used the “attacking” rhetoric in his comments about the new coach. The rest of the players in camp have echoed those sentiments.
So the will is there. The question is whether that will will become a reality.
We’ll see a bit against Mexico on Wednesday night. A first glimpse at Jurgen’s dream machine. And expect the US to play loose, to play hard, to play fun.
But expect them to lose.
That’s the key here. One loss to Mexico is not a big deal, especially in Klinsmann’s first game. But what if the fast, aggressive style he wants to play produces goals… but a series of defeats.
The United States will revert. And quickly.
I hope it works. I hope the Americans show up, show well, walk away with a win against El Tri and keep posting strong results. But let’s be real. If the best teams in the world struggle to attack, it’s hard to see the US succeeding. That’s not a knock; it’s a reality.
So let’s wait for a few months before we fall all over ourselves praised Klinsmann for injecting his attacking style.
Freedom of speech is an invaluable thing. But so is pragmatism.