What is wrong with the United States Men's National Soccer Team?

October 18, 2019

Recently the United States Men's National Team (USMNT) played a FIFA sanctioned, regional tournament game against Canada, and to everyone's shock, lost 2-0.  This result came on the two-year anniversary when the United States was knocked out of qualifying for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia during a rainy evening in Cuavo, Trinidad &Tobago. The US Soccer Federation (USSF) waited for a little over a year to hire their new coach, Greg Berhalter, who happened to be the brother of the Federation's Chief Operating Officer (COO), Jay Berhalter. This hire and the process that chose him was not well received by die-hard fans. If that wasn't troubling enough, the men's team has not climbed out of their rut, and continue a slide into irrelevance.

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The loss to Canada was not what the Federation had expected with the hiring of Greg Berhalter, who was hired to bring about a fresh and improved tactical approach after the October 2018 disaster in Cuavo. It was labeled by American soccer media and fans as the lowest the USMNT has been in years. The state of the men's program is a troubling sign, which is in stark contrast to the women's program, which this past July won their second consecutive FIFA Women's World Cup (and fourth overall) over the past 28 years.  That's pretty amazing.  Why have the women achieved success on a regular basis while the men's golden generation peaked about 10 years ago (the American team's best finish at a men's world cup was in 2002 when they narrowly lost to Germany in the Quarterfinals, after beating regional arch-rival Mexico in the Round of 16)?

Part of it is due to Title IX, the collegiate law that was signed by President Nixon in 1972 to give women opportunities to play and succeed in sports.  The two most popular sports for women were basketball and soccer.  Women were allowed to play competitive soccer through the NCAA and the United States Women's National Teams (USWNT) had a massive head start globally. At the time of the first FIFA Women's World Cup in 1991, very few nations allowed girls to play, and most of the women's national team opponents consisted of amateur and part-time players, who did not train regularly and only received consistent playing time when they attended American universities.  This talent imbalance allowed the US women to dominate subsequent women's World Cups, and Olympic tournaments, which were considered a varsity-type tournament for the women as well (for the men, it was an Under-23 tournament).

Soccer in the United States was an afterthought in America during the 20th century, the lone bright spot being the United States shocking victory over England in the 1950 FIFA World Cup in Brazil.  It was the best World Cup result for the USMNT for many years to come. This was so especially since England invented the game and was a world power and whose football association boycotted the previous three tournaments before World War II.  What was amazing about the victory was the US team was comprised of mostly amateur and semi-pro players.  It remains to this day, one of the greatest triumphs of the men's team.  It wasn't until 1990 that the USMNT qualified again for the World Cup since 1950 after beating Trinidad & Tobago (this country seems to play a major role in the positive and negative trajectory of the USMNT).  That began a run of eight consecutive world cup appearances.

There were ambitious programs to improve the quality of players through the US Soccer Federation's "Project 2010," which was to try and win the FIFA Men's World Cup by 2010. A tad ambitious and arrogant, but it was an attempt at an aspirational path for the USMNT. The goal was to find and give US men's players the tools to be successful on the field, backed by the Federation's resources.  It was a grand plan, but one that was not able to bear fruit in the way the USSF intended.  Some great players came out of that era (1996-2014): Landon Donovan, perhaps America's greatest ever player, Clint Dempsey, goalkeeper Tim Howard, Jozy Altidore, Steve Cherundolo, Eric Wynalda and Brian McBride are just some of the players who represented the United States. These men's players formed the core of the teams that won regional Gold Cups and competed well in World Cups, thereby winning praise for American soccer from the international community.  Now that most of those players have left, USMNT fans are asking what has happened to the talent pipeline?  The recent results have not been promising as to whether the USSF can work with Major League Soccer (MLS) to find, grow and develop talent for the international stage.

I think this is where the problem really lies.  The USSF has a role to play in ensuring that its most talented players are in the best possible situations with the right clubs to grow and develop (for their own career, as well as the national team) and keep an eye on their progress so that the USMNT coach can select the best players to win international competitions. However, most of the heavy lifting needs to be done by MLS clubs and their technical coaches.  "Soccer" countries that win international trophies tend to be successful because the federations of those countries work in harmony with the clubs of their top-flight leagues.  MLS works with the USSF, but primarily to ensure that its marquee players are chosen for national team duty, and then sell those players and the team to sponsors.  The USSF and MLS simply want to make money. Neither seems to have a pressing interest in finding the best talent or trying to recruit great athletes to play soccer.  Most leagues and teams do, but American soccer, on the men's side, is "behind the 8 ball" if you will. They have to make inroads in player development and technical ability since Latin America, the African continent, Asia and Europe are years ahead in terms of talent acquisition and development than in the United States.

The problem is made worse by the cozy, intertwined, and laden with the conflicts-of-interest relationship between US Soccer, MLS and the marketing and licensing arm of the league, Soccer United Marketing (SUM).  It is a relationship based solely on the ability to generate positive revenue streams for MLS, of which US Soccer gets some remuneration for their joint effort. This presents a serious challenge to find soccer players of quality.  MLS has a salary-cap restricted payroll, which means that most teams have a budget of $4.5 million. That is peanuts compared to the mega-club payrolls in rich European leagues.  However, David Beckham's arrival in 2007 ushered in the "Beckham" rule, which allows teams to sign players to incredibly lucrative contracts, of which a tiny portion counts against the salary cap.  The league office promoted this measure so MLS teams can sign superstars or players whose value was too large for a regular contract.  David Beckham (LA Galaxy), Thierry Henry (NY Red Bulls), Carlos Vela (LAFC), and recently, Zlatan Ibrahimović (LA Galaxy) were players who were signed using this provision.

This is all well and good for visibility, and for corporate and television sponsors, but it does not improve the general theme of what ails the USMNT, which is bonafide American soccer talents plying their trade in the United States, or the top leagues in Europe.  Soccer has always been the sport the middle and upper-middle-classes, whose parents put their kids into it when they start playing sports. Eventually, with boys, there are other well-established sports options (basketball, Little League baseball, Pop Warner football, etc.) that pulls some of the most talented boys away from soccer.  If the sport is to find multiple generational talents, it needs to seek out those players in immigrant communities, especially low-income Hispanic and African-American kids who may not have access to travel teams like wealthy children have, nor the means to pay for playing on teams.  It is known as "Pay for Play," and most of the children who benefit from this concept generally come from wealthy (and generally white) communities across America.  For most of these boys, the goal is to receive a soccer scholarship from a university.  Soccer stars who play in Europe play the sport through various club academies and most come from poor communities throughout Latin America, Africa, Asia and parts of Eastern Europe.  If America is to compete with this process, it has to do more to recruit and retain talented soccer players to go through MLS academies and hopefully make contributions for the club's first team.

Big European clubs (Bayern Munich, Manchester United, Manchester City) are setting up offices in the US, and are hoping to attract new fans and find standout soccer players to move to Europe and gain technical coaching that is required to succeed at the highest level.  Does MLS do this enough? They recently forced all clubs in the league to open academies, but because it is free, and due to various labor laws in the United States, they cannot sign star talents until they are at between 16 and 18 years of age.  In some cases, despite the time, money and effort to groom these players to play in MLS, a handful of rich clubs with global appeal sign these kids to move to Europe.  This is a financial loss for the clubs, who lose any chance to recoup their investment in their kids to stay and play in MLS.  The league is not doing enough and must do more to keep star talents in their own backyard.  This is where the war is lost in trying to compete with soccer nations with rich histories, trophies, and legendary players.  The USSF and MLS must do more to get athletic superstars to play their sport, and part of the failure to draw players is the relatively low salaries of MLS, compared to the riches of Europe.

If MLS is not doing enough, then the USSF cannot do much more than what the league is doing, because national team players have to receive quality training from somewhere. I feel that some MLS owners do not care enough, because the passion for the sport is nowhere near what competitive owners in the British Premier League, Spain's La Liga, Italy's Serie A, France's League One or the German Bundesliga do to seek the world's best talents. If even 40% of owners were passionate about the sport, they would be aggressive in their approach (even with the league office itself), to find ways to mine the country for exceptional talent and find financial compensation to keep many of the players in the United States.  Right now, European leagues have the resources to sign the best talent. MLS does not have the cultural cache, brand awareness or loyalty, or provides an incentive to keep players in the league. Until that changes, I do not see the USMNT contending for any international trophies (outside of regional tournaments).  The Federation, MLS teams and owners must care more, and fans of the men's team must demand more, and show their displeasure with their viewership and dollars.  If that doesn't move either the USSF or MLS to make drastic changes, the USMNT will remain in their rut and will fade into a foreseeable irrelevance. That is not something a fan of the team wants to hear.