Free Headers: USA-Canada and Loons updates
Given the prep-aged squad the U.S. Men's National Team brought to this extended international window, maybe it's appropriate that we give them a letter grade. And, for a four-wins-from-four window, you'd have to be a grader from a different generation to hand out anything but an A.
There was nothing on the line, other than bragging rights, but that didn't mean that the game was played in a friendly manner. Canada coach Jesse Marsch thought his team dominated the game, but couldn't create anything; USA coach Mauricio Pochettino said that his team had played like it was a World Cup game.
The form this took was less "high-level soccer" and more "repeatedly smashing into each other." It culminated with Gio Reyna steamrolling Canada midfielder Stephan Eustaqío, sending the latter to the hospital for X-rays on a possible broken collarbone.
It's hard to take a lot away from a team that was playing for the fourth time in two weeks. Everyone is excited about the young players in the squad, but the best player on the field was a "veteran," Alex Freeman. The most notable thing about the lineup was that Reyna was starting a fourth straight game in the window, when four starts has often been a season's worth for him. Cavan Sullivan didn't play, a disappointment for those of us who wanted to say they'd seen the two best players in soccer history* play at Allianz Field.
*Technically, still theoretical.
Pochettino has an old college football coach's talent for speaking at length (and in multiple languages!) without ever really saying anything. You feel sure that you've received profound wisdom, in a Poch press conference, and then when you read the transcript the quotes read like they're out of a warranty for your furnace. Interestingly, Marsch has the opposite problem - everything he says, no matter how hard he tries to be boring, sounds like a gaffe.
The atmosphere was a bit subdued, honestly, for a duel between the USA and Canada. They should have invented a meaningless trophy for the game. The North American Football Union trophy. The Tino Letteri Cup. Something to give it a little more juice, somehow.
Loons injury updates
The unfortunate news, from a Minnesota perspective, from Friday's training session was that Joaquín Pereyra did not participate in the team portion of training, and will miss Saturday's game against Houston. Head coach Cameron Knowles said that next Wednesday's trip to Colorado might end up being a little too soon for Pereyra, too.
Midfielder Peter Stroud is still out as well, and - given how long he's been out - will probably have a longer ramp-up time than Pereyra.
Backup goalkeeper Alec Smir also missed Friday's session, after picking up a lower-body injury on international duty with Jordan. Smir also just had a procedure done on a deviated septum - possibly because he was already hurt anyway - and so he's having a rough week.
Tuesday was also our first chance to talk to new signing Cherrion Valerius, who described himself as "a defender who plays with heart," which is a description that I want more people to use for themselves. Valerius said the coaching staff is telling him he'll fit in at center back, right back, or right wingback, which matches with the scouting report even if his height didn't.
The 21-year-old said this is his first time in the United States, and while he's enjoying it so far, people have been telling him that the weather's about to get worse. "In Holland it will get quite cold, but over here, the snow is like the least thing you can get," he said. "So I'm a little bit scared of what will come next."
This is pretty much par for the course for Minnesotans; we love telling people how bad the winter is. But I think we should all get together and agree that we should stop terrorizing new Loons players. Tell them it'll be fine and they'll love it. Give them a snowmobile jacket and let them borrow your sled. It'll be fine!
Podcast
All this and more is in this week's podcast, which also includes a quiz round that's a sound round without sound. And while we're promoting non-website things, I've been posting a few random videos from training on Instagram, too.
As always, if you're not already signed up, please sign up. It's subscriptions that help me keep going to training and covering soccer in Minnesota.
