Barstool’s Semi-Official Preview of USMNT vs Paraguay

Sam's Army6/10/2016 11:24 PM

Sam’s Soccer Safe Space For Stoolies

Hi haters,

Anybody recognize this guy?

Thatttttttttttttttttt’s right, it was our boy Jurgen Klinsmann on Tuesday night. It may be academic at this point but reading between the lines of what Sunil Gulati (USSF president and JK’s boss) said in the run-up to the Costa Rica game, I got the distinct impression that – for the first time in the Klinsmann Era – his job was legitimately on the line. A loss would have meant USMNT was the first team to be eliminated from Copa America, which is bad to begin with but would have been all the more embarrassing since it would have come against a fellow CONCACAF team in a game being played right here on home soil.

But then these happened:

Dempsey starts the party

Jones adds a second

Wood says goodnight

Zusi kicks the dead body

“BRING ON ARGENTINA, AMIRITE?”

Beep, beep, beep, slow down. Before we start S-ing our own D-s let’s take a look at the facts of the situation.

According to the ELO nerds, the win was the USMNT’s best performance under Klinsmann and the 10th best result in the modern era (beginning in 1988)

but that’s just nerds being nerds and I don’t buy it for a second. Nice win? Sure, but Costa Rica – as you might remember from the Copa America preview – was a bit overrated coming in, and there would no excuse for ever losing to them here at home.

[Sidenote: Does that win mean Klinsmann is off the hot-seat? Some people may not want to hear this, but I think his job is now safe even if we lose tonight… hopefully that too will be academic though.]

More importantly than worrying about “how impressive” the win was or was not though is what it did, which is put us in a great position to advance to the knockout stage (essentially) needing only a draw in our third and final group stage game against Paraguay on Saturday.

So let’s start getting our minds right for it…

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USMNT

Kickoff tomorrow is at 6pm CT (note: I double checked it this time), which gives us plenty of time to get nice and lubricated while watching the EURO 2016 action all day. At the moment though I’ve only got a couple hours to get this published and trek my happy ass down to Soldier Field to watch Messi take a magesterial dump on Panama’s face, so let’s do this Q&A style again.

USMNT [+105]
Paraguay [+260]
Draw [+250]

Pop quiz: who remembers what I said about Paraguay in the preview? Yeah, me neither, so I went back and looked and here it was:

Side note: their FIFA ranking has actually fallen in the days since, and presently sits at 44th, while USA’s did as well, dropping to 31st from 29th. I’m not even sure why I keep mentioning that though because those numbers are borderline useless. Sure, a team ranked in the top 10 is better than somebody ranked in the 40s. But is a team in the 30s clearly worse than one in the 20s? Hell no, especially when you factor in things like injuries, suspensions and where the game is being played. Which is a long way of saying nobody should care much about FIFA rankings so let’s move on.

So basically Paraguay sucks?

No. They are a steady, consistent side that doesn’t have any superstars – true to form, nobody on the Paraguayan side has really stood out so far in the tournament (with the exception of one stroke of genius to be mentioned in a moment) – but the entire team will work their asses off and make you earn everything you get. There is no such thing as an easy game against a team from CONMEBOL. Costa Rica stopped giving their all after the second goal and quit altogether after the third. Paraguay will do no such thing. Playing the likes of Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia on the regular means this is a battle tested squad.

Who is worth watching out for?

Dario Lezcano leads their attack, and is most dangerous on set pieces (our specialty!), while you may recognize aging veterans like Roque Santa Cruz and Nelson Valdez. Nobody is all that scary for the most part with the exception perhaps of midfielder Victor Ayala, who has a habit of pulling a golazo out of his ass every so often. Take for example this puppy against Colombia on Tuesday:

Where are they vulnerable?

Paraguay usually plays a defensive 4-5-1 formation. They held Costa Rica to a scoreless draw, which doesn’t look particularly impressive now, but managed to mimic the USMNT’s performance against Colombia, giving up two early goals (the first off a corner kick) then dominating possession without doing too much with it – the big difference, of course, being Ayala’s cheddarbomb. They are not impenetrable though as Colombia showed, and their back line is experienced but slow.

Executive summary: game in game out, you know what you are going to get from Paraguay. Thus, more important than what they bring to the table is…

How will the USMNT come out?

Some of you may recall the final group stage game in the 2014 World Cup against Germany where our starting XI looked like this:

We only need a DRAW to advance (assuming Costa Rica doesn’t spank the bejesus out of Colombia), which will inevitably be in the back of players’ minds going into the game, but playing for a tie is the best way to lose. Klinsmann has said all the right things in the media about going for a win, but he needs to show it with the line-up he puts out there.

Who should be in our starting XI?

This was our starting XI against Costa Rica (as it was for Colombia as well):

This is should be our starting XI against Paraguay:

Goalie is set. Defense is set. There will be a lot of talk about inserting guys like Christian Pulisic and (especially) Darlington Nagbe given the flexibility the latter can provide, but I am okay having them ready to come off the bench as subs – particularly Nagbe if Jermaine-Jones-vs-Colombia rears his ugly head rather than the Jermaine-Jones-vs-Costa-Rica who we all know and love, which should become apparent in the first 10-15 minutes.

4-3-3 or 4-4-2?

This is an important question for a lot of people. Not so much for me. There doesn’t need to be THAT much difference between the two setups if we play it right with Zardes playing more of a hybrid role with more tracking back than might otherwise be expected. (To expand upon that, Bobby Wood has shown he is infinitely more comfortable in the center of the field, which is all well and good and need not get in the way of anybody with Dempsey sagging off and Zardes roaming one side or the other.) If I were to take a guess I’d say that JK will stick with the same starting XI but calls it a 4-4-2.

Should Wondo start?

***

Prediction: USA to win 2-1

Not that I’m biased or anything.

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There you have it. Come getcha whuppin, Paraguay.

Reminder: all sorts of spectacular soccer action will be on your televisions (and computer screens) now that both Copa America and EURO 2016 – FULL PREVIEW HERE – are up and running, so shouts to the soccer gods for these thy gifts, which we are about to receive from thy bounty over the next month or so, Amen.