American Soccer Weekly Rekrap: New coaches, baseball, and the US Men’s strong statement about USWNT pay

This week the USWNT basked in the glory of qualifying for the Olympics AND got the support of the USMNT in getting paid more. There wasn’t even a sign of an ulterior motive about it at all. Elsewhere, Bruce Arena made the point that fans and **ahem** journalists got it wrong in reacting to just missing the World Cup. The right thing to do was to get over it. He certainly has - thanks for asking.

That AND MORE in the Rekrap this week...

When will the USMNT produce another great goalkeeper?

The USMNT has typically been able to count on a steady and dominant starting goalkeeper. Since Tim Howard retired, there seems to be a first choice keeper - but steady performances haven’t exactly been Zack Steffen’s forte. In addition, Steffen is injured and being checked out by the medical staff back in Manchester. Although Steffen has stepped up, the generation ahead of him hasn’t quite been what Howard was. Brad Guzan, Bill Hamid, and Sean Johnson are quality keepers, but 100% brick walls they are not. While goalkeepers aren’t being developed as successfully goes back to coaching and the steps that the USSF had been taking to bring along new keepers. That’s changing as a new goalkeeping director has taken a position at the federation as detailed by Top Drawer Soccer. In addition to addressing the goalkeeping issue, USSF launched a grassroots Spanish language coaching course as well.

It was dominant - or uneven - but the USWNT are through to the Olympics

Meanwhile, the USWNT breezed through Olympic qualifying with a bit of a bumpy game against Canada. It was dominant, they’re great and showed why the won the World Cup and should be favorites to take Gold in the Olympics. That’s according to SB Nation’s Kim McCauley. Elsewhere on the internet, there’s another version going around - the team isn’t passing well and lacked chemistry in the match. Some of that comes with a new coach but could also be exposed against top teams in Tokyo.

Guy who wants people to get over thing keeps talking about thing

Everyone got it wrong about the thing that Bruce Arena got wrong according to Bruce Arena who is still talking about this for some reason. He wishes everyone would get over it. He’s also written a book about it and did an interview where he talked about it this week. But, seriously folks - get over it.

A statement of support... or self-serving bit of contract negotiation???

Here is a thunderbolt of a statement from the USMNT player’s union about the USWNT pay situation. It’s as strong of a condemnation that has come from the US Men about the ongoing pay dispute. In it they say, “the Federation has been working very hard to sell a false narrative to the public and even to members of Congress. They have been using this false narrative as a weapon against current and former members of the United States Women’s National Team” and go on to note that the women should be making triple what they are now. Seems good, right? Not so fast... Yahoo noted that the men haven’t spoken up in the past - in fact, some sided with the federation because they know economics and supply and demand just like Sunil Gulati does. But it just so happens that their CBA is up for negotiation now and it seems like they might be trying to play to the public to get support for getting more money even though they didn’t qualify for the World Cup.

Clearly, what the USMNT needs is a coach with ideas, fancy European ideas

The Jurgen Klinsmann tenure at Hertha Berlin is over and now all that’s left is to spill the tea. And it spilled. And SBN talked about how Klinsmann is not only a pretty not great coach, but is also a not great salesman of his “I need full control” pitch having been fired from the USMNT and not realizing his goal of leading them to a possible 4th place finish in the World Cup.

If only baseball were more like soccer, there’d be less cheating and more of the America’s pastime that has never had any cheating in it ever

Finally, it’s time that baseball took some real steps to stop cheating in its sport. Like the ones that soccer takes. You know, the ones soccer takes to stop Manchester City from cheating - because they’re for sure going to take those steps.