Pulisic's On Form, Philly Chase the Shield, and Chelsea's Keeper Sees Red

Birmingham were kicking our butt or something.

I can't remember what it was.

We had a good rivalry.

They're talking mad nonsense to me, right?

And I'm like, bro, I'm 40.

I can barely move.

I'm like, what?

You guys are good, but you're not Brazil.

You're Birmingham Legion, bro.

So then I lost it.

And I was like, here's the thing.

I would never sign you.

You're a loser.

Like, I'm just like, I'm giving up.

I'm like losing my mind.

That's so good.

Unfiltered soccer with Landon and Tim, presented by Volkswagen.

Volkswagen has long been a supporter of soccer in America and has proudly been a partner of U.S.

soccer for over five years.

LD, yo, what's happening, my guy?

Yo, yo, yo.

How was your weekend?

Oh, man.

Do you really want to know?

Sure.

My wife went to Boston to have like a not a reunion, but a trip with her old college roommate things.

So guess who was home alone with three kids?

Daddy Daycare.

Dude,

my kids, Tim, you remember these days?

On Sunday, this is not an exaggeration.

My kids had eight sports games.

Eight.

I believe that.

I believe that.

What did you do?

I mean, I was like, it was taxi landing all day.

All day.

My wife's like, how were the games?

I was like, I don't know.

I wasn't even watching.

I couldn't who's going here.

Speaking of sandwiches.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Snacks, the dog, the this.

I was like, geez.

Good for you.

That's funny.

It was actually fun.

Like those, it's fun because you're just zoned in.

Like nothing else matters.

You're like, all right, I'm just dad right now that's right right you have to what about you which why moms are so great i'm always like oh my god i don't know

they rule the world they can just figure it all out uh i was in kansas city which was awesome for uh oh yeah the fan for fan fest yeah so it was such a cool we've done a lot of fan fests and like sometimes they're in the park sometimes they're like uh you know on the steps of town hall or something This was at KC Live.

You obviously stayed against Power and Light or whatever.

Power and Light.

Power and Light is the area.

But then KC Live, I don't know how long ago, they built like, it's all like bars and restaurants.

So it actually creates like an amphitheater style.

It was really cool.

It looks cool.

It looked good.

Super loud.

Yeah.

Really, really, really good fun.

That was fun.

That was awesome.

All right.

Good to be back, guys.

As always, follow us on social media at Unfiltered Soccer.

Subscribe to the show, Apple, Spotify, YouTube.

Leave a review.

Keep following us.

It helps other people find us.

And then you can always email Jordan at feedback at unfilteredsoccer.com.

All right, let's get right in, Timmy, to US MNT on US LNT.

Yep.

Interesting, the latest FIFA rankings came out, and we were talking about this.

That was interesting.

So Spain moved up to number one.

Absolutely deserve it.

The U.S.,

I believe we dropped a spot to 16.

Yeah.

These things are so weird, man.

I remember in 06, because of our performance in 02, we went into the World Cup as the fourth-ranked team.

Did you?

I think it was.

It was such a joke.

Wait, wait, wait.

Say that again?

again because of this.

Because I think we were successful in 2006, and I think we went through qualifying because those two games got sorry, we were so good in 2002.

Yeah.

Going into 06, we were the fourth,

fourth-ranked team.

I know, so stupid.

And

it was just, we just, I just remember saying, like, this is a joke.

Like, this is a joke.

So the U.S.

right now, we are 16th.

Yeah.

Some teams around us.

Germany, 12, Colombia, 13, Mexico, 14, Uruguay, 15, Switzerland, 17, Senegal 18, Japan 19, Denmark 20.

We were saying, Tim, like off the top of my head, I can think of 10, 12, 14 European teams that if you actually just looked at are probably better than we are.

Four or five South American, four or five African, four or five Asian.

So like this is all whatever.

It's just interesting.

I know people kind of get worked up about this stuff, but I don't put much.

Yeah, I mean, I mean,

in short, don't care about the FIFA rankings.

Because again, I look at Panama with all due respect to Panama at 29.

You just said it.

I mean, I could probably rattle off 15 European teams, you know, as you mentioned, a couple of African teams, definitely a handful of South American teams who are all better than Panama and probably gets me over at least 30.

The good thing for our U.S.

men, which I'm happy about, is I don't know if this is the same, but there'll be something in their collective bargaining agreement where

the higher ranked you are

on a given day or going into a given game, if you win that game, you then

get more money.

So, yeah,

that's what I would care about.

Our guys are on that.

Continue then.

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

That's about it on that.

All right.

So, let's talk about some individual performances over the weekend.

So, have to start with Christian Pulisic.

What a game he had.

They were away to, I forget,

Udenese.

two goals, an assist.

He was, he was like, that's the Christian everyone loves to see.

Sure.

He was really after it from the beginning.

He, this is a wild stat to him.

After his two goals, he now has 59 goals while playing for Dortmund, Chelsea, and Milan.

He surpassed Deuce, Clint Dempsey, and Roy Wagerly for the most by a U.S.

men's national team ever while playing in Europe's top five leagues.

Yeah.

Incredible.

That's incredible.

And he's, by the way, he's 26, seven.

Yeah.

And he'll continue to smash that record.

I mean, you know, he'll probably get to, I would think, at least 100.

Yeah, he told us in the summer, or he told the world in the summer, when he plays, he scores.

So

not

surprising.

He's obviously the top player and best player the U.S.

has.

Yeah, he continues to do it on the club level, which is.

And yeah, we need that form

continuing.

And then we need that, obviously, for the national team, right?

So he's he's he's well on his way to getting back in full form and and we need that to continue definitely um malik tillman went to lever kuzin in the summer there were some questions is that jump too big for him doesn't look like it he scored his second goal of the season now for leverkuzen and he's off to a good start so that's important for him the thing about you know the the one thing that i thought about with with tillman is

it's great that he he's a good player so i i wasn't surprised that he would find his his feet.

The one thing that I worried about with the whole 10 hog saga is

he was brought, you know, what a lot of people don't quite get is like, like

you're landing down and you're at the galaxy.

They could bring in 10 coaches.

Your position is not under threat.

You're playing.

Right.

And what happens in Europe is if you get brought in with a 10 hog, maybe the sporting director brought him in, but 10 hog was part of that regime.

He would have signed off on that.

As soon as 10 hog gets sacked, by the the way, all bets are off.

The next coach that comes in when you play for a European club in a top four or five league, they might look at you and go, yeah, I like it.

Or oftentimes, no, not part of my plan, particularly in the attacking areas.

They're like, oh, no, I'll bring in my own guy.

So the fact that, obviously, it's outside the window, but the fact that he's playing, being selected and playing well under the new manager is a big thing.

It's a huge thing.

So I agree.

Yeah, I'm glad he's off to a good start.

Tanner Tessman scored the winning goal for Leon on Friday.

It feels like the ship has sailed a little with him because Pochatino was so high on him at first.

And then over the summer, he didn't get called in.

And it feels like other guys are just moving ahead of him.

It's going to be interesting to follow.

I mean, this camp, and we'll get into this more as the next camp comes in October, but from what I heard internally and a little bit externally,

That September camp, the Japan-South Korea games, were the last time Pochatino was quote looking and evaluating players.

And I know we've heard that, but like,

but now this camp is like, this is all our guys, and this is what we're riding with.

Okay.

So it's going to be interesting to see a guy like Tampa Tessman.

But that being said,

there's still a lot of experimentation, a lot of balls getting juggled in the air.

Like he might, is it, is there a possibility you said Poch really liked him, didn't call him in the summer, didn't call him in September.

He really liked him.

Does that mean, does that mean he was evaluating other talent outside?

Well, yeah, it could have been.

That's what he said about Weston, right?

We know Weston.

We know what we're getting.

They know Tessman.

They saw him a bunch.

So I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know.

We'll see because I'm confused.

Okay, so there was some concerning

news or

thoughts around Jedi Anthony Robinson didn't play,

didn't dress for full this weekend.

And it was weird, Tim.

He came off the summer.

He played, I think, 28 minutes in his first game back, 23 minutes.

Then he was on the bench, but didn't dress.

I'm sorry.

He was on the bench, but dressed.

And then in his next game this weekend, he didn't dress at all.

So the first thoughts were like, is this, this can't be a selection thing, right?

He's been the captain.

He's, he's a leader of the team.

He's, of course, they're going to have him on the bench.

But we did just an hour ago, we got some news from his manager, Marco Silva.

He said,

it's not an injury setback.

He's come from a surgery and he's a player who needs to be in physical conditions almost perfect because this game comes from his athleticism and all that stuff.

We're going to have another session before the game.

And after that, we're going to take a decision on Jedi.

Probably it's going to be Jedi in contention for the game.

That was our aim before the Brentford game, to give him some more days to keep working on his fitness and all of that stuff, his confidence, and to be able to try to have as many minutes as he can tomorrow.

So it's a chance for him tomorrow, he's saying, to play in the Care About Cup.

So I guess that's, I don't know if that's good or bad.

No, I mean, I take that.

I guess I trust that.

I think he's

such a big part of Marco Silva's team and them having success that I, yeah, that doesn't, that sounds about right.

Yeah, okay.

So I guess it's good it wasn't a selection decision, or at least

on the surface, what he's saying, it's not a selection decision, but let's hope it's not serious because, you know, coming off a knee surgery, you need to want to make sure that's good for him.

Yep.

Okay.

All right, let's move into the attacking players.

So

it was a good weekend for national team strikers.

So, well.

Ricardo Pepe had a hell of a week.

So in the Champions League, he had a rough outing.

He gave away a penalty, gave away a pass for a goal, but he did come back and he scored two goals

back in the Ardivizier in his start for PSV.

So that was good.

Ajamang

had a really positive performance in his debut for Derby and

got praised from his manager.

Almost scored a goal.

Haji Wright is now tied for the lead in goal score in the championship with, of course, Josh Sargent.

So

those have been good developments

as the strikers go.

Again, this camp is going to be so fascinating to see who gets called in now, right?

It's going to be really fascinating.

And as we get closer, we can dig into that more.

But it was a good week overall for the strikers.

No, I think that you look at

Ricardo Pepe is so funny because I obviously really like him, but

it made me think back to my playing days when like strikers,

they're so irresponsible

in their own penalty area.

And I can just remember saying to people like, strikers, mate, go away.

Go away.

We're actually better defending down a man without you in the box because the things they do, they dangle a leg.

They get the wrong side of a player.

You're like, this is not meant for you.

Yeah, no, I think, I mean, when I look at Pepe, Ajamang,

Haji Wright, whether it's Sergeant who comes in or obviously Flo,

there's some, you know, some decent firepower there.

If one of them can get going, if having them all in together kind of iron sharpens iron and gets a fire lit under some of these guys um not that they're not motivated but to to be scoring on a regular basis like that's going to be a huge thing as we move into october november to your point about uh strikers being irresponsible so it was my probably my third or fourth mls game ever 2001 i'm 19.

we're playing away to colorado back at uh whatever they call invesco at

big stadium i swear to him i'm not joking.

There were 1,100 people in the stands.

It was a 75,000 C stadium.

So I get a ball.

I come like deep into the midfield to receive a ball and I take a touch and I try to play this like clever ball out to the left fullback with the outside of my right foot.

And I like mishit it and it rolls right to somebody on their team.

And now they're like 2v1 running at our goal.

They roll a ball to John Spencer.

He takes a touch and buries it.

And I was like,

oh my God.

And I vowed to myself, one, I'm never coming that deep again, ever, for no reason.

And two, I'm never trying anything that stupid.

Like, I will just kick the hell out of my body.

Because you learn that lesson once and you're like, nope, totally.

I ain't going to feel that again.

I can literally remember having conversations with managers and saying, like, you know, you'd set up and then you'd have a striker.

And you obviously have to use all of 11 players sometimes.

Like, but you'd have to use your striker doing something.

And I can remember saying to managers, like, Geffrey, he doesn't even want to be in the box.

Like, why are we, why are we asking him to defend the near post?

Like, he doesn't want to be here.

Can we get him up to pitch?

It's amazing.

All right.

So we'll keep following every week with the national team players.

But I would say overall, a good week.

The Jedi Robinson is Jedi Robinson thing, a little concerning, but let's hope he's back and playing well.

All right.

So Andrew, producer, wanted to have some fun with us.

So we do not know any of these answers, just for the record.

So last week, EA Sports released this year's FC26 game.

My kids love this game.

Do they?

God, they're on it all the time.

And they released, I'm sorry they didn't release the game they released the player ratings all right so we're gonna have some a little trivia here

who is the highest rated u.s men's national team player

you go first

andrew will you put it in the chat right away overall well it has to be christian palising it i i think we both agree it's christian has to be okay where are the

84 overall there we go okay all right the one for one yeah there are four american men with overall ratings above 80.

Can you name them?

Yes, I can.

Okay, go ahead.

So Palisic, right?

Yep.

Chris Richards.

Good shout.

I agree with that.

Anthony Robinson?

I agree with that.

Kyler Adams.

That's easy.

I nailed that for sure.

Do you disagree with that?

No, I agree.

I mean, yeah,

the game is going to have...

No, I think the game is going to have, depending on when they did it, I think that's what the game will have.

No Richards and no Adams.

Nah, come on, man.

No Adams.

What about Malik Tillman?

It'd be Timothy Weea.

Malik Tillman, yes.

You got Tim Weya?

No Wea.

No Wea.

That's actually funny.

Wait a minute.

Wait a minute.

Wait a minute.

Tyler Adams, bro.

The guy who plays every single week in the Premier League.

I don't know.

Do me a favor.

Come on.

Josh Sargent.

No, that's not.

So who do we have?

Square's a bunch of goals.

Pulisic?

Tillman.

Tillman.

Jedi.

Johnny Cardoso.

Oh, that makes sense.

I mean, the guy plays every week in Spain.

No, he's athletico.

All right, fair enough.

Okay.

We were.

Which, all right, this is for you.

Which U.S.

men's national team goalkeeper has the highest overall rating?

It's not freeze, you know, because...

No, it's not.

Because

again, I don't know when the game...

It'll be Turner.

Has to be Matt Turner.

Correct.

Okay, good.

Okay, good.

Which center back has the highest overall rating?

We thought Richards would be in the top four, but he wasn't.

Well, no, but overall, overall, it has to be, it'll be Chris Richards.

I would think so.

Yeah.

Nope, not Chris Richards.

Cameron Carter Vickers.

He's in my lineup, dude.

He's in my lineup.

By the way.

I like CCV.

I think he's going to be.

I know, I know you do.

Yeah, and I do.

Who makes these things?

That's the bigger question.

Maybe we should have that person on.

I don't know.

What a role that must be, huh?

Can you imagine all the hate you get?

Okay, both men again, among both.

Let's try that again.

Try it again.

Okay, among both men and women, who is the highest-rated American overall?

U.S.

men.

So the highest-rated is Christian

for the men, and he is an 84.

Yeah.

Because we just get crapped on, by the way.

He's so much better than an 84.

The women would be Trin Rodman.

Yeah.

Or Soph Smith.

I'm going to say Trin.

Oh, Soph, 88.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There you go.

So sorry, Soph Wilson.

Sorry, Soph.

Okay, I agree with that.

Okay, who is the highest rated MLS player?

Gee, let me tell you.

Do we have to guess?

All right, Messi.

What's he like?

He's like 107.

he's a 99.9

86 huh all right someone's getting in trouble we're getting the can you guys work on getting the person or people at ea who make these ratings it's the same people who do the fifa rankings yeah

same algorithm last one there are six mls players with ratings of 80 or better can you name them

six players it's a lot with it's a lot or there's only six i'm surprised no i thought six would be a lot of 80 eight out of 10 a B minus?

Come on.

I'm just.

Well, to be a 90, you got to be, you got to get, you got to be like.

All right.

Well, Andrew just put in the top-rated players in the game have a 91.

That's Mosala, Kilina Mbappe, Alexia Puteas, and Aitana Bonmati.

God, she's good.

Okay, so those are 91s.

Okay, so that's a good reference.

That's what I'm saying.

So above 80, you have Messi.

Yep.

You have Sun.

You have Tomas Mullah still?

What?

No?

Maybe.

I think Denny Blonga should be.

Yeah, yeah, Blonga for me.

One, two, three, four.

Yeah.

Dryer?

He should be.

I bet he's not.

Who else would be

who are the big DPs?

How many of me?

Six.

Evander?

Messy Sunloar

are correct.

Bawonga apparently is not.

Bawonga's not.

You think Lozano?

No.

Chuki, no.

What about the kid from Atlanta, the striker?

Late la.

Oh, Latela?

I wonder if he is.

Nope.

Is it, is what's his name?

Suarez?

It's Suarez?

Luis Suarez?

Oh, what about Busquetz or Jordi Alba?

We're just chucking all the money, all of my own.

Busquets is in.

Okay, that's four.

Six.

What about Gabrielle Peck?

Oh, what about my guy?

Ricky Pooge.

It might be.

He might be.

He might be.

Ricky Pooge is in.

Let's go.

Ring the bell.

Ring the bell.

Landon said Ricky Pooj.

Rodrigo DePaul.

That's the other one.

Oh, yeah.

Okay.

All right.

So, Messi, son, Rodrigo DePaul, Tomas Mula, Ricky Pooge, and Sergio Busquet.

Okay, interesting.

All right, that was fun.

I kind of enjoyed that trivia, Andrew.

Good job.

All right, Tim, let's take a quick break.

When we come back, we'll talk MLS and Premier League right here on Unfiltered Soccer with Landon and Tim.

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All right, let's transition into MLS.

So, all the headlines this week are around the supportership race.

There are some playoff races that are interesting too.

But so, Atlanta draw at home with San Diego FC, who are in the uh

in contention in third place with 57 points.

Uh, Understreyer scored again, by the way.

I know.

Philly beat New England 1-0.

Uh, they are top of the table with 60.

Can we digress real quick, Tim?

Sure.

This

7-0 beating Philly took.

We're not digressing.

We need to talk about it.

This is wild.

I know they rotated their squad a little, but I have, Tim, I've been a part of a lot of really good teams, a lot of bad teams too.

A really good team never, ever, ever loses 7-0, ever.

And I just can't figure, like, that tells me you just quit in the game.

And Tim, you and I have been in plenty of games where you're like down 3-0 after 20 minutes and you go guys

this is not going to be four or five or six like three nothing is fine we're not we don't have it today let's make sure it's three nothing yeah right like forget about getting back in the game and all that but like once i said this in our production call i said yeah we're not doing that i i i we had this in our production call and i and i made the point where like

to the outside it might actually like be a foreign concept but like you and i have been there where you start getting pumped like three nil before halftime right And you see like guys coming together and like, and like having a conversation.

And I think the outside world is probably like, yeah, they're giving each other a rah ride.

Like, how do I get back in this?

And I've been in those moments and guys are literally looking at each other and going, like, she,

we, this, this stays 3-0.

Like it does, it doesn't go to four.

It doesn't go to five.

There's absolutely zero conversation about how do we get back into this game.

It's actually, this cannot, we, we cannot let this go to four or five.

Like, and then the game, like the game's dead at that point.

It's dead.

So, and you know, sometimes you have those days.

It's such a funny conversation.

I just don't.

I, I mean, I don't know if it was lack of leadership.

I mean, Badoya started the game, so you would have thought at some point he said something, but

whatever, they flushed it away and they beat New England.

So, they're still top of those standing.

So, if you know, all's well, that ends well.

But that was just, that was such a bizarre result.

So, so, so, two things about the supporter shield and obviously, like,

MVP.

So, Dreyer, you and I have had this conversation on record.

So, Dreyer right now has

15 goals and 16 assists.

Messi has 22 and 10, right?

I had said, like, if Dreyer, what did I say?

If Dreyer gets like 20 and 15 and they win a supporter shield, he has.

I mean, I don't know if he'll get 20.

He might, he, uh, he won't.

He only has three games, though.

Yeah.

So if they win a supporter shield, he has to win MVP, surely.

Don't forget.

Messi is a God, right?

But like.

How do they vote on the MVP, by the way?

That I'm not sure.

Who has a vote?

I have no idea.

I tell you, I can tell you who has a vote.

I know that.

I was just thinking the same thing.

And it's not a vote, it's the vote.

Yeah.

I think there's one vote.

Okay.

Well, so the supporter shield thing, right?

I'm looking at it and

Vancouver.

Where are my notes?

Vancouver has two games in hand.

Yeah.

I think

53.

And then they're on 55.

Two games in hand.

If they win, win, they win both of those.

They would go top.

They would go top.

They're on 52 points.

So they would.

They have three in hand.

They have three in hand.

So they'd be joint.

I have a feeling which goes against everything I said preseason.

I think Vancouver is going to win the Supreme Shield.

Am I crazy?

No.

It's going to be tight.

It's going to go down to last weekend.

Yeah, which is fun.

I mean, ideally, and this is what's good about now, the Supporter shield and the playoff race is both parts of the table you're looking at with interest, right?

So, hopefully, there's meaningful games across the board because that's what that's what we really want.

All right, Timmy, that brings us to the time for our unfiltered refresh, sponsored as always by Coors Light.

Choose Chill, get Coors Light delivered, go to coreslight.com/slash US L N T.

All right, man.

In MLS this weekend, who chose Chill?

It can only be one.

Yeah, Matty Freeze.

Yep.

Matty Freeze at NYCFC.

He signed a new contract extension through 2030.

Congratulations.

Get paid.

Get paid, bro.

That's a nice long contract.

Oh, by the way, he saved another penalty kick this weekend as well, because as he says from his own mouth, it's what he does,

which is incredible.

So I'm starting to believe that that's what he does.

Look, I'm glad he got paid.

It's actually the right time.

I I think he's earned it.

There's a good chance or as good a chance as any that he'll be number one at the World Cup.

Smart by them because

if he then gets sold on or has a good World Cup or whatever the situation is, they'll be compensated on the back end for that.

Right.

And for Matt, this will give him.

Really good stability, I'm guessing.

I haven't seen the exact numbers yet, but it'll give him good financial stability moving forward.

And then again, protects the club because he's on the rise.

right?

And there's not a ton of good goalkeepers out there in the world.

And if he's on the world stage playing and does well,

people are going to be interested.

So I think it's a great thing.

I love this in MLS now because the league has now morphed to, in the past, they would say, oh, yeah, well.

You're a good goalkeeper.

You're playing for the national team now, but we have you under contract for X number of years.

So you're just going to, and it's like, no, no, no, that's not how the world.

If a guy does well, you reward him.

And look, it's smart business by NYCFC.

If he blows up, if he has a Tim Howard tournament or game like he did in 2014 against Belgium, like the world's his oyster and they can sell him for a lot of money.

So it's great for him.

The penalty was Wilfried Zaha learned that that's what Matt Fries does.

But more than that, I'm just happy that a guy is getting rewarded in the right way.

And kudos to NYCFC for taking care of a player who's been good to them.

And look,

neither of us expected this to happen for him to be the national team goalkeeper.

Right now, it's his spot to lose.

Absolutely.

So we'll see how this unfolds.

But congrats, Matty Ice.

Cheers to you.

Oh, wait.

Matty Ice is taken.

Maddie Ice has taken.

Okay.

Matty cheers to you, man.

Good job, choosing.

Chill.

Okay, let's transition to the Premier League.

So you were at FanFest in Kansas City.

There were some really good games this weekend, some under the radar games, but we'll focus on the three big ones.

So the first, Arsenal City, which ended up being the,

not the last, Arsenal City finished 1-1.

Yeah, it was the last game of the weekend, wasn't it?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Arsenal City finished 1-1.

City, this was really interesting for me to watch Tim because City were basically doing what Arsenal have been doing now.

And Pep, I mean, at one point, I think they had five center backs on the field.

Pep was just like, ah, Holland off.

They had to sub, I think they took, did they take Doku off at the end?

I don't know if they subbed him off.

No, I thought he maybe was going to come off.

Anyway, he was just like, Doku was playing as a lone striker and he was just trying to pack it in and basically do what Arteta's been doing.

In the end, it didn't work because of

a

good goal by Arsenal.

Martin,

yeah.

Well, I just think

I used to think Pep Oriola had like a coach's office.

He has just like a laboratory.

He's a mad scientist.

Like, just when you think he's not going to change,

how does he do something different?

He comes into this game and he basically goes, we're going to essentially concede possession.

We're going to sit behind the ball.

Like it was so,

and by the way, he named the

third straight same lineup,

which I don't think he's ever done before, certainly not at Citi.

So like,

like, he's, he's doing things that you're like, well, Pep doesn't normally do that, right?

So he's always like, he's such a counterpuncher.

Just when you think, like, I got this guy sorted out, we know what he's gonna do he goes nah we're gonna come sit behind the ball when's the last time they did that so do you think he does it tim let me just do you think he does it this is gonna be sound like a weird question

because he really believes that's the best way to win and i know that's a dumb thing to say or is he sometimes just like you know what let's just try to do something different so he can just like be different

Good question.

That's a dumb question.

No, no, it's a good question.

I think he spoke in his book.

I can't remember.

Was it, was it, it was either with Barca, I think think it was with Barca or Byron Mini.

But anyway, he went into the Champions League final and he made it, and he made it, he convinced himself he needed to make a tactical adjustment and he did and he lost.

And he remembers like somewhat second guessing himself.

He said, I'm never going to do that again.

I just think with

when I had Roberto Martinez at Everton, he was brilliant.

because

every game he did something different.

Now, it was in in the overall scope, Landon.

So we have like,

he would never run us out and be like, you guys played really well against Arsenal last week.

We're going to do the same thing.

He would say,

position is the same.

It's the same team we're putting out.

But today, we're going to let so-and-so roam free, and then you're going to pull off into the left space every time.

And it was just one minor tweak.

But for him, in his mind, it was such a tactical genius that he had to, he couldn't let things stay the same.

So I do think Pep,

maybe he, I mean, listen, he's had so much success.

There might be an argument where like, yeah, I'm just getting bored.

I'm going to flip a coin here.

That's what I'm saying.

But I doubt that.

I think there's, I think he's so far above everyone else that he, he has to tinker because

he knows he can.

And I think, I, I, I, I just think he, and he always has to freshen things up, right?

Because

anyway, it worked.

Well, essentially it worked.

I think there was tired legs and Martinelli.

Um, it was a, you know, there's a, that's a good little rivalry that we have, a big rivalry that we have in the Premier League.

I was thinking this in the moment.

Should Don Aruma do better there?

Like, he's, he's out in no man's land, right?

So,

and we'll get on to this with Robert Sanchez in the other game as well.

Um, Donna Ruma

because he comes off his line and he's just stuck.

I mean, there's nothing you can do at this point.

I think what ends up happening is you

get like, you know, this as well.

At the highest level, windows open and close really quickly.

So as you progress through the levels of football, you have time to do things.

When you get to the highest, highest level, the World Cup, Premier League, Bundesliga, whatever,

you don't have time to react.

If you even think you might react in a certain way and don't do it, you get punished, right?

And so I think when that ball, when that Martinelli is so fast, obviously Donna Ruma, one of the best in the world, he knows his personnel.

Martinelli's so fast, that Man City line was so high, right?

He's thinking, there's only one winner here, right?

Which is going to be Martinelli.

I have to hopefully,

his first step would have been to advance, and he did.

And then in an instant, that ball is on Martinelli's toe.

So he probably shouldn't come.

But if you're reading the situation from behind like he was, you're thinking this ball, I have to come for this ball.

Hopefully it skips through.

So you would have come as well.

You would have come for that ball as well.

Possibly.

I don't think the positioning was horrific.

I think it ended up

looking bad.

But look, I'll get back to this with Robert Sanchez.

I do think there's

because of the way the ball was, and it was a long ball and it was a lot of distance.

I would have, I normally live by the creed that you have to let your defenders defend.

Right.

Like if they're cooked, they're cooked.

But if they even have an inkling that they can recover, you have to try and let them recover.

But yeah,

I don't think it was terrific.

I think there's, I think it's more of a really good arsenal goal as opposed to like horrific goalkeeping.

So let me give you from Martinelli's standpoint.

Yeah.

So I always always use this phrase, Tim, I always wanted the goalie to make up my mind for me.

Sure.

And in that moment, Donnaruma makes up Martinelli's mind because when he's running onto, I can promise you, as he's running onto that ball, his first thought before he looks at Donaruma is not, I'm going to lift this over.

His first thought is, I got to get there.

I've got a defender tracking me.

I got to hold him off.

Where's my next touch?

And he looks up and he goes, oh, shit.

where Donaruma is.

This is easy.

And you just flick it over his head.

So I think Bruce always used to say, and this is true, time favors the defense.

So if he has to take a touch and take another touch and he's got a defender closing, that's a much harder finish than just flicking it over, don't arum.

And so look,

I don't know if that's a good thing.

No, he takes that fault or not, but I'm just saying he made up his mind for him and it made it easy.

And anytime a goalkeeper made up their mind, made up my mind for him, it was like, dang, you're going to get punished.

Okay, let's move on to Liverpool Everton.

Tough one.

We have to talk about it, though.

They'd won their, Liverpool had won their four previous league matches and their Champions League match with goals after the 80th minute.

Um, they won this game a little more comfortably, but let's just dig in.

Is that like as when teams do that,

sometimes people are like, wow, what a lucky stretch or what a lucky run!

Or, you know, what's your opinion on teams winning games that late?

And I have a thought on it too.

Well, I listened to Slot in his presser, and and or it was maybe it was post post-match or something.

and no he was asked about he just said look we we are we are fit we are fitter than than a lot of other teams and we're willing to run to the end and so what i think happens is it becomes this like continuum of i think they're winning there's a lot of luck involved when you win that late but i think they're they are willing to

they're just fitter than some of these other teams are willing to run harder and longer and then what happens, and you know this, right?

Then what ends up happening,

if you score, if you score enough times

at the end, you then believe you can, right?

Like

if you're on a team that doesn't score late or hasn't scored a late goal in six months, you're like, I don't know if we hope we can, but I can guarantee you Liverpool is saying,

just keep going.

We're going to get this.

And I'll give you a small example of this.

In my time, I went through that.

I was at Everton 10 years.

There was this really long time landon where i don't know five six seven years where we always won at west ham the old uptark right and so it became this like not not running joke but no matter what the score was we'd go in at halftime and go guys relax we know we'll win and literally you get 22 guys going yeah because we did all we did was win at Upton Park.

And so you start believing.

And so Liverpool just believes they can win at the end.

Like it's become a trait of theirs.

Yep.

It becomes habitual and losing does too.

And there are also times where you'd be like,

you concede in the first 15 minutes of seven straight games and you're just convinced.

You know what I mean?

And it's just a weird thing.

But there's also a piece, people,

teams that are dominant in possession and dominant in the flow of the game.

Over time, there's this idea that you just break teams down and wear teams down.

Every team will come into a Liverpool match or a city match or whatever and say, look, just keep everything in front of us.

Stay tight.

We've worked on it all week.

This is how we're going to defend.

That's all great.

But when you get into the 60th minute, the 70th minute, you're tired.

There's new guys on the field.

The pressure is just mounting.

You're in, you know, you're going against the cop end or the cop ends behind you.

And you're just, all of a sudden, it just feels like the world's crumbling on you.

And we used to say this at Loyal.

Sick jersey, by the way.

Baseball jersey.

We used to win a lot of games late, too, because we would always have 60, 65% of the ball, and you would just wear teams out.

They were just running, running.

We had a guy on our team, Tumi Moshoban, who we would say to him, look,

you're going to score a lot of goals coming off the bench because teams are worn down and you have energy.

And at first, players are like, yeah, right, you just don't want to start me, you know, whatever.

And then he went through a year.

I think he scored 10 goals and I think six or seven were off the bench.

And then you can start telling that story.

And so with Liverpool, like they just know now, like, look, whoever it is, if it's Isak, if it's Ekatike,

whoever's coming in, you're going to get big chances and we're going to score late.

And it's become, it's become a habit.

And, and I don't think it's,

I don't think it's fortune.

I think they're creating it.

Yeah, they are.

They really do.

And, and, and the Darby was good.

It was a good one.

Um, you know, I think from Everton's standpoint, you know, the, the goal, you know, Jack, it's what you want.

You want Jack Grealish lined up one-on-one with his defender on an island, and he does the business, gets a crossover.

Uh, Illiman NJ,

lovely little setup, um, for Idrisa Ganagay.

So, like, that, those connections are starting to happen.

And ultimately, they got spread because Liverpool outnumbered

Everton in the midfield, which then meant they were always late to get pressure.

And then when you're late to get pressure, you start getting spread out.

And that's kind of how the goals came.

They were just spread out.

And that's very unusual for Everton because one of the things they are really good at is being very compact and stout and stodgy on the edge of their box.

They don't allow really good opportunities.

So,

yeah, unfortunately, it happened for them in the Derby.

But

overall, it was well well played.

Yeah.

And then last one,

United Chelsea.

This was a fascinating game.

So I walked away.

I was doing stuff in the house.

Again, I had all three kids at home by myself.

And I walk in at like the eighth or ninth minute, and I just see United pummeling Chelsea.

I mean, they've got them pinned in.

And I'm like, God, I haven't seen this from United.

Like, I was not expecting, I was expecting the opposite.

And I'm watching, watching.

And then I go to my phone on FOTMOB and it's like the 30th minute.

And I look and then I realize United had a a red card or Chelsea had a red card.

And I was like, oh, now it makes sense.

So can you walk people through?

So Robert Sanchez comes off his line and

makes a really bad decision.

Sure.

Can you just, yeah, because it's similar to the Donnaruma.

It's not as, Donnaruma's not as egregious in that moment.

So what are you thinking in that moment?

Ball gets flicked on.

Right.

And it's coming at you.

It's got pace.

It's skipping.

forwards running at you.

So, you know, to paint the picture for the audience, so the

the striker goes up shesko and he flicks it on so there's a there's a center back and a shesko and he flicks it on which means mbumo runs through and there's two recovering chelsea defenders not the defender who the center back who was up against shesco but fafana on the on the right hand side and then i don't remember the other defender who was chasing mbumo and sanchez makes the decision to not only unlike Don Ruma, to come to advance, but fully advance.

So he's outside the box.

So there's going to be a coming together.

There's going to be a challenge.

And he's completely late and gets himself sent off.

And this is a perfect moment where I say,

you have to read the situation, which he clearly read it wrong, and allow your defenders to defend.

What do I mean by that?

His defenders were second best, right?

His defenders were second best.

But given the distance, And by the way, it's chucking it down in Manchester.

It's like, I mean, it's pouring, right?

So now the flick on, and I think maybe Mbumo's first touch, just by nature, he's having to like touch it.

But the ball, and you know, this is a striker, the ball is still like knee-high-ish, like as he's running the ball.

So he has to take, he probably has to take,

I think the collision was like 25 yards out from the goal.

He still probably has to take one to two more touches.

Yeah.

And maybe the second touch is a finish, but he has to take one or two more touches.

And I'm just thinking, even though his defenders are in a recovery position, I think they just get there.

I think they just get there and probably put him off.

If nothing else, two defenders converge.

If your goalkeeper comes probably to the penalty spot and spreads and he gets beat one and he gets beat, no problem.

You can accept that.

But in the end, and this is the problem, hindsight's 2020.

As a goalkeeper, when you make that decision, it's all or nothing.

And he got nothing.

So he gets himself sent off.

But I think you have to let your defenders defend as much as humanly possible up until the danger moment, which is probably like

18-yard box penalty or

penalty spot.

Anytime I see a red card or a penalty, right, or both, my thought is, you know, when I was coaching, you start to go into just the data around it because you're like,

how valuable is being up a man for a team?

Or how unvaluable is it for.

being down or how valuable is a penalty and and the conclusion you come to is 999 times out of a thousand, you should never get sent off in those moments.

And 999 times out of a thousand, you should never give up a penalty.

And the reason why is if Mbumo goes by him and he doesn't touch him,

maybe the defender gets there, maybe, but the chance, the XG on the chance is not as high as people think if the defender's there, right?

Your chances of winning the match down a man are significantly worse than being down a goal.

Sure.

Right.

So we agree.

Even if he scores, fine, he scores, but you still have plenty of time to get back in the once you get sent off, even if it's zero-zero, your chances of winning the game go way

even getting anything.

Yeah, but you're, yeah, we agree on that.

I think, but the

human nature element of it, like the decision-making of it.

No, Tim, I understand that.

But what I'm saying is, if you beat that into a player's head, never give away a red card in that moment.

Never.

It's not worth it.

Never give away a penalty.

Sometimes penalties happen.

It hits your hand or whatever.

Don't go sliding in ever because his XG from scoring from that eight yards is 0.45.

A penalty is 0.75.

Right.

So they're just just, if you just look at, and I'm not like a data nerd, trust me.

I'm like, no, I know this thing.

But if you just look at it that way, you say you should never, ever do that.

You should never do it.

The one exception was like Luis Suarez in the World Cup, the handball, and like it ended up working out.

But at the time, you could still say it was dumb until they missed the penalty.

I just don't know.

I hear you.

You can maybe train that into players, but I still think it's.

I think.

Well, of course, players are going to ultimately make the decision in the moment.

I get that.

But I'm just saying, if you can beat that into their head,

I think it's valuable.

Yeah.

All right, Timmy.

Let's take a quick break.

When we come back, we will get into all the questions in the ATT fan connection right here on Unfiltered Soccer with Landon and Tim.

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It's time for the fan connection presented by ATT.

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LD, you know what time it is?

Yes, sir.

It's the ATT Fan Connection, where we get to

hear from our fans both good and bad all the all the fun stuff we answer your questions and uh it's also an opportunity for jordan to make her weekly appearance which she loves jordan welcome in hello your hair

it's amazing thank you i'm so jealous and

the color that's amazing wait can we can we talk about my shirt for a second

mcr so we are recording this on monday and this morning they announced a new U.S.

tour for next year.

Where are they going?

Are they going to San Diego?

They are.

They are.

They are going to be on the street.

Are we doing a live podcast?

Are we doing a live podcast from the state?

No, we're not doing a live podcast.

They are also, Tim, for you and me, for the actual MCR fans.

They're playing City Field.

So

they are also playing at Anfield.

You're going to go?

They're playing in the middle of the World Cup.

That's a convergence of two of your favorite things in the world.

Yeah, it's like a Venn diagram.

It's just a big circle, and it's a picture of me.

Out of curiosity, where did they play in San Diego?

At Petco?

I can't believe they saw these stadiums.

I feel like

maybe, let's see, San Diego, Petco Park.

Yeah, Petco Park.

Yeah.

No, but I don't see

them as like a selling out baseball stadium.

The Alamo Dome in San Diego.

San Antonio.

I keep that thing still standing.

They're playing like three or four nights in the Hollywood Bowl.

Oh, Hollywood Bowl is cool.

right?

Cool.

Uh, okay, let's talk about soccer, though.

That's what we're really here for.

I have some questions for you guys.

Um, okay, this one's from Mike via Instagram.

Who you got in the USL Cup final, fellas?

Hartford Athletic is super informed, and I don't see anybody stopping them right now.

And for everyone's information, they're playing Sacramento Republic FC in the final.

Is that that Jaegermeister Cup?

Yep.

Oh, interesting.

Okay.

Where's the game?

Let me see.

Heart Health Park.

That's in Sacramento.

Right?

Yes.

Sacramento, California.

They love their hearts and their health there.

Sacramento wins, no question.

So Hartford is really interesting.

Hartford, very talented team.

This guy, Mishigalina, who used to play Colorado Springs, was just a menace.

They've been better lately, but Sacramento is a way better team in playing at home.

I think Sacramento wins.

Tim has no idea about any of this.

I do have some inside information, so I just can't say who, but I do think,

no, it's a true story.

I do think Hartford, they are in, they are in good form.

But, you know,

I'm tempted to not get too overdrawn into the home versus away.

I do think it's real.

We talked to Vermont Green and their home field advantage is real.

I'm not sure that a ton of teams possess that, where like Hartford will go there and go, oh, we're on.

That looks pretty good, though.

No, I know.

I'm not saying it's not good.

And that's a long trip, by the way.

That's maybe that's the part though.

Not a lot of direct flights from Hartford to Sacramento.

In fact, there's

not even a lot of people.

Can we look that up, please?

Can we look it up in the chat?

There's zero.

Zero direct flights from Hartford to Sacramento.

Sacramento in a walk.

All right.

Okay, this one is from Bryce via email, and it's for Tim.

Tim, what was it like playing for the Memphis 901 FC?

I was a season ticket holder since the inaugural match in 2019.

I sat right behind the goal and watched you play.

After your role as a player, can we get some insight as to what you did as a sporting director/slash minority owner?

Oh, it was horrific.

My body.

My body was like,

my body was like, what are you asking me to do?

This is wild.

No, it was good.

I remember, I do remember

rivalry with Birmingham, who was

Jay Heaps was a general manager.

Tommy Sohn, actually, our daughters played together.

ECNL,

he was a head coach.

So I knew those guys really well.

We had a really good rivalry.

So it's kind of funny at the end.

So like, I remember being like sporting director.

Slash goalkeeper.

Yeah, slash goalkeeper.

And like the problem, the problem was, and Lena, you know this because we've been in the trenches.

I'm so fiery and so competitive that like I lost it so many times.

Like there was a, there was a guy, Birmingham, Birmingham were kicking our butt or something.

I can't remember what it was.

We had a good rivalry.

And this kid is this English kid.

He comes over and he's giving all sorts of lollipops in the midfield, right?

They're just running circles around us.

And I remember, and I remember like they're talking mad nonsense to me, right?

And I'm like, and I'm like, bro, I'm 40.

I can barely move.

I'm like, what?

And then, and then I think there was like someone, someone went down.

So there's like a coming together LD.

And one of the guys, one of the, one of the kids, this kid anyway, he's like, he's talking mad nonsense.

And I'm like, bro, you guys are good, but you're not Brazil.

Like you're, you're talking, you're talking like you're Brazilian Legion, bro.

And then, and so then, so then I lost it.

And I was like, here's the thing.

I, I, I would never sign you.

You're a loser.

Like, I'm just like, I'm giving up.

I'm like losing my mind.

You gotta be fair.

Cause I, because I don't have it.

I don't have it anymore, you know?

So like, I'm like, old, but it was, no, it was, it was, but never.

It was good.

It was the,

the, the part about running the club was so interesting.

And I think, uh, and Landa, you experienced this on a USL level, you get an opportunity just by nature of budgets and all the restraints.

You get an, you get a chance to see every operation of the club, the marketing side, the business side, the ticketing, the fans, the going to the supporters' pubs and having a drink with them and talking about season tickets and

everything.

Like you, you, where if you get, if you get hired by an MLS club or, or you just, you don't, you don't have the time or, or the ability to touch all of those things.

And so

I really

to that too, by the way.

Oh, there's like a real like beauty to it.

Yeah.

It was great.

And then we just, we just lost steam.

You know, COVID hit and we, we were getting some really good fans.

We were getting like six, eight thousand people in a 10,000 seat baseball stadium.

Um, baseball conversions are really hard.

A lot of USL teams see that.

And, um, and then, you know, our downtown kind of got run down through COVID, which happens across America and lost a lot of steam.

It was unfortunate.

But we had a little bit of a good run, particularly in the back, the back end.

Okay, let's talk about one of my favorite things in all of soccer, the offside rule.

This question is from Brian via email.

Love to hear your thoughts on FIFA's potential new offside rule and VAR's place with it as both a goalie and a goal scorer.

How do you prefer offsides be called?

And is there any room for improvement?

Will this rule make offsides much clearer and easily identified?

Or will we still be analyzing hairline differences six months from now?

Wait, what's the new?

They come up with a new rule every like three months.

So they're talking,

the internet has been talking about them potentially changing it where your whole body has to be all over the line.

Oh, geez.

Look, I can go first real quick.

I like currently where the new rule, where the current rules are.

And my own person, I think Arsen Banger said something about it as well, right?

Like a clear gap or distance.

I tend to think I like the new rule that

we now are in 2025 and we have the ability to have like semi-automated technology.

So

we can read the line between

a centimeter or an inch.

I'm okay with it.

I'm not really sure what

the massive issue is.

I mean, you guys can tell me if I'm wrong.

You know what I think?

Yep.

I think soccer soccer has become, for the most part, so boring.

Like, you have the ball, and then we'll have the ball, and then you have the ball.

Like, I went to even the Everton City game I went to last year.

I'm like, it's just, it's the same over because everyone's doing all the same stuff.

Just get rid of the roll.

Get rid of it.

See what happens.

Like, I want to see innovation something when they took away the backpass to the goalie, the game changed.

When you could start building inside the penalty area instead of you had to pass, the game changed.

I'm being like half half serious here, but why not just get rid of it and like just take all the ambiguity out?

Who cares?

If you want to stand in front of the goalie, fine.

You're going to play a man down.

Can you imagine how much innovation and how fun it would be to see coaches adapt to that?

But it's why I have to do something, but you're kind of half joking.

It reminds me.

So remember on, do you remember David Moyes on a Friday?

So Moyes would say, you would go, like a Friday pre-match, it was match day minus one.

Do you remember you could just warm up how you wanted?

So you like, you'd go out with your, you'd go out with your mate and he would give you, I think we had like 10 minutes, right?

So you could like jog around the pitch you could do keepy ups you could you could jog around the whole training combo he didn't care but when the whistle blew you were back together i think it was like quick boxes and then whatever speed training so then he would always play this game where he would do old v young were young yeah was it old young i remember so old versus young was he basically split the team up between like i forget what the age cut off what he'd be like here's a here's the six oldest guys and whatever and he'd have these teams and you'd play small side and it was so much fun and one of the things he said it was there was no offside yeah it was brilliant.

We'd have guys stand.

We'd have guys standing like in the on the corner flag.

And it was just, it was chaos.

I don't know if he just introduced that as a global law, but you remember.

Can you imagine though the chaos?

I would love that.

I would love that.

But anyway, I can't.

I mean, in all seriousness, I just can't keep up with it.

I don't know what they're doing anymore.

I always think like in baseball, the ties should go to the runner.

You want more goals.

Stop calling goals off when the guy's toenails offside.

Like, you know.

Yeah, I get it.

I get it.

How about a question for Landon?

We had one for Tim.

Now one for Landon.

This one is from Juan via email.

This question is for Landon.

Our family has always been proud Leon fans, as well as lifelong Galaxy supporters.

So when you joined Club Leon, it was a dream crossover for us.

Can you share a bit about what motivated you to come out of retirement and join the club specifically?

What were some of your favorite memories from your time with Lafayette?

Why was it so short?

Three things.

Certainly a financial factor.

There was I always wanted to play in League MX

and I wanted an experience with a family experience, a life experience.

We had two kids

and I wanted to have a fun experience.

So

it was really interesting.

Leon is like proper Mexico.

Juana Juato is proper.

Like you are right in the middle and it's it's a very um it's a big they have a big leather factory there and it's very working class.

We lived in a beautiful place right on a golf course, course, which was really fun.

The training facilities at that time in Leon

were shocking.

There used to be, I'm not kidding, guys, there was a like

a pipe that came out of the ground that was like, I'm showing like the size of my finger, my thumb and my forefinger together.

It would come out, sorry, come out of the ceiling and water would spew out.

And that was our shower every day.

No.

I wish I was kidding.

This train, it must have been built in the 40s.

It was disgusting.

The toilets didn't flush.

I'm not kidding.

It was disgusting.

The stadium was pretty old, but there was so much history.

So, like, when you played the games, it was really fun.

I was too old.

I like, I couldn't, just couldn't compete, couldn't run.

It's at crazy altitude.

So, it was hard.

But for four months, it was really enjoyable overall as an experience because we, I mean, we really experienced real Mexico.

At the end, they could tell I couldn't do it i knew i couldn't do it and they said look let's just call it a day and move on but it was an amazing four months we had a we had a lot of fun so sorry follow up so

you had retired from the galaxy like when i'd retired in 2014 at the end of the season it was lay on 2015 or 16 no it was it 2018 wait bro you were retired for four years yeah

oh my god wait a minute how did you know

i mean i started working working out again once I knew and like for three weeks, I was

in decent shape, but dude, you're with like 20-year-olds.

You just can't.

How old were you then?

So when you 36.

You retired.

I was like a really old 36.

Yeah, you retired at 32.

You had a lot of miles.

Well, but you didn't you go back to the galaxy first?

I did for a couple of months, but I was.

Yeah, so that was 2016.

And then, yeah.

God, God.

Athletes just can't hang it up.

That's so crazy.

Nobody can.

Nobody can.

It's It's funny.

They called my agent and they said to Rich, they said, look, we're looking for a player this window who's like preferably American, has some name recognition, who can still, who can play and can help us.

But, you know, it's part marketing, part whatever, you know, someone like Landon.

And Rich was like, well, what about Landon?

And they were like, oh,

and that's how it kind of happened.

But it was a good experience.

I'm glad I did it.

Okay.

Last one for both of you.

This one is from Dave via email.

In a lot of industries, there's the idea of a comedian's comedian or a movie that only true cinephiles love.

What's something subtle about a soccer player that other pros might notice and appreciate that the general prop, wow, that the general public might not value or even notice at all?

I think

courage, valor, courage under, under fire.

I just think,

you know, I remember

And I think you learn it like usually after the fact or like somewhere in the middle.

I remember being, I think like at United and thinking like,

I'm, I'm scared out of my wits to like walk out of the dressing room.

Like, this is, this, this moment is big.

It's huge.

And I remember like guys that I really looked up to, like world-class players.

And they'd say something like, anyone else feel that feeling in their stomach?

And I was like, wait, you get nervous too?

Like,

it didn't, it didn't, it didn't, I didn't comprehend it because they were just so good and they always performed.

And so I think the,

you know, guys,

guys who are courageous, who always go out and

even despite the circumstances,

perform.

That for me is like a player's play.

That just triggered something for me.

So I have two things, but that just triggered something.

So

there were certain guys.

No matter what the scenario, what the circumstance, who you're playing, what's going on, they always wanted the ball.

Always, always.

They could make a mistake.

They could miss miss a penalty.

Like Robbie Keen, he could miss four breakaways and he wanted the next ball.

And he was pissed if you didn't give it to him.

And guys like that, I always really appreciated.

You learn more about it when you coach and then when you retire because I just assumed everyone was like me who always wanted the ball.

But there are guys who are like, no, no, no, don't give it to me here.

Like I just had a bad touch.

So guys who always wanted the ball, no matter the situation, were really valuable.

And then the one, I think this is for fans to understand.

There are a lot of players that fans get really frustrated with because they don't do the exciting things that they want them to do.

Or they're like, he always passes sideways or he always passes back or he always does this or he's never.

Those players are so valuable in a soccer team.

And the analogy I use is

there were guys, if you were going to play 6v6 in training, there was one guy you always wanted on your team.

And it was almost always this certain type of guy because you always won.

And conversely, there was a guy you'd be like, he's really talented, but I don't want him on my team because he never wins.

And so

Dax McCarty was like this.

He was more than just a pass it side-to-side guy, but like Kyle Beckerman was like that.

Michael Bradley had a lot more to him, but he was a guy who just, you just wanted next to you because he helped you win.

And sometimes fans would be like, oh, he doesn't do this.

He doesn't do that.

And guess what?

His team wins always.

We had two guys, Marcelo Sarvas and Juninho in L.A.

didn't get a ton of credit, whatever, but dude, when they were on the field, we won won exponentially more than, and so fans, I think, really struggle with guys like that because you want everyone to be perfect.

Ngolo Conte is like the epitome of it, right?

Like in his days at Chelsea and at Leicester, all the little things that help you win.

And I love guys like that.

And fans sometimes like, he doesn't do this.

He doesn't, guess what?

You win.

So shut up.

Funny little anecdote to that is

I'm not going to name him because LD and I played with him at Everton and I won't name him unless he comes for me and then I'll then I'll absolutely blast him.

But, you know, guys who want the ball are special.

Landon said it.

We played with a guy at Everton who he would always hide in moment.

Like you tried to give him the ball.

He'd always hide.

This was like everybody on our team knew.

We took the piss.

He'd always hide.

And then the second that you didn't stick the ball into him, that you played it wide for the crowd.

He'd go, give it to me.

Give me the ball.

And then you know, if he's listening, when I know he listens, he knows who he is.

Hide and seek.

That's what we're called.

Anyway, it's good.

All right.

That's it, guys.

Thank you.

Thanks, JR.

All right, Tim.

Good to be back.

Great, great show.

That was a lot of fun.

That was episode 37 out of 40 this first season.

That's crazy, man.

And we appreciate all of you guys, as always, for being with us today.

Remember to subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, anywhere you get your podcasts.

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Have an amazing week.

We'll be back next Tuesday with another edition of Unfiltered Soccer.

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