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Should The Coach Go If U.S. Soccer Team Fails To Qualify For World Cup?
By Randy Gardner
If you are a soccer fan like I am, you have to be disappointed in the United States National soccer team. I should maybe correct myself and say, are you disappointed in the players, the game or the coaching?
Honestly for me it’s a bit of all three. There are many people out there that are calling for Jurgen Klinsmann to be fired as head coach of this team.
At first, I was a supporter of Jurgen but over the last several months I’m not sure of some of the choices that he has made or of some player personnel choices that he uses during games.
He always talks about being experimental with the players and their positions, but when you’re trying to win a qualifying match to go to the World Cup, I personally feel that you don’t experiment.
You put the players out there who are familiar with their positions and let them play soccer to the best of their ability. As you read this column, the United States National team will have already played a crucial match on Tuesday night and, depending on that result, which I don’t know as I write this column, it could be the last stand for Jurgen Klinsmann. Right now, the team stands in third place in their division and I really feel if the United States does not qualify for the World Cup, it will be a huge black eye for soccer in the United States.
Look at it from the standpoint that if they don’t qualify for the 2018 World Cup in Russia, it will be 2022 before the next squad can play in the World Cup. That will put so many players who are primed right now to be able to play in the World Cup most likely over the limit with their playing ability and their age for the 2022 World Cup. We had made such great strides in soccer over the past 10 years and there is such a following now, I think there’s nothing else to do but let him go. If the team does not qualify, and Jurgen is let go, at least this will give the United States soccer fans the notion that they are trying to put a winner on the field.
Letting Your Son Choose Just 1 Sport
How many times in life have you come to a crossroad or a fork in the road and you were not sure which route to take? I think everybody has this situation multiple times throughout their lives and there are decisions that can change or alter your future in every way. One decision facing our family is the decision to let one of our sons be a one sport player at 11 years old. He has always played baseball, soccer, and basketball but he ended up making a select basketball team and he wants to solely focus on that.
I have always talked about kids needing to be well rounded at many sports as they grow up but what do you do when your child tells you that he only wants to play one sport? I want to be a supportive parent and let him grow and achieve what he wants to in life, but where do you step in as a parent and maybe try to guide them in a different manner? I know there are a lot of other parents going through this same thing right now, maybe in a different sport but ultimately it’s the same decision.
I guess looking at it rationally he can always go back and pick up another sport later if he becomes burned out.
Another prospect that makes me sad is that I have always coached him in every sport since he’s been four years old and to give that up and let him go somewhere else will be so different, but it might be a good thing for him in the end.
