This afternoon, the USMNT (Elo #32) will face Canada (Elo #29) in the USMNT’s first match since exiting Copa América, and the first match since Gregg Berhalter departed as USMNT manager. On Monday, we published a poll to get readers’ picks for the starting lineup. After receiving 559 responses, let’s look at the results! Here’s the roster readers were choosing from.
Tim Weah is suspended for this game after his red card vs Panama.
**GOALKEEPERS (4):**
– Ethan Horvath (Cardiff City)
– Diego Kochen (Barcelona Atletic)
– Patrick Schulte (Columbus Crew)
– Matt Turner (Crystal Palace)
**DEFENDERS (8):**
– Auston Trusty (Celtic FC)
– Marlon Fossey (Standard Liege)
– Kristoffer Lund (Palermo)
– Mark McKenzie (Tolouse)
– Tim Ream (Charlotte FC)
– Chris Richards (Crystal Palace)
– Joe Scally (Borussia Mönchengladbach)
– Caleb Wiley (Strasbourg)
**MIDFIELDERS (6):**
– Johnny Cardoso (Real Betis)
– Luca de la Torre (Celta Vigo)
– Aidan Morris (Middlesbrough)
– Yunus Musah (AC Milan)
– Gio Reyna (Borussia Dortmund)
– Malik Tillman (PSV Eindhoven)
**FORWARDS (6):**
– Brenden Aaronson (Leeds United)
– Folarin Balogun (Monaco)
– Ricardo Pepi (PSV Eindhoven)
– Christian Pulisic (AC Milan)
– Josh Sargent (Norwich City)
– Haji Wright (Coventry City)
With those players available, here’s the lineup readers selected. Gio Reyna’s injury news late this week had a significant effect.
The original lineup would’ve had Gio Reyna in place of Josh Sargent, meaning either Reyna or Malik Tillman would shift out wide, probably to right-wing, and Pulisic over to the left-wing. With Reyna dropping out of contention, Sargent was the next man up. The gap between Sargent (50.8%) and Haji Wright (42.6%) was only 46 votes.
Now let’s look at the polling trends over time. Matt Turner sees a 34-point drop since Copa America, his lowest since the USMNT was thumped 5-1 by Colombia in a pre-Copa friendly. However, none of the challengers got enough to unseat him, with Columbus Crew’s Patrick Schulte being the closest.
This camp is unique in that several key players are missing, so it gives insights to how readers rate some of our depth options. Chris Richards was far-and-away the first choice at center-back, while the second spot was very competitive between Mark McKenzie, Auston Trusty, and veteran Tim Ream. With both first-choice fullbacks unavailable, Joe Scally was a near-unanimous selection, with a pretty close choice between Caleb Wiley and Kristoffer Lund at left-back.
The front six also gave visibility into lots of depth options, with Weston McKennie, Tyler Adams, Tim Weah, and eventually Gio Reyna all unavailable. Yunus Musah and Johnny Cardoso were clear choices for the front three. Malik Tillman rounds out the midfield group. I would hazard a guess that Tillman’s numbers would’ve been higher if Reyna was unavailable from the start of voting.
Christian Pulisic is locked-in for the front three, but the other choices are pretty open between Folarin Balogun, Josh Sargent, and Haji Wright. Wright seems a likely choice, since someone will need to play wide opposite Pulisic, leaving Balogun the first-choice up front as a number 9.
What do you all think? How can we keep improving this format in the future? What do you think of the results? What lineup do you think we’ll see tonight? Which players are you excited about? Hit the comments to discuss.
