Tonight, the USMNT will face Brazil in a friendly in Orlando, FL. On Monday, we published a poll to get readers’ picks for the starting lineup. After a record-shattering 703 responses, let’s look at the results! Here’s the roster readers were choosing from:
GOALKEEPERS (3):
- Ethan Horvath (Cardiff City/WAL; 9/0)
- Sean Johnson (Toronto FC/CAN; 13/0)
- Matt Turner (Nottingham Forest/ENG; 39/0)
DEFENDERS (9):
- Cameron Carter-Vickers (Celtic/SCO; 16/0)
- Kristoffer Lund (Palermo/ITA; 3/0)
- Mark McKenzie (Genk/BEL; 13/0)
- Shaq Moore (Nashville SC; 18/1)
- Tim Ream (Fulham/ENG; 56/1)
- Chris Richards (Crystal Palace/ENG; 16/1)
- Antonee Robinson (Fulham/ENG; 41/4)
- Miles Robinson (FC Cincinnati; 29/3)
- Joe Scally (Borussia Mönchengladbach/GER; 9/0)
MIDFIELDERS (8):
- Tyler Adams (Bournemouth/ENG; 38/2)
- Johnny Cardoso (Real Betis/ESP; 11/0)
- Luca de la Torre (Celta Vigo/ESP; 20/0)
- Weston McKennie (Juventus/ITA; 51/11)
- Yunus Musah (AC Milan; ITA; 35/0)
- Gio Reyna (Nottingham Forest/ENG; 26/8)
- Malik Tillman (PSV Eindhoven/NED; 10/0)
- Timmy Tillman (LAFC; 1/0)
FORWARDS (6):
- Brenden Aaronson (Union Berlin/GER; 40/8)
- Folarin Balogun (Monaco/FRA; 10/3)
- Ricardo Pepi (PSV Eindhoven/NED; 23/10)
- Christian Pulisic (AC Milan/ITA; 66/28)
- Tim Weah (Juventus/ITA; 37/5)
- Haji Wright (Coventry City/ENG; 9/4)
With those players available, here’s the lineup readers selected. There were four changes from the starting lineup against Colombia, with Ethan Horvath replacing Matt Turner in goal, Miles Robinson supplanting Tim Ream on the back line, Tyler Adams over Johnny Cardoso in midfield, and Haji Wright ahead of Folarin Balogun as the number 9 up top. The second-most popular lineup sees Balogun swap in for Haji Wright. Voting was very close between them (48.2% to 45.1%)
Now let’s look at the polling trends over time. The most noticeable shift came in goal, with Matt Turner seeing a massive dropoff, with fans in favor of Ethan Horvath coming in as replacement. Antonee Robinson and Chris Richards continue as the defensive stalwarts, with Joe Scally seeing a nice 15% bump after some good defending against Luis Duiz and Colombia. Cameron Carter-Vickers sees a massive dropoff, and Tim Ream a small one, with Miles Robinson rising up the defensive charts. Weston McKennie and Tyler Adams see dropoffs in midfield, but with Adams it’s more of an injury concern, with Gregg Berhalter saying earlier this week that Adams is only likely fit to play 45 minutes. Johnny Cardoso gets a 10-point bump, probably connected with Adams’ fitness issues, while Folarin Balogun drops to 45% with Haji Wright overtaking him and Ricardo Pepi still chasing.
With significant discussion of Gregg Berhalter’s role as manager in recent days, I added a manager option to the poll at the last minute. 136 of the 703 voters made selections there. Moving forward, the manager may or may not be included – let us know your thoughts! 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.
