World Cup 2022: Congrats to Argentina and the GOAT (WATCH THIS GAME, BEST GAME EVER)

lol is a tie a “result”??? This is why Americans fucken hate soccer.

Sure, but the point is that they would. Because they’re elite athletes.

Yeah, I’m kind of jaded from years of “maybe so and so is finally the guy!” If I had a dollar for every time I heard something about Jozy Altidore’s potential…

But that said, I’m annoyed Pepi isn’t on the roster to get the experience, and I think he has a chance to be solid. Not elite. But at this point I’d be thrilled just to have like a replacement level striker. Just someone who would even make the roster as the third best striker for the elite countries.

Elite athleticism is kind of overrated though.

Here are the Spanish players in training.

If you’re not almost capable of doing this when you’re 15, you won’t beat the players who are just because you’re bigger than they are.

Obviously if they were training for it from a young age then their body composition would end up different, but I bet you could make a the financial case that a guy who ends up being not quite good enough to make the NFL as a RB, or just barely good enough to make it as a RB, has more financial upside in soccer. Obviously they’d need a time machine to go back and try the alternate route, but it’s interesting to think about.

I picked RB because they have either speed/agility or power and the shortest shelf-life in the NFL.

One thing I like about Foden is that he looks like a real life version of Generic English Player from FIFA 2006.

fifa

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If you’re not committed at like ~10, to being good at the sport it will be very tough to catch up.

There are the stories of elite NBA/NFL talent not picking up the sport until 16+. This just doesn’t happen in soccer. The technical ability needed is so high.

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Foden is a bulked up figure from a Lowry painting.

My only regret is that I have but one more testicle to give for my country.

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If every member of the USA 2042 World Cup squad was guaranteed 1 billion dollars just for being on the roster and 10 billion dollars for shipping the Cup, what are the odds the USA ships? Are they easily #1 in the world, and by what margin? What if an aging Berhalter is the manager?

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Ok thread starting to deliver

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Yeah I agree, I’m saying that kids that are that age who’s path to the NFL is RB might be better off in soccer financially. The problem is there’s no money in American football if you’re not on one of 32 teams, and it’s hard to develop to make it if you haven’t done so by 23.

Top 4 easily, impossible to say #1 because another country could produce a crop of players like Spain did not long ago or Holland and Brazil did in the 70s.

Wouldn’t help much imo.

The USA issues are that its very expensive for kids. Traveling teams cost thousands of dollars a year, so you see a team of upper middle class white kids and very few african/Hispanic talents.

Then their academies/teams are 2% as good as Europe. Any good kid will go to Germany or France at 16.

Giving the academies and youth teams money would help a lot, not just the people who end up winning after the current system filters out thousands of potential talents.

25%

Easily top 5.

They probably get 4-5 points in the group stage and lose in the first knockout game.

If your academies suck and it cost 5k a year to play on an elite team for a 13 year old it won’t matter that the 25 players who survive those conditions get paid

It was a trick question. By then, the dollar will have collapsed and 1 billion will be worth $100 in today’s money. USA would be #12 in 2042.

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Welcome to the forums, @Christian_Pulisic!

In the USA you have this charade where athletes have to pretend to get an education. This isn’t the case for soccer in Europe.

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That’s probably true. I don’t really know anything about how US football is organised.