Keepers – Cody Cropper (Southampton, England), Brad Guzan (Aston Villa, England), Tim Howard (Everton, England)
Defense – John Anthony Brooks (Hertha Berlin, Germany), Geoff Cameron (Stoke City, England), Edgar Castillo (Tijuana, Mexico), Brad Evans (Seattle, United States), Michael Orozco Fiscal (Puebla, Mexico), Michael Parkhurst (Ausberg, Germany), Tim Ream (Bolton, England)
Midfield –Alejandro Bedoya (Nantes, France), Michael Bradley (Roma, Italy), Joe Corona (Tijuana, Mexico), Mix Diskerud (Rosenborg, Norway), Jermaine Jones (Schalke, Germany), Fabian Johnson (Hoffenheim, Germany), Sacha Kljestan (Anderlecht, Belgium), Danny Williams (Reading, England)
Striker – Jozy Altidore (Sunderland, England), Terrence Boyd (Rapid Wien, Austria), Aron Johannsson (AZ, Holland), Eddie Johnson (Seattle, United States), Bobby Wood (1860 Munich, Germany).
I’m not really gonna focus too much on the obvious selections (Howard, Guzan, Cameron, Altidore, Bradely, Jones, and the Johnson’s) or the lack of MLS guys (if you’ll remember, I did predict an all European squad), but I want to go into a few of these guys a bit, one slightly run-on sentence for each.
- Cropper (GK) won’t play, but its good for experience
- Thus begins John Anthony Brooks (CB) campaign to challenge for the remaining CB roster spot for the 2014 World Cup, he scored this weekend in Hertha Berlin’s season opener and his size and technically ability have to have Coach K drooling.
- This is Castillo’s (D/M) last chance, he’s been called up 24 times (12th most during Klinsmann’s tenure) but hasn’t played much outside of the Gold Cup/Friendlies, now that we have better left side options, he maybe out of time.
- Evans can lock down RB for the foreseeable future, means a lot that Chandler wasn’t called
- See above for Parkhurst, though he will have the second bite at the apple after Evans.
- Orozco played extremely well during the Gold Cup, but he is too far down the CB list to matter (maybe RB)
- Ream is versatile, playing anywhere in the back 4 and at holding mid, but he’s a poor mans Geoff Cameron and we’ve already got the real McCoy (the real Cameron).
- Bedoya & Corona are competing for 1 wide spot, it is unlikely both will feature on the same rosters in the future
- Mix is in the mix (couldn't resist) for the creative box-to-box mid spot after a great gold cup
- Sacha Kljestan has got to be feeling a ton of pressure from Diskerud who does the same job but has had better showings in his US appearances
- Danny Williams has fallen to 5th on our holding mid call sheet, he will need to impress for that to change
- Boyd usually gets longer run-outs for Friendlies, time to prove that he deserves as much talk as the new guys.
- Johannsson more than likely won’t play, but it’ll be good to have him in camp.
- Wood is the European based Eddie Johnson, can play striker but will likely feature out wide
Predicted Line-up against Bosnia-Herzegovina, and 6 substitutions (based on most to least likely in my opinion):
---------------Boyd-----Altidore------------
Corona------------------------------Bedoya
---------------Jones-------Bradley----------
F. Johnson--Cameron—Brooks--Evans
---------------------Howard-------------------
Subs:
Diskerud => Jones
E. Johnson => Boyd
Kljestan => Corona
Wood => Bedoya
F. Johnson => Castillo
Ream => Cameron
Check in tomorrow for the Podcast, check out the game Wednesday at 3:30ET on ESPN and UniMas
P4TP