Honestly Mark, I'm conflicted.
He has done some good things, maybe brilliant things. Getting out of the so called Group of Death in Brazil two years ago was brilliance and then to take one of the best teams in the world, Belgium, to extra time in the Round of 16... Impressive. His team steamrolled the rest of CONCACAF in the '13 Gold Cup. He took teams to Europe and won friendlies against some traditional powers on their soil. He has opened the door to new ideas and new players, younger players. He is truly working with the guys who will still be National Team players in 10 or 12 years. Lots of them.
Then there are the failures. With last week's loss to Guatemala we are seeing a repeat of the same sluggish start to WC qualifying that we saw 4 years ago. While the team put Guatemala to the sword last night in Columbus, that should have happened last week in Guatemala City. There is just too much talent wearing the good ole red, white and blue to struggle with the 95th ranked team in the world. We are talking about the difference between NFL and Division 1AA here. There is the disaster of last summer's Gold Cup followed by the molestation at the hands of arch-rival Mexico, who was in total disarray and there for the taking) in October for the right to go to next summers Confed Cup.
For all that Klinsmann has done right, he has had 5 years now to establish a consistent team but has failed to do so. Where under former coaches we would see the same core of 15-18 guys called up every time (baring injury) along with 5 to 8 new faces, under Klinsmann there are no givens. Now I'm not advocating anyone get a free ride here and get in on name alone but if the core isn't playing together regularly how are they supposed to get to know each other? This is especially true for the back line where no one has had a chance to settle and because of that we have not had a true leader since Bocanegra was dropped.
I get the feeling that Klinsmann thinks he is the smartest guy in the room and he is trying to prove that every time out with fancy moves when perhaps the basics will do that trick. He continues to play guys out of position and when asked about it refuses to say they are out of position, as if their club managers who work with them day in and day out, have it wrong. Last week he played Cameron at RB but this weekend Cameron will start at center-half for his English Premier League team. He played Yedlin at Right Mid but DeAndre has been a RB his whole professional career. And Zardes was used as a winger instead of a Center Forward, the position he plays weekly for LA Galaxy. Is it a coincidence that when all our players were returned to their regular club positions for last night's match we dominated it?
He came in 4 years ago and told the world that both playing time and form at the club level mattered, that guys who were not playing for their clubs or were struggling would not be called up. Then he backed that up by sitting the face of American soccer, Landon Donovan, when LD took a sabbatical. He did the same for other players who were out of form or without a club (Bocanegra, Edu, Buddle, and Onyewu come to mind). But the longer he has been manager the more erratic (and maybe personal?) these decisions have been. He dropped an in form Donovan from the WC team headed to Brazil in favor of a very young, inexperienced Julien Green, who wasn't getting playing time with his club. For these two qualifiers he brought in Tim Howard and Brad Guzan as his top two keepers. Howard is hardly playing at Everton and Guzan has been in and out of the line up for Aston Villa. Both players are in very dubious form.
The quiet word when Klinsmann was hired was that he was a big picture guy and needed a detail, tactics oriented #2 to handle a lot of the game day stuff. His #2 has been something of a revolving door and he has never really had anyone brilliant in the roll like he did when he managed the German national team (Jordi Low, the current German national coach was Jurgen's #2 then). The more I see the more I fear those whispers were correct. The team looked devoid of a tactical plan last week.
I want Jurgen to succeed. I want to see the US play beautiful football and go head to head with the best in the world. But so far I am seeing regression and that concerns me.