Klinsmann to coach USA Soccer "rumor"

[HawaiiVol]

FOX Sports - USA - German legend to lead U.S. Soccer

Jürgen Klinsmann will be named head coach of the U.S. men's national team within two weeks according to a number of well-placed sources with knowledge of the deal.

His appointment as coach was perhaps the worst-kept secret in American soccer: Klinsmann publicly acknowledged that he was interested in the job and there has been persistent buzz since the World Cup ended in July that the interview process for the national team job was essentially a matter of going through the motions.

Warren Mersereau, who is both Klinsmann's business partner and representative, said "no comment" when contacted for this story.

There were two sticking points in signing Klinsmann: The first was Klinsmann's long relationship with adidas. The U.S. national soccer team is heavily underwritten by Nike, and sources at the shoewear companies said talk of the appointment initially caused some concern. According to a person connected with the shoe company today, Klinsmann has left adidas, solving the issue in one fell swoop.

The second issue looks to be more contentious. Speaking on condition of anonymity granted because they were not given permission to speak about the appointment, two sources confirmed that the issue of power-sharing was a major bone of contention. Former coach Bruce Arena had carved out a wide swath for himself during his tenure, and Klinsmann has reportedly demanded that he too be essentially the sole decision-maker on national team matters.

This has not sat well with some at the Federation, who were mindful of past friction. According to several people at the team level with intimate knowledge of the subject, relations between General Secretary Dan Flynn and Arena deteriorated to the point that the two men barely spoke to one another.

Klinsmann, who steered Germany to a third-place finish in the 2006 World Cup and won the 1990 World Cup as a player, has long been coveted by the Americans to restart a stuttering men's national team program. A star with VfB Stuttgart, Tottenham Hotspur and Bayern Munich, the former forward has a reputation for being a pragmatist and displayed considerable acumen and political savvy during his tenure as German national team head coach.

Klinsmann inherits a program in dire need of fresh ideas. Under former coach Arena, the men's program compiled their best-ever record of 71-30-29, and reached the 2002 World Cup quarterfinals (losing, ironically, to Germany) but Arena took much of the criticism for the team's 0-2-1 performance at the 2006 World Cup. Ranked before the World Cup an unrealistic fifth by the now-defunct FIFA ranking system, the Americans, who have never performed well on European soil, faltered badly despite high expectations.

In addition, during Arena's tenure, the national team youth programs failed to achieve notable success despite the presence of some young talent, while his abrasive manner left many cold.

In hindsight, many people have begun to realize that Arena's record was padded out with many wins — usually accomplished at home — against opposition that fell short of the top level. In particular, Arena's pre-World Cup friendly schedule — Latvia, Morocco and Venezuela — was widely mocked as insufficient; of course the USA also managed to lose to Morocco in the process.

Klinsmann, who is fluent in English and German, is one of the most "American" former European pros out there. Married to an American, Debbie Chin, he has long lived in Southern California and was actually subject to heavy criticism by the German media and Federation prior to the 2006 World Cup for spending too much time in the States.

Moreover, he was questioned for injecting "American ideas" into a moribund German side. Klinsmann hired American-trained fitness trainers and a sports psychologist and displayed a relentless optimism that seemed to overwhelm the traditionally staid German sports culture.

In that respect, he seems perfect for the modernist American soccer scene, which has long depended upon the Bradenton-based academy partnership with IMG for top player development.

Klinsmann also knows a bit about American players, and clearly has a well-developed sense of humor: He played alongside a handful of them with a California-based USL development team in 2003 under a pseudonym, "Jay Goppingen."

Klinsmann enters at a fortuitous time — but also with an extremely difficult task ahead. He has already won over the small core of "hardcore" soccer fans in America (he has been their consensus pick for months now) and is an internationally recognized name in the sport, even to the sometime removed editorial class of American sports journalism.

In addition, Klinsmann will benefit from a small wave of European-trained players now making their way through the ranks to challenge for positions. Jay Demerit (Watford), Benny Feilhaber (Hamburg), Marcus Hahnemann (Reading), Tim Howard (Everton/Manchester United) and Jonathan Spector (West Ham) are all playing consistently and can provide the badly-needed fills for certain holes. Only Hahnemann and Howard, both goalkeepers, were included on the 2006 World Cup roster.

Klinsmann surely has his work cut out for him. His biggest job may well be reforming a stagnant culture within U.S. Soccer itself. Too many areas of the sport's growth in the United States have stalled while too few in the soccer business seem to realize that corporate sponsorship does not mean mainstream success.

Both the men's national teams and the professional league (MLS) are finding it hard to attract consistent, significant numbers of fans at the gate as well. The fact remains that outside of World Cup years, most American sports fans pay little attention to soccer. Klinsmann will have to cajole not just sponsors but the media and the fans as well. He seems well suited for the task, but it is an open question whether sports talk radio — still a bellwether for industry trends — will warm to the affable German or pay more than the occasional minute of attention to the USA's games.

Klinsmann will also have to make peace with the players. There's no question that the drawn-out selection process has irked the men of the national team, or rather, the players who feel they will be or should be on it. By sitting idle for so long, they have lost paychecks, and more than one of them has said in conversation that they fail to understand why they aren't active on available FIFA dates. January's scheduled match against Denmark, likely to showcase a squad of home-based players rather than a full team if history is any guide, has done little to quiet those rumblings.

For now, Klinsmann will have a holiday honeymoon. He will likely spend the next month or two emailing players from that Starbucks in Orange County, and hire scouts to examine the overlooked Americans toiling in Scandinavia and England's Championship. If he's smart, he'll make overhauling the youth development system a priority while his political clout is at the apogee.

And then, like all of us, he'll have to wait and see just what he has to work with. All the charm in the world cannot alter the fact that the Americans still don't have the talent to win consistently at the elite levels of the game, especially on European soil. Changing that fact will be his biggest challenge. If he is successful, it would be an admirable legacy indeed.

Not many are soccer fans but I found this highly intriguing for the next World Cup.

[tvolsfan]

This should be good for the US.

[doozer]

if he gets us to a semifinal, the Americans will love him. obviously, we need somebody who understands the foreign game.

Arena was a good coach in America, and it ended there.

[MG1968]

now if they can just keep Freddy Adu from signing on with an English Premiership or some other non-USA team that actually pays it's players.

[Bennett4UT]

Really have to worry about Adu playing for Ghana instead of the US in international play. He threatened to do it this past world cup because the US team snubbed him

[rwemyss]

This is huge for US soccer. Glad to see it.

[milohimself]

Good. I think a successful World Cup run would be huge for the standing of soccer in this country... I'd like to see it do better.

[crazyguy]

Originally Posted by milohimself

Good. I think a successful World Cup run would be huge for the standing of soccer in this country... I'd like to see it do better.

I agreee, there was a surge in the south after our sucess a couple of cups ago and the ladies sucess has surely brought more buzz here than I expected....Mia Hamm, Brandy Chastain...all household names now.

I've gotta say though I miss the charactors we seem to have had before....who was the guy with the crazy hair and gotee was that lalas?

[HawaiiVol]

That was Lalas. Flaming red hair and goatee, a very recognizable player for the US team.

I'm curious if this does go through, if he will push the notion that the US players need to go the European leagues so they can see how the pros play. We only had I think 2, maybe 3 people actually go overseas to the EPL, etc.

I think that would go a long ways to bringing US talent up to speed. There's still 3 1/2 years til the next WC.

[milohimself]

I dunno.

I think it was on PTI the other day somebody was making a point... Most other places in the world, all the best athletes go play soccer. Basketball is growing quick, but soccer still gets the premier kids elsewhere, and at an early age. In the US, almost all the good athletes go and play football or basketball, or baseball to a lesser extent. Soccer plays the fourth fiddle, sometimes fifth even behind hockey in the northern half of the country.

Reaching the world cup finals and maybe revamped marketing of MLS could definitley put a lot of the more athletic kids on the soccer field.

[milohimself]

Originally Posted by HawaiiVol

That was Lalas. Flaming red hair and goatee, a very recognizable player for the US team.

I'm curious if this does go through, if he will push the notion that the US players need to go the European leagues so they can see how the pros play. We only had I think 2, maybe 3 people actually go overseas to the EPL, etc.

I think that would go a long ways to bringing US talent up to speed. There's still 3 1/2 years til the next WC.

I think there's actually a decent number of guys on the last US World Cup team who played Premier... Even more in the German league.

[crazyguy]

hmmm, I don't know if we will ever be motivated to be competitive in soccer, it just goes against what we believe in as americans.
1. it's a team sport....but so is football you say?
2. Show me the money...Football is popular because there is a lot of money to be made...
3. Infastructure- the same reason that a perfect alternative fuel vehicle wouldn't fly next week- we are geared for other sports...little league baseball, flag football leagues, AAU basketball, etc. Soccer leagues for kids past elementary age don't exist for the most part.
4. Competition- there is no dedicated season for soccer, depending on where you are in the country it must compete with established popular sports like football and basketball...Soccer needs a stage to shine upon.

anyway, that's my .02

[GAVol]

It seems like every few years we get soccer force fed to us for no apparent reason. I actually watch it occasionally for short periods of time, but I can't imagine it catching on in a big way.

They've tried NASL, MLS, MISL etc. People just don't flock to their TV sets for soccer.

[milohimself]

Except when the World Cup rolls around.

That's a national pride thing though.

Pardon my language, but it's just because it's human nature for somebody to see how their s**t stacks up to somebody else's s**t.

[HawaiiVol]

Soccer definitely plays 4th-5th fiddle in the US. Knowing how the US in general is focused on $$$, it would take EPL level salaries to sway some of these kids to go that route, which if I remember right, was the failing point of the last league here.

There's the Beckham coming to MLS talk being thrown around, which would draw some attention, but I don't see him coming here for a few more years at minimum, when he's ready to retire. He'd be a shot in the arm now, but I dunno how effective he'd be when he's past his prime.

I only remember 3 US players being mentioned as playing in the EPL/German leagues, but there could be more that didn't see much playing time. I didn't delve that far into it as I was pissed about our performance after the 2002 run which looks to be an anomaly now.