No solutions for Gregg Berhalter and USMNT in colossal failure: Winners and losers as U.S. are bounced from Copa America with Uruguay defeat

We’ll get the obvious one out of the way: this should be it for Gregg Berhalter and the UWMNT.

It simply wasn’t good enough from start to finish in this second cycle, but that can dissected in the days to come. For now, we’ll focus on just this one match, which did little to convince anyone that Berhalter deserves more time with this team.

“Totally disappointed with the results,” Berhalter said postgame. “We know that we’re capable of more. And, in this one, we didn’t show it. It’s really as simple as that. I think that you look at the stage that was set with the fans in this tournament, with a high level of competition in this tournament, and we should have done better. We’ll do a review and figure out what went wrong, why it went wrong, but I think it’s an empty feeling right now for sure.”

It started well enough, to the USMNT’s credit. Berhalter’s boys came out of the gates relatively hot, taking the game to Uruguay. They held the ball and won it back quickly, pinning Uruguay back to start the game.

This team needed a breakthrough, though, and it never came. Part of that is on the players, of course, as they struggled with decision-making and creativity. Ultimately, it’s the responsibility of the coach to find solutions, and Berhalter never found any.

That’s why the USMNT went out early this summer. It wasn’t refereeing or controversy; it was the inability to find solutions. Coaches have been fired for less, and it seems that Berhalter’s time may very well be coming after this colossal failure.

You wouldn’t blame Uruguay for taking the foot off the gas for this one. Their spot in the knockouts was virtually locked up.

Taking the foot off the gas, though, isn’t how Uruguay operates. This is a team that fights and this is a team that wins, and that’s what they did Monday.

Uruguay showed up ready to brawl, as they always do. Tackles flew in from the opening whistle. If it wasn’t made clear by their lineup, which was unchanged from their last game, it was made clear by how they treated those first few minutes.

Defensively, Uruguay was just about perfect, frustrating the U.S. for all 90 minutes. And, ultimately, they got their goal, making it nine points from nine to finish off this group stage.

They were deserved winners and staked a claim to be one of the favorites to win this tournament. Uruguay have built their culture on proving everyone wrong and, after performances like this, it’s getting harder to doubt this team.

Berhalter will get much of the blame. The old saying is that you can’t fire the players and, on the international level, that’s even more true. Don’t let this group of players walk away without blame, though, because they deserve their fair share.

There was plenty worth discussing just in this Uruguay game. This team simply failed to create the chances necessary to win. Individually and collectively, no one on that field performed at a winning level.

It started up top, where the USMNT failed to find an ounce of creativity. The midfield didn’t help matters, either, struggling to go toe-to-toe with the Uruguayan counterparts all night long. Defensively, there were some good moments, but also some shaky ones, which has been a theme this tournament. Few, if any, players can leave the field happy with their performance. It’s not that they were particularly bad, but none were particularly good.

That is at least partly why they’re out of this tournament. This team didn’t have anyone step up and seize the moment. As a result, this “Golden Generation” has a lot of thinking to do about where they are, where they want to be and, most importantly, how they get here – because this summer certainly wasn’t it.

“I don’t think this tournament really had anything to do with the staff or the tactics or the way we play,” Gio Reyna said after the match. “I think it was more individual mistakes. The staff can only do so much….at the end of the day, the players didn’t do enough to go through.”

So much will be written about how bad this was for the USMNT, but it’s also time to give credit to Panama, who very much earned their spot in the knockouts.

The win over the U.S., of course, was fantastic. This team has become the USMNT’s kryptonite in recent years, largely by doing the little things right. They draw the U.S. into a brawl and have been able to win those chaotic matches by any means necessary.

They walked into the Bolivia game Monday night in a more unfamiliar place, as favorites, and they did what favorites do: win. There was a nervy moment when Bolivia equalized, but Panama responded with two goals of their own to create their own destiny.

They’ll quickly return to the familiar role of underdog. Brazil or Colombia will no doubt prove too much for this team, but credit to Los Canaleros for earning their way with a historic group stage performance this summer.

Balogun is arguably the USMNT’s big winner of this tournament, overall. He was this team’s best and most consistent player across all three games.

So to see it end prematurely was unfortunate. Balogun deserved better.

The striker limped off the field a few minutes before halftime, unable to overcome an injury suffered on a crunching tackle. It robbed the U.S. of the team’s best attacker and it robbed Balogun of an opportunity to truly make history.

Without Balogun, the U.S. attack was totally toothless. The striker’s pace and decisiveness were sorely missed once he went off. The Monaco man is just so decisive and, when he was not on the field, you could see the obvious drop-off.

Would a healthy Balogun have changed the game in the second half? You have to wonder, and he’ll no doubt be wondering it, too.

You can be assured that Colombia and Brazil will be just fine with how things went in Group C. Because of the USMNT’s failures, one of them will have a relatively clear path to the semifinal.

No disrespect to Panama, but either CONMEBOL giant will be thrilled to meet Los Canaleros in the quarterfinal round. The U.S., of course, already threatened Brazil this summer in their 1-1 draw, although Colombia did make short work of them in a 5-1 pre-tournament smashing.

Right now, Colombia are favorites to win the group, as a win or draw with Brazil Tuesday night would see them finish ahead of the Selecao. Should they top the group, they’ll get Panama, a much easier opponent than Uruguay, who awaits the second-place team.

Overall, it fell extraordinarly well for whichever team wins Group D – and that team may well be favorites to go to the final.

It’s not an excuse, but it has to be discussed. Kevin Ortega was absolutely awful in this game, and that may be putting it lightly.

With just seven international games on his resume, Ortega never looked ready for this game. From the opening whistle, the lights were simply too bright, and this game and this occasion was simply too big for him.

From blatant mistakes like whatever that yellow card-turned-advantage mess was, to simply letting the game get out of control with physicality, Ortega was awful throughout. The VAR review isn’t on him, but that was just another data point against an officiating crew that was, at times, the start of the show.

That’s never a good thing, and it’s not what CONMEBOL wants this tournament to be about. Or at least it shouldn’t be. It wasn’t the reason the U.S. went home, to be clear, but Ortega certainly didn’t officiate this game in a way that respected what was at stake.