#53 Who is the USMNT's biggest bogey team away from home in World Cup qualifying? Plus, possible explanations for why that's the case
Soccer 101
TSS
4.9 • 853 Ratings
🗓️ 2 April 2021
⏱️ 21 minutes
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Summary
On this week's episode, Taylor takes a long look at the Concacaf nations where the USMNT has the worst record away from home, and tries to figure out why things tend to go so poorly in one particular locale.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome everyone to soccer 101. |
| 0:13.3 | My name is Taylor Rockwell, and on this week's episode, we're going to be going deep on historical Conccaf World Cup qualifying to try to determine the places the |
| 0:22.8 | U.S. men's national team least likes to play. We will also try to figure out why they do |
| 0:28.7 | not like to play in certain locations. It can get a little bit hostile, is the overall takeaway. |
| 0:34.8 | Recording this on April 2nd, this week saw the first round of Concaf |
| 0:39.2 | World Cup qualifying kickoff with 30 teams split into six groups. The winner of each group |
| 0:45.0 | will then advance to the second round of the format there being that one group winner plays |
| 0:49.2 | another, ideally home and away. We'll see if coronavirus allows for that. And then the winning team over the one or two |
| 0:55.7 | legs will advance to the final round. Normally called the hexagonal because you have six teams. |
| 1:00.3 | This time round, you will have eight teams. So we're going with octagonal or maybe the octagon, |
| 1:05.4 | the octagon, the oct, whatever you think is most appropriate. The U.S., Mexico, Costa Rica, |
| 1:10.4 | Jamaica, and Honduras are all already |
| 1:12.4 | through to that final round due to their standings in the FIFA World Rankings, so five |
| 1:16.9 | teams already there, three still to be determined. But those three aside, we do then already |
| 1:22.4 | know some of who the U.S. opponents will be. And it is the case that the narrative is already building and spreading that Conca Calf is getting stronger. U.S.'s opponents will be. And it is the case that the narrative is already building |
| 1:28.1 | and spreading that Kanka Kaff is getting stronger. U.S. opponents will be more challenging, |
| 1:33.2 | and U.S. fans should therefore be nervous because of the failure to qualify last time around. |
| 1:38.5 | And it is true that opponents are going to be strong, the U.S. will need to be on their game, |
| 1:42.7 | and there will be more unforeseen |
| 1:44.4 | challenges than probably ever before. But it is easy for U.S. fans to let memories of that |
| 1:50.0 | last qualification campaign cloud their recollection of what came before, when the truth is |
| 1:55.1 | Concaf World Cup qualifying has always been a challenging task for the U.S. men's national team, |
... |
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