Hello and welcome

Hello and welcome everyone to The Total Soccer Show.

I am back in the office, which means I can yell as loud as I want without scaring the dogs.

If you woke up this morning for the USA's final group stage game against Australia, credit to you and also apologies, that nil-nil-nill-nall draw allowed the U.S. to advance to the knockout round, courtesy of a second-place finish in the group, four points from three games. Not quite the emphatic finish we were hoping for, but we will break it down why that might have been the case. The U.S. will take on the Netherlands on Friday morning. The Netherlands winning their group in style with Vivian Meadema scoring, I believe, two more goals than the entire U.S. team combined.

So a strong performance from her.

Here with me to discuss the USA's draw with Australia are two wonderful people.

First up, a friend of the show who always counts marginally offside Alex Morgan goals.

It's Jordan Angelie.

Hi, Jordan.

Hello, I do think it was a goal, too.

So great way to start it.

It felt very close, if not on side. I think that line, it's always that case where that line,

the width of the line sometimes dictates. Yep. Well, I'm happy to be here and happy to be on that

side of the line, I guess. All right. And also with me as a man who has all the solutions for how the U.S. can change their setup and win this whole tournament. It's Joe Lowry. Joe, thanks for being willing to provide such knowledge today. Yes, I have all the answers. I will, actually, I'm just going to talk with Blockco. I don't think I'm going to share all of them here. I can't tip my hand entirely. He and I'll have that chat later on. Also, going back to Jordan's intro, I was watching beach volleyball last night. It was the U.S. in Brazil in men's beach volleyball. And they were having the same types of discussion about one of the rules of being able to hit the volleyball

over the net if it's on your side or if it's on the other side or whatever the situation was. They're having the same VAR arguments in beach volleyball that we're having in soccer. And it kind of made me feel just a little bit better that we're not the only sport doing this stuff. Everybody's confused by everything, Joe. You didn't know that? I do now, Taylor, I do now.

Joe, if you were going to have that talk with Vlato, what's the approach? Are you going with like, hey, buddy, and then arm around the shoulder? Like, how would you approach that one? Would you be firm in trying to convey that you know what you're talking about? Oh, no, because I'm not sure I do. I mean, sometimes I feel like I do. sometimes I feel like I don't and soccer is complicated so I think I'd rather hear

his genuinely I think I'd rather hear his genuinely.

I think I'd really like to hear his ideas behind some of the things that the U.S. does, and not just in this game, right? Not just in this game where they're naturally conservative, but in some other games as well. And then, I don't know, then have it back and forth. But yeah, I'm sure he has reasons, but I don't always understand what they are.

Yeah, that's about where I am with him.

And I think I want to stress... and then, I don't know, then have a back and forth. But yeah, I'm sure he has reasons, but I don't always understand what they are.

Yeah, that's about where I am with him.

And I think I want to stress up front. We got a bunch of questions about what's going wrong. How can this team be fixed? What should they be doing? We're going to answer a few questions later in the show. We're going to try to break down what happened today and maybe give some suggestions for why things aren't quite clicking yet at this point.

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