Jurgen Klinsmann’s reign as coach is officially over with the U.S. Men’s Soccer team. The question now stands, who is the right man or woman to right the sinking ship?
At 3:11 pm EST today, news broke that Jurgen Klinsmann no longer held the head coach or technical director role with the USMNT. A move, for many fans, was long overdue and was cause for great celebration. With two losses to open World Cup qualifying in The HEX, against Mexico (2-1) and Costa Rica (4-0), the national media and fans across the United States spent six days yelling, begging and doing every possible thing to force US Soccer President Sunil Gulati’s hand in firing Klinsmann.
The five years Klinsmann spent in charge of the USMNT did have many positives, but, his résumé will ultimately be scarred with losses in games that many experts deemed “winnable” games. Some blamed the lack of tactical awareness by Klinsmann. Others, his indecisiveness with formations and players he chose for important matches.
Now that the announcement has become a dream come true for many USMNT fans, the real challenge begins in finding the next coach. Several notable names have already floated to the top of the pack, but, fans should be aware that it took several days after the Costa Rica loss for Gulati to fire Klinsmann, so, signing a new coach will also take time, something the United States actually has on their side.
The following slides explain several names that are realistic possibilities and some that would be more interesting to see how that person would actually handle the job as well. Regardless of who is tasked with the job, there is a lot of work to be done with the USMNT.