Discuss Group B here

[taremiscores]

I disagree. We all know that getting to top Euro clubs/leagues is a tall order for our boys (for many reasons outside of general talent, and outside of their control). With all the money the US puts in development, training, promotion, etc, they have yet to have had a significant impact on the WC stage of late.

Well, they didn't make the last WC, so yes, recently their WC hasn't been impressive. But that's cherry picking on what their players have been doing lately. But look at the clubs they play for ... Chelsea, Borussia Dortmund, Juventus, Bayern, Valencia, Barcelona ... a who's who of the best clubs in the world. Most regular starters too. Any of these teams we would love for our best to be in.

If we had players like Yunus Musah and Weston McKennie, we would be going crazy. Sadly, even though he has a different profile, but Saeed Ezatolahi at this point of his career should have been at the level these two former players are at.

Now, they are young and they have to come together more. That's where we have the advantage.

[diz]

Well, they didn't make the last WC, so yes, recently their WC hasn't been impressive. But that's cherry picking on what their players have been doing lately. But look at the clubs they play for ... Chelsea, Borussia Dortmund, Juventus, Bayern, Valencia, Barcelona ... a who's who of the best clubs in the world. Most regular starters too. Any of these teams we would love for our best to be in.
If we had players like Yunus Musah and Weston McKennie, we would be going crazy. Sadly, even though he has a different profile, but Saeed Ezatolahi at this point of his career should have been at the level these two former players are at.
Now, they are young and they have to come together more. That's where we have the advantage.

I don't disagree with the high profile club teams. I just think the USMNT is way overhyped. Let's see how they do in this WC (as you said, they didn't even qualify last time; and they came in 3rd in the qualifiers behind Canada and Mexico this time...and Mexico sucked this year!). But like I said, my money is still on our boyz!

[Altamonte]

Wow! Have you followed any of the following recently (aside from Mehdi and Sardar)?

Allahyar
Abedzadeh
Alipour
Zahedi

Allahyar played in a meh league and still plays in a meh league. Did score his first goal recently but I mean.... it's still the Championship. There's promise though!
Abedzadeh progressed really well but he plays in 2nd tier of Spain too, nothing overly exciting. You won't see many US players playing 2nd tier nowadays.
Alipour was average... which is "meh".
Zahedi plays in a poor quality league too so... also "meh".

[The]

I don't think I would go that far

My point is that our raw and individual talent is far superior than the US team's. It's not hard to imagine that with more support on multiple fronts, our boys would wash the floor with them. I still have my money (literally) on Iran against the US.

Go TM!

To quote a great Italian man "If my grandmother had wheels, she'd be a bicycle".

We can only go on what is, not what could be.

Our individual talent isn't far superior.
You might be able to make the argument that our top two (Sardar and Mehdi) are marginally better than theirs, but after that USA is better in almost every position. Honestly talent wise it's pretty even after after England, and things like prep and coaching is what will make the difference.

Iran needs every bit of preparation possible to be able to beat USA and seeing that we can't even arrange a couple of friendlies properly, I'd say it's pretty obvious that USA and whoever makes it out of the playoffs would be favourites to finish above Iran in the group.

Will need more than salavat and gheyrat for this one.

[perspolis#1]

There is way too much we don't know about the Iran USA game.

It doesn't matter what the prep differences are for perception because the world won't say " wow look at the Iran team with no no resources doing this". They will say we went to R16 or we failed.

Similarly they won't say wow the US was so overprepared and went to R16, they either do or fail.

Right now both teams have some injured people who are crucial to their first team. The US has a serious striker problem and we have a transition and midfield problem. At the end of the day, it will be which team addresses their deficiency.

The US being young and fast won't matter if they can't address he fact that we will slow the game down. Similarly, having Taremi and Azmoun won't matter if we don't know how to get them the ball

[diz]

Allahyar played in a meh league and still plays in a meh league. Did score his first goal recently but I mean.... it's still the Championship. There's promise though!
Abedzadeh progressed really well but he plays in 2nd tier of Spain too, nothing overly exciting. You won't see many US players playing 2nd tier nowadays.
Alipour was average... which is "meh".
Zahedi plays in a poor quality league too so... also "meh".

By that reasoning, unless a young kid starts in the top 4 European leagues with CL qualifying teams, then they're just "meh". I'm glad CQ didn't think Mehdi was just "meh" when he played for PP or in Qatar; I'm glad Sardar wasn't thought of as "meh" when he was at Rubin and Zenit before transferring to Bundesliga. And I'm sure glad many others aren't discounting our young stars as they work hard to get to bigger and better things!

[ramingeles2000]

I think they have way more talent - look at the clubs they play for. If we had players playing in the clubs they played for - we'd say we'd win the World Cup lol. The advantage we have is that they are very young and we have the experience. Their youth is what's to our advantage.

please don't state the obvious, lol. the USMNT is absolutely stacked. they're raw, young and have a shit coach but this is by far their most loaded team heading into a WC (if you measure it from the perspective of performance and presence in top euro clubs). i think that we can capitalize on their inexperience but we're definite underdogs in this match.

[PersianLion80]

Discuss Group B here

please don't state the obvious, lol. the USMNT is absolutely stacked. they're raw, young and have a shit coach but this is by far their most loaded team heading into a WC (if you measure it from the perspective of performance and presence in top euro clubs). i think that we can capitalize on their inexperience but we're definite underdogs in this match.

Fitness and depth level we will be done by the time the 3rd game with the US …I have no hopes with this iff and coaching staff…

[inarsenewetrust]

Playing for big clubs is only part of the equation though. What the USMNT is doing on that front is impressive, regardless of how they received some of those chances (despite the fact that few of those players are really figureheads at said clubs).

WE all know football is a team sport, and when that group of individuals comes together so far as diz mentioned the label of overhyped can be thrown at them. I disagree that label can be levelled at their talent, but definitely as what their collective shows on the pitch it can be. I mean, they failed to beat Canada across 2 games, took a deserved beating by a bunch of costa rican kids, got lucky with a draw against Jamaica and even lost against Panama in this cycle.

That doesnt scream "strong team" to me. And we all know their coach is an idiot, even less qualified than Sko somehow. Add into the mix their age, the fact they've never been on such a stage before as a team, and I think it could really go either way.

[mehdi13]

I wish I could be as confident as some of you guys with our starting CBs and mids playing in Qatar and Emirates this past season…

[Hosseini]

USA is not the favorite against Iran. We have the ability to go toe to toe with them and beat them. We should come in with an underdog mentality in all matchups, but we can certainly win and have the edge in matchups

[Keshwardoost]

I wish I could be as confident as some of you guys with our starting CBs and mids playing in Qatar and Emirates this past season…

Keep Calm And Trust In Kaanani!

[Keshwardoost]

i look forward to introducing this celebration when we score in the world cup, specialy against usa and ingilis, at 00.35

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6JifA-fsUE

[Leicester City]

[perspolis#1]

Really wish I wasn't working for the Scotland Ukraine game.

We need Scotland to win. 100% chance we do better vs Scotland/Wales.