Jurgen Klinsmann is the definition of a tactical riddle wrapped in a cloak of invisibility.
His tenure with the U.S. men’s national team has not been without its successes, but much of it has come at the expense of continuity. The German’s tactics have been about as predictable as a coin toss.
A 4-2-3-1? We’ve seen it. The 4-3-3? Part of his tactical nous the day he started the job. A 4-4-2? Multiple iterations, in fact. Klinsmann’s even used a three-man back line for a half against Chile earlier this year before dropping it like a soccer ball on fire.
So it’s anyone’s guess how he pulls a starting XI out of the hat from his chosen 23-man roster for a pivotal CONCACAF Cup match against Mexico on Saturday (6:30 pm PT; FOX Sports 1). And while that goes double for the pair of Sounders FC players and a former Sounder in camp - Brad Evans, Clint Dempsey and DeAndre Yedlin - we do have a few clues.
The U.S. has largely had its run against Mexico in recent years thanks to a committed team approach and a willingness to let Mexico waste its wider run of possession. Those Dos-a-Cero results may seem surprising on one level, but they’ve hardly come out of nowhere. The U.S. has arguably never been as individually talented as any Mexico team it’s ever faced, but it is almost always more organized and committed defensively.
One of Klinsmann’s most enduring legacies through the first four-plus years of his USMNT tenure is his unbeaten 3-0-3 mark against Mexico. And don’t forget that he left the vaunted Estadio Azteca fortress in 2013 with a point in a FIFA World Cup qualifying match less than a year after a 1-0 win in Mexico City in a friendly.
Dempsey’s deployment is probably the least challenging from a predictive standpoint. Dempsey started his national team career under then-USMNT coach Bruce Arena as a wide player, and he’s gradually marched inside and upward as he’s aged. Klinsmann tried Dempsey as an attacking midfielder early in his tenure, but as Sounders head coach Sigi Schmid quickly discovered, veteran Dempsey is at his best up top. In that way, you allow him to drop in as a shadow striker and exploit pockets created by his tactical liquidity.
The problem Klinsmann faces is that Jozy Altidore, Dempsey’s most likely strike partner, isn’t a prototypical No. 9, in the sense that he’s more comfortable wiggling loose of the centerbacks to run off back shoulders rather than bodying them up. He can do both, and he’s gradually become more of a target man at Toronto FC, but he’ll always be more comfortable heads up on a defender in lieu of having his back turned.
The good news? Nobody’s better prepared for that particular assignment than Dempsey, because that’s exactly what he has in Obafemi Martins. If Klinsmann does not start Dempsey and Altidore up top together, color me shocked.
What he does with the midfield (and the back line, for that matter) is much less understood. He’s favored a 4-4-2 diamond with Michael Bradley as the tip of the spear in recent months, but that’s all very subject to change after the Gold Cup failure earlier this year.
It’s become exceedingly clear over the past year that if Yedlin is to progress on the club level, he’s going to do it at rightback. That’s where he made his name in Seattle, it’s the position Tottenham Hotspur signed him to play earlier this year, and it’s where Sunderland Manager Dick Advocaat started him just after securing him on loan in September.
Advocaat has since stepped down following Sunderland’s poor start, but his replacement will undoubtedly be of the same mind. Yedlin’s played one 90-minute match in the English Premier League for Sunderland, and he was quality. He completed 81 percent of his passes and displayed the kind of attacking verve he became so well known for in MLS. He also served up an assist in a League Cup match against Manchester City. Yedlin is and will always be a more natural fit at rightback.
Klinsmann, though, disagrees. Yedlin has spent nearly all of 2015 moonlighting as a right midfielder in between brief stints at fullback. It’s obvious what Klinsmann sees. The U.S. has lacked true width for years, and Yedlin is the fastest guy on the team. The trouble, though, is that Yedlin’s skill set is doesn’t quite translate as a full-time midfielder. He’s not at his best on the cross, and his forays into the attacking third should, ideally, be brief. Like a raider, he’s at his most dangerous in smaller attacking doses.
As if to leave no doubt about his intentions, Klinsmann lumped Yedlin in with the midfielders in the official roster release. That doesn’t mean Yedlin won’t play rightback against Mexico, but it certainly lessens the possibility.
Timmy Chandler, the man who supplanted Yedlin on the right, isn’t in the 23, which leaves the position open to competition during the team’s camp at UC Irvine. And that’s where Evans enters the picture.
During the last competitive game the national team played - a shocking 2-1 loss to Jamaica in the Gold Cup semifinal over the summer - Evans went the full 90 at right back, where he’s played almost exclusively under Klinsmann over the past few years. In fact, Evans’ most notable moment in a national team shirt came as a right back, when he scored a critical late winner against Jamaica in a 2014 World Cup qualifying match.
"He has the vision, he has the technique, he's strong and good in one-on-ones,” Klinsmann said after Evans’ right back stint in a 4-3 win over Germany in 2013. “And he doesn't shy away from overlapping as well. We trained the last couple days and I saw that he was ready for it."
Whether Evans starts at rightback probably depends on DaMarcus Beasley’s fitness. The 33-year-old Houston Dynamo leftback has been a favorite of Klinsmann’s, and Fabian Johnson has often flexed to the right. Johnson’s played just about everywhere, and if Klinsmann starts him at left mid, which he’s done before, Evans could well be the right back of choice.
As if this isn’t all suitably confusing enough, the U.S. is also relatively wide open to competition at centerback with neither John Brooks or Omar Gonzalez in camp. Could Evans play in the middle?
As with anything tactically related to Klinsmann, flip a coin.
