USMNT Ready for Brazil at Met Life

As the US Men’s National Team has been preparing for these new young kids going forward with the future of the program in mind, what you will see are new faces that have been coming along nicely since the veterans fell short in Trinidad & Tobago last year in October to qualify for the World Cup that recently past this summer.

This young group of solid attackers, midfielders, defenders and goal keepers are not afraid to be apart of the big stage that is world football when they take on a five time World Cup Champion in Brazil as Neymar will be gracing the pitch at Met Life Stadium this coming Friday night.

As Interim Head Coach Dave Sarachan chatted with the media he is happy to have these kids tackling a huge opportunity that is ahead of them even though it’s been a short week of training for the team.

“It’s kinda been a short week when the guys come in on Sunday. Then it’s a few days to get to do some training and then Friday comes and the game is already here, so we had to get a lot of work done within a short period of time.” said Dave Sarachan.

“A little bit of heat, but that’s all part of the preparation. We have a good starting point that we have a bunch of guys who have already been apart of friendlies in the last couple of months.

So the starting point is when they get together is a little bit further along and sprinkling in a few new players who haven’t been here so that they can get use to one another. When you get ready for a team like Brazil, you don’t have to say much because they are ready for the challenge.

When you have a roster like Brazil regardless of who is on it, you know for a fact that these players are ready to go when they wear their lemon and green trimmed shirts as the entire country is excited for their national team to play.

But for some of these kids this will be a huge task to take on a nation of Brazil’s reputation, but of course these kids did very well when they took on France before this past World Cup and got a fantastic result as that one ended in a one all draw.

But does Sarachan need to find a way to capitalize on that result to continue a positive performance or talk about that result to make this side feel confident against Brazil on Friday Night in the Meadowlands?

“Well our preparation going into the France game, we didn’t really talk about France till the day of the game. Because these guys are very familiar with these players. There isn’t a lot of fear.

Sure they will be nervous, but they will plow right through it and I think there is a good understanding of how I work, how our staff works to get these kids ready to take on Brazil. I feel good that these kids will not play with any fear.”

Now turning to the Red Bulls players who are apart of this national team camp. It’s been very exciting to see Tyler Adams, Tim Parker and former Red Bulls Center Back Matt Miazga who is on loan at Nantes of French Ligue One.

But the new guy at camp is Aaron Long who earned his spot after logging many minutes this season for the Red Bulls and having that partnership with Parker at Center Back shows that he is in the running at this moment for a future place on the National Team.

“For sure it’s been an amazing experience so far. I felt very comfortable with both Tyler (Adams) & Tim (Parker) introducing me to everyone, having them around me and making me feel comfortable helps me ease in.” Said Aaron Long.

“We want to have clarity and be all on the same page since we are coming from different clubs in different places so I feel very good and it’s going to be amazing to face Brazil and once the whistle blow we are ready to go.”

Now that Dave Sarachan has finally seen some training sessions involving Aaron Long he had this to say about the young center back that he wanted to give an opportunity to for this camp.

“We brought him in for a reason. We watched him and he has a great story, we have seen him at the All-Star Game and he’s gained a lot of confidence. He offers some unique skill sets, how he reads the game and he’s not out of place by any means.”

So get ready for this big friendly that starts the fall series as the US Men’s National Team will being against one of the big powers of South American Football, then a trip to Music City to face the old rivalry as the USA Takes on Mexico at Nissan Stadium.