The USMNT manager and captain are both proceeding with their preparations for Tuesday’s Copa America semifinal with a sense of normalcy.
No matter they’re matched up with a five-time Ballon d’Or winner or the number-one ranked team in the world.
Ahead of Tuesday night’s contest against Argentina, Jurgen Klinsmann and Michael Bradley are instead ready for the challenge that awaits them while still being understanding of the task ahead.
“We don’t want to make this out to be a Mission Impossible,” Michael Bradley said. “It’s 90 minutes. It’s a semifinal.” Those are all absolute, indisputable facts.
“We are not scared of them at all,” head coach Jurgen Klinsmann said, echoing his captain’s thoughts.
The United States will face Lionel Messi and Argentina with a chance to not only make an enormous statement among world soccer, but to also reach the Copa America semifinals for the first time in history.
However, amid all the confidence, there was also a dose of reality, and Jurgen spun it to hit out at US fans and media, as he has more than once during the successes of this tournament. “There will be setbacks, and there’s also a lot of explanation from your [the media’s] end that needs to be done to the casual soccer fan or kind of the more emotional soccer fan, so we still go through a lot of explaining why certain things happen when there is a setback, how you take that and so on.” You can read the full comment here.
Coming into the tournament, the United States had suffered a number of setbacks over the past year, and many speculated that had the US not advanced from its Copa America group, Klinsmann’s job could be on the line. Now, with the team in the semifinals, that all appears to be well in the rear view mirror.