HARRISON, N.J. – The raindrops keep falling on Jurgen Klinsmann, but the US national team head coach is vowing not to let them defeat him.
“We’ve had a lot of sunshine,” Klinsmann said after the USMNT’s 1-0 loss to Costa Rica Tuesday night. “2012, 2013, 2014. Now it’s raining a little bit, and you have to go through that. You have to go through a little mud as well, and we’ll do that.”
Klinsmann’s second World Cup cycle with USMNT has started similarly to his predecessor Bob Bradley’s final year, with the Americans losing their sixth match of 2015 – the most losses since 2011. That year was also highlighted with a poor performance at the CONCACAF Gold Cup and the dismissal of Bradley after a loss to Mexico in the final of that tournament.
Klinsmann deflected questions about his job status in a post match press conference attended by U.S. Soccer president Sunil Gulati.
“When other people speculate about your job safety, that’s OK,” Klinsmann said. “As I said the other day, I’m here to serve the U.S. Soccer community to my best capabilities and give everything I have, and they have to go through stretches that are not so funny and not so exciting.”
After losing three straight matches for the second time in a calendar year, the US head into the semifinal round of CONCACAF World Cup qualifying with matches against St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Trinidad & Tobago next month. Klinsmann said the team’s recent spell of form and the criticism has motivated him to steer the US through the storm.
“With everything that goes not my way, I get even hungrier to turn it around the other way, that’s just me,” Klinsmann said. “That’s why I’m going to take this team and go through that. I’m going to look everywhere for younger players hopefully developing and getting to that point where they reach the transition that we’ve been talking about for more than a year really happens and guide them towards World Cup Qualifying and the Copa America.”
