With 19 players from the 2002 World Cup squad vying for playing time, the United States has plenty of experience, but it also begins the serious phase of qualifying for the 2006 World Cup with lots of question marks.
For U.S. coach Bruce Arena and his players, the real work is about to begin anew.
Since the United States lost a bitterly contested and controversial 2002 World Cup quarterfinal 1-0 to Germany in Ulsan, South Korea, the national team may have faded from public view but it played 22 matches prior to a two-game CONCACAF qualifying series against Grenada in June. A 6-2 aggregate win has set up Arena and his players for the daunting workload ahead.
A six-game semifinal phase with Jamaica, Panama and El Salvador kicks off Aug. 18 in Kingston. The top two teams go through to the six-team Hexagonal in 2005.
''There's been a fairly planned progression in rebuilding the group from the World Cup,'' says Arena, who will be going through qualifying for the second time. ''I don't think people really understand the dynamics of getting players into your team.
''A national team is not a club team. The players are not together on a daily basis or weekly basis. On rare occasions they get together and what throws a wrench into the whole thing are injuries. Rarely or never is there a situation where they're all there and you make it nice and neat and tidy and you have answers to questions and solutions to problems. It changes from day to day and week to week. A lot of variables get thrown into the equation.''
Who among the big three in goal will step up?
One the variables presented to Arena for the semifinal phase is in goal.
The deeply stocked goalkeeper position isn't quite so deep with Brad Friedel hobbled the past three months because of a quadriceps injury, Kasey Keller batting Paul Robinson for playing time with Tottenham, and both Tim Howard and Jonny Walker untested in qualifying competition.
Arena has parceled out playing time to deepen the pool. Howard has played 10 games since the 2002 World Cup, including the 2003 Confederations Cup. Walker debuted in January and has played three games, including the 1-0 win over Mexico in Dallas April 28. Keller was in the nets last year for the Gold Cup and played both preliminary round games against Grenada. Arena has also given time to Tony Meola.
''Each game along the way is going to take some thinking as to what makes sense,'' says Arena, ''but in the end we're always going to have a good goalkeeper.''
Howard didn't help his cause by fumbling a cross that presented Poland with an easy goal, yet the error displayed one of the factors Arena must contend with: MLS players are in mid-season form, but those in Europe are just starting their seasons. Keller wasn't his normally sharp self against Grenada.
Who besides Hejduk is ready in the back?
Arena can be sure of fielding a capable goalkeeper, but he's far less confident of his back line, where he rates only outside back Frankie Hejduk as a certain starter.
''We know what we're going to get out of Frankie,'' says Arena. ''On more occasions than not, you're going to get a real positive game on that side of the field when Frankie's playing. He might not contribute much to your attack but defensively he's going to be rock-solid.''
Hejduk played left back in the first three games at the 2002 World Cup; since then, Arena has used Greg Vanney, Bobby Convey, Cory Gibbs and Carlos Bocanegra. Both Gibbs and Bocanegra also play in the middle; Convey has played midfield for the U.S. as well as D.C. United and will probably line up there for English First Division club Reading.
Not surprising, then, is that Arena rates specialist Vanney as the best of the group. Also not surprisingly, his availability in the early phase of the semifinal round is in question due to his recovery from minor knee surgery. Most of Convey's time in the 23 games he's played since the World Cup has been at left back.
''We need to see how he responds over the next week or two,'' says Arena of Vanney, who since the World Cup has played in 12 of 26 U.S. matches and scored the third goal in the 3-0 win in the first leg of the Grenada series.
Bocanegra has played left back for Fulham since joining the English Premier League club in January. He and Eddie Pope would seem to be locks for the central slots, but not in Arena's view. Pope has been inconsistent for club and country and Bocanegra's only qualifying experience was that first leg against Grenada in Columbus.
''Eddie's not been as consistent as we'd like to see a player with his experience and his ability,'' says Arena. ''It's going to be critical that Eddie Pope steps up in qualifying. If Eddie's going to be shaky from one game to the next, it's going to hurt us in the back. He's going to be expected to lead the other center back in the early going. I'm hopeful that Eddie comes through in qualifying. We're going to need him''
Gregg Berhalter has experience in qualifiers as well as the 2002 World Cup, and Tony Sanneh played in the middle and scored a goal when the U.S. beat Honduras 4-0 June 2. Sanneh, 33, has been injured much of the past two years and as of the end of July had yet to find a club. Injuries have limited Danny Califf to just 16 minutes for the national team his year, but in that span he scored in stoppage time to rescue a 1-1 tie with Haiti.
Pablo Mastroeni, a midfielder at the 2002 World Cup, has moved into the back line for Colorado and did well as a central defender in the win over Mexico. He played midfield against Poland in July.
''He's a choice in either position and has demonstrated he can play both positions,'' says Arena of Mastroeni. ''The issue with the international level [is that] playing in midfield requires a fitness level that he probably doesn't get playing week in and week out as a centerback in the league.''
What if Reyna and O'Brien aren't available?
Like Sanneh, midfielder John O'Brien has seen his career threatened by injury. A fulcrum of the team's success in 2002 with his incisive tackling, clean touches and sharp passing, O'Brien is another World Cup veteran Arena can't count on.
''We've had 26 games since the World Cup ended. John O'Brien's played in one of them,'' says Arena. ''How do you classify John O'Brien on our team?''
Friedel classifies O'Brien as a vital reason for the team's success in 2002. ''Our past results show that without [Claudio] Reyna and O'Brien in midfield, we haven't had much success,'' says Friedel. ''Now, if we have only one or the other, we struggle, but we can get by. If we don't have both of them, and given their past history of injuries – especially in the case of O'Brien – we can't count on both of them always being available this time around, getting results will be difficult.''
To bolster a midfield that could lack both Reyna and O'Brien, Arena has used Landon Donovan on the right side in recent games. He is one of the few players guaranteed a starting spot, assuming he's available and in good form.
''The other part of the equation is why Landon goes into the midfield: to help us with our passing and to give us a little more speed and technical ability coming out of the midfield,'' says Arena. ''He's in the midfield sometimes because the people who can give us that are not available.
''Landon can play anywhere in the top four or five spots on the field, no question about that. We don't want him to be the jack-of-all-trades and the master of none. At some point, he's got to get a grip on a position and be extremely effective in that position. If he's a forward, he's got to score goals.''
Left midfield is perhaps the team's deepest position. With DaMarcus Beasley's move to PSV Eindhoven and Convey's transfer to Reading, all three players vying for the slot play overseas. Eddie Lewis, currently with Preston North End, has played in England since 2000.
Kerry Zavagnin of Kansas City has only seven caps yet is a prime candidate for a holding role in center midfield as an alternative to Chris Armas.
Can the forwards increase their output?
For nearly a decade, only Brian McBride could play the role of a target forward strong in the air and adept on the ground.
In the past year or so, Conor Casey and Brian Ching have showed promise in that position, which has given Arena alternatives to Ante Razov and Jovan Kirovski, who have the size but perhaps not the persona to play with their backs to goal and absorb punishment as teammates make runs.
Arena used McBride and Casey together up front in the 4-0 rout of Honduras in June, and McBride scored twice.
''There's a variety of combinations we can play and the variables are how we're playing behind them, who we're playing, where we're playing,'' says Arena.
Defenders have scored five of the 15 goals scored by the U.S. in nine games this year, and Beasley scored three goals in two games with Grenada.
''We haven't had enough others to jump in,'' Arena says. ''We've been fortunate that our center backs have gotten us some goals this year off set pieces but we need a forward to step up and score goals.''
With more players in Europe than in the qualifying rounds for 2002, travel and fatigue will be critical factors, although a country as big as the U.S. will always present unique problems.
''We've had guys travel from the West Coast and in some ways their travel roughly resembles travel from Europe,'' says Arena.
Playing in Central American and Caribbean countries presents difficulties beyond those of time and distance. Fields can be hard and bumpy, refereeing decisions can be dodgy, and in the past more than one locker room assigned to the U.S. has reeked of waste and filth.
''I'm looking at the next game and the game after that,'' says Arena. ''I'm not worried about 2006. I do look long-term as well, but the short term is what my focus is for the rest of this year. Everything we do has to be designed about being successful over the next six games – and to hell with anything after that, really.''
By Soccer America Senior Editor Ridge Mahoney