Folarin Balogun shows why he's 'different breed' of striker for USMNT
Christian Polanco of The Cooligans is joined by Khendrick Beausoleil to react to Sunday’s World Cup warmup match and why the Monaco star's scoring ability is so key to the Americans' chances this summer. Check out the full conversation on the “The Cooligans” podcast - and subscribe on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , YouTube , or wherever you listen.
Video Transcript
I've really enjoyed seeing that link up between, Tillman, McKennie, Balogun.
I mean- Yeah credit to Pepi, and I, I've seen, I seen some comments already, like, Pepi was, was great- Was great today.
Yeah, yeah, of course.
Passing was fantastic from Pepi.
Yeah.
But okay.
Oh, we got a, a, a Twitter, message from Greg.
MLS hater, we always, we always bring up Greg Berhalter.
But it says, "Balogun playing in front of a Rodan-Berhalter double pivot," which is why- I'm playing.
It's like a Lambo inside a It's true, though.
It's true, though.
It's true, though, 'cause But And I think that's the beautiful thing about what Balogun brings to the team, though.
Like, he's been going crazy at Monaco this year.
Yeah.
I think he scored in, like, seven matches in a row.
Mm-hmm.
So it's literally like feed him the ball.
Yeah.
Like, don't, don't overcomplicate it.
Don't try to, like, do too much.
The, the- Give him the ball and he'll make Obviously, he missed a couple chances today, but like- Right, right, right he'll make it happen when it needs to happen.
The, the, the last two years, I mean, since Balogun started playing for the US, like- Yeah you could s- you saw the, a lot of the sort of adjustment.
But you saw, like, as soon as he got this, like- Yeah this is a different breed- Yeah of striker than we're really used to having.
That's been gone in a while.
It's been a while.
Right, right.
So- It's been a while just the, the, the technique- Yeah and the, the, the, kind of the precision, yeah.
And, and if whoever is the striker for the US- Yeah you just know you are a player.
You ain't gonna be touching the ball a lot.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Right?
Yeah, that's just how it is.
Yeah.
I mean, we're not, depending on who we play for the most part.
And, and I was pretty critical, not necessarily of him, but maybe even just the rest, the, the, the entire team- This team when, like, I, I would look at the stats for Balogun, and it would be, like, four touches in the box.
Yeah.
Three touch- And it's like, that, come on.
It can't happen.
You gotta feed him, to, to get him the opportunity to get way more touches.
Yeah.
And e- just in that second half, I think he averaged- Yeah in, like what he normally does- Yeah in, in games.
And then against Senegal, and you can say, "Oh, it's a friendly," and whatever, but I, I know the Senegalese- Yeah do not wanna get embarrassed by the- Yeah the, by the US Men's National Team.
