BTW, the bulk of the U23 team lost to Serbia 2-1 last night. My takeaways, Brandon Vazquez should absolutely be given a shot to show what he can do against higher level teams when Nations League and Gold Cup come around. He looked really good last night. He's not a hold up 9, but he was extremely active making his runs into the area and supporting attack and he wasn't glued to a 5 yard strip on either side of the middle of the field. He seemed to be a bigger, faster version of Ferreira, the type who found just a little bit of space. Slonina got the start. He is what I call an IQ driven GK. Smart and analytical in seeing the field and the play in front of him. Good with his feet...way more confident with the ball at his feet than say a Zach Steffen (maybe even moreso than Turner as well). The goals against last night were a free kick from 25 yards that went through the wall (the individuals in the wall actually separated right when he struck the ball...pretty bad). 2nd was a nice buildup from Serbia where they slipped an attacker through.
Zendejas should also get a chance with the senior team for the int'l cup competitions coming up. He may be the best technical player the US has, even better than Pulisic. He created all sorts of space last night with his individual skill. He's quick too. My only knock is he needs to get stronger. He's a small guy (smaller than Pulisic and Dest it appeared). His passes lacked the necessary oomph at times to reach their intended target. And the US needs to cap him a couple more times to lock him in and not let Mexico get their hands on him (this may already be a done deal as Mexico has been fined for using him despite him already being capped for the US in a U20 tournament or something). CB by the name of Neal was impressive as well.
My son saw Serbia's lineup and said it was definitely a B or C team, but we were essentially playing a U21 team. Most players were 18, 19, 20 years old save for Pomykal, Walker-Zimmerman, and later Aaron Long came in as a replacement for Zimm and Arriola came on late as well (and almost scored a couple times).
Good building block game for this group in ID'ing players to work into the main team. I think Slonina has a chance to be the GK in 4 years. I think he's that good.