Jurgen Klinsmann came to the defense of his team after a disjointed and often horrific performance in the USA’s 2-0 loss to Ukraine in Cyprus.

He admitted there was a lot of work ahead and was hopeful of learning more when he brings in a new group of players.

In particular, Klinsmann came to the defense of his backline that was badly exposed on the two goals.

“It would be totally wrong now to criticize what went wrong,” he said in his post-game press conference.

“It was clear to us that playing a completely new backline, playing players that come out of the club system, who are in a difficult situation not having the same confidence they usually have, there’s a lot of work to be done and a lot to build on.

“Still, we continue to get John Anthony Brooks back in there, we see where he’s at, Geoff Cameron took the right back role and so on. [Edgar] Castillo flies all the way from Tijuana and played a decent game.

“You see individuals a lot in these type of matches, so it’s understandable that collectively, it’s not clicking. It would be a miracle if we had played well, still we need these games,” he added.