Martin Rogers

USA TODAY Sports

LOS ANGELES – Jurgen Klinsmann’s player selection policy for the United States national team is seriously flawed, unfair, and affects the squad’s quality of play, according to Major League Soccer midfielder Benny Feilhaber.

Feilhaber, who scored the winning goal for the USA in the 2007 CONCACAF Gold Cup final and now plays for Sporting Kansas City, has been frozen out by Klinsmann despite Feilhaber saying he is in the form of his life.

The 31-year-old insisted that he and several other players – many of them from MLS – are not given an opportunity to prove their worth by Klinsmann, no matter how well they perform at club level.

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“I don’t know what that reason is,” Feilhaber told reporters on Tuesday. “I don’t know if Jurgen doesn’t like these players, he doesn’t like their attitude, he doesn’t like their faces, he thinks they are ugly. I don’t know.”

Feilhaber continued: “If you ask me it can’t possibly be based on on-field performances. There are plenty of guys in MLS that have had better seasons than other guys, in MLS or other countries, that are getting opportunities for the national team.”

Klinsmann has been criticized in some quarters for relying heavily on naturalized players who grew up and developed their soccer talent overseas, such as Germany-raised Jermaine Jones, Fabian Johnson and Timmy Chandler, and Scandinavia-raised Aron Johansson and Mix Diskerud.

However, Feilhaber was adamant he has no problem with the head coach’s policy regarding “foreign” imports, merely the way he says Klinsmann rules out certain individuals regardless of their current form.

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“I’ve accepted the fact that Jurgen’s not going to call me,” said Feilhaber, who has made 41 appearances for the USA, played in the 2010 World Cup, but has not figured since 2014. “If I play the year that I played this last year, and I’m not getting a call, then I’m not going to get an opportunity under Jurgen.

“In regards to how a coach should approach a team … there are two duties – one is making the best possible team that you can possibly make with the players that are available to you. And two, try to continuously improve that team so that team doesn’t stall in any way and continues to improve.

“For me, Jurgen seems to try and do the second one without doing the first one. He would rather put young guys on the team that potentially could become somewhat important on the team and he leaves out players that could make the team better right now.

“That’s the number one job of a national team coach. Not to make the team as good as he can make it in five years, to make it as good as he can make it now and continuously improve it. (In that way) he doesn’t do his job. There are players in the player pool that do not get called in that have performed well enough on the field to get an opportunity.”

Feilhaber highlighted MLS players such as midfielders Sasha Kljestan and Dax McCarty of the New York Red Bulls, and defenders Matt Hedges of FC Dallas and Eric Lichaj of Nottingham Forest in the English Championship as examples of candidates whose form has not been rewarded by Klinsmann.

“An example … I can see how Dax can help the national team,” Feilhaber said. “He plays in his position that in my opinion would help (USA captain) Michael Bradley become a better player.

“Dax is a guy that can sit in that pocket and allow Michael to operate in front of him and I think that he does it in a way that is better, or at least competes, with people who are tying to do the same thing on the national team right now.”