German legend Jurgen Klinsmann has admitted he pulled the pin on discussions regarding the USA national team coaching job.
The former Inter Milan, Tottenham and Bayern Munich striker was in negotiations with US Soccer to take over from Bob Bradley but after a few weeks when there was still no agreement in writing, Klinsmann decided to end talks.
"We had conversations, maybe about three or four weeks period of time, and very positive conversations. But we didn't get it to a positive ending because we couldn't put into writing what we agreed to verbally," Klinsmann said during an interview with Wizards' announcer Sasha Victorine broadcast Sunday on the Kansas City pregame show.
"It's obviously always about authority. When you have conversations with a club team or a national team, it's who has the last word in what issues, and that's where we couldn't get into the written terms.
"Verbally we agreed on that the technical side is my side, and I should have a 100 percent control of it. Written terms, they couldn't commit to it. At that point I said, 'Well then, I can't get the job done because I have to have the last say as a head coach for my entire staff, for all the players issues, for everything that happens with the team.' Unfortunately they couldn't commit to that, and that was basically the end of our talks, and then they agreed then to continue with Bob as the head coach, and that's totally fine."