Best, worst and indifferent from U.S. team's early exit

	Jürgen Klinsmann, the German coach who lives in Huntington Beach, Calif., has become the people's choice to replace Bruce Arena as U.S. manager. Bongarts/Getty Images
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LEIPZIG, Germany -- The last time U.S. Soccer president Sunil Gulati communicated with Jürgen Klinsmann was in a congratulatory e-mail after Germany's 4-1 win against the United States in March, Gulati told me on Saturday.

We point this out because Gulati is suddenly a man who might be looking for a new U.S. coach following the Americans' first-round exit from the World Cup, while Klinsmann -- the fair-haired Germany coach who lives in Huntington Beach, Calif. -- is suddenly the guy many U.S. fans are wanting to take over the national team.

First things first, though. Gulati said no decisions will be made on whether Bruce Arena's contract will be extended until after the World Cup is over. Gulati did say that he sat next to Arena on the hour-long flight back to Hamburg from Nuremberg following the U.S.'s 2-1 loss to Ghana on Thursday. They had a "very general conversation" about "the tournament and the future," according to Gulati, but nothing more than that.

Before the tournament started, we wrote that the main lesson of the 2006 World Cup for the Americans could very well be how remarkable their 2002 quarterfinal really was. That turned out to be the case. The U.S. is fast becoming a distant memory as this World Cup marches into the knockout rounds, but we wanted to take one last look back at the Winners, Losers and Somewhere-In-Betweens of the Americans in World Cup '06.

Winners

Clint Dempsey
Maybe next time Deuce will get to wear his favored No. 2 after being the U.S.'s best player in the World Cup. Dempsey showed a fearlessness that was sorely lacking among most of the other American attackers, and he set himself up well for a potential move to Europe in the near future.

Jimmy Conrad
The quotable Kansas City Wizard showed he could play at the highest level in two solid games against Italy and Ghana.

Jürgen Klinsmann
A couple years ago Klinsi was asking Arena if he could serve an "internship" as an assistant coach during a U.S. camp in SoCal. But with Germany's impressive Cup run, he's become the people's choice as the guy to replace Arena. It remains to be seen, though, whether Arena will stay in power ... or whether Klinsmann would want the job at all.

Steve Sampson
Vilified for years after the U.S. disaster at World Cup '98, Sampson must have cracked a smile at some point over the past two weeks. The World Cup can be a brutal event, as Arena now knows.

Losers

Landon Donovan
In the wake of his struggles against the Czech Republic and Ghana, MLS's best player will be viewed (for now) like a band that can't crack the American Top 40 but is huge in Japan. There's value in that, perhaps -- especially from the personal perspective of living in Los Angeles -- but no transcendence, nothing to sustain hopes of greatness. At 24, Donovan still has time, though. Will he reconsider his decision to leave Europe behind? Stay tuned.