I know you crazy americans don't like football (and yeah It's football!), but I was wondering if there were some expections who are following the greatest event in the world!
The opening match was fantastic, the germans are showing that they are the Worlcup team they've always been ! and who would have thaught that T&T would draw against sweden !
Of course I'm watching! Just saw Mexico get an emotional win... the third goal was a thing of beauty. I love watching England make excuses for their poor play against Paraguay; the midfield play was especially atrocious. Brazil is still my pick, but The Netherlands and Germany have looked tough. Gotta love seeing Van Persie have a good match today!
The Czech/US game just ended. 3-0 Czechs. The US played like crap. Flat. Tired. Horrible. Atrocious. Ugly. They got outplayed in every aspect of the game. Beasley never did anything-never took a man one up. Convey was a non factor essentially. Donovan rarely got a chance to make something happen and when he did he got taken down for a card. The defense was picked apart. Reyna's shot off the post was huge. If that goes in, who knows what could have happened. But it didn't, the US stayed flat, they lost. End of story. The only shimmer of hope I found was Eddie Johnson off the bench. Had 3 scoring chances. One a left footed shot from just outside the 18. The other on a Convey cross where he came flying in front of the goalie just a split second too late. The third on a right footed chip shot that just went over the cross bar. The US just came out with no energy and never gained any.
Looking forward to the Italy/Ghana match in about half an hour. The Dutch had a solid showing as did Germany. The Czechs looked sharp today as well. Brazil is the favorite, but I wouldn't be surprised to see any of these teams knock them off.
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"Rust on a nail builds tetanus. Rust on a barbell builds character, strength, and attitude." -EC
"Don't spend your life wishing. Spend it doing." -FishrCutB8
"You're a mutant, like a snake with two heads or a cat shy one nipple. Be thankful that your mutation is helpful." - LD
You are right Kevin, that was a brutal showing. The US attack lacked any sort of creativity or urgency. The Czechs had no problem snuffing out lazy, predictable balls into the area and motoring downfield with aggressive counters. I don't like the US's chances against Italy, or advancing out of the group stage, for that matter.
The only bright point for me is that the new Arsenal midfielder Tomas Rosicky appears to be the real deal. He took 3 shots, scored on 2 and nearly broke the cross bar with the third.
Unfortunately, its back to work for me so I can't watch Ita/Gha. Have to follow it on that internet thing.
England, Sweden, Netherlands, and Portugal haven't looked too impressive in their first games.
Frankly speaking, the U.S. team doesn't belong in the top 20 let alone in the top ten. I don't know how they go about ranking the teams but it sure has to change. I wasn't surprised to see them lose the way the did to the Czech's, who have a very good squad.
Brasil hits the pitch in just a few hours. I'm looking forward to seeing the magic quartet in action!
As for the US's performance, before the game started they played the audio of Bush wishing them luck. I recognized right away that was the kiss of death! Didn't even need to watch after that.
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Working "hard," or the perception of working hard, doesn't really mean anything. Sweating, vomiting, and breathing hard could be a good workout or a tropical disease kicking in.-Dan John
Brazil vs Croatia is on now. Ronaldinho has had 1 possession thus far (its like 4:30 in to the match.) My jaw is still on the ground.
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"Rust on a nail builds tetanus. Rust on a barbell builds character, strength, and attitude." -EC
"Don't spend your life wishing. Spend it doing." -FishrCutB8
"You're a mutant, like a snake with two heads or a cat shy one nipple. Be thankful that your mutation is helpful." - LD
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"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." --Benjamin Franklin, 1759
I haven't had a chance to watch Spain so far this year. Neither Brazil nor Argentina particularly impressed me although I only saw one game each. Same with England. So far nobody has come out and looked great. Korea imo could repeat their run of last cup but they aren't aggressive enough to win it all. Love their fans though....20000 came to the Staples center in LA to watch their game Sunday. And France, man they have some strikers, but they're almost lackadaisical. I haven't seen Germany yet...it seems wide open to me this year. US has a chance to make it to the next round if they can beat Ghana Thursday, that should be a great game. Good speed on both sides.
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"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." --Benjamin Franklin, 1759
This game was a total disappointment!! I hope Arena gets booted ASAP. Playing a 4-5-1 was an obvious mistake he should've seen going into the game. We had to go for the win, but played like we wanted a tie. I'm not excusing any of the players, because some big players like Donovan, McBride and Beasley really choked on us. Except for Beasley one run that lead to the goal, none of the guys played with any brilliance.
Since the begining of this World Cup we've had terrible refs, and that penalty kick was completely uncalled for. The Ghana team should be ashamed that they dove so much it looked like they were going for gold in the spring board. One Ghana player actually went down and stayed down because he was tired. Holding his side like a girl. But in the end the US did nothing to deserve winning that game. I hope we can regroup and start training for next time.
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"So many of our dreams at first seem impossible, then they seem improbable, and then, when we summon the will, they soon become inevitable."
- Christopher Reeve
The penalty kick was probably a make up for the US goal - the commentators ignored it, but our guy was ahead of the defense by a half a body when the pass was made and we didn't get called for offsides.
Maybe Ghana didn't deserve it Charger, but the US had so little offense, I'm not sure we even deserved to be in the World Cup. It was embarassing - the only goal against Italy was scored by Italy? Their result against Czechoslovakia? Now this one goal against Ghana was probably illegal. Sorry, but you need to score and if we have a great goalkeeper, as the announcers keep saying, then we shoud worry less about the counter and put some more pressure up front.
Now on to more watching of the 'real' teams. Watching Brazil play is like a visual orgasm.
My friend went to Germany and has tickets to a quarter final. Not only should the game be awesome but so should the quality of ladies around the pitch by the look of the pictures
I disagree that Dempsey was offsides on his goal. His foot was even with the Ghana defender.
And I though Beasley played well. His midfield defense was superb and his speed was better than anybody on Ghana. Not to mention the brilliant pass. Donovan didn't show up, it's true. Last cup he did so much because he was unknown. He hasn't raised his level of play since then and Ghana marked him well and had him under control.
IMO Gooch Onyewu really stepped up and will get some attention next time around, he showed he can play on a major stage with a lot of pressure and held up well. The call against him was complete garbage.
McBride imo played fairly well, he did his usual. He did not get enough chances, because the midfielders couldn't get him the ball.
I agree that Arena did a terrible job this year. We didn't see enough Bobby Convey or Steve Cherundulo. Beasley played awful against Czech because Arena decided the first game of the World Cup is a time to experiment and play him on the wrong side of the field. He should have pulled Eddie Pope at halftime of the Italian game because it was clear he was on his way to a second yellow, he was playing like crap anyway. Arena was a good coach to get the US to where we are now but we need somebody like Zico to get us to the next level.
I predict Brazil gets to the finals now. I've been duly impressed by them. Brazil v Argentina? Would be classic.
You can't call Dempsey for offsides on the goal. When it's that close, the calls almost always go in favor of the offense. Rule 11 is one of the most confusing rules in the history of sports, as its so hard to see where exactly the player is at at the moment the other player plays the ball through, but IMO the referee's assistant did a good job in not raising the flag.
Beasley's defense was solid, but he's known for his runs on offense and getting something started. In the Czech game, yea he was played on the wrong side, but he did not take a single guy on one on one, which is what he's great at. The Italian game you couldn't really judge him that much as for the last half of the game the US was down to 9 guys. Aside from the beautifully played ball in the Ghana game, offensively he wasn't there. He did play good defense in the game, but the US needed a win; you need goals to win games, you need to push forward to score goals, he didn't push forward. Granted, Arena for some reason went with the 4-5-1 instead of a 4-4-2.
Donovan wasn't there. At all. All World Cup.
I was thoroughly pleased by Wynalda's blunt criticism of the US team, mainly Bruce Arena. I found it enlightening to see someone tell it as it is. I also found it comical how he cut off Foudy and Davis whenever they tried to somehow, someway stand up for Arena. Very questionalbe strategies from Arena definitely. I particularly did not like seeing Eddie Johnson and Bobby Convey coming into the Ghana game so late. IMO, put 'um in after halftime and give them the half to try and get something going.
McBride can't do anything without the ball. The midfielders simply did not get him the ball enough for him to be effective. That was a big thing for the US: they did not get the midfield line up enough. If Keller is such a great keeper, why is Arena leaving so many guys back? The midfield needed to keep moving forward, especially the guys on the wings.
I was overall disappointed. I like Onyewu and Dempsey and Convey and Cherundulo. I don't like how Onyewu is a marked man cause he's big and swole. I don't like how we got two crappy refs in back to back games. The Italy game was a joke with all the cards. The only legit red was on Italy and I'm not saying this because I'm from the US. Pablo whatever his last name is (Maestorni?) deserved a yellow and I think that only one of Pope's 2 yellows were legit. The call against Onyewu was just ridiculous. There was no contact and Pimpong took a dive. Pimpong fell down out of shape with 5 minutes left to kill time. That's crap. Pretty good scoring chances for the US still. McBride's header off the post and Onyewu's header just above the crossbar. Those go in and it's a different story. Oh well, they didn't. US lost. We're done. Damn.
Now, just gotta root on heritage lines and go with the Netherlands and Germany.
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"Rust on a nail builds tetanus. Rust on a barbell builds character, strength, and attitude." -EC
"Don't spend your life wishing. Spend it doing." -FishrCutB8
"You're a mutant, like a snake with two heads or a cat shy one nipple. Be thankful that your mutation is helpful." - LD
I think you guys are too hard on Beasley. He did attack in the Czech game, but he was hesitant and had bad first touches, and every time he made his move he had three defenders on him. That's Arena's fault. And part of Beasley's lack of offense was that he'd give the ball up to Donovan who did nothing with it. You list Convey, Cherundolo, Onyewu, and Dempsey. Well of those guys, only Dempsey plays in the MLS. And that won't last for long. And that is why Donovan hasn't developed, he's been taking it easy in the MLS against lesser competition and no pressure, when he should have been in Europe raising his game to the next level. But he didn't take anybody by surprise this time around and he was completely controlled every game.
They've been calling the close offsides all tournament. Why not in this case? Regardless, the US defined offensive futility. 1 goal scored by the US in the cup? Sad.
I agree with Wynalda's comment about Donovan not being big enough to play an agressive front game. Maybe he was intimidated by all the talent he was up against. And, in the end, if most of the guys on your team are playing in the MLS instead of the English Premier or some other major league in Europe, you've got talent issues. FWIW, I thought Beasley did realtively well - I've had the chance to watch him play live in Chicago.
Definitely Arena's fault that Beasley wasn't fully effective, but some blames gotta go on him as well. Personally, I like Beasley- I like what he can do. I remember one of the commentators saying he wasn't as dazzling as 2002 was that he was too much incorporated into the system. They said that in 2002 he was younger and less experienced and just went on his runs. His play was just too spotty for the World Cup.
As for Donovan in the MLS, didn't he bomb in Europe? Wasn't he on the reserve team for a German club back in 1999-2000? Didn't another stint with another German team end quickly a year or two ago?
Definitely the US's offense was horrible. The scheme to score goals was horrible as well. Arena and Reyna said in interviews after the Cup that the US needs to get players playing in Europe to develop. Reyna said he was supportive of MLS as an early development league, but the US needs to get players playing in the premier leagues in Europe to fully develop. Still, it doesn't matter how much talent you have if you don't put it in a position to win.
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"Rust on a nail builds tetanus. Rust on a barbell builds character, strength, and attitude." -EC
"Don't spend your life wishing. Spend it doing." -FishrCutB8
"You're a mutant, like a snake with two heads or a cat shy one nipple. Be thankful that your mutation is helpful." - LD
Football World cup!
(and yeah It's football!), but I was wondering if there were some expections who are following the greatest event in the world!
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