USA vs Costa Rica is on right now. Should be the first real test of the tournament for us. Oh, and apparently Unimas is an OTA channel, so anyone w/o cable can watch too.
I guess I'm the only one who cares about this, but USA vs Honduras is about to start (Fox Soccer and Unimas). They're playing this one at Jerry's World and apparently the grass they laid down sucks. This is what it looked like before any games were played. I guess they put down some green sand to 'fill the gaps'. Hopefully no one gets hurt.
The ref was brutal tonight. He missed some clear penalties, Honduras' constant hacking and then gives Jurgen a red card.
Is it me, or is this Gold Cup team playing better than the Altidore/Dempsey team in CONCACAF qualifying? Lando is playing at an elite level, Eddie Johnson is the fastest man in the Gold Cup, Beckerman is owning the back midfield, and Beasely just doesn't get beat these days 1 v 1.
I think part of it is none of the better teams have all of their top European based players. I just quickly looked at Mexico' roster and there is no Chicharito, Dos Santos or Guardado. Mexico is a little different position since they just played in the Confederations Cup, but I think most of the better teams are missing 1 or 2 players. But, that isn't to say they aren't playing great. Donovan is clearly still one of our best players and head and shoulders above anyone else in the tournament. His resurgence, as well as our depth at CM have been the 2 best parts about this Gold Cup. EJ has really impressed as well. He is clearly our 2nd best striker and probably will get a lot of burn in the WC. It's crazy to think of his roller coaster USMNT career. He started so hot and then was basically and afterthought for years until he came back to Seattle to revitalize his club career. I still don't like Beckerman against WC caliber teams, but at this level of competition, he's really good (I'll give him a pass on his dribbling out of bounds last night, which was comically bad) Also, Corona and Torres have improved a lot recently too. I'm not sure if both or either make the WC team, but it's good to see that our drop off from our A team to our B team isn't as steep as it has been in the past.
Not Gold Cup related, but it looks like the 2022 World Cup is going to be played in November/December. Qatar bribed its way into hosting, promising stadiums w/ an air temp of something like 75 degrees. Looks like that was a lie and that no one thought about all the time spent outside of the stadiums for fans and the press. The 2022 WC is going to make Brazil look like a well oiled machine. http://espnfc.com/news/story/_/id/1506462/fifa-host-2022-world-cup-november?cc=5901
Chop, I'm going to be working in Brazil for the next WC! If you get down there..... I could probably score some tickets.
Shit, don't tempt me. My friend Jensen (I'm not sure, but you may know him) was there in '02 when they won the world cup. I remember him saying it was like one giant ass party.
I think a while back I read he's still a few years away from being eligible. I'm not sure how reliable that source was though.
Found this. Basically the start of 2016 is when he'd be eligible. That would be right before the start of the Hex so the only way I'd see him making it to WC 2018 is to get called up for the Gold Cup and having a Donovan like performance. http://www.stumptownfooty.com/2012/9/11/3318170/darlington-nagbe-green-card-usmnt-us-soccer
I was so pumped that we won yesterday, but it really sucks that Holden went down again. Hopefully his MRI comes back negative for a major tear, but it isn't looking good. The kid just can't catch a break when it comes to injuries. His first couple were horrific tackles, but yesterday it just looked like his knee gave out. Outside of that, Mix looked great coming in for him, Donovan took a while to get into it, but was decent and Beckerman did a great job stopping any sort of attack Panama could muster. It wasn't pretty, but damn near 75% possession for the Nats is unheard of. And I'm pretty sure Shea wrapped up his spot in Brazil as our super sub. On other USMNT news, Aron Johannson just filed his paperwork to use his 1 time switch to join the US team. This makes me wish Altidore stuck it out one more season in Holland, cause how great would it be to have 2 strikers practice/play together for a full season leading up to the World Cup. Who knows if he'll make it to Brazil, but after Jozy and EJ, our pure striker depth chart is pretty thin (unless you count Dempsey/Donovan as our forwards). Hopefully his paperwork goes through and we get a chance to see him in a couple of weeks against Bosnia.
