if you say so. the US team has proven that they are in fact on the same level as the 2nd tier in europe and south america and the top level african teams. you bring up the 2006 world cup. the US had one poor performance against the czech republic(arguably a top tier team at the time). they had a good effort against italy tying them playing 9 on 10 for half the game(and the two US reds being questionable). then they lost 1-0 to ghana on a weak penalty. while the results there obviously weren't great, if a couple of questionable calls go the other way, they easily could have walked away with 4 points and a win over the eventual world cup champs. that doesn't really mean anything, but the US team definitely proved they could play even with some of the best teams in the world. and as i've said before, this year in friendlies the US has beaten sweden and poland, tied mexico and argentina, and lost to england and spain. would those results not be something expected out of a 2nd tier european or south american team or top level african team?
[video=youtube;KY_Ju3Bimtw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KY_Ju3Bimtw&feature=related[/video] Current target of Arsenal, Chelsea and approximately 9 other English clubs. Not to mention clubs from other nations. [video=youtube;KG4a4mPKenE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KG4a4mPKenE[/video] One of his "casual" runs. World class.
Belgium has made it to the finals 11 times? Spain 12? I think you're confusing the world cup for something else man. 86 was their best year getting to the semi-finals, that is it. And Spain made it once to the semis back in 1950.
Spain's best showing was a semi-final back in 1950, Belgium the same in 1986. Also, yes, Belgium has qualified for the World Cup finals 11 times and Spain 12. Do you even know what World Cup finals even means? I'm sure you're mistaking finals with "the final," in which neither team has ever made it to. World Cup finals = Qualifying for the finals to be held in the host country. World Cup final = The final match to decide the World Cup winners.
LOL I'm sorry that I'm slow today.. But I still don't think Belgium makes it out of the group to go to the "World Cup Finals"
I watched them play in France 98.. But not since then. And I haven't heard much about players from Belgium since then.
it looks like bosnia is lucky the US didn't ever contact vedad about playing for the US as he said he would have considered it. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/29/sports/soccer/29soccer.html?_r=1
Well it shows that the US is not serious about its soccer program, which is sad since they have the potential.
http://www.soccerbyives.net/soccer_...-would-have-played-for-the-united-states.html He was never a US citizen, which makes him ineligible for the US National Team. Also, if wikipedia has his life story correct, he would have been choosing between staying at St. Louis University or going to MLS and getting paid more money that he would make in MLS to play for a fellow Bosnian at PSG. I don't really have too much of an issue here. Its not as though this is Giuseppe Rossi who is a US Citizen coming out and saying the same thing. I'm sure if he was a citizen, we would have made some inquiries.
it's not a huge issue or anything, i just thought it was interesting. and obviously him saying he would consider it doesn't necessarily mean he would have actually ended up playing for the US. the US does seem to have a slight problem losing their potential players who have had the most international club success.
I'm not too sure I'd even call it a slight problem. There's Rossi who left the country when he was 11 and Ibsevic who was never a citizen. We're definitely at risk with Subotic, but that hasn't happened yet. There's Boukary Soumare as well, but he was also never a citizen. Brede Hangeland is another, but I can't really find anything on when he left the country, but he did play for the Norwegian U-21. The only one that we really lost that we should have had (so far) was Edgar Castillo. Castillo would have been very nice to have in the backline, but we lost him to Mexico. Shalrie Joseph we sort of lost, but when he declared for Grenada, he was still a merely average college player and not the top holding midfielder in MLS. We have Altidore (Haiti), Adu (Ghana), Torres (Mexico), and appear to have Brek Shea (Norway) on board.
