Rather than start a thread just for a friendly or post int he Gold Cup thread, i figured we could have one for the national team leading up to the World Cup. Anyone else see the game today? We started off slow and were down 2-0 at the half (should have had a penalty and one of theirs was iffy) but came out ON FIRE in the 2nd. Bosnia made 4 subs at the half, so we have to take our turnaround with a grain of salt, but we were without Dempsey, Donovan, Besler, etc also, so it's not like we were at full strength. Jozy bossed this game with 3 goals and an assist. These past 12 months or so for him have been amazing. Hopefully he can continue this form at Sunderland. If he does, he could be in for a BIG payday. The best part about the game was the variety of ways he scored. He had an outside shot, 25 yard free kick and a clinical 1 time finish from about 10 yards out. Plus, his hold up play and linking were very good. I'm really excited to start watching him every week. [video=youtube;7wvbGx847uQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wvbGx847uQ[/video] For the other players Bradley started slow, but was probably our 2nd best player over the course of the game. He had key passes in at least 2 of the goals (EJ's and Altidore's 3rd). Jones started decent, faded BADLY and then was pretty good for the 25 minutes or so he played in the 2nd. Mix was good, but when he came off we did much better. The improvement was mostly that we switched to a 4-4-2 at that point and EJ was put up top and Fabian at LW. At the time he came off, he was possibly our 2nd best performer. He was even getting stuck in on some tackles, which was nice to see. Bedoya was pretty quiet. EJ was horrible in the 1st half as the LW. His giveaway a yard or two outside of our box directly led to their first goal. he was better as a forward in the 2nd half and scored his 1st non PK, non Concacaf goal for the USMNT EVER. That is an amazing stat for a guy who has scored so many against Concacaf. Fabian was average at best in the first half, but was much better in the 2nd when he was playing in the mid. I think he is a better LM than LB, but assuming we get better wing play (Dempsey or Donovan), he'll probably be our starting LB by default. Assisted on Jozy's 1st goal Cameron: bad marking on their 2nd goal. Otherwise decent. John Anthony Brooks: A few communication problems early and gave up a late header goal to Dzeko, but this kid is for real. He looked huge out there, like a 20 year old Gooch. He fought hard all game against a really good attacking side, stopping at least 1 sure thing goal (breakaway that would have made it 3-0), but that late goal was pretty bad. It was his first cap, but I think he'll be in Brazil and possibly starting. Evans: Didn't notice him too much, which is probably a good thing. I can't remember many attacks down his side so he must have been doing something right. Subs: Aron Johnnsson was really active up front with Jozy. He looks like he'll be an impact player this year and probably means the end of national team duty for Wondo. All the other subs (Castillo, Corona, Kleistein, Parkhurst and Wood) were good. Castillo/Fabian on the left worked much better than Fabian/EJ. Wood onlly got 5 minutes or so, but nice to see another kid get his first cap. Anyone else watch?
I just watched the replay. As a soccer novice all I can say is great game! It was fun to watch. Whenever someone uses "USMNT" I always see "TMNT" first.. Where the US mutant ninja turtles at?!
I think it's on ESPN 3 if you wanted to watch online. It was the perfect friendly. Lots of offense, experimental lineup, good opponent and a win.
Now that I've seen the highlights, I've been spoiled, but frankly I didn't even know there was a friendly today. Jozy banging in the set piece free is lovely. He adds that to his game, he becomes one of the best strikers in the world.
Johannsson looked like a difference maker. Very happy he is on the team now, him and jozy can be a good pair up top if we continue with 4-4-2 in Brasil. If we don't play with 2 strikers, then we have 2 good options up top with donovan and dempsey on the wings
Damn you guys, now I'll always think of the Ninja Turtles when seeing that. I hadn't realized that Jones played a full 90 over the weekend. He's no youngster, so that might have attributed to his poor play from about the 25 minute mark until half. The fact that he was much better in the 2nd half supports that as well. It definitely shows our need for a good 3rd CM in Brazil (Mix if you go offensive and Cameron if we are more defensive) because even if he is on form, I don't think Jones can play every game. Also, I know some here are pretty into stats. During the gold cup I came across MLSsoccer's stats which are pretty awesome. It is under Chalkboard if you are on a game recap. If you hover over a players name, it shows all of his stats and where he was most active on the field. Then if you select something like distribution it shows all of the attempted passes, how long they were, what direction and if they were completed. It was pretty awesome when comparing players in similar roles to see how differently they played in the same game (Beckerman and all his square/back passes vs the other CMs in the Gold Cup comes to mind). I think the best was in one of the games, Beasley, who was playing LB, spent almost the entire game on the offensive side of the half line. http://www.mlssoccer.com/matchcenter/2013-08-14-BIH-v-USA/chalkboard I think that goes to Bradley's page. He completed 92 of 100 passes last night. That's Xavi territory!
We have a damn good national team now. It will be interesting to see how we fare in Brazil. I think a lot of our improvement has to do with the growth of MLS. I believe that someday MLS will be competitive with the top leagues in the world.
One of the UK papers (Register?) agrees with you, and used the Timbers/Galaxy game recently played to exemplify how far the MLS has come.
Tonight we are on the road against Costa Rica. They are looking to get revenge after the "unfair" snow game in Denver a few months back. If we win I think we are about 99% of the way towards qualifying. That might be tough as we are something like 0-7-2 at CR. Part of that was due to their horrible stadium/field, which has since been replaced. Hopefully we can change our fortune in the new venue. Also, we might be without Jozy, who is coming off of a hamstring injury, so this could be the qualifying debut (and debut as a starter) of Aron Johannsson. The game is on BeIn, which means I have to start calling up some bars to see who is going to be showing it down here. A little write up on Johannsson. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/so...on-johannsonn-us-national-team/?sct=sc_t11_a2 Olberman gives a pretty complete account of all the petty acts of revenge Costa Rica has done to unsettle our team. [video=youtube;7dgPV-9I4wg]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dgPV-9I4wg[/video]
Mexico is always a big deal. If nothing else, a win gives us bragging rights. But, if we win tonight I think a tie against Mexico wraps up our spot in Brazil (I think, I could be wrong).
Looks like 7 Pacific is the correct time. Anyone with BeIn want to hook me up with their account and password? I promise I won't hack your account or anything...If you can't trust a semi anonymous poster on a message board, who can you trust?
