Friday, July 20, 2007

Projected Napoleon complexes

Several commenters on his article already make this point, but Michael Wilbon's assertion in his not-really-coherent comparison of MLS with NFL Europe that "[p]rofessional soccer isn't satisfied with being the most popular sport in the world; its international powers that be won't be satisfied until soccer has conquered the United States...." is telling. Conquest? What precisely is he talking about? FIFA and MLS want to continue the slow growth that the sport has experienced in the US over the last 20 years.

What nobody is planning is the displacement of other sports from the US sporting scene. That Wilbon and other commentators always see changes in terms of "conquering" is more indicative of personal insecurity than anything that is going on in reality. These frequent accusations of plans of conquest--followed by confident assertions that this will never ever happen--is just an extended plea for them not to have to cover or think about a sport with which they are not familiar.

Personally, I'd like soccer to grow a bit more so that I can see more frequent highlights, and to get the respect of the mainstream media so that I don't have to read columns like Wilbon's. Otherwise, I'm quite happy with the way things are.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Bunnies! Math is hard!

Every so often, someone in the US soccer community facetiously suggests rehiring Bora Milutinovic as the coach of the US national team purely on the grounds that he's kind of funny. If that's a criterion we are considering (and we definitely should be!), than a better bet would be to nick Japan's coach, Ivica Osim. In a press conference prior to Japan's defeat of Vietnam, he noted that "it is pointless looking for unborn rabbits in the forest." Apparently, that's a proverb in Bosnia, where Osim is from. It's baffling in context, but somehow it's even more baffling out of context. First off, it implies that there are other, better places for looking for unborn rabbits. But I just don't get the analogy; I mean, why would anyone even think of looking for unborn rabbits in the first place? For something to be described as pointless, it has to have some nominal claim to having a point. But this isn't even in the realm of possibility.

Weird almost contradiction: first saying "There are several mathematic equations involved. You have calculators -- you work it out!" and then saying "It's not rocket science!"

Copa America final thoughts

The dust has settled on Brazil's 3-0 victory over Argentina in the Copa America final--probably the only time in history when a Brazil tournament triumph has been seen as an upset--and the dominant narrative has emerged: Argentina bottled it. The word on the footballing street is that Argentina--and Riquelme in particular--can't handle the big occasion.

Perhaps. But it's worth noting that the Argentinian setup and approach to this game played right into the hands of their opponents. Argentina had Riquelme, Messi, and Veron in the attacking midfield with only Tevez up top, and relied on their fullbacks Heinze and Zanetti to provide the width. But with three holding midfielders, Brazil were easily able to contain the Argentinian midfield, and since Argentina so resolutely insisted on trying to play neat combos through the center, they were snuffed out time and time again. What they should have done is played Crespo up with Tevez and taken out Veron. This would have allowed Tevez to get in some wide positions and run at defenders. Argentina seemed unwilling or incapable of getting the ball to wide areas in dangerous positions, something that would have stretched the comfortably bunkered Brazil defense.

Give Brazil credit: they were organized and had two excellent finishes. One has to feel sorry for poor Ayala; rarely has an international career finished with such a sad performance (although even as I type that the words "Claudio Reyna" come to mind.)

The bad news about this, of course, is that we have to deal with another three more years of Dunga-ball. Still, at least the 0-0 draws will be livened up by his completely stylin' shirts.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

US-Austria

A frustrating match against a well-coached Austria team who deserved the win. The first thing that struck me is that the US looked very tired in this match. Adu, Altidore (not surprisingly), Zizzo and especially Szetala looked a little wilted. The US seemed a step slow to every ball.

There were other ways in which things might have been better. The service from the wings was, aside from the Adu cross for the goal not what it might be. And there were too many misplayed balls all over the park, even when they were under comparatively little pressure.

As I say, a tired game. But overall, a successful tournament for the US. Altidore, probably Adu, and maybe Zizzo and Szetala get European contracts out of this performance.

US-Austria coming up

The almost entirely substance-free US Soccer preview of today's U-20 quarterfinal against Austria has no info on the most important question: will Altidore be ready to play. The comments thread at Soccer Insider suggests he will probably sit and come on if needed, which sounds like the right policy to me.

UPDATE: And yet... the FIFA Match tracker of the game lists him as a starter.

Feeling down (under)

I haven't blogged too much about the Asian Cup. It's only televised here in the US on Setanta, and so I've been hesitant to comment too much on the matches I haven't seen.

But one of the big stories of the Asian Cup so far is the poor form of Australia. After drawing with Oman in their first game, they took their game to a whole new level, losing 3-1 to Iraq. (Iraq!) Now this story implies strongly that Aussie coach Graham Arnold has lost the locker room prior to their must win match against Thailand.

It was the right decision, I think, for Australia to abandon the silly Oceania Football Confederation and join the AFC. Their chances of getting to a World Cup are far better in that confederation's format than they are taking their chances against Iran or Uruguay in a playoff. Still, in terms of their team, I wonder if the switch came at the wrong time. Kewell, Viduka and Neill are clearly past it, and it's not immediately apparent if the next generation will be as dangerous as the early-mid 00s Australia team clearly was. As a prelude to their qualifying campaign for 2010, this could hardly be a less propitious performance.

Interestingly, the OFC website still lists Australia as a member, making them seem kind of like that friend you have who insists that his ex-girlfriend is going to call back any day now to apologize for dumping him.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Jogo Boringo

Paul Doyle tells the harsh but fair truth: Brazil have been surprisingly tedious during the Copa America, the Chile game notwithstanding. It's amazing the way that Dunga's personality as a player seems to have infected the entire national team. Hopefully the excellent Argentinians will beat them in this weekend's final.

What's potentially alarming for Brazilian fans going into next year's World Cup qualifying, is that Brazil seem to be a pretty ordinary team with two extraordinary players: Kaka and Ronaldinho. If one or both of them gets an injury, the Brazilians look eminently beatable.

P.S. If you haven't done so, please do yourself a favor check out the Argentina-Mexico highlights. Two simply delightful goals.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

The saddest country in the world is shaped like a tear....


It's been a tough week for Uruguay, so much so that I'll refrain from the usual juvenile orc references. First, they unluckily tumbled out of the Copa America on penalties after twice coming back against Brazil. According to Uruguayan coach Oscar Tavares, this was largely to do with the Uruguayans getting a crummy locker room. Sounds a bit implausible to me, but hey, I'm no tactician.

Tonight, the USA bounced them out of the U-20 World Cup 2-1 in extra time. The Uruguayans were quite unlucky here, as they really had the better of the play. Choosing a high tempo game to harry the US on the ball worked really well, and there were stretches where they really seemed to dominate. But the effort they expended left them a bit gassed in extra time, and without the really dangerous Luis Suarez on the field, they didn't offer as much of a threat after the US equalized.

Best moment: when Cardaccio got yellow carded for essentially just being an unbearable dickweed. Such a shame the ref didn't spot his elbow on Szetala (which Danny totally embellished, by the way) or whatever it was he did after the whistle that so incensed Michael Bradley.

An ugly win for the US, but you kind of knew that a letdown was coming, I think. Hope the injury to Altidore is not as serious as it seemed.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Catching Up

Due to a combination of work, travel, and sheer laziness, I missed about a week of blogging, a week during which the US national team's future either looks very rosy or very bleak. Your perspective literally depends on which direction you look.

Down south, the US meekly fell out of Copa America by falling 1-0 to Colombia. Bob Bradley sensibly gave everyone who hadn't seen the field yet time against Colombia but the performance was more or less the same.

What do we take from the Copa? The point of the whole exercise was to gain experience even as we get obliterated. The problem is that such gains are pretty much intangible; it's hard to say whose future play will benefit by this tournament and by how much. I agree almost entirely with Steven Goff's big picture take on the Copa and the Gold Cup, possibly with the exception of his opinion on Marvell Wynne who, with the right coaching, could take his game to a higher level. I think that Wynne is essentially Frankie Hejduk ten years ago, and that the right sort of development could see him as a future factor for the US.

Up north, the U-20s have gone from strength to strength, beating Brazil 2-1 and winning their group. They face the Uruk-hai in the round of sixteen on Wednesday. It's hard to handicap this match, but assuming that the young Uruk-hai share their older compatriots' propensity for mindless violence, I think the US will be up against it. They'll need to make the most of the inevitable free kicks that their opponents concede and be prepared to use Altidore and Szetala's strength effectively to hold their own.

So a tasty set of international games this week as the U-20 knockout games start tomorrow and the Copa semis begin tonight. Anyone know if the Asian Cup is being broadcast anywhere in the States?

Wednesday, July 04, 2007

Ask and ye shall receive

My previous pessimistic malaise now seems a touch foolish: at the U-20 cup, the US just stomped on Poland 6-1. Freddy Adu got a hattrick. Even the US Soccer website is down in disbelief.

Clearly the difference-maker in this match is that I wasn't actually able to watch the game. There's a repeat tomorrow at 6:30 that I'll try to catch, assuming that my powers to make favored teams suck just by watching them doesn't work backwards in time.

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

The good points...

were the play of Feilhaber, who continues to make a starting place for himself in the best XI, and Clark. I like the idea of a D-mid who can actually make the odd thing happen on offense from time to time.

But to go back to accent-shuating the negative, I also caught twenty minutes of the US U-20 draw with South Korea, a twenty minute stretch where they were getting their asses handed to them. Truly a bad week for US soccer.

On the other hand this result keeps alive the possibility of a North Korea-South Korea final round match, which would be too cool for words.

USA-Paraguay

My match report is here. This match was far more frustrating than getting tonked by Argentina, because really and truly, we could have won this.

I don't need to dwell on the abysmal finishing (three and maybe four or five chances that paid professionals should expect to put away.) Let me just say that this tournament is revealing how little depth there is in attacking midfield for the US. Beyond Donovan, Dempsey, Beasley and Convey, there's a vast gap. Against Paraguay, we were forced to start essentially with four defensive/holding midfielders. Olsen used to be a right mid, and he would run through a brick wall for you, but he's not an attacking midfielder any more... the fact that we need him to play on the right is telling. Kljestan was simply awful on the left. Mapp and Gaven can't seem to raise their games to this level (in the latter's case, to any level.)

A modest proposal: for the Colombia game, why not start Herculez Gomez at the left mid. Yeah, it probably won't work, but he can't be worse than Kljestan or Mapp. Better still, play 4-3-3 with Gomez and Johnson on the flanks. Oh, and I'd bring in Guzan for Keller. Keller has added little at this stage, so why not give the young'un experience?