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.

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.

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.

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?

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?

US-Argentina

I'm reminded of the words of Bob Barrenger, Alec Baldwin's character in State and Main, who dazedly gets out of his car moments after a dangerous accident:

"Well... that happened."

It's a hard game to evaluate for US fans, something that's reflected in the strange Sams Army ratings, which give individuals higher ratings than the team. Certainly you can't fault the effort: the US fought hard in midfield and gave over sixty minutes of excellent defensive soccer. And I think ultimately the younger players on the field--I'm thinking here of Bornstein, Feilhaber, Clark, and Wynne--grew from this experience.

I'm most disappointed in a couple of things. I think the US attackers were pretty passive when they got to the final third. Mapp, Johnson, and Twellman would all hesitate, take a second too long, or not send the right early ball. Clearly, the thought "We're playing... Argentina..." entered players' heads with some frequency.

The case of Johnson is a particularly frustrating one, since clearly the Argentine defenders knew he could do some damage and double teamed him as much as they could. He had some great touches and smart plays, but lacked a real killer instinct. Bradley should show him the tape of this game and say "look what you did, but think of what you could have done."

Secondly, I think Keller's skills have declined from a few years ago. I think he could have been swifter in getting to the free kick that led to the first Argentina goal, and that he was not always as commanding in his area as he might be. I'm already much more comfortable with Howard in the net for the Americans, and I think that Hahnemann is probably the likely backup going into 2008 qualifiers.

I can't help but notice that things started to swirl down the toilet the moment Eddie Gaven was brought on for Olsen. Probably, Olsen was gassed, as he was chasing everything out there on offense and defense. But he also provided a lot of defensive cover on that side, and the US seemed to have a better shape when he was out there. Gaven looked just lost. It's possible that Bradley was forced into this substitution, but if it was tactical, it was absolutely daft. It says a lot about our current lack of depth in the attacking midfield that Gaven is in this squad at all.

For their part, Argentina did a masterful job in breaking down the US defense in the second half, and making the right runs to split us apart. They are on a higher plane.

I do think, however, that this US team can get results against Paraguay and Colombia. Clearly the Paraguay game is a must win if we are really thinking of the second round. But given the stated aims of our participation in the Copa. I'd be satisfied with good play and a draw against an obviously dangerous Paraguay.

A sweet goal

... by Nery Castillo to pull off an upset win against Brazil. This guyis going to give us fits over the next five years or so.

Copa America!

No sooner does the Gold Cup end then lo! the Copa America is upon us. Does the fun ever end?

For fans of the US national team, the answer is yes, on Thursday night when Bob Bradley's experimental squad face a fully loaded Argentina. Remember, as we get thumped badly, that the whole point of this match--indeed the whole point of us entering the tournament--is that we get thumped badly by some world class players. With that in mind, there's really nothing to lose in this game. Kick back, grab a beverage of your choice and abandon all hope, and who knows? Maybe they'll sqeak a 0-0 draw or something.

Meanwhile on the first day, Peru beat Uruguay 3-0. The match report makes this read like a colossal upset, but after Brazil and Argentina, I really don't think there's a huge quality difference between South American squads.

Bolivia drew with the hosts Venezuela 2-2, in a battle between authoritarian socialist nations. I watched half the match and was kind of pulling for Bolivia because of the Jaime Moreno-Joselito Vaca (remember him? Dallas Burn!, the Metrostars!)--MLS connection. There's always a big disparity between how effective Bolivia look and how effective they actually are. In this match, as in the friendly against Ireland in spring, they moved well off the ball and found each other in dangerous positions, but there's not exactly a lot of end product. Their shooting is really bad; even the first half Moreno goal was fortuitously deflected. In that respect, they're kind of the Arsenal of South America, but while Arsenal have the talent to finish matches off, I suspect that Bolivia lacks a big dominant striker. (Some better central defenders would help too.)