France-Italy, Spain-Iceland

The current French team presents a problem for me. I love France, a beautiful country with extraordinary culture, society and cuisine. I have close relatives who live there. And France has produced some fantastic players over the last decade: Zidane of course, but also Thuram, Vieira, Ribery, Djorkaeff, Henry, etc. etc. I even liked Stephane Guivarch'h.

But I find the current French team incredibly frustrating to watch and it's mainly down to coach Raymond Domenech. They play with two defensive midfielders, usually only one committed forward, and outside backs who are very conservative in gettnig forward. The attacking players that they do have--such as Henry, Ribery, Nasri and Malouda--are so good that they often offset this philosophy. But nonetheless the philosophy is still there.

At least yesterday there was a good reason for it: they came to get a draw in Italy, and they got it. With ease. The problem is that they always play that way. I wish that Domenech would give Vieira a little more license to get forward, and get the outside backs into attack more frequently.

So yes, the big match yesterday was all a bit drab. Is it me or is the Italian attack looking very old all of a sudden.

I actually used to live in Iceland, so I was very excited to see them get the result in Reykjavik, although it's a shame about that tying goal. (In fact, I saw my first soccer game at that stadium: NY Cosmos vs Valur in the early 80s) With Northern Ireland losing in Latvia, it shouldn't make much difference to Spain; as long as they can stay within two points of them before their final match against the Irish in Spain, they're going to be favored to go through.

For Italy, it's more tricky. I think they have to win in the Ukraine.

I'm not dead yet

So... um... yes. A five weeks or so without a single post. It was one of those things where for a while there wasn't much going on in the international soccer offseason, and then just as it got interesting, I got extremely busy.

In any case, it's a beautiful Saturday morning and I'm looking forward to a nice slate of Euro qualifiers. As usual, there's the frustrating situation where the match I really have an emotional investment in--England vs Israel--is on US pay per view, and I'm hesitant to shell out the 25 dollars to watch Second Choice Steve (moniker crudely swiped from the Guardian) scrape out a dull draw. And as usual, FSC has managed to broadcast the mostly uninteresting games. But I'll be watching Italy-France on GOL TV today, which should be an excellent rematch. With Scotland matching them step for step so far, there's a very real risk one of these marquee countries won't make it to the 2008 championships, so there's every incentive for both teams to go for the win. If you're lucky enough to live in a Portuguese-speaking area of the US and get RTPi, you can also see Portugal-Poland. Portugal have a game in hand over the group leaders Poland, but if the Poles get a win today, the Portuguese will be in major trouble. I'll also see if sentimental faves Iceland can pull off an upset and get points from Spain.

So sit back, grab a favorite beverage, prepare to teach the offside rule to some member of your household... AGAIN, and enjoy.

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.

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.

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.

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?

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.

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?

U-20

Meanwhile, in the Northern hemisphere, the FIFA U-20 World Cup is about to start. If you're keen on seeing some of the talent that will be breaking on the world football scene in a few years, clearly this is the tournament to watch. In doing so, you'll be joined by hundreds of scouts from top clubs. So if Josy Altidore and/or Freddy Adu have excellent tournaments, they could find themselves with fat European contracts.

Standing in their way are Brazil, Poland, South Korea, and the fact that their squad is coached by Thomas Rongen. Oh and perhaps also their boyish impulses in a city with a vibrant night life. However their prep for the tournament has been strong, including wins against Chile and a closed door match against New Zealand.

The US will play their matches in Olympic Stadium, which I had thought been condemmed, but can apparently still host events with a relatively minimal risk of concrete blocks falling. I passed by it on my trip (on the way to the Botanical Gardens) and took the above picture; I love the way it looms like a claw over east Montreal. Apparently, ticket sales are good--I've utterly forgotten where I read this, but apparently they're the second highest for a U-20 World Cup.

On respect

I agree entirely with Dan's big-picture analysis of the Argentina result. The discussion raises an issue that's often discussed by US fans and commentators: the issue of the US getting respect on the international stage. There are those that argue that gaining this respect is an important thing, and that results such as last night's, where our C-team got stomped, don't exactly help.

I have never understood this argument. "Respect," whatever that means, yields no tangible benefits to US soccer and quite possibly could cause some harmful effects. For instance, I want players who line up against the US to have in the back of their minds a preconceived notion that we are not a good team. That might cause them to only give 80%. Likewise, it wouldn't be good if MLS lost the vast majority of its top players.

Besides, frankly who cares what people in other nations think of our team? The only thing that matters is overall success. And if experiences like this years Copa raise our chances of future success in World Cup qualifying, then I'm all for them.

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.

Ramblings on soccer, hockey and sports journalism

I think the most interesting thing about studies like this one is less the actual comparison and more the choice of metrics. You could probably compare the Gold Cup final ratings favorably to those of lots of different well-known sports. But the fact that the writer chose to compare them to the Stanley Cup is an indicator of their similar positions in the American sports landscape, and of the fact that they are competing for the same pool of advertising and endorsement dollars. Person for person, soccer is probably more popular than hockey in the United States right now, but the popular perception is the reverse. Articles like this will work towards changing that perception.

However, this issue of popularity and perception of popularity is a tricky one. For a start, as I suggested above, the perceptions are often wrong. Witness the disproportionatly extensive coverage given to boxing in English-language media in America.

But I also feelt that the issue of popularity itself is overblown. Sports commentators see popularity as the only criteria for judging the worth of a sport. You might think that that's obvious, but it needn't be. For instance, coverage of art, or movies, or books isn't solely driven by the perceived popularity of what they're reviewing. But sports is different. A sporting event's entire worth is based purely on the perceived popularity of it. Now you might say, well, that's because sports are big business, and it's all about money, etc. And that's true. But it's also true of the movie industry, or the book industry. And yet, there is a professional commentariat who judges movies and books independently from economic factors.

That doesn't exist at all in sports, except in isolated cases (NPR's Only a Game, for instance).
Very few media outlets cover sport because it happens to be simply good sport, judged by standards other then the perception of how many people watch. I'd love to see a sports journalism grounded on something resembling aesthetics, rather than on a popularity contest, one that both encourages "sport vs. sport" articles that make the business of sport a sport in and of itself, and yet justifies itself by mindless repeating that football and baseball are the most popular sports and that it will be that way until the end of time.

Back to the article itself. One on hand, I suppose these numbers are surprising. But on the other, I can't help but feel it's not quite a fair comparison. The Stanley Cup only had one American team, and not a great hockey town at that, while the Gold Cup final probably was watched by every Mexican-American sports fan.

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.)