Paraguay 3 - USA 1
Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah, Paraguay.
There are no two ways about it; the United States gift-wrapped this game to Paraguay. The Americans looked much better than they did against Argentina as they often carried the play against Paraguay, but when Sacha Kljestan’s missed an open header in the first ten minutes of the game, it was a sign that this was going to be a frustrating one.
It only got worse in the second half. Benny Feilhaber played a great through ball to substitute Justin Mapp, but Mapp decided to unsuccessfully chip the ‘keeper rather than pass it to a wide open Eddie Johnson who had a wide open goal in front of him. Taylor Twellman weakly hit a volley on a great chance, and then in the most maddening moment of all, Drew Moor, standing all alone less than 10 yards away from goal, headed the ball straight to the goalkeeper.
To be fair, Paraguay got some solid goalkeeping last night. Justo Villar made a good save on Jonathan Bornstein after a great build up from Feilhaber and Johnson. Villar left the game in the second half, but his backup, Aldo Bobadilla, made two great saves in the second half on Johnson and Ricardo Clark.
The United States, however, did not get any big saves, and this showed on the biggest blunder of the game for the Americans. Bornstein deserves plenty of scorn for that awful back pass to Kasey Keller, but Keller probably played it as poorly as he could by coming out halfway and stopping. It seems that Keller could have come out and dispossessed Oscar Cardozo (or at least force him to round Keller to give the American defenders time to retreat into position), but he gave Cardozo time to control the ball and pick out the far corner. Keller has been great for the US throughout his career, but I really hope to see Brad Guzan against Colombia.
I did like the play of Benny Feilhaber and Ricardo Clark in midfield. Feilhaber continues to show his skill and vision, and Clark displayed not only his ability to disrupt opposition attacks, but also his offensive skills as he took his goal well. Also, despite what some of the crazies on Big Soccer believe, I thought Eddie Johnson played well by holding possession, and making good runs.
In English news, Sheffield United have seemingly lost their challenge to remain in the Premiership. An arbitrary panel upheld that the Premier League’s decision to merely fine West Ham over the Carlos Tevez/Javier Mascherano transfer as opposed to docking them points, which would have put West Ham in the relegation zone.
West Ham were fined £5.5million over the transfer. They would have lost almost ten times that amount had they been relegated, and there is little doubt that Tevez was perhaps the biggest reason they survived the drop. Therefore, the fine is hardly a punishment to West Ham considering the alternative. In my opinion, justice was not served in this matter
I understand the argument that players and fans shouldn’t be punished over the actions of the front office. Yes, it was unfair to all of the well-behaved English fans and clubs that all English teams were banned from European competition after the 1985 Heysel incident. It would have been harsh to the fans of Juventus and AC Milan had the original punishments for match fixing been carried out last year. However, sometimes, such drastic actions are the only way to get the offenders to realize that their actions are unacceptable.
Illegal transfers may not be an epidemic like English hooliganism was in the 80s or match fixing in Italy, but if clubs see that shenanigans in the transfer market will only result in a relatively small fine, I fear we could see more of more cases like Tevez and West Ham.
US Soccer, Copa America, Benny Feilhaber, Ricardo Clark, Kasey Keller, Eddie Johnson, West Ham, Sheffield United
July 4th, 2007 at 12:20 am
Were you able to catch any of the U-20 game between South Korea and the US? I’m not sure I’ve ever been so confused as to who was playing. As Matrim55 pointed out, this was a South Korean team that played like a Dutch team. It was quite impressive. It got me thinking: How much control was Guus Hiddink (I’m assuming he sowed the seeds for this) given over all of soccer in South Korea?
Of course, my next question: Would the US benefit in a similar way? I remember reading about Klinsmann wanting an unprecedented level of control over US soccer, would development of the youth be part of that? And would Klinsmann really be the right idea to overhaul all of US soccer and develop something, I’m going to call it a culture, like the Dutch one in place in South Korea?
I find this to be a very interesting idea, do you have any thoughts?
July 5th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Part of me thinks that part of the problem against South Korea was that Thomas Rongen just isn’t a good coach. I think the US looked unprepared for the high pressure and athleticism.
I don’t know how much is due to Hiddink. One thing he did do was demand that the team play the top teams. The Korean press hated him for losing, but he was losing to the best teams. I think the USSF wants to play better competition with the emphasis on qualifying for the Confederations Cup and playing in Copa America despite all of the scheduling problems.
On the other hand, the Koreans have always been known to buzz around the field with endless amounts of energy. Just remember their game against Germany in 1994 when every German player was about to collapse from the heat and from chasing around the tireless Koreans.
October 6th, 2007 at 4:56 pm
[...] Paraguay 3 - USA 1There are no two ways about it; the United States gift-wrapped this game to Paraguay. The Americans looked much better than they did against Argentina as they often carried the play against Paraguay, but when Sacha Kljestan’s missed an … [...]