Donovan needs to pull the trigger more instead of trying to play the perfect pass. Reminds me of the 2006 cycle where we'd take 5 or 6 touches in the box without a taking a shot on goal.
Too cute. Not sharp. Happy for Gomez; I'm very happy he's with the Nats, I've been in his corner literally for years.
It was funny to see Donovan bitching at Herc for shooting when the right decision WAS shooting, then watching Donovan trying to square a ball across the box when the correct decision was to shoot. Unselfish to a fault, and its unsurprising.
Boyd was atrocious. He really shouldn't see another second with the US until he finally plays a senior match. It's pathetic that he plays for us.
Gomez continues to be a bright spot. Altidore was underused. Donovan needs to shoot more. The team in general tried to be too cute with forcing the ball inside the box too much. Antigua's keeper was short and the ball and ground were wet. Take a few 25-30 yard shots. There were also a few unlucky bounces, which reminded me of the 1-0 Guadeloupe match at the 2011 Gold Cup. Boyd isn't ready, yet. Let him play a year of 1st team ball somewhere, and then bring him into the January camp.
He's still a damn good prospect. He'll make his mark for us at some point. But I do think Jurgen is pushing him into all this too quickly. I'd actually like to see Agudelo get called back in and given a shot now that he's scoring goals again and creating opportunities.
Agree with us being too cute. And Donovan was the chief culprit. We turf, shoot the ball low. Gomez was the highlight, unless one counts the Boca move down the sideline and pullback. Donovan had his moments, but also had a terrible giveaway, and managed to not only pass (p!SS) away most of our chances, but yelled at Gomez for shooting. Still, not a bad game, just I expect more from him. As for Jones playing too high, in this setup, Jones and Bradley are the two attacking mids. When LD or Clint drift back, or central, then it is up to Jones or Bradley to go wide and into that space. I'm fine with Jones being offside. Especially with Dempsey drifting back so much. Boyd clearly isn't ready yet, but at least he's capped now. And we are thin at forward. Still, Gomez, Dempsey, Jozy, and LD are all better options up top. If we ever develop some wide options (or JK decides to actually let DMB or Feilhaber play), maybe we could move LD or Clint into a supporting striker role.
He only played 10 minutes yeah he had a few bad touches but atrocious? There's a lot of geniuses here in BS!
Not enough movement. Not enough accurate passing. Not enough shooting. When Landon finally decided to get in behind the defense, we scored.
I must be in an effing twilight zone here. People are bitching about Landon? Really? He drove the attack tonight. Without him, we don't score any goals. Yes, he should have shot more, but COME ON! He was the liveliest player out there, along with Herc. He got teammates involved, he drove the team forward. Bradley wouldn't do it; Jones couldn't do it. Dempsey, coming soooooo deep, couldn't do it. I'd be complaining more about Dempsey than LD. For a center forward, Dempsey was nowhere to be found. Comes back way, way too deep and not fast enough when we get going to get back in prime position. And yet none of y'all say word one about him. He was our center forward, yet he's not mentioned in the thread titled "Attack"? Thankful for Herc. And Bradley had a poor game; dawdled on the ball far too long. I think that's who Klinsi was referring to at halftime, when it was reported he wanted the ball to move faster. Boyd came in and played poorly. Jozy came in and was more effective but nothing spectacular.
In looking at the ratings from the press, where our attack fell down is the central midfield getting the ball moving (they didn't), and our being cute in the box - and that goes for EVERYONE. In general our central midfield is not scoring higher than a 6 - including Bradley, Edu and Jones. Dawdling on the ball and turnovers. (Minus a 7 from ESPN to Edu, which I'm going to say is hallucinatory). StillKickin has a point. On average our top 3 has the same score with Herc taking a little higher score for his effort. You going to pick on them for being cute, pick on them all. LD needed to SHOOT, but he was involved in all three goals, and burned A&B all over the field, left, right and centrally. Clint's passing game wasn't the best, and his dribbling in the box frustrating and also too cute, but he had some inventive through balls and his SOG from distance woke us up in the 2nd half. Plus, solid PK. Gomez did made a poor decision to shoot instead of cross early on (irony knowing how the game went), and his crossing in the box and passing game in the final 18 needed work. But his effort and poaching ability in the box was solid and he did all that work all by himself up top. One thing of a positive note: LD and CD's chemistry looked like it was back. Can only be good for us. Plus, they both looked like they had chemistry with Gomez. Let's be fair folks. The grades from the analysts show a balance between our front 3 and our CMs.
Dempsey was indeed poor. Bradley and Edu stifled the attack in ways not seen since Armas and ABMOD. Bowels move faster than the ball did in the middle of the pitch tonight.
You know, I posted in the gamethread that I thought our movement wasn't too bad in the first half (2nd half it indeed went to pot except for the flurry leading to the third goal). In reading everyone's posts I now realize our front 3 movement was ok (shooting on the other hand...), but the central midfield dawdled. You are right, and I admit I was wrong on that one...
I have to think the starting forward slot is Herc's to lose. He does so much more than Jozy will ever do.... he's involved with a chance and seconds later, breaks up a play in front of our own net. Boyd did not look good but he is cap tied so now he can work on his game
It looked strongly to me like they both spent significant stretches of the match playing second striker.
One thing that I liked about our play tonight is that there was a lot of variety in where the attacking players attacking from. Lots of unpredictability. There were lots of frustrating things about the team's performance. But I loved the way our attack kept changing shape.
I completely agree with this. The front three interchanged a TON. I loved it. That's why I say their build-up looked good. Up until the 6-8ish. Sigh.
I appreciate it too. The flip side, however, may be too much unpredictability and not enough structure. We're not so much pulling strings out there as we are feeling around in the dark it seems.
I agree that Donovan was lively and better than the Canada match. I like that he switched sides at times. He created a lot of opportunities. Just would like him to shoot a bit more. Remember the 1st Slovenia goal at the WC? Ripped that one, even from a poor angle.