Pre-match: 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup Group Stage: USA vs Guyana

I agree. My cynical side says that I wish that the "meaningful" match was against a team that should have more than nuisance value. Guyana is a third world country with an almost fourth world soccer program. They are so bad that it is almost ludicrous that the matches with them are given any importance whatsoever.

For the record I like Guyana as a country and I have spent many weeks there that I enjoyed immensely and no I did not go as a tourist but rather as a guest of a resident. However it was clear that the country is way behind the US in every way except, maybe, the quality of their leaders.

There are exactly two teams in CONCACAF that just might/should play at the level where we should be playing and those are Mexico and Canada. Canada's soccer program is suffering from a lot of the same ills as ours and their player pool is smaller so it takes longer to rebuild after a big fall. However they just might be a team that succeeds in this Gold Cup. They have, it seems, chosen a lot of youth instead of just recycling the old losers like we seem to be doing.

I wish that CONCACAF had more quality but it just does not and the fact that we often have problems with even the dregs of CONCACAF says a lot about just how bad we are.

 

And I'm incredibly excited that after more than 600 days watching our team play 'meaningless' matches we are about to play a meaningful match about which we can be genuinely, unapologetically, unreservedly, unabashedly critical.

 

It will be a sad day when the world ends and BigSoccer ceases to exist.

 

But will the world ending cause Big Soccer to slip into nonexistence or will Big Soccer's demise cause the world to end or will something else cause both events or is there really no relationship between the two events?

 

We won’t feel emotion when the world ends anyway.

You know, because... well...






We’re dead?

 

I'm always somewhat amused/amazed when we play the deep minnows as to where they pull players from. Guyana's 40 Man (they appear to have only listed 38 players) is comprised of players playing club football in:

• Guyana Domestic League - 16
• England - 13
  • EPL - 1
    • Apparently one of their GK is on Liverpool's books, no action this season at any level anywhere as far as I can tell. Last season he played in the 7th/8th tier.
  • Championship - 0
  • Tier 3 - 1
  • Tier 4 - 3
  • Tier 5 - 4
  • Tier 6 - 2
  • Tier7/8 (semi-pro) - 2
• United States -3
  • MLS -1
  • USL -1
  • USL II - 1
• Canada (not MLS, CA league) - 2
• Netherlands (2nd tier) - 1
• Norway (3rd Tier) -1
• T & T - 1
  
• Suriname -1

Always some good names of these clubs, too. My favorite this time is the guy in Suriname. His club is "Walking Boyz Company." They also feature 4 guys from Guyana's "Fruta Conquerors." Not sure about their soccer skills, but they can split open jackfruit with the best of them.

 

Good news is that the world can never end today, because it is always tomorrow in Australia.

 

First competitive match for this cycle and for GreggB. So, what are you guys looking to see in a match like this (beyond 3 points)?

 

No injuries and good communication between the players.

 

10 PM EST?

Now that I live on the east coast I find these late start times to be a disgrace to humanity.

 

Funny you say that...as I'm back in the USA in NYC (for now) and I said to myself...10PM EST...wtf??????

Sure as hell beats 1AM Italian time lol...2AM Eastern European time?

 

Complete domination of the midfield - any time Guyana steps into the middle of the pitch, they will immediately lose the ball to a systematic, well-organized midfield. We struggled so much in the center last cycle, when even Martinique was able to successfully build up through the middle. If we're still ceding space and possession this cycle, to Guyana of all teams, then we need to rethink what the hell we're doing.

Other than that - it'd be nice to see us score some goals off the run of play. Will be disappointed if we score only on corners and penalties.

A clean sheet would be nice, too....

 

So, how is the USA gonna lose this match?

 

It soccer’s fault you decided to go back to live with the descendants of people to lazy to go out west.

 

I was going to say that the team bus gets a flat on the way to the game.

But then I realized, even if that happens, they would select a team of fans from the stands, who would beat these guys...

 

Freak illegal one time switch by CR7 to Guyana is passed by corrupt FIFA officials. USA is up 2-1 when an un-named central midfielder gives the ball away to CR7 in our 1/3 instead of getting the ball upfield to run out the clock and end the game. Easy goal by CR and we tie instead of winning a game that would allow us to rest some important dudes.

I might have plagiarized that scenario

 

You jest, but what is, in fact, going to happen is Bolsanaro is planning to invade Guyana to take attention off his impending impeachment. On June 17th he will declare it the State of Guyana. The UN and US convene to express outrage, but Guyana sends diplomats to ask them to hold off until late on the 18th. Brazil sends a U20 D team in Guyanese kits. They samba us into the ground, win the Gold Cup just days before Bolsonaro is removed from office and Guyana gets to go back to being Guyana, but keeping their gold cup.

 

A slight correction: Allianz Field is in St. Paul, not Minneapolis. Folks around here get a wee bit sensitive about that.

10 PM EDT because it's a doubleheader, with Panama & T&T first.

 

Guyana, the Golden Jaguars, deploys an eleven of actual jaguars.

Berhalter fails to adjust. Match is abandoned when the team runs out of healthy players.

 

Don't be ridiculous.

Guyana fields a team of 11 Jacksonville Jaguars. Berhalter's hybrid RB Lima can't deal with the speed of Tyrelle Pryor/Marquise Lee and the accuracy of Foles' longballs. They beat him with double-moves for multiple touchdowns.

 

Since this is Guyana's first match ever in the Gold Cup, what's that team like?

 

Full of players who are very very careful about drinking Kool-Aid.....