I watched it again too, it look liked he may have hesitated for just a fraction of a second, maybe thinking the ball was already going in or whatever, which threw him off. Of course players who are "angry" are never hesitant and have that killer instinct decisiveness about them. No it didn't seem that bad actually. I'm sure not nearly as bad as when he apologized to the team with(probably) a lump in his throat….
That's where I think the commentator influenced a lot of people's opinions. When you first see it, you think "damn that was a bad miss." BUT, when accompanied by a guy with an English accent screaming "Donovan misses an absolute sitter! That is the miss of the season!", perception can be warped for the visual to match the audio.
i'm going to agree with a few people above, i just saw the highlights last night, and while he should have found a way to get it into the goal, that wasn't a "sitter"--right after the bounce between knee and waist high, that's a difficult one to judge and hit correctly with the foot. probably would have been better to just use the body and run it in, but it's not as easy as it had been made out to be.
It wasn't the actual miss itself, Ive seen worse by better players. It was more an issue of timing, circumstances; Everton playing well against top Premiership teams, Donovan earning praises, momentum was on Everton side when he missed, enough time left to "steal" a victory, the points lost to move up the table, missed opportunity to put an exclamation point on a good run in (arguably) the best league in the world and of course how easy it should have been...etc,etc. It's like new lovers infatuation broken by one of them being a dunderhead. The timing was just awful.
He was a few yards from an open net with a clear chance-- let's get real, it was a sitter and a very bad miss, particularly considering the circumstances of the match. It hardly makes him a bad player. It's disappointing somehow that people feel like they need to turn every situation involving an American into something either black or white, or drag others down in order to defend our guys. Can't we just call it what it is: a really good player making a really poor play?
I don't think most people are "defending" the miss, just stating that it wasn't quite as bad as it initially sounded. He still should have buried it and I think it represents a bit of a weakness in his game and American's games in general: A lot of times we lack the confidence to strike the ball with conviction when it counts. You see it all the time in MLS where a player (like Donovan) will side foot a ball or take that extra touch instead going in with strength and conviction and putting the ball away. As many posters have said, it all is magnified in the EPL vs. MLS in which individual league matches seem to carry so much more meaning and wasted chances are critical. Not so much in MLS.
He was outside of the goal post and was trying to tuck the ball to the inside. IMO had he been inside of the posts and missed that would've been a "absolute sitter" miss.
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm33Z_2sZj8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm33Z_2sZj8[/ame] There have been worse.
Ollie has 2 great misses on his blog on this subject: https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/blog.php?b=7693
What would really be a bad miss would be to miss the opportunity to do well in the games in front of him because of the game behind him. This would be the greatest miss of all. Let it go.
This. Landon's run was technically inferior. His run should have been TO the far post, not to one yard outside the far post. In saying this, the ball being played across was not a simple one to handle. The reasons this miss seem so important are: 1. Many posters here feel US soccer and its players have something to prove on the International stage. When one of our representatives, perhaps our best field player, screws up, its natural to feel that this miss is symbolic for our inability to achieve internationally. 2. England v USA is huge on June 12th. Landon is our on-the-field leader. If he comes back from England with honors, we feel better about our chances in June. 3. It was a big game for his club. That miss cost them a point. 4. Landon doesn't have a track record of success in England yet. If Rooney, Saha, Drogba or another established Premier league striker misses that shot, the miss says less about the player because they have a record of success in the Premier league to fall back on.
Yeah, it was a very, very bad miss...in particular, the ball bounced pretty far away from him, so he had time to line it up and put it in. But miss of the season??? Hardly, except maybe for the circumstances. Everton was playing the last of a hellish patch of matches, a patch in which they've played ALL the top teams in England except Villa, and had 3 wins and a draw (and the Liverpool loss). A draw at WHL would be a very respectable result, a win would be tremendous. And for the miss to be from Landon, whose insertion into the first XI coincided with Everton's run, just added to the "timing" element of it. Whenever a player is as far outside the post as he is from the goalline, i.e., whenever he's looking at a 45 degree angle, and the goal isn't completely undefended, it's not THAT easy of a shot. I mean, whenever a player hits side netting, it can't really be a miss of the season, because he was outside the post. But yeah, it's got a good chance at miss of the month maybe. A very bad miss, but not as bad as I'd been led to believe.
In my opinion, the miss at 1:54 is the worst of all. It was during an important Copa Libertadores match at home against Boca Juniors. What makes it worse in my opinion is that he didn't need to kick it, it was going in on its own with no pressure. It was such of forgone conclusion that it was a goal that the defenders didn't even realize he crashed it off the bar. I actually saw that game live (on TV) and couldn't believe my eyes.
See below I don't think of that miss as a sitter. I do see it as a bad miss. He was outside the post there was a defender actually in the goal (sliding, but in the area), the ball was bouncing and he was not running at the goal but the end line. ALL OF THAT SAID - he is paid to make them and he should have at least gotten it on goal.
I didn't see the miss but certainly have heard plenty described. I will say that if you are going to miss an easy goal, there is no better way to get a negative reaction from teammates, coaches, fans, etc than to knock it into the side netting where there was never a chance to score and immediately removes the opponent from a dangerous situation. Sounds obvious, but if he missed wide far post or knocked it off near post, the reaction probably wouldn't be as bad as seeing the ball surprisingly "bulge" the side netting. Having said all that, sounds like one that a player of his caliber should, and needs to score.