I want to see Ellis build a full roster of players she will actually use. Others have listed positions we're thin at so I won't duplicate here. The WC is a long tournament with many games with few days rest. She cannot run 12 or 13 players into the ground and expect to win. She needs to be able to rotate players, resting people, throughout the tournament. She still has a some she will never use and she should continue to look for others that may be usable. I am happy that she has called in some different players for these friendlies but she also has called in most of the current starters. She needs to give the newbies a good long look with starters to see if they can play or not. Others she needs to weed out. The first name that comes to mind is Casey Short. There has to be better players out there than her. I didnt think we looked as solid against Canada as we did against easier teams we faced earlier in the qualifying. Canada was the only team that pressed us and I didnt think we looked that great against that. Ellis should try and schedule as many of the powers as possible leading up to the show as she can. I dont see portugal Portugal or Scotland as being particularly useful challenges.
Personally, when The Netherlands had to drop out there was no reason to make the trip. They would have been a fair test in front of a big orange crowd. At best Switzerland is always easily handled as is Scotland even with their best player who is out. Portugal tho they have made strides wasn't even top two in their qualifying group.
As I recall, Ellis' recent explanation of the games was more about getting the travel/foreign country routine down, which makes sense. I also got the impression from her that some of the regulars may get less playing time due to their use during Concacaf qualifying.
While I have no doubt ur right, I still don't see it. What they need is competitive matches in front of hostile crowds. I don't see them getting that here. When the original trip fell apart I would have preferred giving the team November off followed by a two week camp in December to prepare for the January Eurotrip.
I disagree. What they need is a Europe trip. There are multiple positives from a Europe trip, even if we're not playing top-tier talent: getting used to some medium/long-haul flights, learning to deal with jet-lag, playing and getting around in a different environment, and playing in front of an away crowd (even if its not hostile). And I'd point out that we're still playing a team that's qualified for the WWC. One go at learning to deal with those things in January is not enough, especially considering that they've only had ONE away trip since the Olympics now that the team doesn't do the Algarve. Multiple reps is a good thing.
A national team needs international travel experience. We can't be playing all of our games on home soil. It's bad enough we pound the competition in CONCACAF because that so called gold cup is always played in the US. We need to experience more away crowds and different stadiums than we're used to. That's how the women's game grows.
Correction: there were 2 away trips (3 games total), if you count the away game in Canada last year. Still, I'm pretty sure that's the least amount of away games for the USWNT in any cycle, and that includes the dark years of the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Canada does not count as an away game in any meaningful way. With the exception of the ladies that are from the New York area, they may overdose on the Canadian politeness. I hear that can be much like a sugar overdose for diabetics.
You still have to figure out whose job it is to arrange transportation, lodging. meals, visas, who is apt to show up late for the bus, who shouldn't sit together or room together, who has allergies so you can't arrange a dinner at Long John Silver's because of them, and so on and so forth. There are a million and one off field things that need to be figured out on a test run, and not at the WWC. Five or ten years ago a major league team of some sort discovered in Green Bay or London or Monterrey that arranging a practice field on road trips had been eliminated in a reorganization of the front office-- a job had been eliminated and the task not added to anybody else's job description, and everybody thought somebody else was doing it; and they wound up practicing in a parking lot or a public park or something. They had gone half a season or something without this being discovered, because they had standing arrangements in places they went regularly; they had to go to a new town to discover the oversight.
I corrected myself mostly to be precise, and also because it was probably the most "hostile" crowd the WNT have faced since being in Brazil.
What does it say that the "most hostile crowd" the US WNT has faced lately was in Canada. Hostile and Canada are very rarely used in the same sentence. The difference with the MNT is also rather amazing. The US MNT can play "away" games, except for the travel, by simply playing in about 2/3 of the larger US cities. I am unsure if that says more about the US or the soccer fans from other countries or the other countries themselves or soccer fans from the US or all of those together or something completely different but I think it does say that the US soccer fan is not motivated to strongly support the men's team while most other country's soccer fans are not motivated to strongly support their women's team. We can, maybe, get hostile crowds for women's matches without a lot of travel by inviting other countries and playing "friendly" matches in Mexico. Advertise those matches in Mexico as a chance to degrade the imperialist elitist US and I think you might get decent crowds of pretty hostile Mexicans.
Although I seem to remember a Canada-USA match from some years ago when Sydney Leroux had been constantly booed by the crowd for having chosen USWNT over Canada WNT.
Booing is about the least hostile of the hostilities that an away team might face and that was directed at a player that they felt had wronged them and not at the rest of the USWNT. Also I remember that game and I seem to remember an interview with someone from Canada that said, "We are sorry for the booing but we feel betrayed." That is fairly typical Canadian behavior, rude when sometimes warranted but always apologetic for the rudeness.
But this is a big country and they travel all the time. Is short trip thru Western Europe tougher than going coast to coast and back for 3 matches in 10 days in the NWSL? Hopefully the Portugal match doesn't carry the flavor of the Algarve matches in front of empty stands. Anyone know if Portugal drew well for WC qualifying? Scotland should have a decent crowd if the weather is ok but Scotland this late in the year can be bracing.
mysogynistic criticism from a few neanderthals should not dissuade the staff from taking advantage of the known training gains of playing against boys.
Portugal hasn't done bad though, they did beat Australia in the Algarve Cup earlier this year, but then lost to Italy 3-0 & a couple of ties in the WC/Euro qualifiers. They got some quick wingers but likely lack a scoring punch
This was the game, in June 2013. Satisfyingly, she scored in stoppage time to make it 3-0, and then shushed the booing crowd. This game also noticeable for two nearly identical left-footed Morgan finishes.
Yeah, Syd vented a little frustration......me likely. Memory jogged....those two goals hit the net about two inches apart.
Dzsenifer Marozsan is back in the Germany squad following illness. Her side take on Italy and Spain next month. https://t.co/UoYSoILTBf— Kieran Theivamanoharan (@KiersTheivam) October 31, 2018 here is the trip I wish the US had. It would be two teams Id expect in the knockout round in France who play completely different styles. It's also teams u don't see the US play.
I agree with this, but I also agree that there's no pressing reason to release a score. I assume these sessions are more of a controlled scrimmage, with stops and starts, and less of a competitive match (though of course the players compete).
IIRC, I think its usually not USSF that releases the score. It either comes from media or fans who were there, or from the boys' club team that they scrimmaged.
When I coached the need for girls to scrimmage boys was often readily apparent. But the difference is that it was pretty easy to match teams and often, before the puberty time, you could even scrimmage same age or one year older boys because girls outgrow boys before that age. However there were some disadvantages: We were a U13 girls team and we scrimmaged on back to back days U13 and a U12 boys. We lost the first match 4-2 and my girls were roughed up a bit. The next day when we played the U12s my girls entered the match more than a little angry. They won 6-1 and after the match some of the boy's parents approached me an complained that my girls were "too rough." I doubt that will be a problem with the women on the USWNT but they could make a few extra fouls from what they learn from playing boys. In the next match we played after those two boys matches (against a U13 girls team) we were a bit too rough and my star player nearly received a red card. She was having a very bad day shooting and had missed a few open shots badly. She found herself open at the penalty spot and hit the shot so badly it went out for a throw in. As she trotted up the field she was cursing to herself a bit too loudly and very inappropriately. Suddenly the ref (who was about 6'3" she was 5'0") spins around and shows her a yellow card and says "I won't have a lady on my field talking that way!" She then strode up right to him, looked up directly into his eyes and pointed at the bench and very firmly said, "Over there I'm a lady, out her I'm a soccer player!" He showed great restraint and did not issue the second yellow. I was simultaneously a bit angry, a greater bit pleased and even somewhat embarrassed by her actions. On her next sub I did explain to her that she really needs to both watch her language in general and absolutely avoid any further confrontation with the ref for the rest of the game. I present this just to show that even in young age groups there can be both good things and bad things from girls scrimmaging boys. However for the USWMNT I think the pluses outweigh the negatives almost all the time.