quite possibly the one single thing about this WC qualifying cycle that reflects well on US men's soccer is the fact that we haven't been bitching about that call. please don't start now.
Ok ok chill out please, you Nostradamus! Let things flow, you never know... Even though we're heading the WC with such old players like Blas, Baloy and Tejada (37 yo each one), Bolillo has some room for new talents and he'd probably choose some of them to mix the team up with old/young fellows.
It could also be argued that it should have been no goal based upon not crossing the line, but instead it should have been a penalty. Regardless, we didn't earn a spot.
Panama? You mean the team that qualified on the basis of a nonexistant goal, and still managed a negative goal differential? LOL
They wanted it more. I'm actually proud that they qualified for the first time. Go Panama! If our boys had heart, we would have qualified several matches ago. Our loss
Just upset that in a sport where goals are hard to come by and extremely meaningful that in 2017 FIFA can't come up with a way to correctly award goals 100% of the time. Not talking about penalties and red cards, but simple if a ball went into the goal or didn't go into the goal.
Gotta disagree. The usmnt wanted it just as bad as Panama, but the talent was not there. They had heart, they are professionals. But not talented enough to be in the CONCACAF Top 4.
Um, ok. It's just quite disingenuous to accuse them of having no heart when they clearly wanted to qualify badly, they just couldn't hack it. Like the Dodgers last night, they wanted to win just as much as the Stros, but they were inferior.
Agreed and disagreed. This side had neither talent nor heart. Talent isn't only FIFA ratings. We were terrible - I don't remember any particular match where we lost that I can say, "ah well we were unlucky there." Maybe at one time those players were more talented than Panama (luckily for Mexico ), but whether they've become too soft, too old, too whatever, it has impacted their ability to form a good team. They're done and many of them should have been thrown away earlier in the cycle. If we had managed to scrape by with these players, I think Bruce would have kept them for the World Cup and we would have been absolutely embarrassed. But where I disagree is on heart. They didn't show anything near the level of commitment as Panama. Jogging around with qualification on the line, not even confronting various players who decided to test out how strong Pulisic's tendons are. There was never any fire or desire. Contrary to what is common sense on this board, CONCACAF right now is quite weak. Mexico, Costa Rica, and especially Honduras are mediocre compared to squads of the past, and we still couldn't do anything.
Both teams? Brazil Colombia was a hackfest against James followed by felony assault retribution on Neymar. Karma bit Brazil in the ass after that one.
This thread really seems to be sour grapes. Good on Panama. The entire country and diaspora are celebrating their first appearance at a WC while maybe 20% of the US population even knows we failed to qualify. Let the result stand. If we managed to weasel our way back into the WC it would be disgraceful to any true USMNT fan.
Even with video review, it would have been a penalty for Panama. Phantom goal or not, that's not why the US aren't going to the World Cup, it's having no results on the road that sunk the team. Seems that some fans are waking up that CONCACAF isn't the walk in park they thought it was
I have a feeling Ismael will be seeing a lot of minutes, maybe even starting alongside Gaby. I also believe Baloy will be coming off the bench, and Felipe will be starting instead, alongside Roman. It's just a hunch I have.
Personally speaking, I am going to enjoy watching Panama get steamrolled by both England and Belgium. Their bush league Concacaf tactics won't work against serious teams and non-Concacaf officiating.
England are chokers, PAN actually could get a point against ENG, i think they have a good chance to do that.
England is actually only 2-1-2 all-time against CONCACAF at the World Cup, with one of their wins being a squeaker over T&T in 2006 and the other coming at home in 1966 (over Mexico). Panama isn't as strong as Costa Rica in 2014 or us in 2010, but could be the third consecutive CONCACAF team to get a point from England at the WC. As for the call...yeah, we got screwed, but it's our own fault for being in the position to get screwed by that call in the first place. Honduras actually got screwed worse than we did.
Just wondering how you account for our Hexagonal games against Panama and Honduras, in which we outscored those teams 12-2 ?
You have identified the problem with all these "heart" posts. Did we have heart when we won and not heart when we lost? If a heart beats in a chest but no doctor is there to hear it, can it still have mitral valve prolapse? Jokes aside, I don't buy the heart arguments. If Bruce runs a second lineup we probably win. It was about legs and not much more because qualifying out of this confed is a cakewalk compared to say, CAF or CONMEBOL so it comes down to energy and on that last day we simply did not have it. Heart had nothing to do with it. If the muscles won't go, there is no running to be done and BA should have known this and run some kids out there against TnT who THEMSELVES ran young players and used the match as a development opportunity. .
How do you account for the NYY losing 22-0 to Cleveland in a year where they went to the playoffs while the Tribe stayed home Those 2 games are part of a 10 piece puzzle. When the 10 step journey was completed, the usmnt was 5th best in a pretty easy confederation. There are no excuses, the talent was not there. Conditioning is part of talent. IMO, another lineup would have also lost, but we'll never know. Singling out 2 games of a 10 game process is pointless. You gotta look at the whole Hex to see who's good enough for the WC, just like you gotta look at the whole reg season to see who's good enough to move on in other sports.
Hell if Bruce runs the same lineup out we can win that game. Those players can and have won those games before. Remember TnT only scored one goal in that game and it was a 30yd beauty that 9x out of 10 never gets near the goal. Gonzo's own goal was another miracle hit that could have gone anywhere, it just happened to go where Tim wasn't expecting. I hate agreeing with Gulati but its a game of inches sometimes. 2 inches one way and Dempsey/Benny score(I don't remember who it was anymore) and 2 inches the other way and Omars OG hits the bar. Sh*t happens sometimes.