Our round of 16 game is against Colombia. They beat Qatar 1-0, they drew with Senegal 1-1 and they lost to Portugal 3-1. This game is early late tuesday night/early wednesday morning depending on where you are in the United States.
I am a fan of both teams. I rarely root for a team when they face each other. In most situations I would be rooting for a draw and penalties in a knockout stage like this. However, in this one I am rooting for a USA blowout. I do not like Colombia's manager and hope he gets Fired.
If the attack can click and score first Colombia will have problems. Colombia has trouble shooting on target.
I just want a team we can use intelligent movement and set pieces to beat if it comes to that. I respect Colombia's ability to pick us apart through the midfield but our organization, composure and height will be a strength in this one, not a weakness like against Ukraine.
Steffen in goal, Shaq Moore at rb if Tab has put down a bet. Payne at rb if he wants to win. Miazga and Carter-Vickers in central defense. Acosta at LB. The player who I must not name at the #6 because @SUDano will get upset. Captain Hyndman at the #8 and Zelalem at the #10. Its important that they play much better. Delgado left sided winger because I have been disappointed with the play of Allen and Jamieson, Arriola right sided winger, Rubin striker.
My heart's with the US, but my sleep schedule is rooting for Colombia. It's not sure if it can take much more of this.
It boggles my mind that he wants to throw talented players in random positions because their '"ceiling is high." If you want to set up EPB to fail on Wednesday then play him as a 6...a position he has never played for the U-20s ever...in the knockout round of a WC.... Your best individual eleven players is not always your best TEAM.
3:30 AM... Do I wake up or not? How does everyone else feel about waking up? If others are going to, I'll commit
Gonna do what I did with every other game, sleep, wake up at 5am (pacific), and watch it on the dvr, before hauling arse to work. Was really hoping for a 9pm game, there's been so many of those, alas no such luck. Felt really good waking up at 5 and watching the horror friday morning, if I'd stayed up till midnight and only gotten 3-4 hours sleep that would have really sucked. Opponent after we win looks like a lock to be Serbia. Will be interesting to see how things go since we played them better (at least in the scoreline, I didn't see the game) than we did Ukraine, and Serbia is definitely a better side than the Ukraine.
What starting XI do we think Tab will roll out vs. Columbia? Has anyone watched the Columbian team? What are their strengths and weaknesses?
Strengths: Santos Borre, Rodriguez, Tello Weaknesses: For how much talent they have, their form has been pretty bad. I don't know that much though. Just a little. Maybe someone else knows more.
So can someone tell me why the heck Acosta is at LB? Isn't Requejo on this team? I thought Acosta was more of a Dmid? Why not put him in place of, say, Delgado?
Acosta is more of a defensive LB and Requejo is better going forward. Acosta did play LB for almost his entire time at Bradenton. It was almost an accident that he ended up playing RB with FC Dallas. They had a rash of injuries and they needed to fill a hole at RB. He stepped in and played well there. However, when folks asked him what his preferred position was...................he always said CM. This season he's been mostly at CM with Dallas. As usual, its all about matchups.
COLOMBIA has good technique on the ball and will try to keep possession. Lot's of tiki-taka style, but unfortunately for them they have no clue what to do in the final third. The defending is usually spot on. The Keeper usually has a good match (except against Portugal.) And as most Colombian teams this team struggles on corners and set pieces of any kind. Tactically I actually think Ramos is better than Restrepo. This US team actually looks better in the final third and can also score on set pieces.
The one where he plays like he's about a foot shorter than he is and has created nothing outside of that goal that Rubin stole from him.
...and that goal was off of a ball that fell to him IIRC, though I think he did put a little move on to buy some space and he did the right thing by hitting the ball down.