A red card seems probable at this point. Then I can see us just totally collapsing and letting in 5 or 6 goals. Hopefully I'm just being pessimistic.
Holy Crap, that was beautiful... if we get out of this half only down one, it will be awesome. (Edit: Ok, bad defense by NE, but still a great finish)
Twellman: I'm amazed Olsen hasn't made a sub. Me: I'm amazed you can be on television and not do any research.
Arriola, Jara, and Mora were the best players on the field for United tonight. Arriola is no surprise as he was regularly the US's best player at the Gold Cup. Jara exudes confidence, strange lapses aside, and Mora is still the best tackler this team has had in years.
What kind of save attempt was that by Hamid on the 2nd goal? It's like he tried to avoid using his hands.
A disappointing evening on many levels. Our passing accuracy was way down; our center backs were exposed for lack of pace; and Rooney missed another sitter. Without Acosta we had no creator in the middle - Moreno and Canouse ventured forward a bit more but were ineffective. And once again I see little from Rodriguez. Stieber wasn't even on the bench (replaced by Yow, I believe), but I would have rather seen him than Rodriguez at this point. We had a 65-35 advantage in possession, but we did little with it. Pines was very good, but a bit tentative. At times he seemed driven by his junior status to pass to more senior teammates even when he could have/should have played on forward. I would like to see him start again, perhaps in place of Brillant, in part because he has great closing speed, even though his first step, like all very tall players, is a bit slow.
I am confused by Ben. Clearly the team likes slow, measured (too slow, too measured) buildup, but during most of the game Ben seemed to be on the sideline screaming and gesturing for them to play it forward faster. What am I missing? *usual traditional rant against Unkel* Arriola should have been MOTM, hands down. He's the only reason we were threatening. Seriously, if there was a player who I wouldn't have expected to put it over the bar from within the 6yd box, it would have been Rooney. But the ball served to him by Arriola was insane. Amerikwa needs wing players who aren't afraid to try and deliver early balls behind the defense. If he's gonna camp out offside, we could at least serve him up a couple of those on the off chance an errant defender keeps him on. Arriola and Rodriguez also made a couple such runs. Hamid...Oh Bill....I love you buddy, but, man....distribution and vision are not your strong suits. I know from your perspective it's tough to see what's going on at midfield, but if you see one or two of our wing players running like mad upfield, try and play the ball into the space to which they're running. Twice there were clear runs by Arriola when NE defenders were slow to track back that you would have broken him free if you'd released before he reached the midfield line, but instead you did 1-a short roll to a defender who slowly moved it through the midfield where we lost it, and 2-booted it to the center circle where it went to a lone NE player. Lastly. how do so many of our players still not understand the concept of "when not in possession, get into position"? We lose so many passes by guys just sitting there waiting for the ball to come to them, rather than playing to the ball, and so many still don't play into space (probably because of the aforementioned static problem...) Yes, some of that is on Ben, but some of that are the onfield guys who should know better by now, regardless of what the coach does or does not push. *parting anti-Unkel rant*
Yea and I'd have been in the market for at least two if I could have gotten it in a kids size, but realisticly, I don't need another DCU shirt and I am sure not buying it so my son can fume about not being able to get one so I passed. A tad cynical, but thats kind of the MLS trend these days IMO and thats the reality of being a dad to kid who confines most of his wants to soccer gear and DCU.
He pretty much lives his career in the sound bite of the moment and then moves on. If you think he's got much awareness of 5 minutes ago or any awareness of 5 minutes from now ...
His finishing flat out sucked, but I'd guess an inordinately high percentage of our best offensive moments in the Gold Cup came from his speed and him running at defenders.
You know, sometimes you just have to give a GK credit for making a great play. Yes, he skied a few shots, but he was stopped by some great GK play, too.