Beasley as an overlapping back. Bornstein and Spector are terrible. I want to Torres start. I wish they put in Edu, but can't argue with the subs. Jozy didn't look too good. Dempsey should be at an attacking midfield position with Donovan right behind him, or on the opposite side of him.
I think Torres made a good case to start. I like Spector, but dolo has to start. I would be happy if the US didn't go by the books and play MB as the holding mid.
For me, Spector, Feilhaber, Clark, Bornstein and Buddle (due to Findley's performance) move to the metaphorical glass case in South Africa: for emergencies only! The first four simply look like they cannot handle the skill level of international soccer. The fifth is simply trumped by better options in Findley and Gomez.
MOTM- Landon Donovan Torres was fantastic and Findley really impressed as well. Feeling much better about SA now but Gooch was running like a contestant on The Big Loser. That's gonna be a problem
A tale of two halves. Amazing how different our performances were before and after the break. I just don't know how much has to do with: 1. Coach - reading them the riot act vs. reshuffling positions 2. Players - substitutions vs. responding to the coach 3. Opponent - was Turkey worn out from playing 3 games in a week? I'm hoping it's 1 and 2, because if it's 3 it's false hope that we can really play well when we need to.
Bornstein, Clark & Feilhaber....major suckage Spector...meh Torres, Landysweets...woot The rest did as they were expected.
I am from Turkey. We are not going to WC so team is not prepared physically. Secondly, I am looking Turkish newspapers, forums. People didnt care about this match, now there is a song contest Eurovision and people are watching that. Even if we were playing a team like San Marino, Albania, people would be more interested,there is only 1 thread and few posts saying "we lost a crappy team like US, how even we gave away positions", and criticziing Gus Hiddink. For US, probably they were the worst team after North Ireland I saw after a long time. I dont think US have a chance against slovenia, I dont know Algeria.
I've not seen him mentioned yet, so I want to give special props to Bradley, who I'd say gave the most effort of anyone out there, was up and down the pitch all game long joining the attempt and helping to defend, and generally proved why he has such a lock on being our starting CM.
hmmm, cause i am looking fifa website and it say you no good enough to play in WC. maybe you give away positions every game? hopefully we keep taking away positions and get lucky breaks at WC. fingers crossed?
Everyone started out looking a little rusty. This Turkish team has played several games together recently and they stuck with their starters. As the rust came off we looked better and better. Disagree with the poster above and thought Gooch looked much better than Tuesday. I think Torres really has made a case to start. The big knock on him was that he was not tough enough on defense...I saw something entirely different today. He may be small but he puts himself in great positions. Wonderful play! Another player making a case to start: can I say it? Findley. We were a different team with him out there stretching the defense. Wondering if Gomez has adequate speed to do the same. I did not like starting with Dempsey/Altidore up front...so I think we will either see Donovan or Gomez/Findley with him. That is the most interesting call leading into the Cup. Really dropped off on our left side when Boca came off. Get game healthy, sir, and stay out of card trouble. Overall, not bad! Gave up a tough goal but bounced back. Substitutions looked great.
great victory. always knew you would win after i've witnessed you against oranje. made some nice pocket change today.
Thank you for your insightful comments. I can tell they were well thought out and prepared vigorously. It doesn't reek of bad sportsmanship at all.
my general take aways. 1. two defensive midfielders may look safe but we get almost no attack and isn't our bet chance to even get a draw. we need a skilled central midfielder to partner with bradley 2. We need two strikers up front. 3. we are a better team when we move the ball fast with one touch and we need to play our skilled passers over our safe defensive guys. Notice we conceded less goals and gave up a lot less chances in the second half when we had a more positive line up. 3. Cover for each other: Spector's got criticized but i think our defense in general needs to cover for each other and if he's gonna carry the ball all the way out you've gotta cover his ass. He shouldn't have to run past three other plays to be back defending. And i think part of that is a communication issue more then a skill issue. 4. The U.S. doesn't suck. But we aren't so good that we can play a ton of players against their strengths and hope to succeed. Donovan and a few others yeah but that's about it. 5. England got exposed by the skill players of Mexico. Mexico just lacked finishers. If there's a way to slant i don't think it's the defensive two defensive mids, no pace up front of the first half. I think it's the possession, skill and passing like torress was showing and the pace and positivity we showed in the second. Especially considering Torres plays in Mexico and England seemed to struggle with that latin style. anyways my two cents.
Great game. Turkey is a good team, beating them is worthy of some significant praise, even in this context. Gooch looked strong, showing much more composure, and did you see? He can still jump. Shocker! I don't know what to make of Findley. He played really well, but is he starting now? We need that speed up top though. If you saw Dempsey's explanation of the tale of two halves after the game, he was dead on. BTW, great call Bob. Players are still shaking off a bit of rust, but they'll be stronger as we go. The Socceroos are in trouble. Boca is our left back, end of story. It doesn't matter who we're playing, if Boca is not a left back, then Bob's intentionally trying to lose the game. Dolo > Spector. I like Spector, but my god do we need Steve's calm back there. Holden impressed for his time out there, he and Bradley combined pretty well towards the end. SHOOT IT MIKE!!! Other than that, Bradley had a solid game. Props to Bob, good adjustments, let's hope he can keep that up and not hesitate to make them when the time comes.
yes we are not going WC cause european quota is very low. I believe there are at least 4-5 European teams now way better than some none-european teams going WC. Reserve team of Czech beat US for example the other day, Turkey has missing some players and Hiddink was new, if they were serious the match would be 3-0 in the first half. I am just listening most famous commentator of Turkey also he is objective he just said, "Czech we played (their reserve team) was equivelant to austria, N. Ireland was equivalent to Azerbaijan Us was equivalent to Belgium at best, how we lost"
If this is accurate, then the Turkish sporting press and fan base is extremely ignorant. This post reeks of Eurocentrism.
I agree they belittle US too much, nobody even cared to write about, I know us is not that bad cause I am living in US. Though I would say US playing terrible
And yet, you lost. Stop trying to provoke people if you're not interested in actually discussing the match in any sort of constructive way.