It doesn't seem like anyone has mentioned it here, but wasn't Solis at least 1-2 feet offside on the second goal? Of course the highlights show the ball coming in late, but when it starts he is in an offside position. He DEFINATELY is offside if the Saprissa player got a head on it to flick.
I'm glad I didn't watch the whole match so that I didn't get that sick-to-my-stomach feeling when we lost a 2-0 lead, but there seems to be this rule of thumb that the 2-0 lead is most dangerous and unfortunately it rang true for us today. I'm hoping I'm wrong, but could Herc be a one-hit wonder last year and be a shadow of his former self this year? He just doesn't seem to have it but then again, it is the preseason for us and he should get it together when April 1 rolls around. For some reason I'm not terribly upset. Maybe cuz I see that LA is in preseason form against the defending CCC champs at their home. Them's the breaks.
I think MLS and the individual clubs bear the responsibility period. It is up to the players and coaches to be ready for the CCC it is nobody elses responsibility. Concacaf will schedulre the games and we have to adjust. Until we win more than acouple of these championships we will keep being thought of as second rate. The galaxy got recognition as being scrappy but in the end still not as good as mexican and Costa Rican clubs. No excuses should be given if we want to concider one of the best teams the organisation has to start acting like it. The time of the tournament is just another excuse. We did not execute for the full game they did and they showed it on the scoreboard. Concacaf , refs , crowds didn't play. 11 saprissa and 11 Galaxy players did and they were better. Time to step up or shut up.
So let me get this straight, they play attractive soccer in the first half with good link play that produces two well-deserved goals and show confidence through the middle of the field, and then in the second half come out limp wristed and tentative and you call that a change in tactics? I didn't see any purpose to their play, they were a deer in the headlights. Why don't you explain why calling out their focus and will is "ridiculous?" I see plenty of other posters in this thread who saw the same thing I did. They showed they had the talent in the first half to get it done and then laid down until it was tied up. They gave two goals back by contracting combined with some very poor defensive play. You can't blame it on fitness, it was the start of the second half, and as someone else pointed out they've been working since the end of January with a half dozen matches to this point.
piss off then. your bad karma probably ruined it for us. i'm gutted, but our boys showed more fight then the Revs, and against a better team. just crawl back in your hole until our team is in town to beat yours.
you guys do realize that besides the preseason, the Galaxy were missing three starters? who was Kansas City missing when they rolled over and played dead against Saprissa. hell, i don't care, i'm disappointed in the team, and i saw a lot of mistakes tonight. but i also saw Hartman making that killer late save and Albright running 120 in his first game from injury and LD gunning it to the end - and you don't see that from guys who don't have heart. they do. way down under the pain, i'm proud of this team.
The game was lost in LA. If they had one goal lead from the first game they would be playing a Mexican team in the CCC. I thought the Galaxy played well. They just ran out of gas. One good thing about the result The Galaxy players on the USMNT can play Germany. Aaron
hmmm, you seem to forget that he had been playing with the USNT as well as landon and hartman. the pre-season is an excuse, they knew they were going to be playing this cup for a while now.
And you seem to forget that Albright got hurt in the VERY FIRST DAY OF USMNT camp and didn't play/practice any more after that. In fact, I do believe he had surgery. So yeah, it's amazing that he was able to go the entire game, 120+ minutes.
So you can be disappointed in the team's performance but I can't huh? Childish response. Try to express your opinion without casting insults.
yeah, piss off is such an insult. . . weenie, go home. i wasn't even refering to you, but to Team USA's post. i couldn't care less about HIS disappointment. this isn't his team. he decides to cheer for them one game, and then comes on this LA board and tell fans that have watched them lose three MLS title games about disappointment? you don't cuss out our team on our boards until you've earned it. Topper is too nice of a mod to kick him out, but i'm at least going to call him for the troll he is. do you seriously believe that if this had been the Fire that i or any other MLS fan could go on the Fire boards and bitch about how the Fire had let me down? The Blind Pig would boot them from the Fire forum so fast they wouldn't know what hit them. don't dish out what your own mods wont allow.
A shameful second half collapse. Say what you will about Saprissa picking up their pace, but the defense was all a step slow, the midfield couldn't hold the ball (watch Vagenas's giveaway that leads to the second goal), and offensive opportunities were wasted (Gardner's cross to no one when LD was open 8 yards out was pathetic). LA had a team on the ropes and simply gave up. And yes, the reffing will always be bad down there. I agree the second goal was about 2 yards offside (unless the header came of Marshall, which I couldn't tell), and the ref sadly bit on the foul that lead to the third goal (that sad, poke it behind and fall into the defender routine), but if MLS teams cannot deal with that problem, they'll always be also-rans in CONCACAF.
Well, I am absolutely gutted about this match. We had it. We had it in our hands. But the guys played with heart. They did not give up, but fought to the bitter end. It just wasn't good enough. A few plays here and there that we should have made but didn't made the difference in the end. My one question: Why is Naldo still on the team? That was pathetic. He comes in and looks TIRED!! He's outraced by guys that have been running all game long!! If he ever gets another minute on the field, that's one minute too much. I thought the guys had some really good stuff, though, and I'm looking forward to the start of the season.
well said, SK. we're lucky in a way. we're one of the few MLS fans that can actually talk about soccer already and how their team is scoring goals in competitions. i just wish we could talk about winning. and yeah, i'm officially stressing about this team without LD.
This match was exactly the same as the DCU-U.Catolica match in Chile last fall. When these teams get behind, they seem to have the ability to take it up a notch, in a way that the MLS teams just can't. Don't know if it is the players or, maybe the crowd (although the stadium wasn't full last night). But Saprissa took the momentum from LA and LA couldn't get it back. I was disappointed in Donovan. He needs to be able to control the game more (Same applied in the Poland game last week). He's dangerous, but I wish he were better in settling things down for a more controlled attack.
Gomez made a fantastic play to assist on the first goal, though his touch looks a bit like he is still in preseason form. The problem wasn't the Galaxy midfield or forwards. They provided a 2-0 lead by half time. It was the shaky defense and goalkeeping. Sturgis was getting burned regularly and Ihemelu is just scary. Hartman created dangerous situations by coming out too much and too far. We could have really used Nagamura and Dunivant. Gardener had the best chance to help win the game late in reg. on a counter, but didn't see a wide open Donovan and tried a shot instead!! Not good, but he played well for the most part and had a great goal.
Another non-Galaxy fan: I watched the first half of the game last night before going to bed, and thought LA was playing so well (it really was beautiful football), I had to watch the second half before going to work today. So I got up early, all excited, and then - boom, boom it's all square. Ouch. Then lackluster play and the extra-time loss. I usually pull for the MLS team, but rarely do I care enough to get up early and watch part of a game. But, this one actually hurt! How great it would have been for them to pull off the upset in Costa Rica. Damn.
No offense, but I'm sick of this sentiment. LD does better, is more exciting, is infinitely more dangerous when he doesn't have to worry about settling things down for a more controlled attack. As far as I'm concerned, so far this year with the Nats he's channeling Claudio Reyna a little too much. I want the attacking, dynamic LD that tore apart Mexico at the Cotton Bowl a few years ago. Let somebody else "settle" things down; let LD rev it up and go. I'll be fine with LD settling things down when he's 30.
My thoughts exactly. What happened to the defense in the 2nd half. Our long-ball defense was frighteningly bad - I've never seen us handle it like that. Just attrocious. And I too think about that chance that Gardener freaked out on - how I wish he'd played it the way he did in the first half with his feed to Donovan and we scored; it was basically the same play, but he messed it up with a poor decision. I think fatigue set in and when you're tired, you don't think as well.
I felt like someone kicked me in the junk everytime Saprissa scored. The soccer arena where I watched the game thought I was nuts when I started screaming about how far offside Saprissa was on their first goal. Damn near threw my beer at their giant projection screen. On the bright side, during the 1st half we played better than I have seen any MLS side play in a long time. If they can channel that during the season we are going to win some games and look good doing it.
One bad defensive play can change a game. And we saw that last night. We got burned on that first goal - and you could literally see the confidence and cohesion falter after that goal. It took us about 15 minutes to recover, and by then they had tied it up 2-2. And although I wish Gardner had made that pass to Donovan, I'm not going to complain about that or his other mistakes in the second half. In the past 2+ years, Gardner has had a total of 12 reserve league games, a couple friendlies and meager minutes in maybe 1 or 2 first team games. He's got skills, that's for sure, but there's no way you can be physically and mentally ready to go 120 minutes with such meager game time. But that was an awesome pre-season game for him that should give him a lot of confidence going into the season. What was especially frustrating about Naldo last night was that he didn't even do the one thing he did really well last year -- run really, really fast. He was the freshest guy out there and he was getting out-hustled all over the place. Ugh. Well, it's all over. Time to get to work on winning the domestic treble...
Hard to tell from 5 minutes of highlights, but it looked like fatigue in the players is what cost us. But to say we choked is crazy. We went for it from the start, went 2-0 up in San Ho's-e in front of an intimidating crowd and seemed to be controlling the game. Then the tiredness factor kicked in, Saprissa had the superior stamina from being in mid-season(I think), and we tired since this was only our second competitive game. Negative: Obviously we lost Positive: I think we've solved the left-side problem The players should hold their heads up, not many other MLS teams could've went 2-0 up against Saprissa in Costa Rica. It could be worse, at least we're not called Red Bull Los Angeles. Another thing, Naldo!