1/18: US vs. Canada Official Post Game Thread [R]

that was too easy...

 

Well, what happened?

 

USA 4 - Canada 0 or USA 6.14040 - Canada 0 in Canadian dollars.

 

Damn, now I have beer coming out of my nose. THAT is comedy.

 

what would it be in binary?

 

110-000?

 

100-0

 

Jim had it in Canadian dollars.

 

dammit


i was thinking 6 because of the damn canadian dollar


DAMN CANUCKS!!!

 

He forgot the 1404 ten-thousandths of a goal then.

 

Watched the game on DirectTV---uggghhh. Phil Schoen and some guy with a kid that plays at UVA(Italian sounding last name). They sucked too IMHO.

My opinions on the game: MLS is definitely in the off-season. Argentina, with their players in better form, are going to challenge the hell out of us.

Grades(good match, OK(solid) match, sucked):
Califf--between good and solid match

Bocanegra--good match

Howard---OK match

Victorine--between good and solid match

Convey--OK match--if there was ever a guy playing out of position, it was Bobby. IMHO he would have done much better in the center of the park. He had a couple of good plays and hung in there defensively.

Klein--nice finish, otherwise between good and solid match, played right midfield

Olsen---good match---great to see Beninho back

Ralston---nice finish, between good and solid

Mastroeni--OK match, needs to provide more of a calming influence IMHO

Mulrooney--OK match. Almost crippled by a tackle that was completely from behind by Xousa. It deserved a straight red, but the ref had no nuts.

Donovan---between good and solid for his ability. Gave away too many balls to be considered 'world class'. Blew a sitter that may or may have not been affected by the poor pitch.

Mathis--between good and solid---great finish, played some good balls, on another level when it comes to vision and needs his teammates to give him the ball more.

Twellman---solid match, not much time or service.

Cunningham--solid, created a few opportunities, needs better support play to truly shine IMHO.

Garcia--solid

Finishing--A
Offensive buildup--C
Counterattacking--A
Defense---B

Most of our goals came off quick attacks(kind of counter-like) and we were unable to have many sustained buildups that resulted in clear chances on goal. Canada's 3-5-2 might have been responsible for this as much as anything since they had flooded the midfield.

Argentina will attack more and have more chances IMHO, but we should be able to build up attacks better against them.

If Canada could get their players some more professional experience, they have enough raw athletic ability to qualify for the World Cup IMHO. Whether they can do that or not remains to be seen.

Thinking about how much our player pool changed from '98 to '02, we've still got a long ways to go to be able to find an improved squad for World Cup qualifying IMHO. One player who is a definite lock at this point is Carlos Bocanegra. He's ready for prime time IMHO.

 

That was essentially a glorified practice session. It is tough to say who did well because Canada made it easy. Our fourth goal was well done. It is good to see Olsen playing well.

 

just got back from the match and my god it was cold for south florida. the u.s. looked ok, but canada was pretty much awful from start to finish. i sat in row two right behind the goal the u.s. was attacking in the first half, so most of the action was right in front of me. i definitely felt donovan should have finished with ease early, but other than that he was very active. clint's finish was great to see so close up. bocanegra's header was nice, but he would never be that wide open against a tough team. i will write more later, as i am off to the bar to celebrate. nice to see the u.s. in person again after a fairly long layoff, only three weeks to argentina!

 

This I think is consistent with our style and player's strengths, so doesnt sound like much of a suprise.

 

Wanderer, you got everyone but DMB.

 

Blame Canada!

 

Sorry bro--DMB had a good match IMHO. He had one awesome sequence where he was going left, cut back to the right and completely lost the Canadian defender, and hit a rocket near post that Hirschnazi barely blocked with his right hand. DMB is rough around the edges, but his athletic ability makes up for a lot of it. He defends so well for being so small that he definitely deserves to be on the pitch. Hopefully, he's working on his crossing daily.

Canada has some good players, they just need a 'professional' edge to their game.

 

my thoughts:

unlike wanderer i thought bobby looked really good in the left back position, he does essentially what bruce asks him to do as a wing defender...play solid defense and push forward on the attack. i think given time he will be a nice left back <suarez must not be showing bruce anything in camp b/c he has yet to make a game-day roster>

boca looks like a stud out there. i really wish he would have been healthy enough to make the squad in japan/korea as it would have been a great learning experience for a young american defender <i mean he could not have been worse than agoos>

other things:

the field was horrendous. there were divits coming up everywhere, the footing was as if florida just survived a small monsoon. that was pretty disappointing for a match in florida, but i am guessing the cold weather may have had something to do with it.

ps. clips of the goals will be on-line before the end of the night...keep your eyes out

 

i agree, i especially was impressed with #10 for canada until he took that horrible tackle in to mulrooney from behind...the other two canadians that impressed me were #5 on the defensive side and i believe it was #2, the guy with corn-rows who was essentially in a head to head battle with beasley all night long.

 

I thought Convey looked good, just that there was no one calming the game down in the center of the pitch and I felt he would have been even more effective there.

Suarez is a RB BTW, and apparently he got some food poisoning during camp.

 

Somebody in the PBP thread said he had come down with food poisoning and wasn't a 100% during training. Not sure if that's true or not.

 

#10 was Davide Xausa, who plays for Livingston in the SPL, and usually works hard in every match.
#5 was Richard Hastings. He plays for Graz AK in the Austrian Bundesliga and has improved since the last time I saw him.
#2 (the guy with the corn-rows) is Tam Nsaliwa, who is 20 and plays for Saarbrucken in the German Regionalliga (Saarbrucken was relegated from the 2nd Bundesliga last year). Nsaliwa was the kid brought in during the 2002 GC game to neutralize DMB, and did a decent job of it. Today, it looked like they were evenly matched, with DMB perhaps getting the edge since he did have that one decent chance near the end of the match. I look forward to seeing them go head-to-head over the years.

I'm not one to make excuses for my nat'l team (I even predicted that they would lose by 4), but despite the terrible outcome, I think we got what we wanted out of the match, and that was a run-about for the many youngsters we fielded today.

There were 5 newly capped players on that team today, and I saw some flashes of potential amongst an utterly disorganized and tactically unaware group of guys.

I just hope it translates into better fortunes for Canada down the line.

Congrats to all the American fans for their team's thoroughly convincing win. Hopefully next time we'll be able to give you guys a better match.

 

A logistical snafu prevented us from viewing this evening's match. But it was nice to see Magpie and Monty and the Rev Army boys.

With that, I can't comment on player performance.

But I'm irritated to no end about the condition of the pitch. Have we any pride?

Delighted with the result, I am.

I still think that Canada will soon have its day.

 

your biggest problem out there: it seemed as if your team for the most part didnt have a clue as to what they were doing <dont take this as a mean thing> they just looked lost and confused, which is understandable...the marking in the defensive middle, mainly your two center backs, was horrendous and they lost players many times throughout the game.