Seems like the usual suspects have been covered already. I'll take a shot at some peripheral issue analysis. I wonder just how dark it was on the field? Sure looked dark on the stream I was watching. If the lighting was good enough for soccer, then there is huge energy savings to be had all across Europe, the US, etc. Guatemala and Cuba - helping to lead the green movement of the sporting world. Also, I wouldn't underestimate the impact on at least some players regarding powerful Ike bearing down on the island. US players may have been thinking about getting off the island ASAP while Cuba players may have been thinking about impact on homes, family, etc, if it is a direct hit on the island. Hurricanes have a way of putting perspective on things. Or at least making it difficult to focus 100% on tasks at hand.
FWIW... GAlavision people said at teh start that the field looked dark ONLY on the TV screens, and that depite the lighting not being the best in the world, that the players themselves -AT FIELD LEVEL_- could see very well, and that was why there should be no worry about lousy passing/finishing from any players...... (unless that player actually messed up) And Grant asking tougher question would indeed be a welcome thing....
Greece won a Euopean title by winning 4 straight 1-0 games in the qualifiers then winning 3 straight 1-0 in the finals.
and in the process brought the state of soccer around the world into question. Man, I still remember that final. It was like the height of totalitarianism in Europe. Dark Days.
Oh I agree, the football was dire...I was just pointing out the fact that Greece managed to win the Euro's with 7 1-0 results.
Some interesting news...NPR reports the Cuban crowd gave the US a standing ovation. Kinda nice if true.
which is why for the longest i try to separate the people form the government there, as much as possible.... and yes, someone ought to try to give Manuel Díaz Rodríguez an actual jersey...maybe one of teh 5 US fans? Grant? Any reporter who went?
Wasn't it awesome? The only thing missing were the rough polyester Adidas warm-ups, a running track around the pitch and long hairs pissing on the cement mountains behind the goals.
FYI, we didn't get any lucky bounces or calls last night. In fact we got the one missed handball/PK against us. I agree that we have a lot of stuff we need to improve upon and i'm not making excuses for our team, just trying to correct part of your comment. Its not as if we were outplayed in those games, but we certainly didn't outplay them either.
But it wasn't pretty, so it was therefore invalid. I mean, you should have seen the posts during the summer of 2004 over on μεγάλοςποδόσφαιρο.com complaining about how dreadful the Greek team were, even though they won the tournament. Even Greek fans today would rather not have the trophy at all, considering how terrible they were when they won it.
The commentators seemed to indicate that Cuba attacked a lot more vs. T&T, but just had a bad young goalie in that game. Cuba outshot T&T by a lot, but also got burned on the counter. They respected the US a lot more and sat back against us. I didn't see any game reports so I don't know how accurate this is, but I am just paraphrasing what Harkes and JP said.
i certtainly didn't see a lot of sitting back in the second half .....and the US just could not show a proper plan to contain them and punishe them PROPERLY...that is my main beef with this game...the result, the three points on the road? Awesome,... The execution/lack of planning, lack of coaching savvy? Annoying.....
Agreed... either the US game plan or execution was pretty bad. maybe a little of both. Another shutout is a good sign though even if we didn't play our best game defensively there weren't many huge blunders and Howard made a couple good saves when he needed to.
Right. I think Beasley played bad. I swear it looked at times he lacked basic skills, just horrible....but I am not complaining. All things considered, I am happy with the "Three Ugly points".
Germany beat Paraguay, the USA, and South Korea consecutively in the knockout rounds by the same scoreline in Japan/Korea to make the World Cup Final.
Woah, that's my hometown! Though I haven't really been there in ages. They have a soccer bar now?! No kiddin'!
Indeed, though having lived in Dublin during that campaign, the Irish were legit that year (even though Roy Keane cocked up and got his ass sent home like a tool). They took 4 points off the Dutch and held Portugal to a pair of score draws. I watched the final match from the stands of Landsdowne Road and it is still one of my greatest soccer memories. (Standing in the monsoon in April 2002 when the USA came to Landsdowne and Pope scored right in front of me was another one!) Hell they were the only other side other than Brazil to score against Germany the whole tournament (that 92nd Robbie Keane equalizer). Saudi Arabia though... oh dear. That team was terrible beyond explanation!
The point was that (due to the luck of the draw) they reached a world cup final without beating a single european team along the way....doubt that has ever happened before and may never happen again.
Did Ireland move and no one told me? Though I get your point, the draw did help them (though Paraguay is a decent side). Doesn't get much easier than the USA in the quarters and Korea in the semis though.
The Cuban defender heads the ball off his own teammate's back, the ball goes to another defender to toe poke it away, only for it to go straight to Dempsey, who himself wimped out of the previous high ball challenge. That's a good bounce. Bocanegra decides to toe poke ball into his own net and Tim Howard has to dive-save it on the goal line - that's a good bounce. Hand-PK non-call - the guy was sliding with his hand on the ground. He wasn't moving his hand. That's a 80% non-call ... unless it's Belarus-Ukraine. Mike's point was that Germany tied Ireland and then didn't have to face a single European team all tournament - Cameroon (3rd game ... although down a man when Ramelow was red-carded), Paraguay, the US, South Korea and Brazil. PS. Vagaries of the draw - in 2,006 - the Germans had Sweden, Argentina and Italy in their knock-out games. Even if the nominal results weren't quite as good as in 2002, the draw was much, much tougher.