I am disappointed; the team made many costly mistakes but they had some cojones this time, unlike four years ago. The future is bright, can't wait for Brazil 2014
the thing that bugs me is that i really thought after we scored that we would go on to win. Yet it just seemed like we were playing for OT after that and didn't want to push forward enough to go for it. I felt like we gave Ghana to much respect when they didn't deserve it, then not enough when they did. If we won this one, then I would have been completely proud of our boys, not to say that i'm not, but i just really feel like we could have gone on to win this one.
The guys gave me something to be excited about. I'm proud of them and the team is getting better. I don't remember all the US support 4 years ago. Fairweather fans or not, it was nice to see Americans get behind their country. Oh and it was fun seeing Italy crash and burn.
Getting behind and having to chase games is too hard to sustain, you just can't expect to do that every game and still pull out a win. They did good to win the group, it could have been alot worse, 2006 was more of a disaster because the hopes were so high, this time I had at least tempered my hopes and was more realistic.
Growing up in St. Louis, I was fortunate to have started attending USMNT games and WC qualifiers in 1984. The USMNT has come a LOOOONG way. On a day like today, even I need a little perspective. I wholeheartedly agree with your post. And just like that - I've now moved past another of the many steps of a grieving soccer fan.... Thank You.
We played hard, and ultimately, ran out of gas. It happens. At least they guys left everything on the field (except for, suprisingly according to some of you, Bornstein's jockstrap) and played with honor. They can hold there heads high and so can we. We could be a French or Italian fan today. That would be much worse.
Frankly, today's performance revealed that we don't have the individual talent necessary to succeed at this World Cup. Teamwork is a great asset, but when the team doesn't work, problems arise. Too many early goals conceded, too little possession. The team just didn't play well enough. Oh, and I miss Charlie Davies.
that is exactly the mindset I had after the game driving home from work. We could be either french or italian fans and feel like slitting our own throats. We turned heads and people are really starting to show the United States respect when it comes to world football. We played good footbal. Maybe not to our potential but we did play good football. I'm geared up for 2014..this was a great world cup cycle and the next one couldn't come soon enough. So let the "I hate bob bradely" "Freddy Adu" "Guissppe Rossi" threads pour in....
This one stings a bit more, maybe becuase we still feel it, becaue expectiations to move deeper were higher especially after wer were looking at Ghana and Uraguay before someone who we were to lose to. Oooops.
We would have been pretty big underdogs to Uruguay....they've got multi million dollar players and playing well.
Not me. Both suck. But I feel like the group stage was just fluke except the one 45 mintues we actually played. And that after being down for no reason except incompetence on simple plays, like denying space and sticking with a man.
That we want more and expect more of our teams is a sign of progress itself really. I can still remember when the goal was to just qualify for the cup. Let alone advance out of group stage or advance in the knockout. Suddenly, we're able to see the potential that USMNT could actually make some noise sometime in our lifetimes.
Feels like getting kicked in the nuts when you're in the middle of a diarrhea dump, imo. Still, compared to ass kickings at Costa Rica and Gold Cup b-squads getting completely humiliated, the overall WC performance was passable.
...but it wasn't... *sigh* Oh well...give me a little while to get over it, and then go ahead and strap me back into this rollercoaster for another 4 year ride, Marge...
We left it all on the pitch. It sucks but is the truth. We could have done things differently, sure. But we left it all on the pitch. More than Italy or France can say.
The "we could be Italian or French - that would really suck!" suggestions are a bit shortsided, imo. Those teams have player pools stocked with men from their OWN, domestic, extremely high quality leagues, and have hundreds and hundreds of players in the pipeline, teenage professionals in the youth systems at top clubs, etc Italy for sure, will reload and be ahead of nations like ours in a heartbeat. include the Danes, Greeks and other similar second tier European nations, as well as the Mexicans and similarly talented Western Hemisphere teams. MLS expands the player pool, but we're still reliant on our good players going to top overseas leagues to grow into international caliber players. Being Italian or French? Not all that bad. They reload quickly, we have to make the ammo, place it in the magazine ourselves, test the weapons, fix them if needed, etc before we're ready.
it sucks because we will never have an easier draw than the one we had... if someone had said, hey, england, algeria, slovenia in the group stage and then ghana and Uruguay to get the semifinals, my jaw would of dropped immediately
In 2006 we embarrassed ourselves. So yeah, this was infinitely better. Which doesn't mean that it was good. But 2006 was just so bad.
No. 1998 was just so bad. 2006 was just not very good. I have the same feeling here that I did after the U-20s in Canada and the Olympic team in Beijing : We had the opportunity to do some really good things and blew it. More frustration than anger at this point