::My First PDL Game, Or USSoccer Bingo ::

I went to the Southeast Conf. PDL Playoffs this past week, and saw two VERY entertaining games.

DaLLasFortWorth vs. Central Florida
El Paso vs. Cocoa

This leaves my USSoccer Bingo Sheet looking like this:

HighSchoolGame - check
College Game - check
PDL Game - check
ProSoccerLeague - (no)
A-League - (no)
MLS - check
US Open Cup - (no)
USMNational Team - (no)
Qualifier - (no)
Fifa Tournament - (no)

Its rather sparse I realize but i'd like to ramble on a bit about the similarities in the games i HAVE experienced, if any of you are closer to winning USSoccer Bingo and would like to share your opinions feel free.

I'll use the PDL games as a reference point since it was kind of somewhere in between all the other ones in terms of atmosphere and gameplay.

The field was torn up on the side closest to the stands and it kind of affected the gameplay. There were a few players with very good ball control, and then others who seemed to have trouble keeping the ball inbounds. Naturally the former tended to have their way with the latter. While its not entirely uncommon to see players misshandle the ball in MLS it seemed a bit more prevalent in the PDL games, poor passes and bad headers abounded.

The El Paso - Cocoa game ended 5 - 4. I'd say it was characterized by a very plain but effective group effort on the part of Cocoa, lobbing in crosses, taking advantage of set plays as well as what can only be described as the worst defending i've ever seen in my life in an organized game of soccer on the part of El Paso. In El Pasos defense their attacking was much more inspired than Cocoas, one player (number 13) stood out in particular. On more than one occasion he shamed a cocoa defender, and on one of those he managed to slice a very violent shot in from the far right of the box, the keeper had little chance.

The CentralFlorida - DallasFW game was much more evenly matched, and much more exciting, as they traded the lead a few times before CF came out on top. The defending was much better but you could still see a marked difference in the level of play from that of MLS. Suffice it say that one Chris Armas on each team would have vastly improved the gameplay. There were still alot of give-aways, but all in the all the second game was very much worth the $5.00.

The fans were quite loud when their team was in with a chance (which actually wasn't all that infrequent) but otherwise it was about as sedate as a the NON-section 8 end of cardinal stadium (cheer when you score then sit and talk to your neighbor). There was also a sizeable amount of them. Maybe 400-500.

The one thing that really made the play seem amature was the amount of play-acting and sad attempts at gamesmanship. It was afwul not only in that they tried it alot but that they were quite bad at it. Never have i heard so much whining on a soccer field (except during intramurals when i'm the ref ).

If i had to compare the PDL with the other games i've been to i'd say it was only slightly less exciting than the MLS games I attended at the old tampa stadium, but a fair amount less exciting than the fire games. Somehow 400 people in a confined space watching people kick the ball around with a fair amount of difficulty seems more exciting than the same type of play in a cavernous behemoth of a stadium. It was also nice to see that the organization seemed to not only care about its fans but actually came out seemed to KNOW alot of them. The CF kraze organization is apparently tied to the youth soccer league around here and it was nice to see a lot of people in kraze shirts come out and talk to the fans.

The only games the PDL compared favorably with were the NCAA soccer games i'd attended.

Those games were worsened by the unlimited subs, which really changed the nature of the game. It seemed more like a rolling anthill at times than a soccer game, and though it may have been nice to see timmy regan and gavin glinton and a precious few other GOOD players it very much gave the impression that you and your friends could do better had you not been so hungover. I'm not entirely sure that most college teams couldn't compete in the PDL since their players seem to overlap at times but the gameplay was somehow a thousand times worse. I have to assume it was the number of subs.

I'm quite happy with the PDL games I attended, and if you're the kind of person who can appreciate some pretty good individual play and can manage to watch a few kids make some god awful tactical and ballhandling mistakes and grievous errors in judgement w/o screaming your head off at them... then i'd say hell... drop $5 and go see if you like your local PDL team.

Hopefully this year i'll be able to check off an Open Cup game and a Qualifier as well (crossing fingers i still might be able to make it to jamaica, which is closer than any of the home matches we'd be playing unless they schedule them in miami).

If any of you have been to either of the USL or Open Cup games i've missed feel free to chime in. sure there are alot of people who have probably made at least one of every game I listed.

*editted to say*

its been a while since i've been on bigsoccer... what the hell happened to the bease and how are there 4 A-league teams in the USOC quarterfinals?

 

I work on Saturday from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM, if its after that then i'm good to go because it'll be on the way home from my new job.

i would have attended an Ajax game but the USL site misrepresented the place and time of their games against Cocoa (switched the home and away dates).

slightly less than professional.

isn't Ajax sposed to produce an A-league team by next season? is that still on track when they had such difficulty in the PDL? what ever happened to the stadium talk? pipe dream? not that i'm getting antsy or anything... just curious if thats still on the agenda and if its moving forward right now or on hold.