My thoughts for the last several days… USA versus Argentina: 1) Convey and Victorine played well as outside backs; the defensive problem was the lack of strong play by Mastroeni or a “holding” midfielder like Reyna. 2) Olsen started in the central midfield. Taking into consideration the theories provided by the television crew, I still do not understand Arena’s tactic. 3) Howard is Superman in terms of ridiculous saves. But he needs to work on his distribution, especially punting. 4) Donovan looked sharp at times yet needs to stay calm. The road to Germany will be long and arduous. Team USA does not need problems from both Donovan and Mathis. 5) Does anyone else disagree with Mathis wearing the captain’s armband? 6) I miss McBride. What an awesome target player. Other: 7) Does anyone REALLY know what is happening with Nowak/New England/Chicago in the ongoing soap-like saga? There are tons of Internet posts and stories, but what is the truth? 8) I look forward to watching DC United take the field this season. However, I always think this. 9) I still believe LA is going to smoke every team in MLS this year. 10) Where should I stay in Florida for MLS Spring training? 11) I want to be Grant Wahl. Take care, Michael De Simone
1. i think garcia played himself on to the team...over sasha or any other defender except boca... 2. donovan showed leadership...nothing wrong showing emotion in a meaningless friendly... 3. twellman needs to be at least even with the last defender if he's playing forward, otherwise he's out of position.....could've gotten one imo... 4. there were at least 4 or 5 players on our team saturday that couldn't control the first touch b/c they were scared or not nat'l team material...i'll leave it up to bruce to figure it out....but one of them on the fence was convey....who did have that one split the defenders dribble which was nice but most of the time looked scared.... 5. garcia was very impressive in my book.... 6. for a US team, we certainly lack height.... 7. dc sucks 8. i was wearing shorts and a t-shirt yesterday drinking rum runners....i'm watching snow come down in nyc right now.... 9. aside from the us game on saturday, we also got to see model agencies play each other in a volleyball tournament in south beach. omg.
I think Klein was the best player for the US, other than Howard. Not too many strong attacks that I can remember came down his side, and he had most of the good offensive chances. Donovan has to cool it. He has a big 'ole bullseye on him now. If Convey and Victorine are our starting outside backs in WC '06, I'll buy everyone reading this a premium membership. I thought the main thing that hurt us was our poor passing out of the back. There were many times when clearing out of the back that, even when we had time, the ball went straight back to ARG. Order of Finish in West: LA KC DAL SJ COL EAst NE CLB DC MET CHI
I agree with both of the first two posts. As for my evaluations of the players, I wrote an article about it here: http://www.topdrawersoccer.com/NationalTeams/1044751065/view Enjoy -Tron
Its ok for Donovan to show emotion, but hes trying to pick fights out there now. He needs to stick with what hes good at and not risk getting carded/injured because his head is too big.