Discussion of this seems to have died. Is there any word on who might or will be the opponent and the location? Grr I want to look up flights.
Nov 14 Slovakia - USA http://translate.google.com/transla...-a-asi-aj-talianom&sl=sk&tl=en&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
Given that we've already played Italy and Spain this year.. while a bunch of other countries are busy, I've got no complaints.
Slovakia is a solid European side, they won their qualifying group. Technically sound, should be a good test for you guys.
Denmark and Slovakia, two solid teams that won their qualifying groups outright--and, importantly, will confront us with two strongly differing styles. This should provide some new insight as to what work lies ahead for the WC. These are the sort of friendlies we badly needed prior to WC 2006 [and in general did not get]
Slovakia, a less than dominant 4-4-1 team at home during WC qualification, including a near-fatal 0-2 home loss to Slovenia in the 2nd to last game, needed a Poland own goal for the 0-1 away win in the last game of qualification to win their group. I'm sure they're solid, and away games in Europe will always be good tests. But I also wish we had secured Croatia (#8), Czech (#15), or Serbia (#20), all of whom had no games scheduled yet, rather than #33 FIFA ranked Slovakia.
This is a fine matchup. Slovakia won their group and we have played (or will play) most of the other group winners: Denmark, Switzerland (2007), Germany (2006), Spain (2008, 2009), England (2008), Italy (2006, 2009), Netherlands (FIFA.com says March 2010). Serbia is the exception.
now that would have been an interesting friendly for you guys, especially in Beograd... would make Azteca seem like a library. As for Slovakia... well they beat us (Czech Republic), though that is rather easy these days. A strong but inconsistant squad, great set of midfielders with Hamsik and Sestak.
Cool, you want to play North Korea and Bahrain/New Zealand too? Tell me, how many times did you see Slovakia play over the course of qualification? I saw them 2 times at the end, and they were crap in both games. Sometimes it's about current form and not how many points they garnered earlier on. Ya know, cause we're actually playing them in less than a month.
Slovakia is a team we could actually play in the WC so I don't see it as a bad match at all. Do we know the venue? Is it definitely Bratislava?
The location was not yet announced, or at least is not mentioned in this article (in Slovak), nor is it listed (game nor location) on the FIFA fixture list.
Considering who was available, this wasn't a terrible choice. Ironically, Serbia will play South Korea on the 18th in London, so they may have been available for the 14th in western Europe. Every other qualified team is either occupied (Paraguay is "free", but plays Chile on the 4th and the Netherlands on the 18th), a team we've played at some point since 2006, or ranked outside of FIFA's top 45 (North/South Korea).
Two road games against teams that won their UEFA qualifying groups. Considering other top European teams already have scheduled games or are playing in World Cup playoffs, what else do you want? Seriously, why do people have to gripe about everything?
Perhaps you'd read my post where I said the 3 teams who were open on 11/14 that I'd rather see the US play. I guess reading comprehension's not your strong suite. Assuming we play a home send-off series in May against semi-weak competition (hello Latvia, Venezuela & Morocco) and camp cupcake games in Jan-Feb, we only had 3 FIFA intl dates to schedule tough games. I'm extremely happy over the Denmark and Holland away games. Brilliant. Amazing. Huge kudos to USSF. More than I ever expected. But to say I can't question the 3rd game against a team who sucked hard in their last 2 games is foolish. As I said, I'm sure this game will be tough, as most away games in Europe are difficult. I just would've rather seen Serbia, Croatia or the Czechs. It's an opinion, live with it.
Croatia looked good - they were in a brutal group with England and Ukraine, and unfortunately couldn't get through with 20 points. That would've been a fun game to see. Czech's looked very solid once they switched coaches mid qualifying. They were effectively out by the last game, and didn't try in their N. Ireland game. (I also wouldn't mind revenge over the '06 debacle in Germany). Look, Slovakia has good, solid players - some stars, some not. But let's hope their negative playing in the last games was an outlier and not typical of how they'll play the US.
The problem with playing teams that didn't qualify for the WC is that you have no guarantee they'll play their A squad. It's all too possible that they begin working on younger players as they want to get a look at guys who haven't been in the squad. Too much of an unknown playing non-WC qualified teams.