Poland vs. US Post-Game Thread (R)

Nice to see that the long wait for casey wasn't for naught. looks like we might have something there.

 

nice WC revenge, wish i could have seen it

 

i'm concerned about some of the decisions our forwards made when they got into the box. there were too many poor passes in that area. overall i believe that things went well and there were some positive things to take from the game. i'm not sure why reyna went the whole way, though. that confuses me.

oh, and casey seemed to have a hard time trapping the ball at times. it was ugly. having said that i'll readily admit he did his job.

 

To me, Casey's involvement/performance is the story of the match. He looks very promising for the qualification run, even with some missed chances, most notably by Mathis on a perfect setup from Klein.

 

Woohoo.

 

Second half we started out well and lost a bit of control. Friedel was forced to make 2 nice saves (and almost dropped the ball in his own net). Casey continued his very impressive match. Mathis looked pretty bad including an awful first touch when he was unmarked 5 yards from goal. Convey came on and looked pretty good if a bit rusty. Sanneh came on for klein and looked big and fast but his passes were relatively off. Zavagnin came on late for mathis but didnt do much as he was just there for defense. Boca came on for mastro.

All in all clear MotM was Casey in my mind. Don't recall a single 50/50 ball he lost, but unlike certain other targets we have had in the past, he looked very solid with his feet. Other than the one poor no pass to convey in on goal, played a very solid match. Cherundolo looked pretty decent defensively. Klein's crosses (other than the one that mathis botched) continue to look poor. Mastro got a look in the middle of defense but may be making the move to right side... seems like he would be well suited to it. Vanney continued to have bad giveaways in his own half (and his one corner was awful). Basically considering mathis and reyna both didnt seem to have their best first touch (although reyna was again dominant in his own half), very nice win.

 

Yeah. I'm came in at the 20th minute, in time for the goal. Casey had a few miscues right in the 35-45 minute that had me pissed, but he really came through in the second half. Well played.

I thought Beasely looked tough and took on anything he could. Cherundolo and Berhalter looked composed and in charge, Convey looked hungry for action, and Klein looked fast and loose. Good performance.


I just wish that Mathis hadn't COMPLETELY CHOKED TWO FEET FROM THE GOAL!!! Mon Dieu.

 

Brad was under more pressure in the second half, and had to make a few good saves. By the way....what the f!ck was Mathis doing taking a touch in he box before he shot, he was near if not in fron of the PK spot, I didnt really understand that. A goal there would have sealed it, and he screwed it up.

 

Conor Cassey is a keeper. He was excellent today. Looked confident on the ball, made good choices, won headers and had vision.

Glad to see Beasley finally finish an opportunity. He also had a great game. Went at defenders, drew them to him opening up spaces.

Josh Wolff also good game. Made things happen a great one-touches. Glad to see him returning to his previous form.

Cherundolo I thought had a good game on the right. Tight marking and smart. Didn't allow any runs on the right that were dangerous at all. Quality game.

Vanney was less than spectacular. Didn't really showed anything and made more than a few poor touches.

Mathis didn't get his named called a lot. Deffinitely disappeared once he pushed up to forward and he had that horrid first-touch in the box that got away from him.

Chris Klein while steady defensively wasn't an asset offensively. He wasn't bad but he wasn't good. Too many off target and too forward crosses.

Reyna was again steady and good. Did well in his D-Mid role.

Convey didn't do much once he came in as a sub. He was able to work the ball around but could never get in any good runs and was a bit wild. He runs a lot but sometimes it seems just for the sake of running.

Pablo and Berhalter had good games. Did well until the end of the game when the Polish pressure really came on. But steady none the less.

Freidel was again his spectacular self. Great job getting down on the last shot that got put through the US defenders legs. Had a brain fart when he lost the ball off his own player but it was dangerous.

Sanneh did well coming in as a sub. Doesn't have the ball skills that the others do, but he is a big guy making runs. Should get better with more playing time after coming back.


Overall the US looked light-years better than they did against Haiti. We had really good long streches of possession. Good one-touch ball a couple of series. We still have the problem of not trapping the ball cleanly. Once again I saw tons of passes the bounced away too far from their targets and onto Polish feet. Conor Cassey again I thought had an outstanding game and played his way onto the team.

 

A much better overall performance coming off two rather pedestrian matches against Holland and Haiti..

Defensively I thought the US was outstanding today going toe to toe with a much bigger Polish team and holding them off the shot chart until the 64th minute..

Some individual performances were uneven though..

I thought Casey in his first cap did well enough but he had a few Roy Lassiteresque first touches and should have sent that last pass over to a wide open Convey to seal the match.. With that being said though, I thought he played pretty well and deserves more long looks..

I might be in the minority here but I thought Mathis was absolute crap today.. He sealed his craptacular match by completely botching that beautiful feed from Chris Klein (who besides that one pass was also pretty bad) with a horrific first touch whereas normally he would settle and slaughter..

I thought after a rough start Claudio Reyna was awesome in the defensive midfield role.. His first few passes were off target but after that he was winning balls and bringing a sense of calm to the team..

I thought Convey came on and energized the team and worked both ends of the field pretty well..

All in all I think was a great match for the teams confidence and a welcome respite amidst there rather dire play of late..



Oh yeah, fire Bruce Arena.........

 

Casey for MOTM, though he exhibited some stone feet a few too many times. Reyna in the "Armas-spot" was for most part a huge success - an exponential improvement - though I bet Claudio would say he didn't have his best game. I thought Mathis had a horrible game - lost all his 50-50s, bad passes, poor runs, and blew an absolute sitter (looking horrible doing it) which would have saved his whole performance. Thought Cherundolo was great before he tired late and that Berhalter, Mastroeni and Boca all played well in the back. Big Bad Brad had one superlative save and played a fine game, except for mishandling a few balls late which didn't in the end hurt him.

A big thumbs up to all concerned, though just for balance sake, I thought Poland looked piss poor and couldn't tell if it was just us looking pretty darn good or them playing pretty darn bad.

But well done!!

 

Waiting to see where the "Fire Bruce" crowd is today . . .

 

IMO there wasn't anyone on the US squad who could be rated too poorly, but I also can't overstate how badly Poland played.

As for Casey, he generally played well, but he kept the ball too long on at least two occasions when there was someone wide open in front of the goal. Maybe he's not used to getting that kind of help at Karlsruhe? Anyway, I thought he had a promising debut.

 

"Mathis didn't get his named called a lot. Deffinitely disappeared once he pushed up to forward and he had that horrid first-touch in the box that got away from him."

Very good call. I think we need to accept the fact that Mathis just is not a forward. He always looks out of the game the most when he starts out waiting for the play.

 

To me Connor looked big, strong, physical tough and imposing, and also not much of a soccer player. A lot of bad touches from a lot of guys out there, but Casey had the most.

Had a pretty decent game overall since being big is most of what you really need to play target forward in this system, but I sure wish he had shown a little bit more skill.

Josh Wolff showed plenty of skill but looks like he's lost a step or three.

Clint Mathis?

Was this Poland's A squad (I know not completely because Olisadebe was missing)? They looked dreadful.

 

I agree with most of the concensus here. Casey was the surprise (for someone who has not seen him). He looks like he could be a factor. Mathis did better in the first half than in the second. His flub in the box in the second was uncharacteristic.

Reyna, however, turned the ball over in mid-field a few times. He had some very odd, poor passes. Nothing to get concerned about, to be sure, but I find it amusing that Mathis gets criticized for every mistake, yet Reyna is a bit teflon when it comes to his.

In any case, it was the best showing from the Nats in awhile. Good game.

 

I'd like to call for an immediate moratorium on calling it the Armas-spot. I believe this proposal should pass by acclamation.

 

its hard to get a good feel from matchtracker, i'll have to wait until i get home to see it, but it seemed that after convey came in, there was no action from the entire midfield. Is that accurate?

I dont think i saw his name but once in the matchtracker...

 

I was impressed in the first half. We could have used Donovan on a couple of the attacking runs, but I was still pleased. Beasley is only 21...hard to believe. He has to be playing in Europe within a few years.

 

Klein is Hejduk2.0. His crosses look a little prettier but they were all worthless. His pass to Mathis and some of his runs were effective.

Casey has to get a first touch. He looked like he was Polish (only about 2 Polish players had a first touch).

Reyna had one glaring mistake and that was letting a Polish player run by him with the ball towards the end of the game and at midfield. That player fed a player on the left who was through on Friedel, but Friedel made a nice save. Dmids can't do that. Other than that Reyna had a mediocre game. He gave the ball away far too often on hopeful passes that were too long or right into a Polish player.

If we take anything from this game I think we should take that Wolff is our best forward, Casey is strong and looks to combine, and that Mastroeni covers a ton of ground as a center back. Best game I've seen Pablo play since the World Cup.

 

Actually, I don't think anyone played like "crap" today. As an example: First half, I thought Mathis played pretty well, second half I don't think he did as well moving into a striker role.

In general, I agree with Cweed that the defense was pretty lockdown tight. Maestro and Berhaulter played well. Cherundolo was very active. Only slippage came with tired legs in about minute 75 or so.

The surprise for me was Vanney. I'm not a Vanney fan. I don't usually go negative on our guys, but I've drummed him a bit in the past. I thought he played pretty solid, and I think his time in Euro has made him more comfortable over the ball.

DmB played very solidly after he was hacked down. It's almost like he woke up and realized he needed to get "stuck in" after that. He was especially active on D and transition in the second half.

I haven't been able to see Casey too much since the Aussie Olys... Man, bummer he couldn't have joined the squad down in Mexico. Very solid performance tonight. I was very impressed with his control, willingness to knock bodies around and overall work rate. He also had a number of clever flicks and back heels that kept Poland from truly figuring him out. Lots and lots of promise there.

Beyond that, thought Reyna played a solid, but quite match. Josh looked pretty good and opened up a few lanes with his nice cuts off the ball. Klein was a bit better than I expected.

I never really felt like Poland was going to score. Even on that VERY nice save by Brad late in the 2nd, I just didn't think they'd put it in... Says a lot about having Brad in the net. I was a little startled by the dropped cross, but that's going to happen once in awhile.

 

Here.

It was Poland...as Andy Mead said. "woohoo"