After USA watched Brazil hoist the trophy last summer we witnessed Clint Dempsey cry and I recall Donovan saying something to the effect of that as a soccer nation it is no longer good enough to just make it to the dance and that when they get there as a team they expect to win every match at this point. Did it strike a chord with anyone besides me, that the prevailing thought from Bob Bradley and Landon Donovan in interviews following the win against Algeria seemed to be that we had accomplished what we set out to do after we had advanced from the group, and that anything else we achieved from there was gravy? Does this not directly contradict what we thought we had gained and learned as a soccer nation last summer, as per Landon's own comments? In 2002 we beat Portugal and eliminated Mexico in The 16 and then lost a very well fought match to eventual finalist Germany in the quarterfinals. Why then was our stated 'goal' here only to get out of the group? For me the lessons learned last summer appear to have been forgotten far too quickly. Did the team feel that we weren't good enough to accomplish what the team in 2002 did? We may never again see a path to the semis that doesn't contain any top 15 sides. For me, our attitude was all wrong and that was the biggest problem we had.
They can't just will their way to a victory, Ghana was the better team for that game, maybe that wouldn't be the case everyday of the year but it happened. As for the spin after the game, I don't really know what else they are going to say? We are a disgrace and will never wear the shirt/coach again? It was said in another thread but they lost 'fair and square' here.
Yes, they did.. But where was the killer attitude? How did 'we have to take advantage of these opportunities when they're there' and 'we expect to win as a soccer nation now every time out' from last summer as they dealt with the pain of coming so close to beating Brazil in a Cup Final turn into, 'well we accomplished what we set out to do and now let's see where we can go from here'? (I'm paraphrasing, but I know that the messages conveyed were perceived correctly on my part). It doesn't make any sense. Did any of the things you heard come out of the players' or coach's mouth instill any confidence in you that we were going to go on a good run? No, it didn't. I felt as if Bradley and Donovan were warning us not to get our hopes up too high. Sad but true. This really was a wasted opportunity.
They just lost. We had problems on defense long before the Ghana game. It is no big deal what anyone said really. In general all teams go to the World Cup with their first goal being to get out of the group phase and then once they do that they have the goal of winning it all.
You think they didn't play to win this game or think they were going to win? They came out pretty bad but when it was tied it was anyone's game and they were even getting the better chances. The defense broke down, as it had done so many times before in the 93rd minute. Its a tough break but I don't think they were 'just happy to be there'.
No, they didn't just lose. I think they were spent. I don't think they understood how to be hungry after the Algeria match with only a couple of days turnaround. The proof is in the pudding: The things Bradley and Donovan said post-Algeria were vastly different from what we should have been hearing. They shouldn't have been satisfied in the least with getting out of the group. They should have said things like, "It feels great to top the group but this is nothing- We've got a lot of work to do yet.". How did we not have a killer attitude with a chance of revenge at the same team that eliminated us last time out? I guess if our round of 16 opponent would have been Mexico, maybe they would have sounded like they had a little fire in their bellies and they would have come out and played like it. I didn't hear anything even remotely resembling that from post game comments. What I heard was a whole lot of satisfaction at having tied England and Slovenia and having beaten Algeria and advancing from the group. I didn't hear any hunger- All I heard was satisfaction and for me that was in stark contrast to what I heard when this team tasted defeat in the Confed Cup Final last summer. I just expected more. I feel like I have died a little every day for the last four years dreaming of perhaps a semifinals run and after we get out of the group stage and find out that we are playing Ghana again, and that we have a relatively easy path to the semis I hear things like, "Let's see where we can go from here", "Everything else from here is fun" and "We accomplished what we set out to do and everything else is gravy"?? Are you f**king kidding me? This is THE WORLD CUP. I heard that bradley told the team at halftime of The Slovenia match that if they didn't believe that they could come back that they shouldn't even bother going out there. Well all the same, if the goal was only to get past a group that contained Algeria and Slovenia, then maybe they would have been better served just giving their place to Costa Rica.
By the looks of the US soccer blog and pictures of Boca drinking with President Clinton... you wouldve thought we had won the World Cup I agree that attitude was definently a factor here... but it doesnt tell the whole story i also think that the way we beat Algeria had a lot to do with it... had Dempseys goal been allowed, we would not have ended the night with a "this is as good as it gets" attitude
I think BS posters said things about 'gravy' I don't know if Bob Bradley ever said that, in fact he said this: http://goal.blogs.nytimes.com/
Everyone sets goals in steps, you have to or the end result is often too far away to be seen and thus feels unattainable. It's no different than a player saying "we're not focused on what happens next, we're only focused on this game". I'm sure the first goal was to simply get out of the group and thus improve over the '06 tourney. Then they probably had the goal of reaching the QF or something and so on.
I had actually heard Bocanegra use the word "fun" to describe going forward from the group stage? Again, I just didn't feel that with the "Hi Bianca" stuff, President Clinton partying with the team, the comments I heard from everyone associated with the team, that the focus was on what was left to do. It was more about that they felt that they had done something big already. This wasn't big. You have to be a deeply fortuitous side mentally to advance in The World Cup. Losing to Ghana in consecutive tournaments when your path to the semis doesn't contain even a top 15 side- What a colossal waste and disappointment. What we accomplished in 2002- That was pretty significant. This probably ranks up there with 1994- Except at least then we were eliminated by eventual champion Brazil. The only true positive from this run is that the media jumped on board and people supported the team. For me, our guys were caught proud of what they had done, and not hungry for what was to come which could have been HUGE. Sure, I dreamt of a semifinals finish- But it all seemed highly improbable until I saw that to get there we would need only to beat two of the following 3 sides: Ghana, Uruguay and South Korea. Not easy, no- But it should have been doable. It should have been done. We blew it, and i'm still not convinced that the wrong attitude.. or at least the inability to overcome what was an emotional win a few days earlier was to blame. I think the emotional impact and fallout from that game doomed us into forgetting all that we had learned in South Africa in 2009.
It was a wasted opportunity, but I do think you are relying too much on FIFA rankings in severely underrating Uruguay. I said it elsewhere and I'll say it again here. There have been only 8 sides that have advanced to multiple quarterfinals since the cup went to some form of the 16-team knockout format in 1986: England, France, Germany, Italy, Holland, Spain, Argentina, and Brazil. The 8 modern powers are the only teams that have any expectation of regularly reaching even the quarters. We had the opportunity and I do think we were mentally and physically drained. We weren't played off the park, but we were exposed at one of our big weaknesses this cycle (speed in the middle of the defense). Clark was to blame for losing possession in the middle, but that is going to happen a few times over the course of 90 minutes. Our lack of quickness in the middle means that we are horrible at closing on guys that leak through the middle of the field and we tend to give up more than our share of goals just outside the box. Being satisfied with "winning the group" had nothing to do with it. Going into the Ghana game, there were some insinuations on this board that in another 8 years, we wouldn't miss Landon Donovan. People here were that high. In this game, we missed Eddie Pope and Cory Gibbs, so I don't see how we won't miss Donovan when that day comes.
If only they had thought "What would EEUU want me to say and do?" and adjusted their attitudes accordingly, we probably would've won the cup with ease.
Well put. When I heard Donovan say in a pre-match interview that losing to Ghana would "not be a failure" I knew the team didn't have the right attitude going in. Any athlete will tell you that the mental game is as important as the physical game. For what it's worth, Klinsmann, who broadcast the game for a German network, said he didn't think the U.S. was playing with the right focus and energy in the game.
Thank you for noticing that. I was beginning to think I was the only one seriously irritated by this. Never did I say that it was the only problem, but at the World Cup you are NOT going to be the better side in the round of 16 if you do not come out prepared, focused and ready to explode onto the pitch out of the starting whistle both mentally as well as physically. There were several times I thought I heard pre-match damage control being done by our guys. Maybe that was why Tommy Smyth was on ESPN the day before the game saying that he thought this team was spent mentally. I hate it that he was right- And he was.
Everyone is finding a reason (excuse) for why the US team lost, I believe it is simply exhaustion. There was only a two day turn around. The team only really had one day to prepare after one day of regen. I really dont think Bob had time to put in a new effective system to combat Ghana. In 02 Arena just played everyone back and that confused Mexico. Ghana and Germany didnt play up and down soccer to qualify like the Americans or English. They pretty much stopped playing after 65-70 min and knew they had qualified. They were playing for draws initially. Then when you add in that the US and English key players are not exactly young, you get a tired team. Combine that with altitude and younger players from Ghana and Germany and you get the result that was found. It still doesnt make sense why other than the US and ghana, teams had three days off. FIFA Fair Play? This is the World cup, not a weekend youth tournament.
The problem vs. Ghana was that just about every one of the front 6 US players failed to finish a good scoring opportunity.
You know what? No one is right all of the time, but maybe just this once it would have done them so good. Someone should have gotten into a few faces and asked why they were lauding accomplishments and answering questions about whether or not it was a failure if they lose when they had a favorable draw to get to the semifinals. You know what? No big deal. We'll learn from the mistakes yet again and be more fired up next year. Oops.
Add to that their second matches, which the US (through its own fault) had to overcome a two goal deficit, while Ghana was able to sit on a 1 goal lead for 60 minutes against a 10-man Australian side. That helped put us in the position where we were dragging on Saturday and they looked a lot more fresh. But of course if we had a real coach, our players wouldn't be limited by basic human physiology.
Which has nothing to do with attitude or being hungry I guess. Ghana wanted this game more than us and you have to ask questions about how or why that was. But hey, our guys were already trying to say that if we lost this match it wasn't a failure even before they played it. How can any team win with that outlook at this level?
Your armchair psychology might come across as a bit more valid if you didn't rely on sports talk radio cliches.
The problem was simple. The US lead a total of 3 minutes in all games played in the tournament , 3 minutes! Our guys had to chase every game, you can't chase every game in a short turnaround tournament like the WC and expect to survive. For all our vaunted fitness, our style is exhausting for our players. Guess who has the least (or second) shortest distance run in the tournament? Argentina We need to make the ball work more for us, that takes first touch and passing ability. Benny could have helped Backs with the ability to distribute better and start the attack could have helped A distributing strike partner for Jozy could have helped Robby Findley is a perfect example of what was wrong with the US side. He started because he runs a 4.4 40, nuff said.
You raise good points, but even though it would have been nice to have had an extra day like England and Germany, we actually played earlier in the day than Ghana so if anything we had a few extra hours than them- Not that that would make any big difference. While Ghana were getting prepared to carry Africa's torch deeper into the first ever WC on African soil, we were drinking beer with bill Clinton and answering questions about Landon's estranged wife. It was exhaustion to an extent. Exhaustion that made it difficult to adjust our focus on big tasks ahead. Exhaustion that made it easy to get distracted and forget the lessons that we had learned when we got deep into the Confederations Cup last summer. Exhaustion that made it possible to have mental lapses on the field that helped hinder our ability to reach down and find yet another equalizing goal- Especially when we had already convinced ourselves that this run was no failure if we failed to come out on top.
So help me out here Doctor. What would have been the new and hot way of saying that we didn't want this game more than Ghana? I think I fairly elaborated on my point at length in my original post before I ever used any cliches.
I agree, but trying to convince the press that we weren't a failure if we should lose before we had even stepped on the field and lost had nothing to do with anything? There were lots of things wrong here. For me though at the core would be that if we are fighting to convince people that we've accomplished something and are not a failure if we should lose, then we do not have the proper attitude to go and play an elimination match against a hungry side. Perhaps another day or two to regain our composure, refresh and adjust our focus would have helped matters, but this has to go down as a huge wasted opportunity. If that isn't a failure than what is it, a success? The only place this Cup was a success for us was in the P.R. department, which I guess is a success of sorts for us- But the real fans know, that we came up well short of what we were capable of, and I don't think we displayed the right attitude in the end that would have made that success achievable.