Washington coming off a 2-0 loss to LA. Prominent players include: Briana Scurry Cat Whitehill Homare Sawa Abby Wambach
From watching them in the season opener Scurry looks like the back-up that she is, she has lost a step and maybe a foot or at least 6" of vertical too. Wambach seems to be fully healed and fit but her match form is still not fully back. I hope she waits at least one more match (or until her next call up) to get her groove back. ;>) The french player Bompaster is one to watch making runs from the back. She along with Sawa from Japan and Lisa De Vanna from Oz are the only Internationals on this squad so Pia should be watching them. ;>)
We Freedom fans are frantically collecting donations toward a good immigration lawyer for Erin McLeod. Any Chicago fans going to make the pilgrimage to the Soccerplex for this match?
Underestimate Scurry at your peril; she's not coming off the bench without having played anymore - she's a starter. And in the opening game: (i) Falk never touched the ball on the first goal; should have been called a foul, and (ii) Washington's defense blew it on the second goal; Scurry played it the best she could, but had no chance once her defense let her down. Hope Solo also lost her opening game (against the Red Stars, by the way). But Chicago also has an excellent 'keeper. Should be a good game; I'm looking forward to it.
If your premise/thesis is that Scurry is not 'past it' go ahead and write it up, and good luck with that, time will tell. I will not be surprised if by the end of the season (if the starter she is backing up doesn't return) her GAA may be 2.++ something or more, right now it is 2.00 and that is a statistical fact that can't be nuanced away. As for the gratuitous Solo comment (GAA 1.0*), get over it or take it to the Women's Nats forum and see how many people still want to talk about it (hint; few to none, it is a settled point), it has nothing to do with the Red Stars match this week except that we are going in undefeated. ;>) * Having already played the best team in the league. ;>) ;>0
I was also wondering about the Solo comment.haha Basically the LA goal should not have stood..but it did... honestly Scurry never looked confident at all in goal the whole game. Karina Le Blanc at the other end looked unbeatable & confident now whether she was or not is neither here or there, its what she gave off.. not only to her own defence but to the opposition forwards as well. Scurry might have been confident but it didn't show to anybody watching that game, even the commentators picked up on it. But we shall see in the next couple of games its very early.
Anybody wanting to compare Solo and Scurry should look at the highlights of the Algarve Cup at USSoccer.com. Solo was amazing in that tournament, especially one eye-popping save against Norway and two uncontested breakaways against Sweden. Quite frankly, I have been a defender of Scurry leading up to the season. On the WPS fansite, a lot of people were trashing Scurry. I thought it was unfair until we see how she plays. I agree that I thought the first goal was a foul, but Scurry was not exactly forceful in going out to grab the ball either. And I thought she looked tentative at different times throughout the match and allowed herself to be in no-(wo)man's land in a key spot. I don't think you can measure anybody completely based on one game. On the other hand, if this continues, the position should at least be open to competition. As for the game, I will be very interested to see Wambach against a fairly physical Chicago defense. I saw Chicago play last week and their backline saved them (and Saint Louis' inability to connect with anything inside the box). There might be some very interesting battles for 50/50 balls.
Absolutely correct, regardless of the player, but in one match one can detect a continuing pattern or a change. Well we should hope there are, it is on National television which is to me the big leg up WPS has over previous women's leagues here. Looking at the talent on each team and recognizing that none of the league's squads seem to have settled in yet (understandable) I'll predict a glorious victory for the Red Stars.
Sorry for the back-to-back posts but this is a different subject (somewhat) I went over to the the Washington board to look around and even though the match is tomorrow they don't have a match thread. So anyway I was looking at the new posts in their old match thread and found this link and story. (Maybe someone should tell Beulah not to "(u)nderestimate Scurry". ;>) ) Beulah's report on the match. http://www.beulahsports.com/wps_3_29_09.html Fair use paragraph: "Scurry – I know immigration lawyers. Good ones. Who have experience getting Canadian athletes visas. I’m not even joking. It’s not the goals she gave up that bother me. The first one was almost funny. I could see the cartoon bubble over her head saying “Oop, have we started?” Careless lapse in concentration – she can blame the ref all she wants but that’s what it was. Contact happens all the time and fouls are not always called. Deal with it and take responsibility. The second one, that’s just how you beat Scurry. You pull her out and chip her. It’s easier said than done, of course, but that kind of goal against Scurry is not surprising. What concerns me and should be giving the coach night sweats is that kicking game. Over the years it’s gone from “not a strength,” to “bad” to “atrocious.” Let’s count: the clearance that didn’t go 10 yards, the goal kick that didn’t make it half way to the midfield stripe, the fact it was so bad that the director of the telecast was shooting Scurry from behind and staying on her real close up so the nice viewers at home couldn’t see how bad the kicks were. All signs that this could be a significant problem. What comes off her foot is unpredictable, and the best that you can hope for is that it’s not terrible. It’s simply going to cost goals as the season wears on and the opposition gets some game tape of it. Even if all the goal kicks are short passes to defenders, eventually, she’s going to have to make a play with her feet. It’s that inevitability that would have me leaning on the league to get Erin McLeod’s visa problems resolved." Maybe Briana can tape that to her locker for motivation. (And the Red Stars can pin it on the bulletin board for inspiration.)
Who is that annoying female commentator? Don't you have any female commentators with less grating voices? And do they have to be so wordy about nothing in particular? "Oh My God, Everything Is So Amazing! You'd Never Believe It! It's Just Sensational! Look, She Kicked The Ball! How About That!!! It's Tremendous!"
om smulan we are on the same page again. When she said carlie shoots so hard she almost strikes "like a man" i wanted to beat her like "a woman"
normally I would never cheer for Chicago, but a Chicago win helps STL in the standings more than a Washington win, so for today - Go Red Stars! ;-)
That sacrilegious STT! I am starting to jump on the Scurry sucks bandwagon. Chicago's defense really, really looks porous. What's up with that? They played 10 times better last week.
Promise it won't happen again - unless it once again benefits STL. Just now? I was there in 2007. Agreed.