The players who did not play in either match were, and correct me if I am wrong: Swanson, Shaw, Reale, Rudd, Jackson, Bethune, and Campbell. The last 4 probably are not on the roster if Girma, Coffey, Cat, & PTJ are fit. And I get not throwing a recovering Swanson into that frying pan. But Moultrie playing over Shaw and Cooper at FB over Reale (Patterson can play both sides) were interesting in terms of possible roster implications and pecking order. Did Shaw have a knock? If you ask me to pick a 26 today and obviously overreacting yo the last two: First XI: Dickey; Fox, Girma, Davidson, Patterson; Coffey, Heaps, Lavelle; Rodman, Wilson, Swanson. Second XI: PTJ; Cooper, Sonnett, Wesley, G. Thompson; Hutton, Yohannes, Moultrie; Sears, Macario, A. Thompson. 3rd GK: McGlynn 3 Wildcards: Shaw, Biyendolo, Sentnor Next XI: Campbell; Sams, Rudd, Bugg, Reale; Jackson, Bethune; Ryan, Joseph, Sanchez. That is only 10. Need another CM or winger. Wiesner eould probably be next for me, but that isn't a functional XI with the others.
Denmark, France, Germany & Spain qualified for the WC by winning their respective groups. The rest of Europe will now have to go to a playoff format to qualify for the 7-8 still available spots in their confederation. This should at least leave the group winners available to play friendlies in the next upcoming open window week’s. The first three I mentioned seem to be a little underwhelming though, it’s Spain that looks a class way above the rest with two very dominating wins over the week(England 4-0 & Iceland 6-1). will be a clash between these two titans(US & Spain)??? I think it depends who would want to travel to the other country as I’m sure both would to host the match(s).
That's exactly what I wanted to see! I guess only the additional RC to the bench at 89' was missing from this video (on the other side, at the end of it I also had the chance to see the replay of the goal ). I have seldom seen a bunch of whiners on a pitch as this Brazil; they sure deserved all of the cards coming at them. What about Brazil #17 who at the end went huggin the ref? Was she sincerely apologizing for her team-mates and coaches or did she want to be ironic?
Yeah, forgot to mention that it was as surprise that Swanson got no time on the pitch. I also would have brought on Shaw in place of Sentnor, but that was 10 minutes into stoppage after the 2nd Brasil player red card, so no matter. With McGlynn's performance in the first match, I do agree she is the 3rd. Rudd, Jackson, and Bethune are, I agree, probably on the outside, but all bubble players. Moultrie can play physical, and I think she has better ball control than Shaw. Cooper was playing because of the physical nature of the match. Had this been a more technical match, I think she would have been subbed off for Reale or G Thompson. Looking at the subs (I was surprised there were only 3 plus Sentnor), it seemed that Hayes kept the players on the pitch she knew could handle the environment and keep their heads. To me, this was a match of fortitude, and the players needed to understand that. Rest of post over in the Hayes project thread (later today).
Ary Borges. She was trying to calm the players down earlier, and seemed to be acting as a leader. My interpretation was to show her teammates that they needed to calm down. I think it was a very good move. BTW, Elias (Brasil coach) made many comments in the post-match press conference about discrimination and "xenofobia" from the officials. Do you have any view/knowledge of this?
After watching various highlights three things stood out. Love the fight we showed We dominated them playing the game Brazilian team were punks and should be ashamed.
The player wasn't walking back, she charged up to within a yard of Sonnett. And, kicking the ball into an opposing player in the middle of the field is a whole different thing than doing it in the box.
Ok, so she was genuine in her try: I had that feeling, but I didn't know enough about the context to be sure of it. To be frank, my take is that this is the typical excuse by a coach who knows he's in the wrong, so he tries to turn the wrong on the opponent by playing the "discrimination" card. I don't have any additional knowledge, but my impression is that Brazil wanted to take advantage of the home crowd as they had done in the previous game, but when that strategy miserably failed because the ref clearly wasn't intimidated, they started whining the worse way, as typically as the men use to do in the same sport (and that's not a compliment). If I have to really speak my mind, it reminds me of Cameroon's coach at the WWC 2019, when he set up his team to mostly unsportsmanlike beahavior in the match vs England and then claimed there had been discrimination against them. In my eyes, it was a way to avoid responsabilty and to try to justify a loss and a questionable behavior in the only way that allowed him to ignore the matter of the question. I think Elias is doing the same.
Rarely watch and never enjoy those videos. From my experience, it is often by people/channels degrading WoSo.
Listen to his comments post match (I put the video up). There seems to be a lot more than simply what we saw on TV.
I am even less a fan of mass carding staff. It really means nothing in the end - just performative. I do agree though that carding earlier would have been really wise. Heck Sonnett alone could have been carded 3 times this game, and plenty of Brazil players should have been carded earlier.
Well i kinda knew what i was getting into reading the results last night, but i turned on a soccer game and a circus broke out. 1. still pretty tragic officiating, though it again it didn’t seem biased. Just terrible. No control of encroachment. Some tight calls but then somebody would get football tackled or annihilated and no call. The one where the Brazilian simply ran through Sonnett and injured herself was almost comedy. Without the Thompsons lack of size on the field, it didn’t really impact either team more. Just made for a struggle of a game. No injuries for us at least. 2. Not a lot of chances but they were all for the US and 5-6 were really good chances. Should have scored 2 or 3, and of course the one that goes in is a goofy deflection. 3. Forwards: Agree with others that Wilson is moving really well, but not finishing well yet. Sears wasn’t great - kept showing the ball, but she could have scored twice. Rodman was better in this one. Cooper was a good battering ram and didn’t do a lot soccer-wise. But it was battering ram kinda game. 4. midfield: struggled to control things, but holding onto the ball could yet killed. Lily again seemed the weakest link, but she had some nice quick releases. Nobody was all that good in MF in this one though. 5. Defense: for me Wesley was the clear player of the match. Pretty much did nothing wrong and you hardly noticed her play. Sonnett was better then last game, but she easily should have been carded 3-4 times in this one and got zero somehow. Fox and Patterson were both good. Overall the defense was very good and Brazil really had nothing dangerous.
I didn't think it needed stating, but I guess it does: seems clear to me that the US response to Brazil,as exemplified by Sonnett was simply "We don't like or want to play this way-- but if you insist, we can, and at least as well as you and more subtly..."
Again, listen to his comments post match (I linked his presser). Him just whining does not seem to paint the whole picture. In fact, there could be an argument that he was fighting for his team. How he did it was not the best, but hearing his comments brings added context.
I listened to his comments, although it's hard to know how good the translation was. One take is that he was "working" FIFA to get reffing more like what we saw in the first game as opposed to what we saw in the second game. Another is that he was defending the level of physicality we saw from Brazil in the first game and saying that the crew in the second game was prejudiced and xenophobic because they did not allow that in the second game. This may have to do with different cultural attitudes towards what is appropriate in soccer. It's impossible to know whether these was more to it than that. I also worry a little that is comments were dangerous in terms of how Brazilian fans may approach the World Cup. I.e., he's saying the European refs are xenophobic and prejudiced against the Brazilian team. Could that cause Brazilian fans to go over the line during the World Cup? If there are facts indicating a true problem, Brazil should put them in writing so they can be evaluated. Maybe Brazil will do that, but he seemed to say his battleground is the media.
In act, it is kind of weird-- for all their cultural subtlety, and all the accumulated wisdom on the men's side, when the Brazilian women set out to be physical and disruptive it takes them about 15-20 minutes to turn into the Dave Schultz era Flyers, just mugging people all over the place...
Male channels don't tend to want to degrade male players. I would think you know me enough to assume I'm not talking out of my ass.