While others wail, and tear their shirts is agony over this USA player and that USA player, the most interesting thing I though this game proves is this: Brazil continues to set the standard in international soccer. Now, you might ask, what IS the aforementioned standard? Samba dribbling?? Every player with just one name and their own signature move? Fabulous technical skills on display withe very touch? Ummmmmmmmm....Nope. No...while MLS touts the "new soccer nation," Brazil exemplifies (at least the Brazil that played the first half of this game) the "new soccer standard" of international play. Here are the qualities of this standard. High pressure defense, all over the field, all the time Whenever the ball is lost in transition, each Brazilian player immediately clamps down on a mark. Rarely is an opposing player WITHOUT the ball given time and space. So even if the dribbler gets off a pass, his teammate who shows for the ball is going to have a very tough touch. Of course, if the guy under pressure is a defender who has a hard time shielding, and gets stripped...well, so much the better. In fact, forwards in this new international standard of football MUST win balls. Forwards are EXPECTED to create turnovers, and not simply lurk for the great through ball. Every Second Ball is MIne Unless you're willing to do the dirty work to win the balls, don't bother stepping onto the field. Everytime I Shield the Ball, No One Takes it Away from Me Yes, soccer fans, it's not about great moves, or dribbling through 10 guys to score: it's about receiving the ball with mark on your back, shielding the ball, and not giving it up. Bocanegra and Mastroeni MUST be twice as strong as Ronaldinho -- but did this guy every lose the ball off the shield? I can't recall. Your offense? Check, shield, combination, play...rinse and repeat until you close with the enemy Brazil did this again and again to advance the ball dangerously. Ping, ping, ping, ping. Speed and athletcism kills Sure all the Brazilian guys have great first touches and can juggle the ball 1000 times just using their big toe...but my friends, it's speed and strength, speed and strength. Did you see Belletti (Belletti???) just jet by Beasley on a couple of occasions? Everybody on that team has lighting feet, great nimbleness and flexibility, and are absolutely stud athletes. So, ladies and gentlemen, there you have it. It's not the new soccer nation. It's new soccer UNITED nations, though some are playing the game better than others. Don't believe me? Rewind the tape..particularly the first half.
Some things you say I agree with. But to be honest with you, Brazil is sliding behind the standard in international football while the US is still tweaking, experimenting, and making progress. There were some things the plyaers did well, but being a CBF fan I can tell you that there are things that they do not do well behind the scenes, that will still hurt them. Primarily, the CBF - and Brazilian federations, IMO, tend not to look so much at how things will affect the Selecao in the long run. Everything is about immediate result, and mix that with poor organization, you have 10 days of training before this cup, with players from Europe mixed with players from Brazil, uncapped players, and a team of little to no chemistry as many have never played together. US has better organization. As individual skill may not be the same with Brazilian players, don't underestimate how a successful system to utilize the skills of your players helps. For the US, the tema needs Claudio Reyna or a player just like him that holds, is cool under pressure and can switch positions like him. Not having that exposes the flaws and holes in the lineup.
Re: Re: Why Brazil Sets the Standard in International Soccer This is an interesting and, I think, accurate view. You are right to point out how much organization and planning can help a national team succeed. This is where the United States may have an advantage.
Sure they do. Their youth coaches didn't always tell them to pass the ball when they were under pressure as youths. ALL of their players have great touch. They're experts at 1 v 1, therefore receiving on the run is a given.
Karl, I've always liked teams that play high pressure defense "all over the field" and I especially enjoy watching the U.S. when we employ those tactics (BTW, it's what Cameroon did so successfully in their match against Brasil and it is why I like Armas though he did have a subpar game against Turkey) However, high pressure defense is certainly not what we did against Brasil last night, which is what disappointed me most about the game, more so than the loss. Based on the post game comments, the U.S. game plan was to pull players back, play positional defense, and hope to get the occasional counterattack and steal a point or victory. Perhaps not too surprising but it made for a depressingly unattractive display of soccer by the U.S., lightened only by occasional flashes of creative attacking play on the flanks. No shots on goal in the first half and one for the entire game! I believe our B team, even when we play Brasil's "B" team, can do better than that. I'm a fan and supporter of Bruce Arena but I question if it is to the benefit of the team and development of the players to use those tactics in a tournament that Bruce has conceded is not as important as the Gold Cup. Why not go for it! Be agressive, force turnovers. You will never learn or have the confidence to play that style of game against a skilled quality opponent if you don't make the attempt. Yes you run the risk of getting blown out (I don't believe it would have happened) and perhaps that played into Bruce's thinking and he didn't want to destroy the confidence of some of the new players on the team. But the fact is we can force turnovers from Brasil and other skilled opponents when we play pressure defense. We did it in the 2nd half, occasionally in the first. When we pressured the ball Brasil made bad passes, lost possession - they are not soccer gods! The belief that Brasil is so superior to the U.S in every way - tactically, skills, and speed and athleticism - that we can't compete, is false and defeatest. No one can argue that the U.S skills match those of the Brasilians but the gap is narrowing, which most would acknowledge. And I don't agree that the Brasilians were all absolutely stud athletes and frankly I have not been all that impressed overall with this Brasilian team. Athletically, I'd argue the U.S team had greater team speed than Brasil (with the exception of our defenders - i.e. Berhalter). And with regards to Belletti vs. Beasley. Beasley won that match hands down picking Bellotti's pocket twice in a row when Belletti tried to take the ball down the sidelines. The argument that some have made that the U.S. couldn't play pressure defense because it was the second game in three nights and the players were tired doesn't hold up. There were only 3 U.S. field players that started against Turkey and Brasil -Donovan, Beasely and Berhalter. Eight of the Brasilian players started both games! As for the argument that the U.S didn't have the players on the field that can and know how to play a high pressure style of game - perhaps. Bless Earnie Stewart for all he has contributed to U.S. soccer but he is a poor defensive player. Mastroeni played fairly well but I still don't think he is as good a ball winner as Armas. Mathis - terrific vision and a wonderful creative player (as a Galaxy fan, I rue the day he was traded!) but only makes half hearted attempts to play defense. Klein - fairly invisible last night and an OK but not great defender. Beasley can and did on occasion play terrific defense (see Bellotti above). Donovan can, for an attacking player, also play good defense but it is and was not his focus last night. Our missing midfield generals, Reyna and O'Brien, are not only our two best midfielders at holding the ball, but they have both become, over the years, very good defensive players. So that is my rant. Though a bit down about how we played the two games so far in this tournament (Brasil more than Turkey, though Bruce says he was much more pleased with the Brasil game, which I suspect is simply an attempt to build up the team's confidence going into the 3rd and final game) I am optimistic about the players and the team's ability to compete, win important games, and play attractive soccer. Lee
Re: Re: Why Brazil Sets the Standard in International Soccer Yeah, but most national teams are like this. The U.S. does this because we have a very small supply of quality players. The players have to get acclimated to the international game because the leagues they play in don't prepare them well enough for international competition. That is not true for the world powers like Italy, Germany, Argentina, Holland, Brazil, France, Portugal etc. As a point of reference you'll notice that John O'Brien played very little with the U.S. in the run up to the cup, mostly because he was injured. But since he plays for one of the best club teams in Europe, Ajax, he didn't need to acclimate himself to the international game. He just shows up and plays. It doesn't matter who he's playing with, he KNOWS the game of soccer. I personally think the whole chemistry thing is an excuse, and totally overrated. Certain circumstances within the game itself require universal reactions---I play a combo to you posting up, and then I run into space expecting a wall pass. It doesn't matter IMHO who I pass to--I'm expecting the return wall pass. That's just soccer. It doesn't matter if I'm giving it up to Ronaldinho, Zidane, Raul, or whomever, I expect to see that wall pass if I'm unmarked. We won't join the elite teams when we have guys struggling with touch, not knowing when to move into space, not knowing when to check, not being able to read situations and think a solution out on the spot--that's not something that all the chemistry in the world provides. Again, I feel that the U.S. has to be extremely organized out of weakness. I guarantee you that if we had an 18 man squad playing at the top levels in Europe, we could get them together two to three weeks before the tourney and play really well.
Nice! These are my thoughts exactly. I was remiss in never mentioning Beasleys Defensive game in any of these threads. In watching Nigeria I was really impressed with Boletti and was sure he would give us a world of problems with his speed, pace, and skill at corssing and DMB completly took him out of the game. Nice analysis
Re: Re: Re: Why Brazil Sets the Standard in International Soccer The problem here is that some of our players do indeed have a good first touch, good skills, and now how to read the game very well. The players I can think of are Donovan, Lewis, DMB, Convey, Dolo, and Mathis. Its just that you don't play 6 v 6. They gotta pass the ball to other players (Armas, Mastro, Klein, Stewart, Gibbs, Hejduk, Berhalter) who have no idea what to do with the ball unless a player is wide open. It kills the attack and all those3 players who DO know what to do and have the skill to do it are rendered useless because of the failings of their teamates.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Why Brazil Sets the Standard in International Soccer I couldn't have said it any better myself...
That's very true. Our only chance at a possession game against a high quality opponent like Brazil or Turkey is to stick those 6 on the field with Reyna and O'Brien. ---Friedel---- Boca----Pope---Gibbs -----Dolo----Reyna--- ---Donovan-----O'Brien----Beasley----- ------Mathis----McBride------- Or, against a team better in the air, moving O'Brien back instead of Dolo and putting Convey in O'Brien's spot would be a team who could actually keep possession without the defense being crap. McBride may not even be in there by '06, because of Twellman or someone steps up that may be an even better option. Edited: And by keeping possession, I don't mean just back passes to the goalie or backline. I mean players who can actually play the ball in tight space and create dangerous opportunities.
I was interested in Belletti because I had heard he was slated to take over for Cafu. Was very unimpressed with Belletti. In fact, I saw Beasley take the ball away from him more than once. I'm totally not a Beasley fan (He needs to learn to pass, cross, and shoot), but I was laughing at Brazil's #2 the whole game. He seemed quite frustrated at times.
One thing that should be added is that against Brazil, even our players that are normally gifted when it comes to first touch, and sending through balls to attacking players had off days. I'd have to use all my fingers and toes to count all the times that Donovan, Beasely, Dolo and Mathis among others simply didn't see, or refused to send a through ball to a player that was making a run, Beasley and Donovan were particularly poor when it came to this. I'll not sweat it this time because Donovan and Beasely are usually much more on the same page, but this game featured really attrocious passing, pathetic attempts at build ups, and a real and genuine total lack of vision. All of that and we still only lost because essentially Berhalter wasn't sitting on the bench where he rightly belonged. Heck, If Pope hadn't cracked the kneecap, and a ref wasn't a complete and utter jacka$$ in the opener we'd probably have four points right now and be singing a different tune (something like,"Uninspired play, but whose to argue w/four points in two games against Turkey and Brazil?").