[quote]dcb wrote:
[quote]stevekweli wrote:
Ok I hear you,you are right about donovan,it is true that most of his sojourn in europe were loans to other clubs. About me saying altidore injury favored USA,it meant dempsey would have played probably as a second striker slightly behind altidore,meaning that usa would have 4 men in the mildfield,2 out of them would be wingers leaving only 2 in the middle. And all the teams the usa met played variations of 4-5-1 which meant it would always be 2 vs 3 or at times 5 players,who are better mildfielders than the americans.if altidore played,america would have played 4-4-2 and she would have been badly beaten. Case in point,watch the friendly with nigeria before the world cup, nigeria was horrid in that match,altidore scored true,but anytime nigeria wanted to control the mildfield,it was easy for them.
All the 3 guys u mentioned are not world class,or what you would call good,I’ll rather put dempsey up there if I were a coach,and I don’t think dempsey did a bad job top striking for the USA. think about it of what use is playing behind a not so good striker as a supporting striker?
As for injuries, portugal had more problems with injuries,aguero is out,higuan isn’t 100 percent fit,and the list goes on. Given not all of them are hamstring issues but that’s football for you,injuries happen,sometimes it is just down to luck or misfortune. Thank you
[/quote]
You’re going to site a game vs Nigeria in which the US won and Altidore scored twice as a reason as why he shouldn’t be on the field??? That’s up to you but it’s perhaps the weakest argument you’ve put forth in this thread.
The US gave up possession in midfield anyway, but it compounds the problem when there’s no outlet up front who can hold the ball. Dempsey couldn’t do it and that’s really no knock on him as that’s not his position. The other forwards I mentioned are as good as Wondo and in two cases better at holding onto the ball. Even with Wondo, our play picked up with the team pushed higher up the field because we had two forwards.
Listen - you’re wrong in your evaluation of the US team. It’s OK, I wouldn’t even try to evaluate the Nigerian team. I don’t know their players and wouldn’t hazard a guess as to what went right or wrong for them.
[/quote]
When I cited the game against nigeria,I wasn’t talking about the scoreline,I was talking about the mild field play,it was poor against a disorganized team(nigeria). I think against top opponent in the world cup,playing an extra body in the middle helped the usa. And I think the game play improved markedly from when you played nigeria. if the team played her usual diamond 4-4-2 formation,she would have been stretched too much,and I don’t think altidore would have been so effective against those world class defenders you guys met(with altidore, the USA is too predictable). By playing a 4-5-1 it meant the threat of goal could come from any of the mild fielders and a lot of teams had problems dealing with that, as against marking or cutting altidore out of the game.
Unfortunately the USA was paired with superior teams who were always gonna dominate in the mild field,but having an extra man stemmed things down a lil bit. And the game didn’t pick up because you had two forwards on the pitch,it did because belguim began to doubt themselves(on paper it shouldn’t have been that tough to score USA).
As for the article, it is easy to criticize a coach when things don’t go right,but you should remember that USA would have won the game at the last minute,if wondo was calmer. If they won everyone would be saying klinnsmann was a genius,that’s the fickleness of football fans.
And let’s be truthful here the USA should have expected a siege,altho I think a great deal of work was done to keep hazard relatively on check,in that I commend the defense. Plus if the writer watched the EPL regularly,he would know that lukaku is a beast,u just pray he his having a bad day where he is misfiring. So in conclusion,I don’t think it is fair to blame klinnsmann,the USA doesn’t just have the quality to compete with the very top teams in the world and Belgium is a member of that elite group.
