This World Cup has been plagued by poor officiating. From the mystery foul that ruled out a perfectly good Maurice Edu winner against Slovenia, or Frank Lampard’s goal that wasn’t against Germany, or Carlos Tevez’s offside goal to open the scoring against Mexico, referees have been at the center of attention too often and for [...]
Filed under: Rules of the game, World Cup 2010 | 1 Comment »
This is one for both the purists and the neutrals. Spain are the best team in the world at passing, possession, and controlling the ball. Germany are the best team in the world at counter-attacking with pace and efficiency, seeming to control the game without dominating possession. German coach Joachim Loew has displayed a master-class [...]
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This is pretty indescribable. So I wont describe it, other than to note that it does not appear to be a joke. (H/T Ginge Talks the Footy)
Filed under: Future of American soccer | 1 Comment »
Andrew Sullivan, a British transplant living here in America has done an admirable job tracking the following of the World Cup here in America from a British perspective. Usually that means narrow-minded dismissal of “soccer” ever taking hold here, but Sullivan has not succumbed to that lazy analysis. He does post today, however, the chart [...]
Filed under: Future of American soccer, World Cup 2010 | 4 Comments »
The US showed some great strengths and glaring weaknesses in its four games at the 2010 World Cup, but overall this team is in position to continue its improvement before the next World Cup in Brazil in 2014. The top players performed well, young players had solid tournaments, and coach Bob Bradley showed admirable flexibility [...]
Filed under: USMNT, World Cup 2010 | 1 Comment »
I know its hard in the midst of such disappointment to push away those feelings and recognize that the US team accomplished a great deal in this tournament. There will be plenty of time for analysis and recriminations. The bottom line is that this team earned the respect of the soccer world. I can’t tell [...]
Filed under: Future of American soccer, USMNT, World Cup 2010 | 1 Comment »
Here we go, the business end of the World Cup begins today. As we have discussed repeatedly, the US has a favorable draw but none of that matters unless it performs well and wins games. The Ghanaians are a quick side that play two holding midfielders that help clog up the middle and stiffle their opponents. [...]
Filed under: USMNT, World Cup 2010 | 1 Comment »
Norway loves Association Football – the sport and the blog! The Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation has run a story on Americans embracing soccer and watching the World Cup in record numbers. The piece, titled “Amerikanrnes VM-interesse tar av (The Americans Interest in the World Cup Takes Off)” picks up a quote of Max’s from today’s Agence-France [...]
Filed under: Future of American soccer | 1 Comment »
Max and I created this blog because we love soccer and we firmly believe that the growth of the sport in America is irreversible. More than most, we know that at times, just being a soccer fan in America is hard – you have to endure constant invectives about how it will never take hold [...]
Filed under: Future of American soccer | 2 Comments »
Shock and horror rang out at 9:25 am Eastern time yesterday when the USA lineup was announced and Coach Bob Bradley made the big decision to drop the struggling Oguchi Onyewu, move left back Carlos Bocanegra into the center, and fill his spot with Jonathan Bornstein. It was understandable but still brave to replace Gooch, [...]
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Max Bergmann
Ken Gude
Pat Garofalo
Jay Heidbrink