|
The U.S Football Performance against Belgium...
I`m a huge football fan and I just have to say that the U.S were fantastic against Belgium and have shown terrific character in their 4 World Cup games. Belgium`s quality shone through in the end but that is to be expected with the stars in their squad.
The U.S truly put us (the English) to shame with their performances. |
|
Sad to see the U.S.A lose, not much of a soccer fan myself, but for some reason this year I really got into it. And it wasn't just me, there we're a lot of other people who were more into it this year than any other. I think that soccer is really starting to pick up steam here in the states, especially regarding the world-cup. We're a patriotic bunch and rooting for the USA was fun. First time I ever watched a full match was the USA vs. Portugal. I must say that it was intense down to the last 5 second goal made by Port.
Looking forward to the next World Cup! |
well played, indeed. you just need more efficiency in scoring
|
Quote:
Klinsmann is clearly doing a first class job getting the team working well as a unit. |
This Cup's run has boosted American soccer, let's see if it carries through past this summer. There is a sports bar in the building that I live in. This afternoon there was absolutely zero parking. The bar was packed.
|
Toughest part of the sport in the US is that there are no true stars for the country to get behind or loathe.
Till their is a Lebron or a ARod or a Manning. US fans will be fans every 4 years when the media tells them to be. |
Quote:
Johnny Manziel that is :pimp |
The two best US players are our goalkeeper (who seems to be the best in the world) and Altidore who was hurt almost the entire time. The team showed a lot of heart, had a very tough draw and the worst travel schedule of any team in the competition. I'm proud of them and plan to start watching some MLS games now that I can see the league isn't rubbish. What we need is a playmaker. We have never had one.
When I was a kid I used to watch New York cosmos games and watch Pele, Giorgio Canalia and a bunch of world class players who came there after their prime years. I've never seen a US player in his prime set up other players as well as those guys did in their 40s. It doesn't have to be Messi or Ronaldo, it just needs to be a world class midfield player who can create chances. It didn't look like any of ours were top 25 in the world and that makes it really hard to score against any good team. |
Win a bet ?
|
You must be joing? They played very well for the last 15 minutes.
For the first 90 minutes they were terrible... The whole game it was clear that they can do absolutely nothing while Belgium was doing everything. 30:5 shots after 90 minutes. Every non US and non Belgium spectator was waiting for when finally Belgium would officially mark their dominance by the goal. Nobody even expected US to win watching the game... Announcer on the TV even trashed this game as the biggest cat and mouse game (as in Belgium was totally dominating the US). They had nothing for the whole game (except the good shot at 89th minute or so). This was the most one sided eight-final game out of all.... |
Quote:
|
Quote:
Too star-centered when the sports are team sports... |
Quote:
I watched Bill Parcells beat better teams on the playoffs and SuperBowl by 'taking air out of the ball' and dragging better opponents into close games where they would crack and lose. Almost worked this time and the effort was a good one. Winning a Texas holdem with 8 6 off suit isn't easy, but it can be done. Congrats to Belgium. They have no chance against Germany, unless they play the same cat and mouse game from the opposite POV. |
Quote:
WTF are you talking about? Every bloody team has star players, no matter the country of origin. Stars are what people want to see in any sport - they want to see the *BEST*, the guy/girl that can do what no one else can do. The person who can perform what seem like miracles.... The WORLD is crazed about stars and it doesn't just apply to sports - all these reality talen shows are a great example of this :2 cents: |
Quote:
|
Quote:
And since I follow basketball I pretty well know what I am saying. It is like a cult in NBA, "fans" are talking about clashes of the stars and not so much about teams.. It is different in other countries. Of course they like stars as well, but they are more centered on the team than on the stars. |
Quote:
And yes, they could have won it anyways with that missed goal at +-89 min :) That's football - one team can dominate 89 minutes and lose by one goal suddenly made by another team :) |
I thought the match was boring... have you seen the Colombia matches.. non stop action.. they are all over the place the whole game and its really exciting to watch, fans cheering the WHOLE game.. Friday will be a monster
|
Quote:
|
Fair play to the yanks yesterday. For guts, effort and no small degree of ability, they ALMOST made it through to the QFs. Hats off to them
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
Take the earlier game for example (Switzerland v Argentina). Absolutely dire game with the Swiss sitting back and looking to defend in numbers against a very ordinary Argentina. |
Perhaps something that would help many Americans understand the game better is if someone could explain why there are such low scores when "for the whole 90 minutes it was full on dominance by Belgium."
When "full on dominance" results in nothing better than a tie, or at best a winning score of 2 to 1, it seems there may be some liberties taken in the way that phrase is used here. Wouldn't another way of signaling dominance be to actually score a lot of goals? Why isn't that what happens when one team full-on dominates another team? So if someone who really understand the intricacies of the game could explain how both of those things can be true, that would be great. Thanks! |
http://m.fifa.com/worldcup/matches/r...tatistics.html
USA actually had good possession numbers, was just way outshot by the Belgians. We had our few chances that could've easily made goals too though. Again, happy with the results |
Quote:
Just a heads up but the USA team really looked horrible. The goalie is not supposed to make that huge number of spectacular saves. The Belgium team then moved to a prevent defense that allowed us to get a lot more pressure in the closing minutes. Think in terms of American football. The rookie comes off the bench and throws for a 150 yards in a quarter but still loses as the other team was playing back. The game was already over and he is the only one who didn't know it so he looks good. |
Quote:
The dominance from the Belgians came from their shot ratio with the United States. But Tim Howard kept turning that back almost all night long |
The English put to shame all by themselves. =)
|
Very good game... It's nice to see that soccer is growing and it's more popular daily... Just keep on. :)
|
they should play like last 10minutes hole game
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
best way to understand the why, is to try and play it you'll see it's just so much harder to score in football than in many other sports and that's against your buddies, who probably aren't that great at defense or being a goalie your feet are also far less precise than your hands, the skill to get that ball in isn't easy, that's why, I would say |
The US made a great showing in this world cup. They got a lot farther and won more games than a lot of so-called veteran fans from so-called 'elite soccer nations' thought they would. Which makes me kind of smile, only in that it seems to piss a lot of foriegn SOCCER fans off. :D
I can only wait in hopes that one day perhaps Canada can field a men's team that is as much of a threat as the US was this year. But sadly I think our women's team could beat our men's side. :D Anyway, dominated or not, the US held their own for the full 90 minutes, and even when down by 2 they never gave up until the final whistle and even damn near tied the game again which would have sent it to penalty kicks. And by "damn near tied it again" I mean that it was one hell of a close chance they had. I'd wager that every damn Belgian on earth had a slight arythmia for a few seconds there. Anyone who can't concede the USA did well and played well above expectations just doesn't know jack about shit regarding this game. |
Quote:
Belgium's shooting in 90 minutes was wasteful, so they didn't deserve to win in normal time despite their dominance. |
Quote:
See... you don't like it either when someone assumes you may not be able to understand something. So let' agree not to play that way together...okay? Quote:
Quote:
And just to lend some transparency. I don't watch football of any other kind. Except for the Super Bowl (for religious reasons, per Lewis Black). And I don't have an opinion about whether footBall is better than handEgg. But I tend to pay attention any time a country with a buying population the size of this one gets interested in something they weren't very interested in before. So I'd like to understand this game a little better, without having to invest any time into watching games. And something I hear a lot is that the low scores don't seem to make sense to the people who do watch, and that it's also a reason why some people here don't get interested enough to watch. It's like the game is designed that way. So I'm looking for a better understanding of the fans who *like* the fact that's it works that way. Versus the people who prefer games where there's a lot of scoring. Anyway, thanks for the replies and I do understand what you were both saying. Maybe some of the answer is that aggressive dominance is valued higher than successful defense. At least that would explain the idea that a team can totally dominate a game yet barely score in all that time on the field. :) |
Maybe they could win if some of the players act like they got shot by a sniper. Whole sport is ridiculous anyway with their childish fake injury bullshit -- so unsportsmanlike and shows no character. I'm glad our team won't play along with those antics.
It would be better to lose and not act like a pussy. |
Quote:
Clubs tend to build their teams around their organised tight defences. |
Quote:
|
I always enjoyed playing defense over offense in soccer, because it is much easier to reject the attackers from scoring. So over and over you get to tell them to fuck off. It is harder to beat someone with a soccer ball (and harder to move as fast) then without.
Playing forward is much less exciting, cause you are pretty much waiting for and trying to setup that one perfect play to finally get a goal. While scoring goals gets most of the attention, it is a less exciting position to play. Also, you are dealing with the play being behind you, versus defense where the play is in front of you Playing midfield will have a lot of activity too, but fuck doing all that running Of course, with soccer at this level you'll get most of the players covering most of the field... |
Belgium did such a stellar job!!! I was rooting for US though..
|
| All times are GMT -7. The time now is 05:28 AM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8
Copyright ©2000 - 2025, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
©2000-, AI Media Network Inc123