The U.S. Cup is Empty

So I refrained from writing about the first two games for a couple of reasons:

A. I wanted to give the U.S. the benefit of the doubt and grade them on their total performance, especially after the Czech game.

B. There were plenty of other DC bloggers already writing, some of whom actually had decent recaps/opinions on them.

C. I'm not a real big fan of all the people who suddenly come out of the woodwork and act like they know alot about soccer because they watched part of the game and saw a Sportscenter feature. I've played soccer for the better part of 27 years, I'm more qualified than most to tell you what's really going on.

That being said, I just watched the US-Ghana game, which saw us dumped out of the tournament with one solitary point, one goal scored (by us) and a general lack of imagination and intelligence from our head coach, Bruce Arena.

So here we go: In my opinion, Arena screwed up, he never had the team ready to play. In the opener against the Czechs, he expected the CR to play a passive game, where their defense would sit back, afraid of our speed. Instead, they played high pressure, testing our inexperienced back line, and forcing mistakes. It worked to a tee, the early goal from Koller killed the US confidence, and we got torched.

In the Italy game, which media across the country have hyped as a major "victory" for US soccer, the team definitely played with more spirit, and Arena made the right move to bench Beasley, but he still finished a game w/ 9 men where HE STILL HAD A SUB. I'm not saying it had to be Johnson for McBride, Johnson is really too young to play solid defense. But there were other defense options that would have given some extra fresh legs during that last 10 minutes where the team was barely able to walk.

And today, 2nd half substitutions were too late, the team looked they had no idea what they wanted to do on set pieces, and Landon Donovan's confidence has disappeared. I doubt he'll even dominate MLS in the near future the way he played. Arena blew it on the biggest stage of all. And the US may need more than 4 years to recover.

All that being said, the officiating in this World Cup has been a joke. I don't care what FIFA said, Mastroeni's tackle was a yellow at best, the penalty kick given today was a complete phantom, and other teams have gotten burned by it too. The US has just had the consequences hurt more than most.

Not sure who to root for from here on out. Maybe Spain, they seem fun to watch... so Bruce Arena, its time for you to move on. You built the team up great the last 8 years, but you choked in the clutch.