A smattering of Facebooks status updates and comments I made last night:
* Trent Hergenrader is watching the US vs Costa Rica NOW on ESPN2 – 9:04pm
* Trent Hergenrader thinks this is the worst USMNT in a decade. – 9:23pm
* Trent Hergenrader was just going to say DaMarcus Beasley’s not playing at Rangers for a reason – 9:37pm
* Trent Hergenrader holy crap, Bob Bradley… I’m getting like four hours of sleep a night and I’m staying up for this? For THIS?!?!? – 9:57pm
* Trent Hergenrader Good lord. If that wasn’t an indictment of US Soccer coaching and player development, then I don’t know what is. It’s not just that they were so bad, but that there seem to be no answers in sight. – 11:32pm
Anyone (and I predict there are probably many on message boards around the Internet) who claims that this was just a bad night for the US is kidding themselves. The defense is awful, except for Howard. The midfield is bereft of creativity, and Josie Altidore looks like the only genuine threat up top. They’re quite simply a bad team. In the Bradley era, goals tend to come off set pieces or off long balls up to the strikers. Quick, intelligent passing is a thing of the past. Only I do have to give credit to Bradley for bringing a new tactic last night—the long throw-in! Christ, we’ve gone from Bolton to Stoke. Genius.
The most depressing part was the shot of the bench while JP and John Harkes say the stereotypical “Some of those guys could change the game.” Really? Who? I looked at the bench and I saw a bunch of untested players, none of them definitive game changers. If losing players like Brian Ching and Frankie Hejduk throws your team into turmoil, then your team sucks. Full stop. And I liked how Bradley took out Torres at half, one of the few competent US players on the night. Had I been in San Jose last night, I would have tried getting the ol’ “you don’t know what you’re doing” chant started.
Delusional US fans don’t seem to understand that the US’ undisputed rise in the region has more to do with Mexico’s decline than our improvement. Right now, I would definitely take the 1999 version of the USMNT over the current lot and I’m sure lots of Mexican fans would say the same.
Not-so-fearless prediction: the US will still qualify for the World Cup with relative ease, but they’ll get slaughtered at the Confederations Cup and won’t make it out of their WC group. I was going to predict that the US woudn’t win a game at the World Cup but I probably should wait for the draw first, huh?
(BTW, JP Dellacamara said no one would have predicted the scoreline. Last night in the car at 8:58 I asked Amy if she wanted to watch the US lose to Costa Rica. Had she asked, my predicted scoreline would have been 3-0. I wish, wish, wish I would have said it aloud so I could have Amy sign a sworn testimony that she heard it but alas, I only thought it and thus it turns into a “fish that got away” story. It was 3-1 anyway.)
Current Mood: Pissed | 
2 Comments
I was amused at the expectations management going on in the run up to the match. There was a long article in the Washington Post yesterday about how awful it is to play Costa Rica at home, and how the U.S. had never won there, and how close the fans are to the field, and how the playing surface is old-style hard Astroturf, and how playing there too long will give you Dutch elm disease and on and on…
I have watched the US lose in Costa Rica many, many times. The fans pelted players with bags of piss, batteries, and rotten eggs, and they have been on the wrong end of a number of truly horrendous refereeing decisions that cost them the game.
Last night I didn’t see a single missile thrown from the stands and I thought it was one of the most neutrally reffed games I’ve seen in CONCACAF qualifying (although Bradley’s yellow was a joke). The US put in a pathetic display and don’t deserve a single excuse.