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OK I'm not a Soccer expert, but I do like to watch the USA play. I don't get these yellow cards. Help me out here, do these cards seem to come a lot faster when the USA is on the field? I missed this last game but out of the few games I have been able to watch, most of the cards I have seen have been over nothing at all.(I.m specifically refering to the world cup qualifying games as I havent been able to watch a single one of these games in South Africa)

GG

generalgrog wrote:OK I'm not a Soccer expert, but I do like to watch the USA play. I don't get these yellow cards. Help me out here, do these cards seem to come a lot faster when the USA is on the field? I missed this last game but out of the few games I have been able to watch, most of the cards I have seen have been over nothing at all.(I.m specifically refering to the world cup qualifying games as I havent been able to watch a single one of these games in South Africa)

GG

it might seem like "nothing", but Football has rather strict laws on what is permissible. Generally, if the referee rules that a Foul (striking a Player while tackling before the ball) was Accidental, it is a Foul. If it was not a reasonable attempt at "playing the Ball" it is a Yellow Card (Caution). If it was a Deliberate attempt at the Player, that's a Straight Red. There are other rules, but that's the general jist.

taken from The Laws of the Game (PDF):

A player is cautioned and shown the yellow card if he commits any of the following seven offences:
• unsporting behaviour
• dissent by word or action
• persistent infringement of the Laws of the Game
• delaying the restart of play
• failure to respect the required distance when play is restarted with a corner kick, free kick or throw-in
• entering or re-entering the field of play without the referee’s permission
• deliberately leaving the field of play without the referee’s permission

A substitute or substituted player is cautioned if he commits any of the following three offences:
• unsporting behaviour
• dissent by word or action
• delaying the restart of play

A player, substitute or substituted player is sent off if he commits any of the following seven offences:
• serious foul play
• violent conduct
• spitting at an opponent or any other person
• denying the opposing team a goal or an obvious goal-scoring opportunity by deliberately handling the ball (this does not apply to a goalkeeper within his own penalty area)
• denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity to an opponent moving towards the player’s goal by an offence punishable by a free kick or a penalty kick
• using offensive, insulting or abusive language and/or gestures
• receiving a second caution in the same match A player, substitute or substituted player who has been sent off must leave the vicinity of the field of play and the technical area.

As you can see, unlike GW, FIFA know how to write rules (My Favourite is the Specific Exception allowing a Goalkeeper to deny "the opposing team a goal or an obvious goal-scoring opportunity by deliberately handling the ball". If GW Wrote the book, they'd probably forget that and not Errata it for 3 years )

Redbeard wrote:If the US had their best athletes playing soccer instead of football, they'd probably clean up consistently. As it is, they've dominated their continental grouping for years now, while essentially being the 5th-tier sport (After football, baseball, basketball, and hockey) here (compared to most of the heavy-weights, where it's the #1 sport)

Bollocks. For one thing the game the op posted about was a friendly. Players don't give a crap about friendlies, especially when there bang in the middle of there post season holiday.

...the continental grouping you're dominating is probably the worst continental grouping in the world. And comes no where near to Europe, South America and Africa. If you had had to fight for your World Cup qualification in one of theose continents I doubt you would have featured in a world cup yet.

...and if india can't dominate cricket when it's there no.1 sport and they have a population of over 1 billion I can't see any reason why the USA would "clean up" in football, unless you're suggesting that your athletes are somehow inherintly better than they are everywhere else. In which case I laugh, hard.

And for the Record, Italy were the first team to win the World Cup Twice, first to win it on Foreign Soil, First to win it Consecutively, have held it the most amount of years and have appeared in all but the first World Cup (only Brazil Beats them in this Regard).

Be fair though,Italians are naturally suited to playing football..

..you swap sides halfway through remember.

I think the USA thoroughly deserve their success in this tournament. They were unlucky against Italy in the extreme and did very well seeing as they were down to 10 men for most of the game. The Italians should have had a man sent off too but somehow....

With regards to the number of cards thing.... I suspect that this is partially as the USA team play in a very English style that relies upon a lot of hard tackles and running as opposed to the finer or more elegant passing game of some teams. Considering their best players either learnt or earn their trade in the English League-- which has dominated the Euro competitions for the last few years ( Ha! Take that Platini ! you witch !) -- this is no surprise. Related to this the USA players don't tend to dive as much as.... certain.. other teams too, and I think this combination, much like England/the UK teams, often works against them at the international level, where it seems, sometimes, that certain nations or refs would like to make the game entirely non contact.

reds8n wrote:Be fair though,Italians are naturally suited to playing football..

..you swap sides halfway through remember.

That is by far the best Joke I have heard about Italy in years. Saving that one.

As for the League thing, have you seen a English League team? There are no English Players, because the English cannot play football.

Hmm... I agree that there are no 100% all English teams, but I think it true that the "heart" or backbone of the most successful English teams have a core of English players.

Man U, LIverpool and Chelsea have been the dominant teams in England for the last few years, and I really think that Ferdinand, Rooney, Carragher, Gerrard, Terry and Lampard are all key components to those teams success.

And you look at construction of Man U's first great all conquering side under Fergie : Neville's 1 and 2, Scholes, Beckham... etc etc.

reds8n wrote:And you look at construction of Man U's first great all conquering side under Fergie : Neville...2

Neville 2? Neville 2 was one of the worst players to have played at man you in the premier league.

+ that was well into fergies success. You need to go back further and look at irwin, bruce, hughes etc. to see the "first great all conquering side under Fergie."

whatwhat wrote:

reds8n wrote:And you look at construction of Man U's first great all conquering side under Fergie : Neville...2

Neville 2? Neville 2 was one of the worst players to have played at man you in the premier league.

The neville brothers were good? Could have fooled me.

Neville 1 was alright, but the sequel was gak.

Both were regulars in the 1st team, not just the squad, both won lots of medals, both played for the country at full international level multiple times.

Yeah, they must both be fething terrible players.

Robson, Cole, Sheringham, eevry successful modern team in the English league -- maybe Arsenal as an exception and they've been looking dodgy last couple of years-- has had an English core. You're not actually goingt o try and tell me Bryan Robson wasn't the heart of Man U are you ?

Holy crap, the US has a Soccer team?

whatwhat wrote:
Bollocks. For one thing the game the op posted about was a friendly. Players don't give a crap about friendlies, especially when there bang in the middle of there post season holiday.

Ok, so you're clueless. The game that the OP posted about is part of the Confederations Cup, and while it's not quite the World Cup, the teams are fielding their A rosters.

Besides which, saying a player doesn't give a crap about friendlies is just ignorant of the nature of these athletes. If you're playing a sport at the top level, that means you're a competitor, and while before and after the game they may know it doesn't matter, once they're on the pitch, they want to win. If they didn't have that in them, they wouldn't be playing at the top level of their sport. The coaches may not field their best team possible - they have other motives, like getting playing experience for younger players, or letting certain people get rest. But the players - once you're on the field, you want to win, friendly or not.

...and if india can't dominate cricket when it's there no.1 sport and they have a population of over 1 billion I can't see any reason why the USA would "clean up" in football, unless you're suggesting that your athletes are somehow inherintly better than they are everywhere else. In which case I laugh, hard.

Then you don't really get it. There are two parts to how well a country can do in international sport competition. One of them is the talent pool available to them, and the other is whether they have a system in place that can identify and nurture talent starting at a young age. India has the population, but they don't have the system. China is developing the system, and they cleaned up at the Beijing Olympics. In many ways, athletes competing at the top level in their sport, whatever their sport is, are a bit like freaks of nature. They're just different. And, while there is no controlling in which country these people will be born in, it simply stands to reason that you get more of them in a bigger country. The larger your population, the larger your population of freaks. But, it's not enough to have them, raw talent only gets you so far. You have to identify them early, and train them for what they're going to do.

The US (and, remember, I'm not American) has probably the best talent development system in the world. There is organized sport in every American town, starting as young as 4 years old. There are leagues that work to take the best of small local teams and put them on more competitive "travelling teams" as young as seven. There are scouts from professional sports teams that evaluate 14-16 year-old players across the nation - and it's a big place. If you look at the athletes who play in the NFL, they're ridiculous. You have 300 pound men who can run 40 yards in under six seconds, and can jump out of a swimming pool full of water. (You try this... most people can't even making a standing high-jump of three feet, and then to do it from submerged in water...) US culture has developed in such a way that sports are central to people's lives from an early early age, and then the best are methodically advanced as they age.

So, no, I'm not saying that US Athletes are inherently better than anywhere else in the world. What I'm saying is that the US has a significantly better evaluation and development system in place that allows them to consistently locate amazing athletes and promote them in professional clubs, while operation with one of the world's larger populations to select from. Thing is, very little of this goes towards soccer, it's largely focused on the big revenue generating sports here, Football, Baseball, and Basketball.

For the same reason, I think more and more, China will be the dominant force at the Olympics, and they're turning their attention towards soccer now too. As a country, they've shown that they're willing to set up these early identification and training programs, and they have an even larger potential pool of citizens to draw from.

India?? Nothing against the place, but their culture doesn't emphasize sports anywhere like the way that most western countries do.

Gwar! wrote:

Redbeard wrote:At the end of the day, the US is playing in an international tournament and just beat Spain, and England is sitting at home. This is the point in your trash talking where I simply point at the scoreboard, right?

They in the tournament because They beat Canada and some Caribbean Teams with less people than a Small City. Oh yeah, I hope you are REAL proud of them. Last I checked, England has won more World Cups than the USA.

This is all irrelevant and does reflect why the US is uber cdominant (and also why we SOCCER is just now growing). Hold on I'll explain.

We only view sports that have Hawt Chicks (Killkrazy TM) on the sideleines as real sport.
Football, basketball have these



Soccer doesn't. We win You lose. HHAHAHAHAHAHA, er what we talking about again.

I think part of the thing about football ( not "soccer" ) that American's don't "get" is that at times a draw is a good result and it's quite possible to have a tense and enjoyable 0-0 draw ( yoiu get some $%^&*%£ dull ones too of course ) and the way it's set up doesn't really lend itself to American TV coverage as there's not the convieniant breaks every 10 seconds for a painkiller/Budweiser/car commercial that , from a UK perspective, ruins what American sports I have seen. I can dig how a 1-1 draw would or could seem dull if you're used to scores of 37-30 ( or whatever), but in a similar manner I can't watch American football because it's 5 seconds of action followed by 5 minutes of standing around doing sod all.

Duh thats what the cheerleaders are for!

You have to remember our weather though--football is played mainly in the autumn/winter/spring, so any such cheerleaders would essentially be leaping round in long trousers, gloves, hats and even wellington boots which would largely ruin the affect.

There are actually a few clubs with cheerleaders...but... it just doesn't really work over here to be honest. Pretty much every UNi sports team has a cheerleading squad... and on one memorable occasion...err... actually that is perhaps a story best saved for another time.

Our red card was complete crap. Bradley hadn't had a foul all game and went in FROM THE FRONT with cleats a little high (not at a very dangerous height though), hits ball and man and its a straight red card. Awful. I thought the officiating was rock solid until then. A yellow card, maybe, but a red? After no previous fouls? That's extremely rash and harsh judgement by the official.

On to my game analysis. Howard played fantastic, making some 8 or 9 saves against one of the best offenses in the game right now. Our back line was solid for once thanks to Gooch holding it down with his size and speed. It was nice to have Bocanegra back and his experience. Still need to figure out a way that we can distribute better out of the back as opposed to just kicking it away. Still not impressed with Spector. I think that he undeserving of his position. Donovan played nicely with some good chances taken and created. I still wish that he would get more selfish around the goal and put the ball in the net instead of passing it off every time. Michael Bradley had a great game until his sending off. But its already been established how I feel about his sending off. Ricardo Clark was completely invisible the whole game. No mistakes to speak of but he didn't really do anything either. Dempsey played fantastic, lots of energy and skill on the ball. His tenacity got him our clencher at the end of the game. He had some moments of space creating brilliance. Davies was fun to watch, wasn't necessarily a huge impact on the game but his bicycle kick (that sailed just wide) let the spanish know that they were in for a fight. Altidore played great. He used his size greatly to his advantage and it worked well for him. Fantastic showing, finish could've had a bit more finesse, but it did get in the net. Quite a feat on the spanish. Overall, it was a nice effort by the U.S. A bit more ball possession would have been nice, certainly. We got shaky around the end of the first half and the start of the second, got our legs again around the 65th and then lost them again around the 89th. Fantastic game to watch either way. I was glad to have watched it.

It's "strikers" and "defenders" but .. we'll let you off.

I pretty much agree with your analysis there, did ride your luck in parts and on another day I reckon both Villa and Torres would have buried 2 or 3 each.

But they didn't and you took your chances and ultimately that's all that counts. I'd have to say that I still fancy Brazil to win the tournie.... but Egypt showed that their defense is pretty shaky and if you can play with the same grit and spirit then you're in with a chance still.

Be nice if you could finish a game with 11 men though.

reds8n wrote:Be nice if you could finish a game with 11 men though.

That's as Likely as Ronaldo Learning to play football instead of Professional Grass Diving.

It would be really nice if we could finish a game with 11 men and play at a consistant quality rather than it varying between horendious and respectable. As for all the Brit's out there did you guys fail to make it into the Euro Cup last summer? On a side note I just heard that ESPN is going to broadcast like 46 Premire League games in the USA in this next year. I am totally excited about this.

Emrab wrote:It would be really nice if we could finish a game with 11 men and play at a consistant quality rather than it varying between horendious and respectable. As for all the Brit's out there did you guys fail to make it into the Euro Cup last summer? On a side note I just heard that ESPN is going to broadcast like 46 Premire League games in the USA in this next year. I am totally excited about this.

ESPN gained the rights from Setanta UK to broadcast the EPL matches in Great Britain. Setanta US and Fox Soccer still hold the US rights to the EPL matches.

Frazzled wrote:
We only view sports that have Hawt Chicks (Killkrazy TM) on the sideleines as real sport.
Football, basketball have these



Soccer doesn't. We win You lose. HHAHAHAHAHAHA, er what we talking about again.

(Quoted to replay hot chicks...)

My team (Bears) doesn't have cheerleaders :(

reds8n wrote:I think part of the thing about football ( not "soccer" ) that American's don't "get" is that at times a draw is a good result and it's quite possible to have a tense and enjoyable 0-0 draw

No, that is something they get. I think you can have draws in hockey too - at least until the playoffs.

and the way it's set up doesn't really lend itself to American TV coverage as there's not the convieniant breaks every 10 seconds for a painkiller/Budweiser/car commercial that , from a UK perspective, ruins what American sports I have seen.

And yet the Mexican TV stations over here manage to broadcast soccer just fine... As does ESPN2. So I don't think that's it either.

No, the real problem is that American league soccer is just not good soccer. There isn't a lot to cheer about when they're just lobbing long balls back and forth and hoping for corners as a chance to score. American soccer doesn't seem to favour individual player's footwork or fast-breaks, and that's the sort of thing that makes for exciting games. Comparatively, watching Mexican/South American/European matches, there is a lot more of that play and a lot less just booting it back and forth.

but in a similar manner I can't watch American football because it's 5 seconds of action followed by 5 minutes of standing around doing sod all.

American football is very different, I agree (although you're exaggerating the downtime, there are 45 seconds between snaps). It's also the most strategic of any sport I've ever watched. Watching a good American Football game is like watching a real-time chess match (but with violence and collisions) - and it's precisely because they do stop and line back up between every play.

As a side note, I was in London a few years ago, and not yet adjusted to GMT, so I was up around 2AM flipping channels in the hotel room, and I found Monday Night Football. I had this sense that something was wrong, but it wasn't until halftime that I realized that for the British re-broadcast, they'd cut out all the commercial breaks. I think they finished the entire show in an hour and a half.

The unfortunate thing is that this win doesn't actually mean a whole ton. As stated by Emrab, their play is so inconsistent this ends up being looked at as "Spain played bad and that American's played decent". If the US could consistently play this well, they would easily be one of the top ten teams in the world. (Granted, they are currently ranked 14th, so the push past Paraguay and Turkey shouldn't be too horrendously hard)

I must say I was rather shocked that we showed up against a team like Spain. To be honest, our victory won't give me any faith in US soccer/football. Frankly we got lucky to be playing Spain in the first place and if we don't show up and loose 3-0 or 2-0 to Brazil or South Africa in the final, I think our win against Spain won't do much to help US soccer.

If we loose (and frankly my money is on us loosing if we play Brazil again). All it will show is that the US team still only shows up randomly (playing like we did against Italy and Brazil the first time is unacceptable). Our "stars" mostly play for MLS, which is terrible to watch. Until we get more of our "star" players playing in Europe (and getting minutes), we won't have any real "stars" and US soccer will still be a 2nd tier sport. As a final note, when the World Cup finally rolls around, I'm still betting our "stars players" disapear like they did last time.

The US has a soccer team?

The US has a soccer team?

Casper wrote: Our "stars" mostly play for MLS, which is terrible to watch. Until we get more of our "star" players playing in Europe (and getting minutes), we won't have any real "stars" and US soccer will still be a 2nd tier sport.

Clearly you aren't familiar with our national team. Out of the starting 11 yesterday, only 2 (clark and donovan) play in the MLS. Also, keep in mind that the Brazil that plays today is not the Brazil of the 2002 or 2006 World cups. This Brazil team is a bit older and not as fast as they are used to being. Overall, I've not been that impressed with them compared to previous years. I think the final will be much closer than one might expect. The US is playing some great defense with both keepers (Howard and Guzan) in top form.


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halonachos wrote:The US has a soccer team?

Triple Post?

Triple Post?

Triple Post?

youngblood wrote:
Clearly you aren't familiar with our national team. Out of the starting 11 yesterday, only 2 (clark and donovan) play in the MLS. Also, keep in mind that the Brazil that plays today is not the Brazil of the 2002 or 2006 World cups. This Brazil team is a bit older and not as fast as they are used to being. Overall, I've not been that impressed with them compared to previous years. I think the final will be much closer than one might expect. The US is playing some great defense with both keepers (Howard and Guzan) in top form.

Your, right I'm not as familiar with our team as I use to be, as I have lost most of my enthusiasm for the national team.

Although Brazil is older they still beat us 3-0 in the group stage. Yes they may be slower, but their still good. Our 2 goals were opportunistic and involved a bit of luck, which is valid and, well, we needed everthing we could get. I would like to see our team score on something a bit more organized and actually try to get a decent counter attack off then just kicking the ball away and giving it right back to our opponent. I will be watching the game closely. Every game we get against top teir teams, like Spain, Brazil and Italy gives us more experience for the Cup, which is where we need to perform.

If we play like we played againts Spain yesterday I can see the Brazil game beng very good. A problem I see with the US National team is most people (fans) are pessimistic going into the game.

The biggest problems that I see with the Nats right now are lack of unit cohesion, questionable substitutions, and some strange Nat call ups. I assign blame for the first two problems on the coach, Bob Bradley. I think that he calls players up who shouldn't be (Connor Casey) and starts players who shouldn't start or really be subbed in at all (Connor Casey). As far unit cohesion goes, the US just needs to figure out a way to get familiar with each other's playing styles and adapt together. There is far too much miscommunication the occurs for them. While they have no "superstars" to speak of, there is some very solid young talent on our team. Altidore showed that he can effectively use his size and speed against the best.

I hope that South Africa beats Brazil today. Only 3 1/2 hours to game time!


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Edit: Casper, didn't mean to sound like such an ass. I just get a little pissed when people assume that the Nats are composed of house bred players.