USA / Mexico Reliant Stadium 2/6/08

Can't beat a good rivalry night on the Duece. The Horns and the Eagles.

Was the Dempsey call back for offsides or a foul? One of the announcers thought it might have been a foul when Clint possessed the ball.

Syracuse - sorry to redirect, but you are confusing fasting with abstaining from meat. Two separate things. Catholics do both on Ash Wed. And I am hungry!

CRAP! The rain just knocked out the games!
 
I agree. That is the only explanation outside of an outright blatant screwing that makes any sense.

There have been more than one time tonight when the noise of the crowd with the roof closed resulted in poor communication on the field.
 
DC - My wife's entire family is fresh off the boat Irish Catholic, and no one in their community fasts. Yes, they abstain from meat, but no one I've ever met actually fasts. Maybe it's a regional thing.

As for the game, I called the score.
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Too bad Dempsey's goal didn't count, but we were lousy for a long stretch in the 2nd half.
 
Just a few thoughts on the game:

Dempsey's goal did not count because he was offsides on the original pass. They showed the highlight during halftime with the yellow line and it was the right call. It took the ref a while to see the linesman, but the right call was made.

With the outside defenders that we were working with tonight, this was a good result. Not to mention that Convey is completely out of his league in game like this.

We definitely need to find a center mid combination that feels more comfortable. There was absolutely no chemistry there tonight.

Loved watching Altidore play tonight. He is a beast in the air and obviously an intimidating athlete. He was under the skin of the Mexican defenders all night, even when he wasn't in the most dangerous positions.

All in all, it was an entertaining game. I think the positives on the offensive side outweigh the shaky defensive play (hopefully we have better than the two outside defenders that played tonight).

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Here are my random thoughts....

-Does the US Soccer Federation have no say-so whatsoever in who refs a friendly game? I mean. Seriously. Until about 10 minutes left in the game, Mexico had 8 fouls and 1 yellow to our 18 fouls and 4 yellows. There were SEVERAL phantom calls - especially on Jose.
-Jeff Agoos called and he wants to play right back. God, I can't believe that Agoos flashbacks were hitting me everytime Moor got close to a ball. Or completely missed marking a player.
-Convey. Not so good either. My friend and I were screaming for 30 straight minutes to sub him out.
-I hate that *****, Marquez. Don't know if y'all saw it or not, but he cleated Onyewu - who was on the ground - with about 20 minutes left in the game. It was after the play... I think the one in which Onyewu was called offsides in the box on a set piece.
-Landon - very average
-Boca and Gooch played well. Constantly had to clean up the left and right back's mess.
-Altidore, Feilhaber, and Gooch were my men of the match. Go ahead and add Boca to that as well.
-Wasn't too impressed with Corrales. He CANNOT handle speed on the outside. And, he's kind of clumsy with the ball.
-Howard - awesome. He wanted to fight someone tonight -- whether it was a Mexican or someone from his own team, I don't think it mattered.
-Dempsey, Bradley, Clark, Edu, Adu all played decent. Nothing spectacular.

I did not like Coach Bradley's strategy. They were getting beat all over the field. He waited too long to sub. Once the subs came in, we started playing better. Clark and Bradley should not be paired up together as they are both defensive-minded midfielders. Benny or Edu should replace one of them.

Overall, I'm happy with the tie. Espn can suck it. Naming a Mexican as man of the match for a US home game with a US broadcast is ********.
 
It was a very entertaining match, and I don't think the americans were expecting Mexico to hang with the pace. Donovan said as much in the post game sit down. The scary part was that Mexico was without their two fastest players. The even scarier part for me, who has been following the Ratoncitos since the mid 70s, is that I am even using Mexico and speed in the same sentence.

As a a fan of Mexico, I cannot beleive they had the stones to get not one, but two equalizers. Ususally they just turn into hacking headless chikens. So that was encouraging to see them bounce back. Let's see if they can do it against the stronger sides.

Altidore is going to be a huge star. He needs to be gone and playing in the G14 next fall. How different would his life be if he would have stayed in Haiti? And Dempsey needs to get as far away from Fulham as possible. He deserves a better.

Both teams had their moments. These are two teams that no one will want anything to do with in South Africa.
 
I must admit I am not a soccer expert but I do enjoy watching the World Cup matches and I also enjoy watching Team USA.
I watched most of this game last night and I have two observations....

The offsides rule is stupid.
Never understood it at all.
Why should the offense have to depend on the defense to get back to defend ?
I know it keeps one team from keeping a player back for a long pass but so what. Defend him if he is back there and not playing defense for his own team.

The other observation is soccer players are the biggest floppers in all of sports and I have never seen so many guys barely get touched and the flail around on the ground holding some part of their anatomy as if they were in pain.

Ridiculous.

I did enjoy watching the game but thought the USA got hosed on that "non" goal offsides call.
 
Without offsides there would be even less offense. Teams would have to leave multiple defenders back at all times, therefore defenders would pretty much never join the attack.
 
the offsides rule is necessary, but totally subjective. newcastle got ****** out of a draw with chelsea this season when a chelsea player was about 2 yards offside - no call.

there was an offside call late in the game last night against the US where it was obviously onside according to the yellow line thing, but no comment from the commentators.

i just wish there was some way to get the calls correct in soccer. but with only one ref and two assistants, its going to be difficult.
 
The only thing I hate about the offsides rule is how often the side judges miss the call when the players are even. They give the tie to the defense every time.
I wish there was some way, electronically, to have computers judge these types of calls.
 
I thought this was a well played match by both sides. Mexico wasn't playing dirty and complaining as much they have been recently and USA played tough and confident. I agree about El Pato (Howard), he def. wanted to fight somebody last night and he made some nice stops look easy. I think Magallon was wearing a USA jersey in his postgame interview which was surprising to me.
 
i thought Mexico played well, and weren't dirty. the ref sucked, but that isn't Mexico's fault.


Bradley was completely inept. did he do anything besides lose his man, overrun passes, give away clumsy touches and make bad passes? seriously, that guy was horrible and I think we'd have down better down a man if he was off the field.
 
So when is it offsides ?

Is it when the ball passes the last defender that the offensive player has to be even or behind the defender ?
Or is it when the ball leaves the foot of a player passing the ball towards a teammate downfield.
 
A player is considered off sides when he is ahead of the last defender when the ball is played forward.

The theory is that the linesman should always line up with the last denfender, and if the offensive player is ahead when the ball is played, then the flag goes up. It is a very tough call to make, especially considering the "affect play" aspect. If a player is in offside position, will he affect the course of the play. If the linesman says no, then the flag stays down.

Players can be offside when a shot goes off, not offside. The ball hits the post and the player gets the rebound and knocks it in. He's offside.

TnT got into the world cup because they scored the winning goal just like that vs. Mexico. It should have been disallowed.
 
The problem was not that the call was not made when the ball was passed. The assistant made the call right away. It was the referee that did not see the assistant until Dempsey was shooting. I agree that not seeing the assistant’s flag earlier is inexcusable at this level.

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Pretty entertaining game for stretches. We weren't able to control possession for a good part of the first half, but we eventually settled down.

The Clark-Bradley midfield didn't look like they were on the same page at all. Kinda understandable, as they rarely play together, but it was a source of frustration the whole night. Rico Clark works very hard, is tough in the tackle, and wins a lot of balls, but the whole 2-deep-lying midfielders just doesn't work for me. I'd rather we play Rico as a Patrick Vieira type position and allow Bradley to get forward more (while still allowing Rico to make runs to the box).

Mikey Bradley just looked off his game, probably because his dad puts him in a much different position than he plays with Heerenveen. Granted, the international game is a lot different than the Eredivisie, but the kid's scored 12 league goals (15 in all competitions) and he needs to be given more of the offensive reins. Due time, I guess, but I don't see Bob ever switching up his Neanderthal tactics.

Mexico were missing two of their best offensive players (Castillo and Guardado), but the two goals they scored were both on Drew Moor, who got burned on the same play twice. It would have been a much different game with Bornstein and Cherundolo, as well as Castillo and Guardado. FWIW, Moor put in a really nice ball that Jozy finished clinically.

I think Jozy stays one more year with RBNY, which isn't the worst option for him. He's still growing into his body and MLS is a good level of competition, both for building confidence and getting your feet wet. It's certainly as physical as any of the Euro leagues and when he does move abroad he won't have to adjust to that side of the game. I just really, really hope he goes to France, Holland, or Portugal before making the leap to Spain/Italy/England.

Anyone see Jozy say something to Marquez right after the game? He definitely got a laugh out of Rafa. Perhaps a joke about seeing him in El Clasico?

The offside call, while it was probably the latest whistle I've ever seen, was the correct call. Frustrating that the ref (who was abysmal) didn't see the flag raised, and Dempsey finished well, but it was the right call.

I like that US-Mexico friendlies are actually competitive and exciting. The rest of the day's action that I watched were all incredibly boring. Mexico-US really means something to these players.
 
The other thing I have noticed about Team USA over the years is they just do not control the ball individually nearly as well as other elite teams. They seem to turn it over too much.

Am I seeing this correctly ?
 
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