CONCACAF HEXAGONAL MATCH DAY 1 (US-Hon C.R.-Pan & Jam-Mex)

Do any of you think Donovan might retire full stop from international football after his break.

I can see that happening even if the US get by without him.

I hope not I want him to reach 200 caps

Ché Guayaba wrote:Do any of you think Donovan might retire full stop from international football after his break.

I can see that happening even if the US get by without him.

It's possible but if he was going to do that, I think he would have done it by now. I don't understand his nonchalance about the international team these days. The last round was a struggle and this round is shaping up to be even more of a bitch. If we don't get at least 3 points out of the next two games, we've got a real crisis brewing. He's always paying lip-service to the promotion of the MLS and football in general in America. If we don't make the Brazil World Cup, it will be a huge fucking disaster. All that momentum we built off the South Africa World Cup will be squandered. With Brazil occupying the same time zones as the US, we can expect American viewership to be even larger than it was for the South Africa World Cup but if we're not even there, that's a wash. It'll be a major opportunity pissed away. You'd think a scenario like that would light a fire under his ass and get his ass out there but I guess not. I don't know if he feels he's just done enough for USA or what. I'd like to think that if I were him, I wouldn't feel I had done enough until my body literally just didn't allow it anymore. I appreciate that he saved our asses in South Africa and he fueled the most successful World Cup in USA history in Japan/South Korea, but he still has good playing days in him and I do not believe that he is currently injured. He needs to be out there.

I kinda feel for him in a way. Obviously, every country has their idols, but Landycakes had the added pressure that he was the guy everyone hoped would make soccer popular in the US. And I think he's gotten closer to that than anyone else has. Footballing idols from other countries don't have that load to bare, soccer is already a thing in those countries.

Donovan's mental fortitude has always been questionable. (At least to some USMNt fans and pundits.) So I can see how it just became too much for him.

I can't fault him for being tired or burned out, but this "I'll be back soon" and making everyone wait is a dick move in my opinion.

I think he should have just retired full stop. (At least from international football.)

I'm not sure Klinsman will welcome him back when he is ready either. Klinsman isn't American, he probably doesn't put Donovan on a pedestal like most of the American soccer fan base does. (Although, he is the one who brought him to Bayern) I think he might hold a grudge and exclude him from his plans.

Jozy sure wants him back. 11 of his goals came with LD on the field. He has scored just twice when Landycakes has been absent.

Jozy Altidores emergence is quite incredible.

Spends about 4 years scoring a solitary goal a season to having over 30 today.

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Did anyone watch the U-20 match between Haiti and the US yesterday?

I only watched a bit of it but the US's performance was a bit underwhelming. They held on though and won 2-1.

US faces Costa Rica next I think.

Yeah, we got Costa Rica on Friday. It was a bad game no doubt. A bunch of the players were being played out of position as well.

Mexico is playing that place I bought my couch from. It's like playing against 11 Jozy Altidore. Massive kids man.

Winning 3-0.

IKEA?

Curacao.

It's like a really festive, really Mexican Ikea.

Party and furniture. Should have known those two things could go together.

Ché Guayaba wrote:I kinda feel for him in a way. Obviously, every country has their idols, but Landycakes had the added pressure that he was the guy everyone hoped would make soccer popular in the US. And I think he's gotten closer to that than anyone else has. Footballing idols from other countries don't have that load to bare, soccer is already a thing in those countries.

I would rather have to deal with that pressure than deal with the pressure that Rooney, Ronaldo, Messi, et al. have to deal with. Building up football in America is a feel-good cause, kinda like raising awareness about breast cancer. You can't really be faulted as long as you are trying to do something. But in England, for example, when they fail, the team gets ROASTED in the media and in the pubs and sometimes, people riot. They take their football seriously. When the USNT fails, Americans shrug it off and move on pretty easily. We (speaking in general terms here, not about me personally. I'm more like the English fans when it comes to the national team) are growing to like football more and more but we still don't really care about. Not all that much. We're starting to enjoy it and we will watch it and we will support the national team but when the national team loses, we're done thinking about it in about 15 minutes. Because once the World Cup is over, the NFL season is just a couple months away.

Mexico beat Jamaica 4-0, and join Cuba, the U.S. and El Salvador on that plane to Turkey.

The competition at the U-20 is too easy for Mexico and the US.

Mexico's semifinal is against El Salvador, a team they beat 3-0 like two days ago.

The US is up against Cuba.

Jeez.

US vs Cuba u-20 semifinal is on right now.

Cuba has been impressive but the US has got this.

2-0 already. I take that impressive bit back. There's no competition at this level.

Mexico beats the US 3-1 in the U-20 final. The US took longer to crack then I expected. Pretty disappointing talent wise for Mexico this time around.

The best thing out of this is Jesus Corona, he's head and shoulders above every other player in the tournament.

Concacaf refs at it again. They wrongly disallow a goal for Mexico and if what I heard was true gave the US a controversial penalty.

Apparently gave us a real weak penalty, but denied us two stone cold ones. The ref giveth, and taketh. And the goal that Mexico had incorrectly ruled out was in the 119th minute, when the game was already over as a competitive outing.

Mexico was clearly had the better talent, so it was surprising that we were able to force overtime in the game. Did Mexico have a strong squad for the tournament? We scraped by a bit, obviously Gil left after we qualified, and we had to play a couple of players out of position just to finish the tournament (Serna, I think is his name, is a #10, and he played right back against Cuba and Mexico). I think we might have been a bit more competitive in this tournament and the actual World Cup had Pelosi and Packwood been available. Alas, broken legs are a bitch.

Steve is around

Must mean something suspicious is going on. Or it's just the return of the MLS season, so now I'm back to watching soccer on the reg.

Scuba Steve wrote:Apparently gave us a real weak penalty, but denied us two stone cold ones. The ref giveth, and taketh. And the goal that Mexico had incorrectly ruled out was in the 119th minute, when the game was already over as a competitive outing.

Mexico was clearly had the better talent, so it was surprising that we were able to force overtime in the game. Did Mexico have a strong squad for the tournament? We scraped by a bit, obviously Gil left after we qualified, and we had to play a couple of players out of position just to finish the tournament (Serna, I think is his name, is a #10, and he played right back against Cuba and Mexico). I think we might have been a bit more competitive in this tournament and the actual World Cup had Pelosi and Packwood been available. Alas, broken legs are a bitch.

I think Mexico's teams is a bit "meh." Casillas nasty injury made him lose his place in the squad. (He started against Columbus recently, didn't do much though.) There are players like Marin, Abella, and Bernardo Hernandez who haven't even played a single game of professional football, and then there's Van Rankin, god that guy is just not very good.

The squad talent wise isn't very good in my opinion. The biggest name on the team is Jesus Corona, then there's u-17 world cup heroes Gomez, Briseño, Bueno and Fierro. The last two include a player who even in the u-17 world cup has shown erratic finishing, and the other who must have ran over Almaguer's dog or something because he spends 85 minutes of a every match on the bench.

Obviously, it's enough to get by in Concacaf but it's hard to get excited by the squad.

There are still a couple of months left before the world cup kicks off so there's still time to build a better squad in the next few months but the squad as it is now, I think might go home early.