I think the Czechs were already dead. I can’t account for how they played today. If they had been that sluggish against the U.S., we’d have slaughtered them. What gives?
Quite the Jekyll and Hyde performance, that’s for sure.
Ghana played Italy tough but I was astonished by the CR’s performance today. Well done to Ghana though for playing attractive, attacking footie.
And I hate, hate, hate the American announcers. Give it up already, we know when the US is playing and it’s not all about the US!!!
I don’t follow football but the Garveyite in me is smiling. Africa’s on the rise.
See I guess I just don’t get this. Not trying to start an argument but I don’t get excited when France do well or when Italy start revving up. They’re white, I’m white but I feel no kinship. I can’t imagine you have a tremendous amount of kinship to Ghana (maybe you have relatives there or some such but your comment about Garvey suggests not). So basically you’re happy for Ghana because they are black. Is that a fair comment?
Also, Ghana played well but the Czech Republic were muck.
So, the US is somehow still alive, after an ATROCIOUSLY officiated game. Mastroeni given a red card for a sliding tackle no harder than dozens of others we’ve seen?
Yow-za.
We were lucky to get away with a point, but get away we did, and we certainly looked better than in the Czech match.
Now we have to (a) beat Ghana, and (b) hope for the best.
I knew the Italians had been paying off refs, but I thought that had been stopped! That was horrible - all three red cards were questionable, and the two against the US were just obscene. That ref should be shunted down to the AYSO GU8s for the rest of his career.
He wasn’t even close to the ball, and came into the Italian player’s ankles cleats-first. That was an ugly tackle.
Not the best refereed game in world cup history, that’s for sure. Did they got him on loan from the National Hockey League? (Where the typical way to call penalties is that the first one is deserved, then the other team gets whistled for a dirty look). Someone speculated that for the second US red card, the ref forgot he’d given Pope a yellow in the first half, and didn’t realize that a yellow would send him off. Not that either of them were really yellow card fouls to begin with.
In any case, none of the US fouls were anywhere near as egregious as a deliberate elbow to the face- which on replay clearly deserves a red card at the minimum. Does FIFA have a procedure for adding penalties beyond a red card for deliberate assault with intent to injure?
The US definitely looked vastly better than against the Czechs, and – questionable penalties aside – completely outplayed the Italians until they went a man down. No, even then, they outplayed them until the last 10 minutes; until then they mounted at least as many quality attacks as the Italians while playing a man down. Too bad they probably won’t have the chance to show what they could do in the next round.
It was a late two footed tackle and it deserved a red card in my opinion. I’m not sure about Pope’s though.
I agree with you on Mastroeni’s red card, coming in as he did didn’t give the referee any option but to red card him. The BBC commentators reckoned that if the Italian player’s studs had caught the ground he would have had a broken ankle, it really was that bad.
Pope’s two penalised challenges were heavy, the second definitely deserved a yellow card, the first could have gone either way.
De Rossi’s (I think it was De Rossi) elbow to McBride’s face was nasty, and certainly deserved a red card. I think FIFA can fine players for violent conduct, he could also face an extended ban if they decide it was malicious.
Overall I thought that the ref was fair, if a little blind, there were a number of times where free kicks should have been given, and at least one challenge that imo deserved a yellow card (US player blatantly pulling shirt in the 18yd box).
The US were lucky, maybe it’ll hold out and they’ll get the results they need to progress.
Worst foul of the day though, goes to the karate kick to the face that Figo suffered. THat was just plain nasty… and it went totally unpunished.
Mastreoni’s foul was a yellow card offense, IMO. Not a red card. Pope’s I am 50/50 on. But a very good effort by the US.
My friends and I were watching the Italy/Ghana game after the U.S./C.R. one, and we basically summarized the commentary during the game as this:
*“Hey, nice slide tackle for Ghana there. In case you’re just tuning in, the U.S. lost to the Czech Republic today, 3-0. It sure was disappointing to see that. Oh, look, a shot on goal saved by Ghana’s keeper…”
“And there’s another shot on goal by Ghana. By the way, did all you viewers hear that the U.S. lost today? Shut out, no less, which really sucks considering how high we were ranked before this round…”
“…and Italy has won! Oh, just in case you missed it, and didn’t hear us mention it a hundred times already, the U.S. got beaten soundly by the Czech Republic today…”*
I think I might have rather watched the game on Telemundo, even if I wouldn’t have understood everything the commentators were saying. :smack:
At least, however, the U.S. showed a lot of improvement today as a team. That gives me a bit of hope. 
The U.S. team played more than just quality football. Before all the fouls, including that ugly McBride incident, they had the ball 60% of the time, completely dominating the midfield and most of the action occured down on Italy’s end. It might have been an off day for Italy, but they only really started to kick around the ball when U.S. was down to 9 players. Hopefully we continue that next week and hopefully the Czechs have an off day with Italy.
And I think they proved that the hype was true, if only we were saving the toughest matches for the realy tourny. If things don’t turn out good this year, we should dominate 2008.
During qualifying for the 2010 World Cup? I suppose the United States probably will seeing as they are in CONCACAF after all.
Regarding the 2010 World Cup, that one has to be Argentina’s to lose quite frankly. Messi will be 22 and Teves will only be 26 as well. Messi is already a hell of a player and will only get better. The rest of their team is relatively young as well. You also have to keep in mind that other teams just wont’ all of a sudden get worse, either. Brazil will always be Brazil and Germany will be a hell of a team in four years, they’re very young. The United States may inprove and may even be an outside contender to win but they are a ways away from domination, In my opinion anyhow.
They’ll stand a real chance of ‘dominating’ when the MLS is on a par with The Premiership, La Liga, Serie A and Bundesliga etc in terms of talent, competitiveness and matches played. Until you have a basis on which to develop worldclass talent, you can’t hope to ‘dominate’. Anyway the only country that truly ‘dominates’ is Brazil.
OK, this is a dumb question, but I bet you guys know the answer.
I was checking the FIFA World Cup site, and I have a question. The stats page seems to have two scores per match. Sometimes they are the same, and sometimes they aren’t. For example, in the Poland/Ecuador match, it lists the score as 0:2 (0:1).
What does this mean?
The score in parenthesis appears to be the score at halftime. Educated guess.
Now this is what I was talking about (I assume you mean 2010?). No offence dude, but … no. Not taking anything away from the USA, but achieving an (undoubtedly excellent) draw against a lacklustre Italian side in the early stages is, well, one swallow not making a summer. Should Switzerland be thinking about winning after their draw with France (on paper a far better team than Italy)? Well yes, I guess they should (everybody should), but they still won’t. Or, what Szlater said.
Nice to see I was completely wrong about both the Italy result and the nature of the match, though. What a crazy group this is shaping up to be.
Can’t agree, I’m afraid; even in a demonstrably more physical league like the Premiership he’d have been lucky to get away with a yellow, and the referees at the World Cup have been told to come down heavily on dangerous challenges (I saw one player get a yellow for a successful one footed slide, although that was a travesty). You can’t come in with two feet, miss completely and expect to get away with it.
Perhaps a dumb question, but why keep the player in with a yellow card when the next yellow card he gets sends him down? Why not substitute with a fresh guy who can afford to get a yellow card without making you play shorthanded?