I wanted to watch the Brazil/Italy game and the USA/Egypt game, but they were both running at the same time. "No problem," I thought to myself, "If Italy plays well, there will be no point in watching the US game, so I'll just record the US game and watch the Italy game live." Little did I know how difficult it would be to avoid the score of the US game.
The first problem was the scroll at the bottom of the screen. Since they haven't invented the remote that can turn the scroll on/off yet, I had to bring out the duct tape, and physically cover the scroll. The second problem was the game breaks. These are easy enough to avoid by changing the channel for a few seconds, the announcers always give a little intro about "Here's so-and-so with a US/Egypt game break..." But the third and largest problem was the announcers themselves. They were constantly talking about the US score and where everyone stood in relation to advancement, and they don't always give much warning, so I had to be quick with the mute button. They snuck the halftime score in on me, but I managed to get through the 8oth minute without learning anything else, and that was good enough for me.
So then I could actually watch the US game, and it was great. We hadn't played well against Brazil/or Italy, but with a 3-0 Brazil win already in the books (in my chronology anyway), a great game against Egypt would advance us. And we delivered. I won't nit-pick this game too much, though there were plenty of missed opportunities on both sides. We played with heart, and we scored when it counted, so I am satisfied.
A lot of things had to go right for us to get here, and they all did. Incredible. Now we get the privilege of playing Spain in the semi-finals. This will be an immense challenge for the US. Spain has cruised all tournament. Torres and the offense get all the attention, but Spain has a great defense too. They haven't allowed a single goal yet. We played well against Egypt, but we will need to play even better against Spain. But I'm optimistic we can hold our own and provide a good showing. Today should give us some confidence and momentum, and hopefully we can bring that with us on Wednesday......we're going to need it.
Speaking of the Confederation Cup, I would like to say that my new favorite player for the Azzurri (Italian National team) is Giuseppe Rossi. That kid can strike a soccer ball. Watch this goal he scores against the US team. (I figure it's ok to admit being impressed by the goal now that Italy is going home) What a beautiful shot. He hit 2 or 3 like that against Brazil, and although obviously none of them went in, they were still damn impressive.
I like Italian club teams, but not the Italian National team. So it's a little bit surprising that I like this player so much, given my bias against his team. Whatever. I rationalize it by saying he was born and raised in New Jersey, so he's got a lot of American soccer in him.
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7 comments:
This Confederation Cup...how long has this been around??? This is the first time I can recal this tournament occuring...does it happen yearly? Every four years?
And what's the prestige? Is there any? Bragging rights heading into the Cup?
I need answers =)!!!
It's a relatively new tournament. The Confederation Cup has gone through a lot of changes. It started as an international tournament hosted by Saudi Arabia, then just kind of grew. FIFA took it over in the late 90's. It used to be every 2 years, but they just changed it to every 4 years.
It's basically a warm-up tournament for the World Cup. But it's a lot more than just a friendly, national teams go all out.
As far as prestige goes, it depends. For a world power like Brazil, not so much. Yeah, it's nice, but there are bigger fish to fry. But for a challenger like the USA, it definitely has a lot of prestige. If we win the Confederation Cup, that would mean we beat Spain (FIFA ranking #1) and probably Brazil (FIFA ranking #5)
That would be huge, and you can bet American soccer would gain a lot of international respect.
~You think we'd gain international respect? Maybe in the fact that we won (a pat on the back from the rest of the world, "Nice job, little Americans"), but I still don't think the world would respect us to the point that they'd consider us a contender for the World Cup or anything like that. I mean, in a way we are a little fortunate to even be in the position we are in...we didn't exactly blow away our competition.
~I saw some of the highlights of the U.S.-Egypt game...that first goal was awesome! Persistant little fucker.
~And how is Brazil #5 in the World? Soccer is their thing! I understand you can't be on top forever, but #5?!? Who's in front of them? Spain...I'll guess Italy...Argentina?
We are definitely fortunate to be in where we are. But I don't think we played as poorly as it seems. We were beating Italy 1-0 at halftime, while playing almost the entire game with 10 due to a very dubious red card. If that call isn't made, we would have had a great chance to win that game.
And sure, we're not one of the elite soccer nations, and a Confederation Cup Championship wouldn't change that, but we have made a lot of progress in the last 15 years. Not only in how the world sees us as a soccer nation, but as we see ourselves. Simply qualifying for the World Cup is no longer good enough, the expectation now is that we will advance out of our group.
We are currently ranked 14th out of more than 200 FIFA countries. That's not too shabby, considering what we used to be.
Go here for FIFA rankings, but I have no idea how they are calculated. I think it's kinda like the BCS, there is some type of formula used to determine the rankings.
http://www.fifa.com/worldfootball/ranking/lastranking/gender=m/fullranking.html
I was listening to an ESPN soccer analyst...I forget his name...on the radio and he said that he doesn't put much stock into the FIFA rankings. He said something to the effect that it's all "results based", and the U.S. has been feasting on weaker competition in North America and having some prettier results than some other countries elsewhere. I don't know how much the competition level would effect their ranking, but the analyst said the U.S. is probably the 20-25 best team in the world. Take it for what it's worth.
But, you're right, U.S. soccer is at least on the map. I mean, I know some of the players now, and I hate soccer. I even care (just a little) about the outcomes of games and tournaments. That's a big step because once the casual fan gets into it, your sport is going somewhere. It'll be curious to see where they are in ten years.
Out of curiousity, did you read/hear some of the comments from the U.S. players on advancing to the semis? Basically they were saying "how do you like us now" to all the writers/criticizers. Haha, trash talking with a 1-2 record and a negative goal differential. Gotta love that. If they have a good showing against Spain, then talk.
I don't know how the FIFA rankings are calculated. But I do know that CONCACAF (the US confederation) is pretty weak on talent. I could buy the arguement that our ranking is inflated.
We are somewhere in the top 25, definitely not top 10. I'm fine with that.
I haven't heard any of the comments but, yeah, trash-talking with a losing record never goes over too well. But I have to cut our players a little slack. It was a really long shot for us to make the semis. Yes we needed help, but we also needed a dominant game against a solid Egypt team (that had just beaten Italy) and we handled our business.
But I agree, any comments our players made will come back and bite them in the ass if we don't play well against Spain. We don't need to win, but we need to be competitive. We can't get blown out the water.
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