OT: Boneyard "Other Football" World Cup Thread

[junglehusky]

The object - is to impose your will on the other team. Demoralize them. Competition. To UCONN football, the best win, the most effective we have ever been at this level of play we've been at since 2000 was the bowl game win over South Carolina in 2009. We ended that game, with the QB taking a knee, with the lead, at the opposing team's 5 yard line or something, instead of punching it in for the TD.

There is absolutely nothing demoralizeing that taking the ball into the corners could have done for Portugal, at the end of that game, when our offensive players had the opportunity to attack, and my opinion is that it's actually contrary - and was uplifiting to the attitudes of the Portugese players.

I don't know, I get the feeling if your team is down in the dying minutes of the match and the other team is doing a really effective job hogging possession and you aren't able to advance to the attacking third, I bet that's pretty demoralizing watching the seconds tick off the clock.

 

[Carl Spackler]

I don't know, I get the feeling if your team is down in the dying minutes of the match and the other team is doing a really effective job hogging possession and you aren't able to advance to the attacking third, I bet that's pretty demoralizing watching the seconds tick off the clock.

Unbelieveable!! If you can score a goal from your own half in under 5 seconds, and apparently you can, and you have the best player in the world - why the hell would you be worried about a player tooling around with the ball in your own corner? I'd be freaking psyched that we still had a chance. I guess that's what makes me different from other people.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

Also, why shouldn't Ghana advance. They drew Germany, we didn't (theoretically in the future), they beat Portugal, we didn't. (and really they outplayed us in our game, though we got the result). (think I got those scenarios right)

Pretty simple really. They'd have the same record. When they played each other, one team won and one team lost. The team who won advances. They're getting too cute with GD.

Keep in mind I'm saying this as a guy who has not watched one second of WC soccer, so what do I know?

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

Play calls are awesome when they work, and absolutely idiotic when they don't. I do think that going for the first down, was the correct thing to do. I would do it again. What happened to Don Brown's defense in that game, is often overlooked by McEntee's throw.

If you watched Liverpool/Chelsea in the EPL this year, you'd know that sometimes, it makes total sense to just go ahead and park the bus and play defense. If you can just keep the other team from scoring, sometimes that's a win. You really can't draw US football analogies because they are wildly different sports. The US, strategically, did nothing wrong at the end of the game. Bradley was exhausted and gave up a ball and Cameron failed to mark his man.

You make mistakes and it only takes a second for a player like Ronaldo to make you pay for it. It can be absolutely heartbreaking. But all you gotta do is not lose to Germany by more than Ghana theoretically beats Portugal by and you're through.

 

[ZooCougar]

Unbelieveable!! If you can score a goal from your own half in under 5 seconds, and apparently you can, and you have the best player in the world - why the hell would you be worried about a player tooling around with the ball in your own corner? I'd be freaking psyched that we still had a chance. I guess that's what makes me different from other people.

You guys need to stop engaging the lawn care guy. He started watching soccer last month and he apparently still thinks scoring a goal is like scoring a field goal.

The whole idea of closing a game down is to prevent some sort of dangerous counterattack which is exactly what happened.

 

[Carl Spackler]

If you watched Liverpool/Chelsea in the EPL this year, you'd know that sometimes, it makes total sense to just go ahead and park the bus and play defense. If you can just keep the other team from scoring, sometimes that's a win. You really can't draw US football analogies because they are wildly different sports. The US, strategically, did nothing wrong at the end of the game. Bradley was exhausted and gave up a ball and Cameron failed to mark his man.

You make mistakes and it only takes a second for a player like Ronaldo to make you pay for it. It can be absolutely heartbreaking. But all you gotta do is not lose to Germany by more than Ghana theoretically beats Portugal by and you're through.

Ok - I understand this - really I do. My point here - once again, is that the USA went up 2-1 with about 15 minutes left in the game. At that point, they changed - offensively - what they had been doing all game long, to get from 0-0, down 1-0, to up 2-1. I simply don't think, that changing the offensive approach at that point, is the right thing to do. I was not surprised at the failure to win, and write whatever you want about me - the failure to win, came from that change in approach - offensively. I don't quite understand why changing the offensive approach might have such a dramatic approach on defensively playing, especially because a defensive oriented substitution had already been made - the difference I saw, is that when players had the ball in the offensive end - they stopped going for goal.


on another note, I now know why ties are valueable in soccer, but a wrote the other day - half in jest - that a tie is a loss. Sure felt like a loss yesterday.

 

[Carl Spackler]

You guys need to stop engaging the lawn care guy. He started watching soccer last month and he apparently still thinks scoring a goal is like scoring a field goal.

The whole idea of closing a game down is to prevent some sort of dangerous counterattack which is exactly what happened.

Lawn care? what does that mean?

anyway - you make no sense - the whole idea to close the game down was to prevent a counterattack? So what you just wrote is that the US tried to do something, and Portugal did it anyway?

I think it would have been better to just continue what was working. Best defense is a good offense if you ask me.

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

Lawn care? what does that mean?

Dude. Your screen name.

 

[Gurleyman]

Against Ghana, Bradley boomed the ball to the goalie in the final minute looking for a pass instead of going to the corner flag - a mistake that didn't matter. Gave Ghana one last counter that they otherwise wouldn't have had, but we cleared it before it got into our offensive third.

The idea is to minimize the amount of time you have to defend in your own box, when anything can happen (strange deflection, accidental hand ball, etc). We did it right except for the very last sequence. We really gave them two chances in 15 minutes after taking the lead (Ronaldo put a weak header wide on the other, hey also had 5 guys offsides on one that I am not counting). If Bradley traps that ball well and sends it back to a corner flag, we hold on 2-1 without Howard needing to really do anything in the last 15 minutes.

If you get a clear breakaway or a 3 on 1 or something, then you go for the final nail. If it's just a guy running up the sideline with defenders in the way, head to the flag and try to kill a minute or two. An ambitious foray into the box where there's a slim chance of scoring gives the other team the ball quicker and forces you to defend longer.

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

Ok - I understand this - really I do. My point here - once again, is that the USA went up 2-1 with about 15 minutes left in the game. At that point, they changed - offensively - what they had been doing all game long, to get from 0-0, down 1-0, to up 2-1. I simply don't think, that changing the offensive approach at that point, is the right thing to do. I was not surprised at the failure to win, and write whatever you want about me - the failure to win, came from that change in approach - offensively. I don't quite understand why changing the offensive approach might have such a dramatic approach on defensively playing, especially because a defensive oriented substitution had already been made - the difference I saw, is that when players had the ball in the offensive end - they stopped going for goal.


on another note, I now know why ties are valueable in soccer, but a wrote the other day - half in jest - that a tie is a loss. Sure felt like a loss yesterday.

The more you open up your offense, the more vulnerable you are to counterattack. You absolutely want to change the way you play with a lead vs. behind. It's the nature of the game. It's not always conducive to your squad -- for instance, the US is not really a great defending team, but the truth is, you've been running around in the Amazon for over 80 minutes at this point. Sure, you'd love to keep driving and score another goal, but there are a lot of considerations, like the fact that your midfielders are absolutely exhausted and you don't have unlimited subs.

There are nothing wrong with the game strategically. It was just a bad play by Bradley and Cameron at the worst possible time.

 

[ZooCougar]

Lawn care? what does that mean?

anyway - you make no sense - the whole idea to close the game down was to prevent a counterattack? So what you just wrote is that the US tried to do something, and Portugal did it anyway?

I think it would have been better to just continue what was working. Best defense is a good offense if you ask me.

Yeah, Bradley reverted back to business as usual. He coughed up the ball, Portugal countered, they have the best leg in the game on their side. It was comically painful.

 

[Carl Spackler]

The more you open up your offense, the more vulnerable you are to counterattack. You absolutely want to change the way you play with a lead vs. behind. It's the nature of the game. It's not always conducive to your squad -- for instance, the US is not really a great defending team, but the truth is, you've been running around in the Amazon for over 80 minutes at this point. Sure, you'd love to keep driving and score another goal, but there are a lot of considerations, like the fact that your midfielders are absolutely exhausted and you don't have unlimited subs.

There are nothing wrong with the game strategically. It was just a bad play by Bradley and Cameron at the worst possible time.

Holy crap. I have been SPECIFIC about this. Nowhere am I arguing that we needed to OPEN UP OUR ATTACK. I"ve been specific, that substitutions were already made to improve the defensive posture. My point, is that when players on the field, had the choice of making an attack at the goal, or playing the ball out - they chose to play the ball out late in the game, when all game long, prior to going up 2-1, after being down 1-0, the opportunities were there, within the normal flow of the game, to take shots, create opportunities and they took them - until the end of the game. I am NOT saying they shuld have opened up their attack more - I'm saying that when the opportunity was there late, they should have taken it - and they were there - instead of playing into the corners. The effect on the flow of the game mentally for both teams, was palpable to me - when that happened. I don't understand, how if Wondolowski after amking those great moves to get forward and be 1-1 with the defender to the goal, if he had continued to make a try on the goal, instaed of going to the corner - how that would have compromised the defense - all 10 other players were still way back. Those same opportunities presented themselves late in the game after going up 2-1, and instead of taking the opportunities, the players on the field chose not to.

Were they told not to by the coach? I doubt it. I can write, again, that if to change the offensive attack at that point in the game, given the way the game was played, and flowed, is the prevailing wisdom, and the coach did tell them to do that after going up 2-1, that is probably the single biggest reason why I have never really taken a liking to soccer - but I don't think that is the case.

 

[junglehusky]

Unbelieveable!! If you can score a goal from your own half in under 5 seconds, and apparently you can, and you have the best player in the world - why the hell would you be worried about a player tooling around with the ball in your own corner? I'd be freaking psyched that we still had a chance. I guess that's what makes me different from other people.

Because you can't score if you don't have possession - even if you have the best player in the world.

 

[Gurleyman]

The more you open up your offense, the more vulnerable you are to counterattack. You absolutely want to change the way you play with a lead vs. behind. It's the nature of the game. It's not always conducive to your squad -- for instance, the US is not really a great defending team, but the truth is, you've been running around in the Amazon for over 80 minutes at this point. Sure, you'd love to keep driving and score another goal, but there are a lot of considerations, like the fact that your midfielders are absolutely exhausted and you don't have unlimited subs. There are nothing wrong with the game strategically. It was just a bad play by Bradley and Cameron at the worst possible time.

In pretty much every sport, you change your strategy when leading late in the game. You run the ball in football, milk the shot clock in hoops, keep defenders at the blue line in hockey, play no doubles defense in baseball, lay up in golf, etc. It is playing the percentages. I guess you could make an exception for net sports like volleyball and tennis where there's no clock and no strategic advantage to a more defensive posture.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Against Ghana, Bradley boomed the ball to the goalie in the final minute looking for a pass instead of going to the corner flag - a mistake that didn't matter. Gave Ghana one last counter that they otherwise wouldn't have had, but we cleared it before it got into our offensive third.

The idea is to minimize the amount of time you have to defend in your own box, when anything can happen (strange deflection, accidental hand ball, etc). We did it right except for the very last sequence. We really gave them two chances in 15 minutes after taking the lead (Ronaldo put a weak header wide on the other, hey also had 5 guys offsides on one that I am not counting). If Bradley traps that ball well and sends it back to a corner flag, we hold on 2-1 without Howard needing to really do anything in the last 15 minutes.

If you get a clear breakaway or a 3 on 1 or something, then you go for the final nail. If it's just a guy running up the sideline with defenders in the way, head to the flag and try to kill a minute or two. An ambitious foray into the box where there's a slim chance of scoring gives the other team the ball quicker and forces you to defend longer.

This makes perfect sense, if we're up 3-1. I don't think it's ever smart to compromise your defense in a bad way, intentionally - regardless of the circumstance. It's not smart to compromise your defense - I just don't understand why attacking the goal to the end of the game yesterday would have compromised our defense - hadn't we already substituted for a 5th defender - and we were STILL getting offensive chances with less attackers right? Am I wrong about that?

 

[Carl Spackler]

Because you can't score if you don't have possession - even if you have the best player in the world.

This is becoming a circular discussion. I apologize for that.

How about this? If Dempsey is still playing the single forward position, and he's got the opportunity for a breakaway chance at the goal, after making some great moves down the sideline - do you (or anyone) think he makes the choice to go to the corner? Up 2-1 with less than 10 minutes to play? I don't - I think he goes for the goal. I suppose the difference of opinion here, is that when Wondowlowski - who is a backup in his first world cup - had the same choice - he went conservative and changed the entire flow of the game, and others here think that had he gone to the goal it would have changed our defense somehow? I don't think so, the player was 1-1 deep in the other end, with our other players way back. I bet that Klinsmann has already told wondowlowski, that if he's in that situation again, to take a shot on goal.

It breathed new life into the Portugal players, while we were on our heels hoping for the win, and they made the plays when it mattered - to avoid the loss - and we didn't make the plays when it mattered to get the win.

 

[Carl Spackler]

In pretty much every sport, you change your strategy when leading late in the game. You run the ball in football, milk the shot clock in hoops, keep defenders at the blue line in hockey, play no doubles defense in baseball, lay up in golf, etc. It is playing the percentages. I guess you could make an exception for net sports like volleyball and tennis where there's no clock and no strategic advantage to a more defensive posture.

You change tactics depending on the flow of the game, and what's working and not working. Not strategy. The strategy in soccer as far as I can tell, is to score more goals than your opponent to win.

As far as I can tell, and I don't see why this is so difficult for others, except maybe it questions all your "conventional" wisdom about soccer, is that the offensive tactics we were using against Portugal were working, to get us from 0-0, down 1-0 to up 2-1 through about 82 minutes. The early goal we gave up was because we couldn't get the ball out of our own box on a pass, the game tying goal came the same way. The only thing we changed tactically defensively late, was substituting and extra defender (which didn't work). I don't see any need for changing what we were doing tactically on offense, it doesn't make sense. The only thing they did, was substitute Dempsey for another forward with fresh legs. No reason why Dempsey with tired legs couldn't stand around in the corner - why substitute fresh legs for that? I wonder if someone will actually ask klinsmann that. This is not American football - the ball moves so fast, and you can score so quick from anywhere on the field. We did change offensively tactically though late in the game - we stopped creating scoring chances.

My opinion apparently goes against all conventional soccer "wisdom". So be it. The game changed, when we stopped creating scoring chances offensively, by our own volition. I would bet anything that Klinsmann will have a long talk with the players, about not doing that again.

 

[DarthGrumpy]

I thought this was a good post-game assessment, especially after the emotion of the draw worn off a bit.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/world-cup-pass-move-i-cant-believe-that-we-did-draw/

 

[BlueMAB]

Wondo had fresh legs to chase the ball around and put pressure on their back line, and he did a good job. You really show how little you understand the game here Carl. Wondo just wasn't standing in the corner, he was chasing the ball and pressuring the back line.

We were creating scoring opportunities with our fullbacks making runs up the side. You don't send your fullbacks on runs deep into the opposition up 2-1 with a few minutes left in the game... "because the ball moves so fast and [with a few well placed passes and runs] you can score quickly from anywhere on the field". You leave them back to defend the attack and the turnover and counter attack.

The game changed when Bradley turned the ball over, and we had two defenders run to space instead of finding the attacker and marking him.

 

[meyers7]

I do wish that OT was sudden death though. If in OT, the team that score first wins. Period.

The reason they went away from that was it made the teams too tentative. Nobody would risk going after the win, too much to lose.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Wondo had fresh legs to chase the ball around and put pressure on their back line, and he did a good job. You really show how little you understand the game here Carl. Wondo just wasn't standing in the corner, he was chasing the ball and pressuring the back line.

We were creating scoring opportunities with our fullbacks making runs up the side. You don't send your fullbacks on runs deep into the opposition up 2-1 with a few minutes left in the game... "because the ball moves so fast and [with a few well placed passes and runs] you can score quickly from anywhere on the field". You leave them back to defend the attack and the turnover and counter attack.

The game changed when Bradley turned the ball over, and we had two defenders run to space instead of finding the attacker and marking him.

Just writing what I think. I understand what happened on the final goal. I'm not concerned with the specifics of who failed to cover who, and what - Portugal needed a goal, and they got the ball to their best player, and he made the play - that's what happened. I'm concerned with the failure to squash the Portugal team mentally, which in turn fails to take their legs out from them, which Germany did effectively without a doubt - they crushed that team - and that opportunity was lost well before because we took the pedal off the gas in the offensive zone of the field in our own offensive play - that's my position, and it's not changing.

I wish I could find a clip, just tried, failed - but here's my memory. We are defending - the ball gets to our possession, Wondowloski gets the ball on the opposing side, near sideline to camera. he makes some kind of moves to get down the sideline, and past his defender - at this point, he is from what I remember 1-1 with the remaining defender and ahd great position to make an attack toward goal which would put him 1-1 with a defender at approximately the corner of the goal box, or to continue to the corner. The rest of the USA team - was way back. I don't see how that compromises our defense in any way. Instead - he goes to the corner, putzes for a few seconds and then makes a real long pass back out to midline of the field and the USA has possession for maybe another 15-20 seconds clearly, and then Portugal is back on the attack.

For me - that's when the entire game changed - Portugal didn't quit. We didn't make them quit. We had them down, and we let them back in the game. That's what I saw.

 

[meyers7]

I thought this was a good post-game assessment, especially after the emotion of the draw worn off a bit.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/world-cup-pass-move-i-cant-believe-that-we-did-draw/

Some good stuff in there. Thanks

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

Just writing what I think. I understand what happened on the final goal. I'm not concerned with the specifics of who failed to cover who, and what - Portugal needed a goal, and they got the ball to their best player, and he made the play - that's what happened. I'm concerned with the failure to squash the Portugal team mentally, which in turn fails to take their legs out from them, which Germany did effectively without a doubt - they crushed that team - and that opportunity was lost well before because we took the pedal off the gas in the offensive zone of the field in our own offensive play - that's my position, and it's not changing.

We're not Germany. We don't have that level of talent on our team. We took plenty of shots all game at Portugal. We had a lot of shots on target. But they don't all go in. That's the nature of the game. Portugal is a top 10 team in the world and ranked ahead of us by virtually every ranking system imaginable, so the notion that we should've crushed their spirit, while admirable, is probably a bit ambitious. They hung around cause they're a good team. A team like the US isn't going to be able to blow the doors off of many other World Cup teams because we just aren't at that elite level.

 

[Carl Spackler]

We're not Germany. We don't have that level of talent on our team. We took plenty of shots all game at Portugal. We had a lot of shots on target. But they don't all go in. That's the nature of the game. Portugal is a top 10 team in the world and ranked ahead of us by virtually every ranking system imaginable, so the notion that we should've crushed their spirit, while admirable, is probably a bit ambitious. They hung around cause they're a good team. A team like the US isn't going to be able to blow the doors off of many other World Cup teams because we just aren't at that elite level.

I can tell you one thing, and this isn't negotiable, no matter what my experience with soccer is. A ball that is not directed at the goal, will not go in the goal.

 

[BlueMAB]

Carl, I'm not asking you to change your opinion. But you're being really obtuse, and no matter how many times you say the same thing over and over again, you're wrong.

You're ignoring the fact that Portugal had 10 men on the field for about 55 minutes while Germany blew them out. I can't imagine that had anything to do with the outcome.

You're ignoring the fact that our scoring chances were coming by sending Beasley and Johnson on runs. If you think we should have kept sending our backs up the field, then when Portugal won that ball from Bradley, Beasley wouldn't have been anywhere near him. He would have been pressing up the field, and Ronaldo would have been 1 v 1 with Howard. There's no way he doesn't score in that scenario, and we still tie.

Sure Wondo could have went on a 1 v 1 and tried to score. We have no idea what would have happened. He may have turned it over sooner, he may have scored, he may have sparked a counter attack, we'll never know. But his decision to sit on the ball and waste time wasn't the wrong one, and wasn't what cost us the game. He moved the ball as far away from our goal as possible, without removing it from play. What cost the game was the failure of 2-3 guys to mark the lone attacker in the box.

You're arguing the tactics were wrong because of what you saw, apparently what you didn't see were the numbers were in our favor. Cameron stops running on the play instead of going to the attacker. He literally slows his run back to defend just one or two steps, and that was all it took for the ball to be by him and in the net. They had a 2 on 4. They shouldn't score in that scenario. You're free to not change your mind, but you're still wrong.