world cup - Page 4

I knew they were booing Barthez and Dhorassoo but thought they were also booing Zidane. Okay, it was Cisse, whatever. At any rate, why the booing? Is this just dissatisfaction with the choice of players? I would wonder if it is a racist thing (Zidane, Cissee, and Dhorassoo(my guess by name at least) being of African descent), but Barthez?

bob

Barthez plays for Marseille which is the arch rival club of Paris. I don't have a rational explanation for this as they are really just a bunch of idiotic fucks

Yeah, I see this. It just seems that sometimes expectations are too high.



Ah, I didn't see the match, only heard the reports later. These latter two reasons are what I thought it was. Barthez vs Coupet (who I'm unfamiliar with) and Paris vs. Marseilles.




Weird huh? I think it's our American obstinancy (sp?). We just have to do things differently.

bob

I'm both more and less optimistic about the American chances. O'Brien looked great but was clearly lacking conditioning. He should be great coming off the bench. If the US ever went to a Libero, he'd be my pick. Beasley is lacking confidence, a true shame as he has rare speed. Eddie Lewis remains our best crosser just as McBride remains our best target player. It would be something to see Lewis play with an aerial finisher on the order of a Klinsmann. Look for Donovan (der kleine Kaiser) to have a huge cup performance as playmaker and the highly over-rated Reyna to (finally!) be on the bench.

Bobbie Convey is also going to provide some sparks before the Americans bow out.

Sorry, CdM, but I fear Donavon will do nothing. He will crumble under the pressure of not playing at home. But I pray I'm wrong.

I am looking for Eddie Johnson to shine. I think once he gets that first goal after missing national team games due to injury, he will be burning for more--and will get them.

Onyewu has a real potential to come out of this with big contract offers too. As one of the commentators was saying the other night, he has the size, the determination, and the speed to be a phenom defender.

I agree, though, that Reyna is on his last legs. And that Lewis, Beasley, and Convey will provide much of our spark. They will be the troops that keep us going.


bob

I think Donovan's thing was homesickness, playing away from the US for extended periods. I think he'll do just fine on his German vacation. Even Ronaldo always said that he preferred playing in Spain over Italy, partly because of language. I don't fault Donovan for that. You could argue that he should have never signed with a German club if he didn't want to play there, but he was a pretty young kid when he did that.

I guess I see it much more cynically than you. I look at his failure in Germany not simply as a case of homesick-ness that is cured by going home. I see it as a person who claims to want to play on the international stage and at the highest level failing in Germany, but not even trying anything else once the first attempt (as an adult) didn't work. He drove straight home to his place of comfort. He speaks spanish, so why not try Spain? Why not England or Scotland? Having a common language would at least make him feel more at home.

A large part of this is also that I feel he was representing the USA in this and he let us down. Howard didn't fare too well when he moved to ManU but he is still trying. He's going on loan next season because he wants first-team game time. He wants to show that he can play in the EPL. Landond packed it in and said "I'll stick with mediocrity."

And then when you look at all of the phenom US players in Europe who get no mention in the papers back home while Donovan gets all this praise, it makes me very very angry with him. [Yeah, and the media that portray him as this darling-wunderkind of US football.]


bob

Lampard sucks and needs an anchor like Makelele. Gerrard is a complete midfielder who could play with either an anchor or another box to box midfielder (a la Alonso, Pirlo, etc). Lamps + Gerrard is suicide. I remember Ericson playing Becks as the anchor, needless to say it was bloody hilarious.

Oh and no offense but I dont think USA would even get out of the group stages but then I dont watch MLS at all so I cant say much.

Barthez would probably get the nod over Coupet (who is much better now) as Domenech is an imbecile.

Titi is black and no French supporter would boo him. Same with Vieira, Thuram, Makelele etc.

And he had a big freaking rock on his forehead.

But don't base our prospects necessarily on our MLS players. There are 12 Euro-based and 11-MLS based on the squad. And O'Brien only moved to the MLS in the last, what 6 months?

bob

Oh yeah, duh. I rather managed to forget about all the other players.


bob