A lot of talk has gone on today and last night really about the CONCACAF World Cup qualifying standings at this point. I know I made a bigger deal out of the standings a couple days ago and I still stand by my thoughts about how I think the US are still fine even with the loss to Mexcio.

There is still a lot of qualifying left to do. Let’s make that clear, four games may not seem like much but it can certainly change the landscape of how things will finish out here.

First of all the US has gotten it’s hard games out of the way on the road in Costa Rica and Mexico, not to mention getting their home game to Mexico out of the way. They still have Costa Rica at home left to finish out qualifying but as we all know in the Hexagonal, Costa Rica and Mexico (up until the Gold Cup for them at least) don’t win in the US and the US doesn’t win in Mexico and Costa Rica. If that holds to be true we will indeed be fine.

But saying we will be fine isn’t enough for some. The way the standings are right now we pretty much have a sense of who the top four teams will be and who the bottom two are. Trinidad and Tobago and El Salvador aren’t out of the running but they sure have a longer way to go with four games remaining.

At this point the best case for the US would be a first place finish in the group with say 19 points (the two home wins and a win in either T&T or Honduras). Speaking of Honduras they are sort of the wild card team in this for CONCACAF. I still think they could qualify over Mexico here if things go right.

Again, a lot of soccer left to be played. I still feel good about the US here but I know some naysayers out there may disagree.

Time for some extra links though to get you through the rest of the day. Continue Reading…

Our boys are ESPY winners! (Getty Images)

The U.S. men’s national team’s amazing upset of Spain in the 2009 Confederations Cup semifinal is now an award winning upset. The national team won the award at the ESPY Award Ceremony on Wednesday night in Los Angeles for Best Upset in American sports.

The ESPY Awards Ceremony was taped on last night, but will air on Sunday on ESPN.

Several members of the USA Confederations Cup team were on hand to accept the award, including Landon Donovan, Sacha Kljestan, Clint Dempsey, Carlos Bocanegra and Jozy Altidore.

Disappointing yes, but proud of the US national team nonetheless. (Getty Images)

No one ever said this game was easy. The highs and lows of soccer have never been more noticeable until today.

It is always amazing how a game can be so different from one half to the next. The first half in the FIFA Confederation’s Cup final against Brazil showed the world that the US is here to stay and could be a power on the biggest stages of them all. But the second half showed that the US is just not all the way there quite yet.

Yeah, it was an emotional game to say the least and I wonder at times if the guys just ran out of steam emotionally late in the second half along with running out of steam physically and mentally. We knew Brazil would make their run in the second half and that they would more than likely score. Its never easy to go into the half with a 2-0 lead. Never easy.

But looking back the first half was more than a dream. For 45 minutes the US pressed hard and got their chances early and often. Clint Dempsey’s first goal was a bit of class between him and Jonathan Spector. The second half on the counter-attack with Charlie Davies and Landon Donovan was something else entirely. Usually the US is on the end of those kind of crazy counters, but this time it was our guys sticking it to one of the world’s best.

Let’s face it though, we should be able to say that we are emerging as a soccer power in some degree. Getting big time results across the pond, even if it is in Africa is still a big deal. Scoring two quality goals on a country like Brazil is something to be happy about. I’m not usually one for moral victories but in a way the US can hang their hats on a few quality things. I don’t believe going into the negatives in this one because I really felt a lot of the same passion and energy from the Spain game was carried over to this one.

I do believe we are getting very close to what a lot of people expect out of this group now. If anything this last week was a total confidence boost to the US national team program as a whole and going forward into next year. I know there is still some qualifying left on the menu for the year but I fully believe the US will now show less fear against those that they have struggled with before. Biggest step for this bunch will obviously be the Mexcio game in a couple months down in Mexico City. If the boys play anywhere near the level that they did against Spain and the first 45 against Brazil then we should expect our first win in Mexcio.

The US has announced to the world that they are for real here and that we aren’t just a fluke. Before this week I don’t believe we could have said that. I can say too that I have never been more proud of this bunch until now. We know where we need to get next and that is a huge step going forward.

Could this be the biggest win ever for the US? (Getty Images)

Boy what a thriller huh? If you called a 2-0 win over Spain for the US you should probably be well on your way to an island somewhere celebrating your winnings. No one honestly called that kind of a win for the US today. Sure some had hopes of that kind of result but truth be told you’d be kidding yourself if you thought it would actually happen.

But looking back on the game I can honestly say this was the best performance from the entire team as a whole in a long time. It’s been a very long while since I’ve seen the US national team play so well for 90 minutes and not give up anything too stupid or costly.

Consider this, the Spanish put their best squad out there today and gunned for the win. Its not like some past wins in this tournament where the world power didn’t care. Today they cared and the US were able to take it to them. While I don’t think this makes us a world power or anything just yet I do believe it will help get us to that next level that we as a country have been reaching for a while here.

A big thing today was the level of passion and intensity on the field from the US. I have to give credit all around the field because the defense stepped up like never before and the offense did just enough to annoy the Spanish defense to get the two goals. Maybe it had something to do with Carlos Bocaengra wearing the captians armband once again, or maybe it had something to do with the level of respect that US were not getting from the start.

I kind of believe the US just delievered the world a blueprint to beating Spain. Hold them tigh defensively and press the crap out of them when the chances are there.

Also the possession was there more so for the US than expected. They weathered the storm of corner kicks and Tim Howard came up huge with needed. Oquchi Onyewu and Jay DeMeirt had one of their best games each in defense, they were constantly clearing everything that came in their way.

Just how good were the two US goals too? Jozy Altidore and his strong possesional play to score his first goal and Dempsey’s hammering home of the second game late in the second half. Landon Donovan really set up the second goal were as good play from Charlie Davis and Michael Bradley helped fuel the first.

I know a lot of folks hammered Bob Bradley last week but this lineup worked well for the US today. Some would have liked subs brought on earlier in the second half but he picked his moments right today when he did bring on fresh legs. Also speaking of those fresh legs I thought he did an excellent job of picking the right guys off the bench to come on for the game. Benny Feihaber came on first for US and I thought he was the best sub of the game. Conor Casey late for Altidore was a smart move as Casey is big, strong and able to hold possession well.

In all this will definitely go down as one of the biggest wins in US soccer history. Bigger than the Brazil win in the Gold Cup a decade ago, and bigger than the Portugal win in 2002.

Now on to the final on Sunday. Do you all think the US has any magic left for the final?

Editor’s note: Geoff Reid appears each week on WVHooligan.com. This week he is tackling the great debate about who is the best US National team player? Feel free to leave Geoff your thoughts below.

This is a question I’ve thought about the last few days. There can be cases made for a number of players depending on accomplishments achieved, trophies won, goals to matches ratio and list can go on and on. The big question here is who is the current best national team player? Four players come to mind in no particular order: Michael Bradley, Timmy Howard, Clint Dempsey and Landon Donovan. Continue Reading…

Call it a new feature here on WVH, while I’m trying to maintain focus on the MLS playoff race; this is something I’ve been wanting to do for a while now, a focus on the Americans abroad in other leagues. I was going to debut this last week but honestly ran out of time early in the week so I put it off until today.

Hopefully this will evolve a bit more over time but for now its just going to be a simple rundown of how everyone did this weekend in their respective leagues.

Some Yanks had the weekend off, some didn’t make it back to their respective clubs after the World Cup qualifier on Wednesday in Guatemala.

Biggest news may be out of France, Freddy Adu did make his debut for AS Monaco this weekend, playing just three minutes in place of Jeremy Menez. We could see Adu replace Menez at Monaco here real soon as from what I’ve been reading Menez is looking to transfer out. That could be a very good thing for Adu as we all want to see him get more playing time, wherever he is.

If there are players I forgot to list feel free to list them below. Or if something is incorrect, also please post it below. As much as I try to focus on everyone I know I will miss or slip up on someone, somewhere.

ENGLAND

• Tim Howard started, played 90 minutes, and made three saves in Everton’s 2-1 win against West Bromwich Albion on Saturday. Give this man an iron-man award for actually making the hustle back to England for this match, despite getting knocked in the head by Carlos Ruiz on Wednesday.
• Brad Friedel started, played 90 minutes, and made zero saves in Aston Villa’s 3-2 loss to Stoke on Saturday. Ugly game really, I caught some of it and felt kind of bad for Friedel, his defense really looked bad in this one.
• Marcus Hahnemann started, played 90 minutes and made six saves in Reading’s 4-2 loss to Charlton on Saturday. Another ugly game, lots of goals though which was fun but defensively it was not pretty.
• Bobby Convey started and played 73 minutes for Reading.
• Clint Dempsey came off the bench and played 13 minutes in Fulham’s 1-0 win vs. Arsenal on Saturday.
• Jay DeMerit started and played 90 minutes in Watford’s 3-2 loss to Nottingham Forest on Saturday.
• Eddie Johnson did not dress in Cardiff City’s 2-2 tie vs. Norwich on Saturday. Might wanna cut Eddie a break, if you’ve seen this video you will know what I am talking about. The Grown-Ass Man clearly is a bit jet-lagged right now and knows very little of why he is playing in the Coca-Cola division.

Continue Reading…

Even though I decided not to write recaps or thoughts to the other two friendlies that the US men’s national team played over the last couple weeks, tonight compelled me to do so. It wasn’t that the other two were disappointing, okay the England game was, but its something about facing the world’s number one and gaining a positive result that really makes you think.

Out of the three friendlies, this was by far the best game. It was like we’ve built this up over the course of the three matches. England, as mentioned before, was disappointing on all levels. Spain was a positive step forward but in the end we showed we ran out of gas. But tonight’s clash with Argentina proved to me and a lot of people that this US side will be able to handle the best sides in the world.

I won’t recap the entire game because I honestly missed a few minutes here and there for work related reasons (blame the schedule for me being on-call this weekend…).

But a few thought on the game itself:

• Tim Howard – Easily the man of the match. So many key saves in big moments of the game. How he isn’t in discussions for one of the world’s best keepers is beyond me. That game tonight proved he is worthy of being in the discussion if he wasn’t already. Good luck to Brad Guzan or Dominic Cervi for beating this guy out for the starting role over the next few years. He has it on lock down.
• Speaking of having a position locked down. Heath Pearce easily has the left back position on lock down now. Damn how he intrigues me. Proves yet again how the MLS fails at signing home grown talent at a good wage. This guy is really improving his game on all ends any more.
• Eddie Johnson, again not bad but nothing great. His bar is still so low that it almost doesn’t matter what he does but his pace can be effective.
• Clint Dempsey actually looked good in this one. After the last two matches he looked practically useless out there but tonight he was effective, making solid runs and really working hard.
• Same goes for Michael Bradley.
• Landon Donovan elevates this club more than we really believe. He wasn’t great tonight but his work ethic out there shows.
• I loved the energy that the US came out with in the second half. Very promising.
• Argentina had the bulk of chances in the game but the US probably came a little closer with a couple post-hitting shots.
• Argentina is a completely different squad without Messi in the line up. As good as they looked all night, without him they lacked a certain element to their game.
• How Julio Cruz missed all of those shots at point blank against Howard is still pretty amazing. I thought he would have at least nailed on in after a while but Howard had his number tonight.
• Weird second yellow to Pablo Mastronei, who had a decent night. The yellow-to-red shouldn’t have been called but at least the US weren’t down a man for too long.
• Nice to see Sasha Kljestan out there tonight, even in a substitute role.
• Great crowd (78,682), too bad it was nasty rain at the end of it though. Still even as big as Giants Stadium is you can deny its a solid venue for soccer when it is full.
• I think the US looks fit and ready for World Cup qualifying now. We should get rosters early this week for the Barbados game this coming weekend.

What else did I miss? Feel free to pipe in your own.