It was all US in the first half - all Brazil in the second. Tim Howard had a series of excellent saves, Jonathan Spector was all over the pitch, and Jay DeMerit, with the exception of being turned on the second goal, played an excellent match, but Brazil out-lasted and out-formed the US squad, winning the Championship 3-2.
The US ran out of juice in the second half but had nothing to be ashamed of - they simply lost to a better squad. Tim Howard continues to impress, creating one save out of nothing by convincing the referee what looked for all the world like a goal was a save.
Attention now turns to World Cup qualifying where, with half the 10 matches played, US is 4 points clear of the play-off spot.
2 comments:
Hi Watford Yank,
I was just in the US for a holiday during the confederations cup. I didn’t notice much coverage of the Spain victory in the news, but maybe I was watching the wrong channels.
Did it get much attention?
No - they were pretty much written off against Spain given 1) Spain's record, 2) the backdoor way we slid into the semis, and 3) our overall feebleness.
Once we beat Spain however, the bandwagon started rolling - see:
Stephen Colbert - "Is it Time to Care About Soccer?"
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/232488/june-30-2009/is-it-time-to-care-about-soccer-
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