The Morning After

No pictures today just text. This blog is so beautiful.

I am still trying to process yesterday's game. Luckily, I had an 8 hour shift at Barnes and Noble starting at 3pm yesterday, so I had plenty of time to process. And by luckily, I of course mean miserably.

4 years of build up for that. It's like Jim mentioned. I can handle losing, just not like that. Of all the teams to step on the field so far in Germany maybe only Poland looked worse. And that's wholly optimistic.

Onto some players...I am pretty sure DeMarcus Beasley is a media creation. He had 45 great minutes vs Portugal, and had some goals here and there since. But, has he really brought more to this team over the past 5-6 years than say Eddie Lewis? Not really. He's been benched at PSV, looked awful in the tuneups, and yesterday he was by far the worst player on the field. Bruce Arena called him out after the game. The same Bruce Arena who states that current form is so important in how he makes his team. So why leave him in for 90, Bruce? He needs to shoulder some blame as well.

Donovan - invisble.

McBride, set up to fail in a 4-5-1.

Keller, on an island.

Gooch - stock falling.

The left side of Convey and Lewis, defenseless.

We were told over and over that this is the best team the US has assembled for a World Cup, and I remained a bit skeptical. The worth of guys like Earnie Stewart, Cobi Jones, and Joe-Max Moore goes beyond the scoresheet. We don't have guys like that right now. McBride and Reyna aren't those guys, and Donovan isn't ready to be yet either.

It really seems that by and large this is a team, that when they believe their own hype gets into trouble. They were hailed going into Poland in '02 and fell flat. Azteca in qualifying, we were told they could finally win their, and tehy told us they could too, and they fell flat. And now after all the hype, the deepest team in US WC history falls flat.

I am used to this though, I am a Philly fan. On Rocisky's third goal I could have swore I saw Joe Jurevicius running down the sidelines too for teh Tampa Bay Bucs with Blaine Bishop futily chasing him down in the last game at the Vet. It was the same feeling. Awful.

But, you know what...After a dreadful performance against Poland in 02 the team beat Mexico. After a dreadful performance at Azteca, this team bounced back and won their qualifying group. So, though the odds look stacked against us, and Italy looks rather good, I will be at radio radio again Saturday. I will be wearing my American flag. I will be waiting to see the bounceback. I can't turn away just yet. I just don't know any other way to do this.