World Cup - Netherlands vs. Brazil

I still disagree with the Oranje for not bringing Ruud van Nistelrooy to the tournament. They should see how well Klose is doing for Germany. Now that Van Persie is not in good form (I actually never considered him as good as those other great Dutch strikers), will Robben and Sneijder, great as they are, be enough to open up the excellent Brazil defense?

On the other end, Elano will be out injured. Felipe Melo may be out also. Ramires has to sit out with 2 yellows. Kaka still has not shown that he is as good as he once was. All these issues will weaken Brazil's attack, which makes the 2 teams more even.

With Brazil's defense and Van Persie's poor form, I am not sure if the Netherlands can score one goal. Even with Felipe Melo out, Brazil should still win by a goal or by penalty shootout.

This is the best stats I've seen so far:

Landon Donovan 3:0 Wayne Rooney

The USA's loss is gut-wrenching. It helps a little when England and Mexico also lost. It showed that they were no better than us (even though we know that that's not true).

The truth is we have overachieved with a bunch of poor to mediocre players. Coach Bradley had done a good job in instilling confidence and spirit into the team. The players bonded well and seemed willing to fight for each others. But in the end, they were still a ragtag bunch.

When you build a team, you build from the spine. Unfortunately, those were our weakest areas. Other than Tim Howard and Michael Bradley, the rest of our spine are shaky at best. Bocanegra, DeMerit and Clark all cost us goals. Altidore, at 20 years old, is still too young and unseasoned to spearhead our attack.

It is time to revamp the team and the program. Even so, I still think the suit, Sunil Gulati, just talked smack.

World Cup - USA vs. Ghana

In 2006, we were in the World Cup and needed a win in our 3rd Group Stage game to qualify for the knock-out phase. Instead, we were beaten by Ghana and went home in humiliation. Four years later, we need to get past the same team to go where we want.

Ghana have a very strong midfield and they are a very disciplined team. They have strength, skills and can hold their formation well. Their weakness is that they do not have a lethal striker and they can't score. 4 years ago, they beat us on a penalty kick. Since then, the only goals they scored in the World Cup were penalty kicks.

Their backline is very disciplined. I've watched quite a bit of their right-back Pantsil because he plays for the same club as Clint Dempsey and I was never that impressed with him. Since we don't have someone who is a natural left-sided attacker (please, no Beasley), I would play Altidore slightly to the left and exploit that area. Which means we need another striker more to the center and I hope Coach Bradley will give Buddle another chance. I understand Coach always wanted a Charlie Davies-like player in Findley, but there's a big gap between the two and it's time to shelve that experiment.

Ghana usually play a 4-2-3-1 and midfield is their strength. We can counter them by playing a 3-3-2-2 with Cherundolo, DeMerit and Bocanegra in the back; Bradley, Edu and Clark in front of the backline; Donovan and Dempsey supporting the attack; plus Buddle and Altidore up front. This may seem a little too defensive-minded but when we attack, we can have 7 with Dolo, Bradley and Edu going forward.

What I like about the approach is flexibility in defense. DeMerit will be marking Gyan. Bocanegra, Edu and Clark will be covering each other on the left side, usually against Tagoe. Our 3 defensive midfielders can minimize the creativity and long shots from their 3 attacking midfielders. If they get pass them, we still have Bocanegra and Cherundolo covering.

In attack, I prefer not to have our best player, Donovan, always playing on the right. He and Dempsey should be given free rein behind the strikers. With Dolo (and sometimes Landon) going deep right and Altidore sliding slightly left, there will be plenty of chances for Donovan, Bradley, Buddle, Dempsey and Edu.

My worry is if Coach plays too conservatively. That will suit Ghana better than us. We should be aggressive minded and set a target of scoring 3 goals.

Go USA!

World Cup - Groups E & F

The game of interest today is Denmark vs. Japan. Italy has always been a slow starter. Like England, they will find a way to squeak by Slovakia. Netherlands should easily handle Cameroon who is playing only for pride. New Zealand will fight Paraguay hard for a draw.

World Cup - Germany Must Win

Serbia should beat Australia for sure, so Germany have to win to advance. Ghana, despite leading the group now, will go home if they lose to Germany.

World Cup - Capello's Stage Fright

Capello, after being a very successful club team manager, had stage fright as he approached his first World Cup as a national team manager. After a very successful World Cup qualifying campaign - where England won 9 of their 10 matches and scored the most goals in Europe, he decided to call up some old and retired England players.

Midfield dynamo Paul Scholes turned down the offer citing that he didn't want to take away precious spots from players who helped England secured the World Cup qualificaton. Ledley King, well known for his chronic knee problem, agreed but lasted only half a game. Jamie Carragher, with his slow pace, also agreed but his limitation was immediately shown against Altidore in their USA game.

Adam Johnson was a left-footed winger who can play on either side. He was in excellent form when finishing the Premier League and Don Capello called him up for England's initial World Cup squad. He was dropped in the final selection for lesser players like Aaron Lennon, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Joe Cole - who, although with more England team experience, were all recently recovered from their respective injuries.

It is well known that Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard, both excellent players, cannot play together in midfield. They are so similar in style that they end up giving the contribution of one player instead of 2+. Don Fabio knew that but was too chickened to drop either one of them from the starting lineup.

Capello must be pretty jealous when he saw how USA's Altidore assist in their 2nd goal against Slovenia. Those are the kinds of assist he wants to see his pet, Heskey, delivers on the England team. Emile's contributions has been minimal outside of assisting in England's only goal so far.

It is highly likely that they will draw against Slovenia and end up on the next plane back to England.

World Cup - Team USA

USA have a World Class keeper in Tim Howard but one of the worst backlines in the tournament. Howard has injured ribs which might explain his approach in losing the 2nd goal against Slovenia. DeMerit and Onyewu are poor distributors such that whenever they had the ball, one of our 2 central midfielders had to come back and help distribute which meant we had one less player in midfield.

The lack of a good and reliable holding midfielder is our Achilles heel. Clark's defensive lapse gave England their only goal so far, plus he was not a good passer. When we tried pairing Bradley and Torres in the 1st half of our 2nd game, Bradley mistakenly moved up too much and left José for defensive duties. That was surprising considering it was known that Torres is a good creator but a poor defender. Either Coach Bradley designed the wrong plan or son Bradley did not follow order. Edu in the 2nd half, to me, provided the best pairing with Michael.

Donovan is our best player but we need more urgency from him. His lapse cost us Slovenia's 1st goal. As Birsa moved in from the left trying to receive a pass, Landon somehow decided to run upfield instead of marking his man, which left Birsa unchallenged to place a beautiful shot. Donovan's urgency in the 2nd half of that game is what we need from him for 90 minutes.

Dempsey is better as a 2nd forward than as a midfielder. His bravery and surprise shots scored him a lot of half chances. He is willing to work hard defensively while being assigned to midfield, but his lesser ball skills limits our creativity from midfield.

Up front, Findley should never be a starter. I known coach wanted to have somebody like our injured Charlie Davis, who was quick and deadly, but Robbie is not the answer. Coach should have experimented more with Gomez or Buddle as Altidore's strike partner.

With all our limitations, we should still be slightly better than the Algerians. If our key players deliver, we should end up at the top of Group C.