The Analysis of the USA in South Africa

Now that the "storm" has passed -and so have a few days- and we have been eliminated from the world cup, I will attempt to make sense of what happened to the team in South Africa.

First of all, let's say that we pretty much played catch-up throughout the tournament. First with England, which went ahead in the score within the first 5' of the match. Then Slovenia which also went ahead in the scoreboard, but 2-0 instead. Then it was Algeria in a must-win situation in the last game of the group phase. The only, and winning goal came in the 91st minute -wish it would have been in the NinetiethMinute!-

Talk about an emotional roller coaster for 3 matches. Then it came Ghana in the round of 16. We all knew it would be a tough match. However, prior to the match we talked about some of the keys which could assure the US a win over the team that had denied us any chances -slim, at best- at advancing out of the group stage in the previous world cup, Germany 2006. We even talked about the line-up we thought could provide the US the best chance. It certainly did not include Ricardo Clark in the midfield, whose grotesque mistake originated the first Ghana's goal to, once again, put the US behind in the scoreboard only 5 minutes into the match. Two minutes later Clark would see a yellow card, and 25 minutes later he would be substituted by Maurice Edu. With this move, Bob Bradley conceded he had made a terrible mistake by starting Clark, and consequently wasted one substitution for when it could be needed most.

Bottom line is the gross coaching mistakes that were made in absolutely every US match were to blame for trailing in the score every match.

As we have repeteadly said US Soccer is trying to compete against world-class coaching talent and experience, in the biggest soccer stage in the world with American coaches whose only experience has been coaching college and MLS soccer. If anyone else in the world read this they would laughing uncontrollably. But here, we believe is the right thing to do. Are we really serious? We have, in Sunil Gulati, an India native man running soccer in this country. Who are we kidding for Pete's sakes? Nobody, that's the answer as we all could have seen during this world cup.

The players left all they had on the pitch, and that was our only saving grace. Tactically, what the US showed was poor at best. Everyone could agree on how we had to play against Ghana, but the coaching staff was on another planet. To be caught off-guard in the first few minutes of one match is understandable. But for that to happen in almost every match demostrates the lack of knowledge and experience of the coaching staff.

It is very easy now to point fingers in every direction, but when we have been talking about the same flaws that we saw in the world cup for years, someone has got to start paying attention. I truly believe we now have, for the most part, the player talent needed to compete with anyone in the world. Unfortunately, when it comes to coaching we are light-years behind everyone else in the world.

If US Soccer, or Gulati for that matter, is so fixated on having American-born coaches, fine. But let's train them properly. Let's send them to learn and acquire experience at the UEFA Coaching School, or the Brazilian and Argentinian Coaching schools. We have the resources to do that, but where are our coaches acquiring experience? This is a joke now, really.

As you can probably gather from this article I am fed-up with the coaching style and "talent" we have in this country. I applaud the players for their dedication, enthusiasm and desire to put the US on the world soccer-map. But with the stunning public response, support and involvement we all witnessed during this world cup from the American people it's time to get really serious now.

Regardless of what we say about the US participation in South Africa, I believe majority of people expected the team to advance further. And that is because we believe in the talent, we believe in the players and the experience most of them are now obtaining from playing in some of the top leagues of the world. Never once did I hear from anyone, "Bob Bradley is the man who is going to lead us into the quarter-finals, or the semi-finals," never! We have achieved a certain level of proficiency now that qualifying in CONCACAF should not be a threat. However, we just don't want to get to the big dance anymore. We want to keep going further and further.

The Bruce Arenas, the Bob Bradleys and company are certainly not the ones who will take us there!