Nod of the head to Bill Simmons. I used to love reading his running diaries when I was in college and he was still writing at ESPN.
Pregame:
- Line-up is out. Two forwards? Zardes is starting. That’s gonna go over well.
- Long is captain? Wow. Didn’t see that coming. Bad sign for Bradley?
- Time to head to Twitter to check the reaction. I bet it’ll be positive. Twitter is such a nice place…
More Pregame stuff:
- Bradley hate. Lots of Bradley hate. *sigh*
- No one knows the formation. Confusion reigns.
- Best guess: 4-4-2, 4-3-3? I have no clue.
Baird——-Ebobisse——-Zardes
Mihailovic—-Bradley—–Roldan
Lovitz—Long—Zimmerman—Lima
—————-Steffen—————-
*That’s my best guess. We’ll see how it looks on the field.
- Hey. US Soccer. How about a graphic that shows the formation? I think Panama might be able to figure it out anyway. Not gaining a whole lot of competitive advantage there and it’s freakin’ annoying.
- Alternatively, Tenorio says the team has been working on a 4-1-4-1 with Mihailovic and Roldan as dual 10s. That’s a much better guess than mine, but I’m still confused.
- Caught the Sportscenter pregame segment. Zero insight. Gotta love the clearly uncomfortable anchor reading questions off a piece of paper. Why is our country like this? Ugh.
- Time to try to get my kids (4 and 2) to clean up the living room. Be back at kickoff (I hope).
Pre: Mom has heroically taken over and is doing bedtime. Man, that empty stadium is depressing. Everyone and their mother is tweeting out shots of the deserted stadium. Can’t wait for the extreme close-up cam tonight to try to avoid showing the empty seats.
Pre: First time I’ve ever heard the WWE blamed for low USMNT attendance. Royal Rumble is pretty awesome though. Maybe just lower ticket prices a tad, eh?
Pre: ESPN’s lineup graphic has Ebobisse on the left wing in that 4-3-3 formation with Zardes at CF. Interesting. Shutting down Twitter until halftime. This is going to be weird. Can I watch soccer without obsessively checking what everyone else is saying about it?
Kickoff:
2nd minute: Panama looks dangerous…
3rd minute: A Panamanian (?) has apparently been shot in the face. Hope he’s okay.
6th minute: Game is living up to the January camp stereotype. Yuck.. System looks interesting though. Sort of a back 3 in possession and a back 4 defending?
8th minute: Zardes doesn’t put a wide open header on frame. Drink. Does Mihailovic have frosted tips or is he blonde? Dude, I hope he’s blonde.
14th minute: Berhalter is an attractive man. Statham-esque. I bet he drinks wheatgrass and sh…tuff.
16th minute: Roldan with a shot, but misses a wide open Baird breaking on goal.
18th minute: Bumping heads kills. One of those things you don’t do as an adult anymore. Bet that sucks bad though. Hope they’re both okay.
23rd minute: It’s really nice not seeing Bradley drop all the way back between the centre backs.
27th minute: Couple shots just wide lately. The last one was from Lima. Twellman mentions that might be Adams’ spot when he’s with the team. I’m not sure how to feel about that. The RB role does seem like a hybrid RB/CM spot though. Interesting.
29th minute: A couple corners in a row. Corners are boring. Open play goals are way more fun.
30th minute: Zardes loses the ball into a fairly dangerous chance for the US. Drink. I miss Josh.
33rd minute: Panama sends a shot into low earth orbit. Optimistic, that.
34th minute: Mihailovic hair update. I think he’s just blonde. Crisis averted.
38th minute: Zardes misses a header. Drink. Zardes hair update. Not great, Bob.
40th minute: Mihailovic GOAL. Nice goal on a delayed run into the box. Scores on the cutback. Deflected a little. Ironic, I was just thinking Mihailovic hadn’t showed as much as I’d hoped he would. 1-0.
HALFTIME:
Berhalter interview was actually a little informative. Nice. He wants to get the ball to the “10s” and then play the wingers in behind. Klinsmann wants them to play nastier. Bruce Arena just farted and walked off.
Thoughts? Not bad, I guess. It looks like we’re actually working on something and we scored a goal. That puts this game ahead of like every January game of the last 6 years.
Halftime Twitter check: People are pretty happy! “False” RB position is interesting, Mihailovic playing well, Lovitz’ passing is bad/confusing.
2nd half kick: (Panama with 3 subs – US with none)
51st minute: Random thought. Timmy Chandler *ducks* would look decent at the “false” RB position, wouldn’t he? Assuming Berhalter can talk him into giving a crap. (I know he’s injured and hasn’t played this year)
54th minute: More talk of Adams at the RB position. I might be talked into this. Love him at the 6/8 though. He killed it in central midfield with RB Leipzig today.
56th minute: Nice save from Steffen after a deflected ball falls to an open Panamanian.
60th minute: Another late run from Mihailovic, but the shot gets blocked. Nice move though.
62nd minute: Mihailovic off for Lletget. The subs have started. This is where the game starts feeling extra meaningless. The 6 subs kill the flow of friendlies. New friendly rule: subs only at 45, 60, and 75 minutes barring injury.
66th minute: Zardes misses a chance then sends rebound into row F. Drink. I’m not a big Zardes fan. Has that shown at all?
68th minute: Bradley with a nice defensive recovery run. Much of the US fan base explains that the run just shows how much he sucks.
71st minute: Berhalter is a disappointed dad over that set piece defending. Josh Wolff is also disappointed.
74th minute: Goalkeeper sub in the middle of a half. Wacky. Berhalter cares not for your conventions. Arriola on for Baird. Surprised Arriola didn’t start.
76th minute: Not gonna lie. The fact that Lletget’s twitter handle is da boy negatively impacts my opinion of him.
79th minute: Da boy whiffs on a cross in the box. It was a tough chance, but still. I bet if his twitter handle were SebastianL he would have scored.
80th minute: GOAL. Lima wipes out a Panamanian to break up a counter and then puts in a perfect cross for Zimmerman to dunk with his head. That was pretty sweet. 2-0.
87th minute: another random thought – Yedlin is in trouble if this is what Berhalter wants from his RB.
89th minute: GOAL. Jonathan Lewis undresses his defender and Ramirez taps in the cross. That man had a family, Jonathan. 3-0.
90th minute: Lletget dives in the 90th minute of a friendly where we’re up 3-0…good call, da boy.
GAME OVER
Takeaways:
- Berhalter has a real plan and it’s an interesting one. I can’t wait to see the full team try it out.
- This was a January game that didn’t blow chunks. So that’s nice.
- I almost didn’t notice the backline at all. That’s a good sign. Almost like not noticing your offensive line or the refs.
- Mihailovic may not be a starter with the full team, but he took advantage of his opportunity tonight.
- I think I might love Nick Lima.
Hope you enjoyed this. Maybe I’ll make it a regular thing? Let me know.
