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Villarreal 5, Twente 1: The Highlights

RossiGooch (Getty Images)

Villarreal took a giant step toward the UEFA Europa League semifinals with a sound thumping of FC Twente in the first leg of their quarterfinal series at Estadio El Madrigal on Thursday.

Nilmar scored twice, and Giuseppe Rossi added a beautiful strike in the second half to put Oguchi Onyewu and his teammates in a giant hole heading into the return leg. Twente was able to secure an away goal through Marc Janko at the end of the match to salvage a 5-1 scoreline and maintain a sliver of hope in the competition.

Highlights of the match are after the jump:

Comments

  1. “And Rossi has never had the opportunity to show his stuff on the biggest stage for a national team, the WC, where LD had excelled.”

    Not to disagree but many people would say the Champions League is the highest level, higher than the World Cup. Rossi has at least 8 appearances and 3 goals there, something LD has never done.

    I would say there are more question marks about Donovan as a player than about Rossi, who has done it consistently at a higher level than Landon. However,both are really good and would have been great together for the US.

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  2. This is not a rare poor game by Gooch.

    He was beaten in the last minute in the 1-2 loss to AZ Alkmaar in February after Twente had heroically tied the game at 89 minutes — bad karma. He also failed to clear the ball on the play that led to the first goal. This was Twente’s only loss in the league this year.

    He and the team played poorly in the 0-2 loss at Zenit.

    And now this poor showing — slow, clueless, careless, and half-hearted play.

    The team is a very strong 5-0-1 11-2 with him on the bench and only 6-3-3 20-15 with him playing since January — 15 points dropped in 12 games versus 2 in 6 games.

    Given his poor play with the USA team, I think he’s toast. AC Milan won’t want him back.

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  3. Do you understand anything about the game?

    Gooch kept the guy onside on the second goal and didn’t react quickly enough to help out. When Rossi was going at him, Gooch payed like a frightened chicken. I don’t have a clue what Gooch was doing on Rossi’s goal — looks like he was worried about Rossi deciding to attack the corner — not the corner of the goal, but the field corner. He opened up a path right to the goal for Rossi. On Rossi’s assist to Nilmar, Gooch also made it far too easy for Rossi and far too hard for his mates. Even on the first and third goals Gooch wasn’t well-placed. He didn’t come off his spot to defend on either, when he was probably the defender with the best chance to stop it. Just awful.

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  4. um, no. he defended neither of them, and kept the play onsides. make a decision. If he had stuck to the winger, then Rossi if offsides. if you defend two, you defend 0. that is what he did.

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  5. I have always liked Gooch, but he had a really bad day; keeping forwards onsides, failing to get stuck in on a shooter, coming over late with help, he looked like a kid who just got moved from offense to defense on a u-10 team.

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  6. Hey did poorly on the second goal, drifting way behind his line to keep the man onside. And he wasn’t great on the fourth goal, either – he and the other defender couldn’t seem to decide who should take Rossi, and in the end neither did.

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  7. Good God I hope this post is not serious and not referring to what I think it is.. because I believe Rossi’s father actually passed away earlier this year.

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  8. God…he’s so f*ckin good and it makes me sad and pisses me off at the same time. He’s easily one of the top 10 strikers in the world right now. He is the one thing that we needed in the World Cup and the one thing we need right now. I hate to be the one to beat a dead horse, but goddamn.

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  9. Well they play different roles. And Rossi has never had the opportunity to show his stuff on the biggest stage for a national team, the WC, where LD had excelled. I think it’s a bit strange in one sense to say that the USA “produced” Rossi, considering he was coached by his father in high school, and then went to Europe at a very young age to play in Italy/England/Spain.

    But it’s clear that Rossi probably would have been the best pure striker the US ever fielded, had he chosen to represent the country of his birth. It’s sad but true — Rossi would have perfectly filled our #1 weakness at the past 2 World Cups, and who knows how many future World Cups.

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  10. For the Board:

    Who is the better play- Rossi or Landon?

    Rossi might be the best player the USA has ever produced.

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  11. There was a Villarreal attacker on the wing, who was drawing Gooch out. Gooch actually points at him after the goal. If Gooch commits to the ball, that winger is wide open, and in on goal if Rossi draws Gooch in and slides the ball out to the wing. That being said, Gooch is pretty terrible now. His national team start against Argentina was downright embarrassing.

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  12. Gooch needs to put his body in front of the ball when somebody is about to shoot. He got owned badly on that 4th goal.

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