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Altidore scores again, ties career high for goals in another AZ victory

Make that 15 Eredivisie goals and 19 across all competitions this season for Jozy Altidore.

Altidore scored his latest goal for AZ Alkmaar on Friday, netting the third goal for the club in a 4-1 victory over VVV Venlo. The U.S. Men’s National Team striker put the game out of reach by running onto a through ball played in behind the defense and opening his hips before slotting a shot to the far post.

The clinical finish now ties Altidore’s career-high for goals in a season (which he set in the 2011-2012), and he has a little less than half the campaign still to play.

Here is the goal:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJDkFw5ggBs?feature=player_embedded]

What do you think of Altidore’s goal? Impressed with the clinical finish? Think he will score 25 or more goals this season?

Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. How often do you see any of the US team strikers get service like that? Midfield going forward is a bigger problem for the USMNT than the forwards.

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    • I agree with you there. The biggest problem with the the Nats right now (in my opinion) is it’s lack of of a big assist guy. In goal we’re great (d’uh, the U.S. has always done well with GKs) up top there are guys that can put ball to net pretty well ( Jozy, Herc, Deuce, Donovan) but not much in the way of someone who can feed forwards the ball with ease. Sure the Nats have other problem areas (defense) but goals win games and if you don’t have a guy to set up your goal-scorers you won’t get far.

      Reply
  2. Would love to see Jozy go to a club like Chelsea and succeed. The US has never had a forward at a top level club like Chelsea, which would automatically make Altidore one of the most famous players in the world.

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    • Never would happen. If Jozy could head to a club like Everton (mid table status and lots of passionate fans) or a Swansea (small club where he could eventually start and be central to the team). Chelseais a nightmare.

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  3. Jozy is doing well enough that he’ll get looks from Ajax and PSV, at least. I would be skeptical about interest from EPL, though. He didn’t do much during his stint at Hull City and he fails to deliver when playing for the USMNT. Too hot and cold, I think. Moving up to a bigger club within the Netherlands or a bigger club outside of UK, Spain, Germany or Italy is a possibility.

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  4. Whether you like Jozy or not, he is finding ways to score goals and this is good news! The guy is a beast. It’s obvious that he is pressing a bit when he puts on the US kit. He wants to do well for his country. Gotta love his play

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    • why would any true American fan hate Jozy? I realize evidence is that many do, but it’s pure BS with their own agenda, much like those who proclaimed MB was shite and now are stuck in that perspective without the stones to step out of their own BS

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  5. A goal is a goal…first touch and second touches were good…tougher shot then it looks to open the hips as your body is going in the opposite direction and a reasonable finish…looked a little like a miss hit(ball might have taken a bounce) but that is where his technique saves him. The only issue is that might now been a goal in the Prem or the Bundesliga. In a better league somebody who slows the ball down that much gets caught but it is the fact that he slowed down that left the goalie helpless.

    Is he that good? I hope so!!!!!! I am just glad to see him continue to score. I would rather see him rack up goals in an inferior league then go to a big league and not get playing time. Maybe you can break Micheal Bradley dutch league total for a single season.

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  6. One of his best goals this season for me. Excellent run and classy finish. I hope he tears it up at the national team level so I can eat all the negative words I’ve said in the past.

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    • Me too…+1….Jozy is the type of player you want to root for but sometimes he looks disinterested in putting the work in during the full course of a game for the Nats.

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  7. Am i the first to notice he was wearing gloves? I recall watching a hull match and he was subbed in and the commentator quickly asked, “IS HE WEARING GLOVES?” I’m not sure the prem will work for him…..

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  8. Geez, you guys are really going to keep making these sarcastic anti-Jozy posts his entire career, aren’t you. They aren’t original, clever, or funny. Get it together, fellas!

    Reply
    • I would love to see nothing but sarcastic anti-Jozy in the comment sections. the truly annoying thing is all the real anti-jozy (any player, really) comments.

      And they only get more funny the more there are.

      I feel the same about sarcastic nepotism Michael Bradley comments – hysterical forever in any number. Mostly because the haters are mostly the ones who think their superior soccer knowledge qualifies them to deem such and such player (Eddie Johnson) as a failure or weak. With each sarcastic repeat of their most astute criticisms it reminds them just how poor their ability to rate players really is. And therein lies the the hilarity of repeated sarcastic comments.

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      • Travis,

        EJ was deemed a failure because…….well , he was a failure.

        He’s better now.

        The great big secret is that players are like anyone else,they go through ups and downs , they get better they get worse.

        Most SBI hater commentary is based on old sterotypes because keeping current with a US player’s progress is so difficult these days.

        Do you realize how hard it is to type “Jozy Altidore” or “AZ” into Google and then click on it?

        For one thing you would have to be able to spell.

  9. a better striker would have rainbowed the ball over his head then scorpion kicked it into the net.

    then in celebration he would have runned up to the nearest ball-boy and kicked him in the chest.

    whatever jozy…

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    • I agree. The Mongolian third division just does not cut it. Did anyone else notice that the second defender In the video is actually a goat?

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  10. Great finish. I do wonder, though, why always looked so tired on the pitch. I watched most of the game, and after about 20 minutes he looked spent.

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      • Right. That makes sense. Shouldn’t expect a professional forward to have the stamina to play 60-70 minutes without being exhausted. Cheers Michael.

      • After watching Jozy play i’ve come to realize that he just “looks” tired. I remember the match a couple months ago when AZ got a red, and played for 50 min with 10. I thought he looked gassed after 60 minutes, but I started to realize he was still running down long balls and harassing defenders.

    • I don’t feel that is the case anymore. A year and a half ago, that would have been the case but these days he plays the full 90 with good energy the whole match. He doesn’t have quite the work rate of Herc but he’s a much larger player and dragging around a much bigger frame.

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      • Yeah, fair point. He did outrun those defenders in the 60+ minute. I still think Fanjam and David might be right: some people just look tired. Perhaps Jozy is one of them.

    • Is it not possible that he wants to look more tired than he really is? There have been plenty of athletes of display a greater level of fatigue to gain an edge on an opponent who underestimates how much they have in the tank…if he was such a fat slob I’m sure his manager wouldn’t have him in his starting 11 every match

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    • Switching sports, Jim Brown used to look tired. He would make a good run and get up like it took all his strength to rise again, then get the ball and bowl over a couple of tackers the next play. The defense kept thinking Brown was spent and he kept running over them. Doesn’t matter how he looks, but how he plays. If you remember the Algeria game in the WC when everyone was running on fumes, after Howard took the shot from Algeria and started the fast break going the other way, it was Altidore among the first players down at the other end of the pitch. Consider this play shown here, too. Altidore doesn’t look like he’s running hard, but he is beating the defensive players down the field.

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  11. Reminded me of the second goal Slovenia scored against the US in the World Cup. Beat the offside trap, control the pass, finish to the far post. Very nice.

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  12. More impressed with the run behind the defense. A better ST would have scored with the outside of his right foot, leaving less time for the defense to attempt a slide.

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    • No. Great strikers score goals by opening up their hips. Messi’s hips are part of what make him so great. He can open them up at a moment’s notice at a full run weaving through defenders. The outside of the foot is much less accurate than opening the hips and slotting it home like Jozy did. Pretty much lesson number one for strikers is to open the hips and practice it until you can do it at the full run and in all different situations.

      Reply
      • TomG,

        Great strikers score lots of goals on a regular basis usually when they really need to.

        The technique they use is irrelevant.

      • I was responding to the comment made above on this particular goal. Check the thread Before you criticize please.

      • TomG.

        I was responding to your comment:

        “Great strikers score goals by opening up their hips.”

        While that technique is something every player should have learned by the time they reach adulthood, regardless of their position, your comment is not necessarily true.

        I‘ve seen guys in Jozy’s position:

        • Keep the ball and round the keeper and either walk it in or slot it in

        • Keep the ball and round the keeper and center it for a teammate to tap in.

        • Put it on their left and slot it in

        • Chip the keeper.

        Etc, etc. Great goalscorers are judged by the quantity, and to some extent the timing, of their goals not the quality.

        For example, I’ve seen Mikey Bradley score some great goals but he is not a great goal scorer.

    • Agreed, typical Lazy OutTheDoor finish, he just does as little as possible to get by. A true striker would have done a rainbow over the keeper and an overhead kick for the goal. Jozy’s always been to lazy to score truly creative goals, it’s amazing he even ran onto the ball in the first place given his outright aversion to movement off the ball…

      …Seriously though kb, you’re going to criticise that finish? He had plenty of separation from the defender and chose to place the ball where neither the keeper nor the defender could have stopped it, and chose to do so by opening up his hips and striking the ball with the inside of the foot, which guarantees the greatest amount of accuracy for a shot where accuracy was much more important than either power or a quick trigger. If you use your speed and first touch to create separation as he did, there is NO reason to get fancy with the outside of your foot when a much more pragmatic and higher percentage shot is available. Will you people never stop criticising him?

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      • +1 – correct.
        Correct technique, well schooled finish, etc.
        But, could he do that against either CONCACAF first team defenders, or CONMEBOL first team defenders. I could see a Brazilian centerback chasing him down and muscling him off the ball, at least slide tackling him in the area and getting ball.

      • funny 🙂

        anyway, it’s amuzing (that’s right, with a Z) to hear the negativity on Jozy after he scores such a nice goal…again.

      • I stole this joke up on the first of this double comment, but I didn’t realize it. Also, I added like 1000x more hyperbole. You can claim the joke as a discovery player, but I made it a DP.

      • Very true. But if Altidore had done that he probably would have just drunk a 12 ounce slurpee because hes way too lazy to drink a 64 ounce slurpee on the finish, as any real strker would do. So my point is that even if he did the rainbow – slurpee finish he still would have done it lazily.

  13. More impressed with the run behind the defense. A better ST would have scored with the outside of his right foot, leaving less time for the defense to attempt a slide.

    Reply
    • A goal’s a goal. A “better” striker might have been fancier but Altidore got the job done. The ball was in the net. That’s all I want out of my forward.

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      • A world class finisher could score in a myriad of ways, but at the same time, in that particular situation, any well-placed shot was going to find the back of the net.

      • I disagree. He was running at an angle away from the near post, so I don’t see what advantage would have been obtained by the outside footed strike you mentioned.

      • It was a clinical finish. Controlled, placed, with good vision. Clearly the first poster in this thread isn’t a world class striker as he is in his armchair and Altidore is notching 15 league goals so far this year. Its not like he got a lucky bounce, the shot was tougher to save because if the keeper anticipated it, he still had the option to drag it past the keeper’s right as well

    • You’re an idiot and obvious non-soccer player. First of all the goalie had the near post covered which is why he needed to go far post. If you are suggesting far post, much more difficult to score an outswinging shot (outside of right foot) at the far post than an inswinging shot and also while at full run. Jozy used the right technique…stop hating and don’t comment about things you know nothing about. Hater.

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      • Give the “hater” nonsense a rest. If anyone’s a hater, it’s you. It’s amazing how so many of the haters call other people haters. There is absolutely NOTHING hateful in the post you are responding to. Yours, however, is another matter.

    • No, Good strikers would have done exactly what he did — open up his hips and side foot that ball accross the keeper into the net. Some strikers would have hit that ball with their left foot, near post. which lowers the percentage of scoring. No need to critic his finish. It’s a goal.

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      • I agree. Most top strikers would have either done the same as Jozy or went for power by hitting with shoelaces. There is no need to take a lower percentage shot with the outside of the foot in this situation. .

      • Well stated. Coaches are always going teach players to do things the no-nonsense way. That means making the high-percentage decision and executing.

    • Only took 3 posts for some complaint to come in. Haters gonna hate. Oh, BTW, how many professional goals have you scored in a major European league KB? Yeah, me too.

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    • A WAY BETTER STRIKER WOULD HAVE FLICKED IT BACK UP OVER THE DEFENDER, DONE A BACKFLIP FOR NO REASON, NUTMEGGED TEN RANDOM PEOPLE INDISCRIMINATELY, RAINBOW FLICKED THE BALL UP, DONE SOME GYMNASTICS AND LIU KANGED THAT $#!+ INTO THE UPPER 90, LEAVING THE OPPOSING TEAM IN A SMOULDERING PILE OF RUIN.

      What a ridiculous thing to say, speculating on how a “better” striker would have done it.

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    • Outside of the foot, inside of the foot, does it matter?? he scored…And quite frankly i would take a striker who’d have taken that shot with his inside then someone trying to shoot with his outside.

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    • Also the inside of his boot was able to put english around the keeper instead of spinning away from with the outside of his boot which would have been too close to him. Physics you lose.

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      • Not true. If you are good enough you can bend the ball as much as you need to with the outside of the foot but it is much harder to do when you are in the position Jozy was.

        Doing what Jozy did was simpler and the higher percentage move.

        He was trying to score, not impress people.

    • I don’t know about that. Outside of the foot creates less angle for the ST in that shot. Sure a pinpoint strike with the outside allows for the shot a step earlier but opening up allows for better control and surer placement. Besides outside curls away from goal. Inside curls in to goal.

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    • Outside of the right would mean going for the near post with a curving shot. GK are taught to always prioritize covering the near post. If the defender had slid on the inside of the right foot shot that Jozy took, he would have risked a penalty and red card. Ergo a far post shot was not a bad option.

      BTW, check out those tights Jozy is rocking.

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    • Striking with the outside of the right risks the ball swerving wide of the post. Opening up like he did to strike with inside right was prolly the better move. If keeper had tried to cover far post Josh coulda rolled it back to his left fir an easy left footed finish

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    • Haven’t you ever heard of the acronym KISS–keep it simple stupid? Why go for the complicated, with more chance of failure, than the simple, more sure of success?

      Reply

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