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Americans Abroad: A Look Ahead

Michael Bradley Chievo 2 (Getty Images)

By FRANCO PANIZO

Michael Bradley was one of the key figures in the U.S. men's national team's upset win over Italy on Wednesday in part because of his ability to contain Andrea Pirlo.

His club, Chievo Verona, will be hoping Bradley can replicate that type of outing this weekend.

Bradley and Chievo take to the road to face second-place Juventus in one of the marquee matches involving an American Abroad on Saturday, and that means Bradley will once again square off with Pirlo. If Bradley can do as good a job on the Italian midfielder as he did when he played for the United States two days ago, Chievo will have improved odds at getting a result or perhaps even an upset win.

One American who is not a fixture in his team's lineup but still draws interest from fans every weekend is George John. FC Dallas head coach Schellas Hyndman told SBI that something would be decided for John in the next day or two, so some insight on his future with the Hammers might be provided based upon his role for the match against Cardiff City.

Fellow centerback MIchael Parkhurst will be in action, as the Danish Superliga resumes play after its lengthy winter break. The American defender should be one of FC Nordsjaelland's starters in a match against AGF Aarhus that could bring Nordsjaelland to within one point of the top of the table.

Here is who the Americans Abroad play this weekend:

FRIDAY

Joe Corona, Edgar Castillo, Greg Garza and Club Tijuana play Estudiantes Tecos U.A. de G.

SATURDAY

Adam Henley and Blackburn Rovers play Brad Guzan, Eric Lichaj and Aston Villa.

Stuart Holden, Tim Ream and Bolton Wanderers play Manchester City. (Holden is out injured.)

Tim Howard, Marcus Hahnemann and Everton play Queens Park Rangers.

Zak Whitbread and Norwich City play Stoke City.

Robbie Findley and Nottingham Forest play Barnsley.

Jonathan Spector and Birmingham City play Conor Doyle and Derby County.

Robbie Rogers and Leeds United play Southampton. (Rogers is out injured.)

Mike Grella and Bury play Huddersfield Town.

Anton Peterlin and Walsall play Leyton Orient.

Frank Simek and Carlisle United play Notts County.

Dominic Cervi and Celtic play Aberdeen.

Maurice Edu, Alejandro Bedoya, Carlos Bocanegra and Rangers play Heart of Midlothian.

Michael Bradley and Chievo Verona play Juventus.

David Yelldell and Bayer Leverkusen play Bayern Munich.

Steve Cherundolo and Hannover 96 play FC Augsburg.

Alfredo Morales and Hertha Berlin play Werder Bremen.

Jermaine Jones and Schalke 04 play SC Freiburg. (Jones is out injured.)

Terrence Boyd and Borussia Dortmund play Mainz.

Matt Taylor and SC Paderborn 07 play Alemannia Aachen.

Luis Robles and Karlsruhe play Fortuna Dusseldorf.

Charlie Davies and Sochaux play Valenciennes.

Quentin Westberg and Evian Thonon Gaillard play St Etienne.

Jozy Altidore and AZ Alkmaar play SC Heracles Almelo.

Oguchi Onyewu and Sporting CP play Vitoria Setubal. (Onyewu is out injured.)

Eugene Starikov and Zenit St Petersburg play CSKA Moscow.

Mix Diskerud and KAA Gent play KV Mechelen.

Michael Parkhurst and FC Nordsjaelland play AGF Aarhus.

Herculez Gomez and Santos Laguna play Michael Orozco Fiscal and San Luis.

Jonathan Bornstein and Tigres UANL play Sonny Guadarrama and Atlante.

Jose Torres and Pachuca play Atlas. (Torres is out injured.)

SUNDAY

Clint Dempsey and Fulham play Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Brad Friedel and Tottenham Hotspur play Manchester United.

Daniel Potts, George John and West Ham United play Cardiff City.

Timmy Chandler and FC Nurnberg play Borussia Moenchengladbach.

Fabian Johnson, Danny Williams, Joe Gyau and TSG 1899 Hoffenheim play FC Cologne.

Sacha Kljestan and RSC Anderlecht play Cercle Brugge KSV.

Brad Rusin and HB Koge play AC Horsens.

Clarence Goodson and Brondby IF play Conor O'Brien and SonderjyskE.

Chris Rolfe and Aalborg BK play FC Copenhagen.

Adrian Ruelas and Jaguares de Chiapas play America.

DaMarcus Beasley and Puebla play Chivas de Guadalajara.

MONDAY

Bobby Wood and TSV 1860 Munich play St Pauli. (Wood is out injured.)

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Which matches are you most looking forward to? Think Bradley can help limit Pirlo from making an impact once again? Do you see John staying with West Ham or is a return to Dallas more likely? Expecting Parkhurst and Nordsjaelland to finish this season in first?

Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. It was sad to see the extent to which Pirlo has declined. He is so inept against the USA that he did not have to be marked. If one really watched the game , you could see he retreated to the back four to try to pick up the ball, and his teamates ignored him. If he plays for Italy. Italy losses. He plays zero defense, and the other midfielders know it and resent him for his lack of effort and lazyness. It forces them to work extra to cover for negative ball distribution. The blame is with him. He has become an old dinosoar like Riquelme. Why do you think Milan let him go? Dongt feel sad for him, he had a good run.

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  2. I don’t disagree with that, but it’s worth bearing in mind that central defenders often have a much longer shelf life than midfielders and forwards (freaks like Giggs and Scholes aside). Even with this setback, if that’s what people insist on calling it, I think he’s got time to find his level, wherever that may be.

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  3. Your silliness aside, the author’s opinion is wrong. Pirlo was lobbing perfected ball after ball into the top of the box. Mostly unmolested from Bradley. Either you go with the opinion that Bradley wasn’t doing such a hot job of “containing” Pirlo, or you realize that had those forwards beaten ONE of those traps the entire game would be different. America, obviously, deserved the win, but don’t ruin it with stunted opinion.

    Not trying to take from Bradley’s performance, but he hardly dealt with Pirlo. If we want to be real, Dempsey was probably the one who should have had the most contact with Pirlo. Come at me with something more substantial than the BS you just posted next time.

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  4. Yeah, it’s kind of a no win situation. You just have to trust that Pirlo doesn’t do anything to dangerous with the ball, but then again, he’s Pirlo…

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  5. Clint marked Pirlo but only just enough to maybe distract him a bit, once in a while.

    JK and Clint both know that even at his defensive best, Duece wasn’t going to be able to shut down Pirlo and if you do that you take CLint out of the offense, which means the best the US could have hoped for was a 0-0 draw. They made the right choice.

    Now if Donovan had played, I would have had him live in Pirlo’s jersey and left the goals to Clint.

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  6. You are right however, all those guys, except maybe Landon, were younger.

    So they had a little more time to shake off the effects. George needs to get right back in the saddle and not go into a funk like Sacha did when his Celtic deal fell through.

    Time is not his friend.

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  7. About time. I can’t believe he’s been left out of the senior squad pool for so long when Kaiserslautern seems nearly incapable of scoring goals with their current forwards!

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  8. Clint Dempsey was the man who was supposed to be marking Pirlo, which he did a few times, but he did so lackadaisically, which is why Pirlo had so many chances to dictate play.

    Pirlo was shut down in no way shape or form and I’m pretty sure that Franco, no offense to him, was just looking for a nice headline…

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  9. I dont think that Holden will play for Bolton this year. There was an article on ESPN that gave some insight on what he has been up to.

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  10. I didn’t say that. Italy had several chances they didn’t convert and we had one that we did. That’s not luck, that’s one team having Clint Dempsey

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  11. +1ish. MB was playing pretty deep and Dempsey & Altidore often were given the task of marking Pirlo. It’s really a team effort since he can ping passes from anywhere on the pitch.

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  12. Bradley had one hell of a game. One of the best I’ve even seem him play for us. But to say he contained Pirlo is a bit of a stretch. He may have slowed him a bit, but his job was mainly stopping the guys who Pirlo passed to.

    The US doesn’t have a player that can shut down Pirlo. That’s because such a player doesn’t exist. Dude is an All-timer.

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  13. Goodson’s stock high? I thought his performance against Italy was passable and he was clearly the weakest link in the back four. I really hope somebody with more talent replaces him. My bet would be on Cameron. Also, I’m still skeptical that Gooch should be our starting CB leading up to 2014 despite his good form recently in Portugal.

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  14. BTW,
    Let me add that Reid was injured in the New Zealand friendly, so chances are John will finally get a start this weekend.

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  15. How so? West Ham has every little depth in defense. Winston Reid, who John would compete with for a position, has been in relatively decent form lately. However Reid is a starter mainly by default because West Ham lost Upson after being relegated. The other main CB, Tomkins, has had some knocks lately. All they have behind them is basically 17-year old Potts. I suspect Big Sam will keep John.

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  16. Bradley was magnificent, but he wasn’t marking Pirlo, neither was Edu, that’s why he had so much time on the ball. In the end both DM’s played very deep with neither on Pirlo.

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  17. Hyperbole much?

    Michael Bradley had a difficult loan spell to a shambolic Aston Villa and he’s back at the top of his game less than one year later. Landon Donovan’s move to Bayer Leverkusen didn’t work out, nor did his loan to Bayern München. Jozy has largely recovered from a lousy loan spell at Hull. Hell, even Freddy Adu is showing signs of improvement after some pretty disastrous loans. One less-than-ideal move isn’t going to kill John’s career.

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  18. I think that comes down to Alex McLeish, unfortunately. Lichaj has been playing well in the reserves, but McLeish has tried all sorts of options at left back rather than give Lichaj a first-team start. Ciaran Clark got a run out a while back and was run ragged, and he’s out injured at the moment, anyway. Carlos Cuellar did quite well there, but he’s needed at center back. Stephen Warnock has had a nightmare season, but I imagine he’s more likely to get the call against Blackburn than Lichaj. As for right back, McLeish seems to like Alan Hutton more than just about anyone else who is not playing on the left wing against Aston Villa.

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  19. Bradley played really well in the Italy match, but if he contains Pirlo as you suggested he did Chievo will lose by 5.

    That is because Bradley did not mark Pirlo.

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  20. Bradley was not the US player marking Pirlo.
    That was Dempsey’s job.
    And even he admitted that he did a marginal job at it.

    On the other hand, scoring makes up for it….

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  21. So in otherwords, we just got lucky. We didn’t beat them, they beat themselves and we were the beneficiaries?

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  22. I love bradley jr., but did not see him delaying pirlo’s passes. pirlo was getting off those long lofted inch-perfect passes pretty much when he wanted. however, bradley and edu were not getting beat by the dribble, so italy predictably resorted to the long ball over and over, which our defenders did a nice job stopping.

    that said, italy’s forwards had some quality chances that they didn’t convert

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  23. I wonder if the time is coming for Goodson to consider a bigger club. One would have to think his stock is pretty high, even in spite of Brondy’s lower position on the table…

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  24. Clint Dempsey did NOT score a goal against Buffon. Buffon’s defense (and three imaginary leprechauns and the European Central Bank) scored a goal against Buffon.

    See how ridiculous that sounds?

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  25. how close is Lichaj to getting a run with the first team at AV? and is Guzan going to re-up with AV or leave come summer?

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  26. how is Clarence Goodson doing? His team Brondy, arguably the biggest club in Scandinavia, is in the relegation zone. Shame cause they have the talent to be in the Europa League

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