Before Tuesday's trip to Guatemala City, a 1-1 draw might have seemed like an acceptable outcome for the U.S. national team. The Americans, after all, knew they would be facing a hostile environment and desperate opponent. But as it turned out, the result left much to be desired.
Guatemala substitute Marco Pappa's superb 83rd-minute free kick negated Clint Dempsey's first-half tally as the U.S. settled for the tie, moving to 1-0-1 in the semifinal stage of CONCACAF World Cup qualifying. The U.S. currently sits atop its group, level with Jamaica at four points but ahead on goal differential.
After controlling the match for long stretches in the opening stanza, the U.S. struggled to hold off Guatemala's second-half surge, conceding several opportunities before finally getting burned by Pappa's equalizer.
Stepping over a 25-yard free kick following Fabian Johnson's foul on Carlos Ruiz, the Chicago Fire midfielder curled a left-footed shot over the U.S. wall and past a motionless Tim Howard.
The U.S. went ahead in the 40th minute when Dempsey collected a pass from Johnson, evaded the flailing tackles of two Guatemalan defenders, and slotted a low shot into the back of the net for his 27th international goal and second in as many games.
U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann offered no surprises in his starting 11, using the same lineup that picked up a 3-1 win over Antigua & Barbuda on Friday with the exception of Johnson, who returned from a calf injury.
Coming off a 2-1 loss to Jamaica to open the stage, Guatemala failed to find much cohesion going forward in the first half, often falling into a defend-and-counter strategy and looking to earn set pieces in the attacking third. The Americans, meanwhile, struggled to find the final ball until Dempsey broke the deadlock.
The strike came just moments after Guatemala had a chance at the other end, with Howard turning away an angled blast from Carlos Figueroa.
Klinsmann used his first swap at the start of the second half, bringing center back Geoff Cameron on for Clarence Goodson, who had picked up a yellow card. Guatemala, on the other hand, used all three of its substitutions, adding attackers Pappa, Manuel Leon and Dwight Pezzarossi.
The gamble paid off. Guatemala found increased confidence going forward as the half went on, and the home side should have leveled the score in the 68th minute. Mario Rodriguez forced a stellar save from Howard off a corner kick and the rebound fell straight to Ruiz, but the veteran striker skied his point-blank rebound effort over the bar.
The U.S. will return to World Cup qualifying in September, with a pair of matches against Jamaica: Sept. 7 in Kingston and Sept. 11 in Columbus, Ohio.
now this is more reasonable. acknowledging that playing those two as attacking options may not be the best idea. personally, i’m not entirely convinced Adu, Benny or Corona would really be able to change that, but i think Adu and Corona deserve a shot. put Jones in Edu’s spot, Edu to the bench, replace Beckerman with Adu on the roster.
we didn’t play with three defensive mids!!! we played with one, and used two other players who normally play in a defensive role, in an attacking role. jesus.
spot on.
i’d even try Beasley at this point.
dude, you are way off based. we attacked more tonight on the road than we have ever done before. we had possession, we had double digit chances (not many on target though…), and outplayed Guatemala for the majority of the match.
it’s because of the style we played that is keeping people from going insane. had we tied while playing bunker ball, like we use to, things would be a lot more negative around here.
it wouldn’t have been that bad if it was the USA. Mexico and El Salvador are big rivals.
i totally forgot about the missed PK call. he got taken out hard. and i believe JK even mentioned this in the post game that Jozy was limping after that.
i think it comes down to the style in which we get results. when have we ever had that much possession on the road in a place like guatemala? or create as many chances as we did? we were up 2-0 in my mind before the ref decided it wouldn’t be a CONCACAF game without controversy.
dude, Jones has more assists (3) than anyone else on the team since the start of the year. he has been very good getting forward and involved in the attack. his foot work is what lets him down. he’s a great passer, has good vision, but can’t dribble like a true attacker.
i’m with you. this was a very entertaining game and the USA looked good away from home in a hostile environment. probably the first time since i have been watching have they looked that good away from home in a tough atmosphere.
see, this is what i find ridiculous about USMNT fans. Jones has the most assists (3) since the start of the year for our team (although Johnson may have tied it up last night). he also has one of the highest passing percentages. i don’t understand how you can say he can’t pass.
we actually had good possession.
Decent ratio for Altidore. But he’s usually the primary target every time he steps on the field. So it’s skewed a little.
Scoring avg
Bradley: 15% What exactly is so great about him?
Altidore: 27%
Dempsey: 31% Usually not at pure striker
Donovan: 35% Mostly from midfield
Gomez: 40% Aging. But our only natural striker.
Altidore should continue to be groomed. But there’s no way he starts over dempsey, donovan, or gomez. IMHO. He is way short on instinct.We have always lacked someone who finishes the easy ones. He doesn’t.
Altidore is our best striker I’d say. We just won’t agree on this one, which is OK.
Sure his workrate can be an issue, but he’s a proven track record of scoring goals with the Nats and at his club. At he’s very young so much room for improvement. What’s he achieved at his age for a USA player is quite remarkable, actually: success at international and club level.
There were actually quite a few 1on1 situations were player with dribbling skills could have turned the tide…but jermaine jones( gotta love that name!) Had feet of stone. Happy? 30 pesos could have bought me a good time in guatamala!
It’s hard to say in hindsight…But I am on board with the attack in some order consisting of Gomez, Donovan, and Dempsey. I think it’s our best chance at goals.
As for the rest I think we could have learned a lot from
———Bradley——-
—Beckerman—–Corona—
johs–goods–cameron–dolo
———guzan————
Beckerman and Bradley could both fall back to defend as needed. I really want to see Edu at a pure CDM without bradley or jones around him. But this game wasn’t necessarily the time. Would really be curious to see how Corona’s experience in Mexico would have translated. Gomez looked unphased by the play and the crowd, Corona may have as well.
I genuinely think that Beckerman gives us all of the benefits of Bradley with a much lower turn over ratio and more accountability on defense. Wish Williams, Feilhaber, Kljestan (deserves another shot), rogers (yes rogers), and quite a few others were options on the bench. the bench is skimpy.
Guzan needs to be thrown a bone every once in a while so he doesn’t lose interest. He is more than capable.
He does play in the Italian league. He plays box to box, and he does it pretty damn well. Edu is our only defensive midfielder in the formation we use.
I agree with most of that. I think gomez, donovan, and dempsey are all better options than altidore at striker. Of all differing opinions about USMNT, the one that I just can’t wrap my head around is how anyone likes altidore. He’s lazy and his skills are miniscule. He occassionally scores, but he’s rarely in the right spot. Gomez is our best option as far as someone who can sniff out a goal and bury the easy ones. That being said I also like Donovan at forward more than at mid.
Getting Danny Williams or Lichaj or whoever ready to replace dolo is essential. We need to start thinking about boca’s replacement as well.
I couldn’t agree more…Adu can find holes and put the ball through….now our strikers have to make the runs. He deserves to be there….he is not a kid anymore…
Jones had a couple of lazy giveaways. Then again, so did Johnson. Jones was also getting clobbered every time he got within the same zip code of the ball.
You misspelled “*over* 100 caps”
Bradley should have slotted that.
they had two fluke goals go their way El Salvador was really giving it to them. they won but by the skin of their teeth.
mexico did not dominate the game like we did in guatemala the problem we had was we let guatemala back in it by not finishing our chances
Donovan unwillingness to attack the goal with only 1 defender in front of him was very disappointing.
Its hard to score when the hosts basically parked the Bus the game was ok slow at times and i agree the final third is where we would run out of ideas. we had pretty good possession which is a new thing for me to watch. considering that for the last decade we basically defended and countered when we played in central america. some people will never be happy
this was a tie that felt like a loss we really should have had the win We really needed that second goal to put guatemala away.
Saprissa may beg to differ that was like watching Futsal on a regulation field
As I said in a comment yesterday, I would like to see Castillo, Torres, Corona and Gomez in a staating line-up. I think Donovan would be a great super sub. I would love to see below as a starting line-up. But if MB is on the bench as a sub, Klinsmann is going to feel the heat.
—————-Gomez——–
—————Dempsey——–
Castillo—-Torres——Corona
————-Jones——-
Johnson–Boca–Cameron–Dolo–
Klinsmann has had all these friendlies to try something new, like the line-up above, which is what a lot of us wanted (something new), and all we are getting is basically repeat of what we had under Bob Bradley, except using all three defensive midfielders and a crazy experiment with Jose Torres at left back. Do I sound frustrated? Well, I am. That said, I still support Klinsmann. I just want to see him show a bit more courage.
was in response to “Dude’s comment in the above thread, sorry for the misclick
I can see how some people disagree with 3 defensive mids. Given our injuries/player pool, what lineup would you have trotted out there?
I think the problem with Dolo is Landon. The fact Landon has been playing so poorly since Scotland forces Dolo in some weird spots.
I think as long as Dolo is a starter at his Bundesliga team (i.e. he’s in shape), he probably starts until we can develop someone else. Chandler was the heir apparent, but now I wish that we see Lichaj develop there at his club first. But you’re right that Dolo, though still serviceable, is a question mark for 2014. I still think he’s the best RB we have right now, but certainly we should be exploring finding his successor.
If Holden can find it again, you can slide Jones in lieu of Edu and Holden in lieu of Jones for more defense/offense balance in that sector of the field. Or danny williams can have a role too. I’m not a huge fan of Torres though I have to admit. I think Altidore should start again (he’s our best pure striker) if 100% fit, and we could drop landon and put deuce on the right and Gomez on the left, perhaps for more pop in the final third.
… He does have 100 caps.
+1
I missed the part in those games where Messi was at left back and Ronoldo was playing Center Defensive Mid.
My point is the results are one thing if you put out a good squad. When you repeatedly just throw something together you open yourself up to criticism.
Clearly Scotland was an outlier for this team. It means nothing. I love the 433. I was relatively ok with the line up yesterday…..aside from the entire midfield. You say putting the veterans in there was the safe bet for an important match. I say we won despite them.
Bradley needs to play attacking mid if anything. He has a massive issue with turning the ball over and needs to only be able to do it in the offensive third.
Jones is a CDM and that’s it. He has some assists but they were no brainers, not creations. I thought for sure he would be red carded in the Guatemala match. Glad he wasn’t, but for me is too much of a risk to ever put on the field.
Edu needs a chance at a pure cdm role without jones or bradley on top of him, then we can make a determination about him.
Donovan has turned into a crap shoot. Unfortunately there is no telling what benching him would have done to his ego.
Cherundolo is too old to play an attacking back style. I don’t think we can afford to have two backs attacking anyway and Fabian is clearly better at it. Also, dolo sure as hell won’t be any faster in 2 years.
Yes, we should win every game 5-0 in central America because they don’t know how to play soccer. Let’s fire JK right away because the sky is falling. Start Adu & Lichaj and our problems will be solved. Edu on the other hand is evil and should be banned from playing soccer ever again.
Jogi Lowe? Didn’t his team lose 5-3 vs Switzerland recently? What a bunch of bums they should have fired everyone and the German players obviously are not very good because they didn’t blow out a minnow, right? Ronaldo should never start again, since Portugal couldn’t beat Cyprus. Obviously Portugal is an extremely weak team. I can’t believe Messi is still playing after Bolivia beat Argentina 6-1. Argentina is obviously a team with no talent and they should fire everybody there.
What if we had put a young player in the midfield and the inexperience cost us the game? People would have said we should have started a veteran. Also don’t forget JJ has been an assist machine playing in JK’s 4-3-3, the same 4-3-3 people were raving about after it demolished the Scots.
Hindsight is always 20/20 that’s the problem. If Altidore’s goal counted we win this one 2-0 and people would not be having these types of discussions.
Now I don’t disagree with you that we need more creativity and attacking potency, but the main culprit yesterday was really Donnovan, who seems not up to par so far.
I think the problem for this USMNT player pool, which btw is also in my opinion the best in history, is the lack of attacking midfielders. So JK is kind of forced to play this team, unless he takes some risk with some very green players, such as a Gatt or a Corana say. But again, it’s a big risk in WCQ.
It’s an endless discussion really: does JK try untested youngsters in a tough WCQ venue or does he go with something more experienced and solid to secure a result? The fact we didn’t win the game gives weight to the former, but personally I’d rather get the points and move on. Once Torres, Williams, Holden, etc.. come back we’ll have more options. Then perhaps in the friendlies in August we can try some young blood on the wings to experiment a bit so we can see if they can be useful come the next WCQ games.
you are so sure a player like Benny could not help this team in the final 3rd?
he used to help Bradley’s teams in the final 3rd, and so far, Klinsmann’s teams seem to struggle in the final 3rd most outings
No Mas! Comments:
1. I’ve seen enough of this formation with THREE defensive midfielders and a single, stranded forward–inefficient and ineffective.
2. Bad player choices– Edu and Torres are liabliities at this level; same for Parkhurst, and Wondolowski who are also not international quality. (same goes for Klejsten (sp) although not called)
3. No excuse for Lichaj not being on this team.
4.Ojectively, Adu brings more at the international level than Torres.
5. Tired of the excuses. We should not be struggling for “results” against minnows ten years after our run at the WC in 2002.
6. Those who said Jogi Lowe was the man were probably correct. I hope our next coach is an Argentine, a Brazilian or a Spaniard who truly “gets it”.
Whatever happened to no one is a guaranteed starter? Efforts from Donovan, Jones, Edu, Bradley, and Dolo just haven’t been enough. They aren’t getting it done. It’s been made pretty clear that they are all guaranteed starters no matter how out of position they have to play
well said. it’s a slugfest, not a beauty pageant
definitely, and in our region it is fact proven time and time again
I do not think we can go easily in our region anywhere and win, and i am not some young pup either–been around.
and we were lucky to escape with a point last night being forced to scamble and emergency defend down the stretch to keep the point.
the USA was outplayed in the second half so I’m very happy with the one point
In the 4-3-3 that JK is using, the team needs the outside forwards to do some creating, especially when Bradley has to mind his defensive responsibilities. I just did not get the sense that Donovan was willing or able to fill that role. Indeed, it seemed that Jones had the ball more often in attacking positions that Donovan did.
*disagree
You are right. However, for me it’s really disappointing. Why? Because we don’t put the right team on the field. Playing a 433 with bradley, edu, and jones, really makes it seem like Klinsman just doesn’t have a clue. What do you learn from playing Jermaine Jones at outside mid? Nothing. Winning on the road is a challenge and that’s why you should either be developing young players with that experience or going with what you know. We didn’t do either.
I didagree that the official was against the USA…no.
He was yelling “Jozy! Jozy!”
Not sure why, though.
agreed. can’t blame the ref for this one although he was imperfect, but for our region, on the road, thought he was fine
the ref was not the problem last night
The sky is falling.. it must be qualifications time