August 26, 2008
Lamont's take on Olympic women's soccer
A guest blog from Lamont Weston Harvey follows, full of good analysis of the U.S. Women's National Team and its performance in Olympic soccer. -- Jeannette
Carli Lloyd, above, is mobbed by teammates after her goal against Brazil in the Olympic final. However, Lori Chalupny and Hope Solo, below, keyed the win with steady defense.
Analysis of U.S. women's Olympic win
By Lamont W. Harvey
First of all I'll say that it was the best womens game I've seen since 1999.
Formation:
I was glad to see the USA back in the 4-4-2. When coach Ryan had us in a 4-3-3 against tough opponents, it drove me crazy. 4-3-3 is fine to press weaker teams like Mexico, but I wouldn't dream of using it against a team like Brazil.
Tight Defense:
The USA did a good job of closing any possible openings that Brazilians had feasted on in the past. Brazil has young players with good fitness and ball skills, but they are second rate passers and have suspect defense (the same as their men) By playing tight defense we picked off just about all of their passes when they got close. I think it exposed them as not as good as everyone thought. And were able to mount effective counter attacks.
Possession:
Though Brazil had more possession, especially in the first half, it was used to launch exhaustive attacks. The USA's passing was more deliberate. I was glad to see the Americans mixing short passes with the ocassional long pass, and only attacking/shooting when they saw a legitimate opening or chance. This wore down Brazil who stumbled around barely able to walk in the 2nd half.
Without Abby:
When Abby was injured there were people who were doomsday predicting, my response was that any good team is better than any "one" player. Every two years a whole new crop of college girls comes out that are at least as good as the best forward on most of these smaller countries we should try one of them. Abby is also slow, so her absense gave us a chance to try something different, the forwards we had did a better job of pressuring opposing defenses into bad passes. The Brazilians were VERY suseptable to this. We forced their defenders into a lot of very bad passes. We did miss Abby on free kicks, no lie, we weren't the same team without her. I'd rather have her on the team, but there is life after Abby. She is one of the few celbrities to actually make a pass at me, and so made a life-long supporter out of me (sorry, Jeannette was there to see it)
Brazil's attack:
The Brazilians fested the USA back line in an admirably methodical manner. They took on each of the US backs in turn. They found that it was a waste of time going down our left where Chalupny was. The talented red-head in fact led the Americans most dangerous counter attacks. I'd rate here an "8-9" on a scale of 1-10. Our opponents by the end of the game appeared to be completely avoiding their right wing. Trying to keep the ball away from her.
Margraff in the center and Boxx:
Both of these players have shown questionable decision-making ability once they've gained possession, but they were solid, nearly mistake-free, Boxx after her incident with Adriana in the WWC, was especially carefull about South American diving.
Mitts:
Sooo... that leaves Heather Mitts, okay, she's easy on the eyes for guys, and she has good overlapping speed, but after two broken legs, the Brazilians picked her out as the weak link. Nearly every successful Brazilian attack came down our right side. Mitts in frustration got a seemingly foolish yellow card. I think she was tired of them picking on her and tried to send a message. Temper-temper!
Brazil neutralized:
I was happy to see the Brazilians looking rather ordinary by the 60th minute. Marta was recuded to taking wasteful, off-balanced shots from outside of the box.... of course she came VERY close to winning it, but if chances were goals, the USA would have had a 3-0 lead by then.
Formation:
I was glad to see the USA back in the 4-4-2. When coach Ryan had us in a 4-3-3 against tough opponents, it drove me crazy. 4-3-3 is fine to press weaker teams like Mexico, but I wouldn't dream of using it against a team like Brazil.
Tight Defense:
The USA did a good job of closing any possible openings that Brazilians had feasted on in the past. Brazil has young players with good fitness and ball skills, but they are second rate passers and have suspect defense (the same as their men) By playing tight defense we picked off just about all of their passes when they got close. I think it exposed them as not as good as everyone thought. And were able to mount effective counter attacks.
Possession:
Though Brazil had more possession, especially in the first half, it was used to launch exhaustive attacks. The USA's passing was more deliberate. I was glad to see the Americans mixing short passes with the ocassional long pass, and only attacking/shooting when they saw a legitimate opening or chance. This wore down Brazil who stumbled around barely able to walk in the 2nd half.
Without Abby:
When Abby was injured there were people who were doomsday predicting, my response was that any good team is better than any "one" player. Every two years a whole new crop of college girls comes out that are at least as good as the best forward on most of these smaller countries we should try one of them. Abby is also slow, so her absense gave us a chance to try something different, the forwards we had did a better job of pressuring opposing defenses into bad passes. The Brazilians were VERY suseptable to this. We forced their defenders into a lot of very bad passes. We did miss Abby on free kicks, no lie, we weren't the same team without her. I'd rather have her on the team, but there is life after Abby. She is one of the few celbrities to actually make a pass at me, and so made a life-long supporter out of me (sorry, Jeannette was there to see it)
Brazil's attack:
The Brazilians fested the USA back line in an admirably methodical manner. They took on each of the US backs in turn. They found that it was a waste of time going down our left where Chalupny was. The talented red-head in fact led the Americans most dangerous counter attacks. I'd rate here an "8-9" on a scale of 1-10. Our opponents by the end of the game appeared to be completely avoiding their right wing. Trying to keep the ball away from her.
Margraff in the center and Boxx:
Both of these players have shown questionable decision-making ability once they've gained possession, but they were solid, nearly mistake-free, Boxx after her incident with Adriana in the WWC, was especially carefull about South American diving.
Mitts:
Sooo... that leaves Heather Mitts, okay, she's easy on the eyes for guys, and she has good overlapping speed, but after two broken legs, the Brazilians picked her out as the weak link. Nearly every successful Brazilian attack came down our right side. Mitts in frustration got a seemingly foolish yellow card. I think she was tired of them picking on her and tried to send a message. Temper-temper!
Brazil neutralized:
I was happy to see the Brazilians looking rather ordinary by the 60th minute. Marta was recuded to taking wasteful, off-balanced shots from outside of the box.... of course she came VERY close to winning it, but if chances were goals, the USA would have had a 3-0 lead by then.
USA by position...
Midfield Passing:
Sub par for the USA at times but the Brazilians may have been part of the problem, Brazil started off good, then had a near total collapse. Heat no doubt effected both teams.
Lloyd:
It was obvious to me... that Lloyd was having a bad day. She has been a decent player, who is improving. She is big, tall, getting stronger, has good control but MAN!!! Her passing was terrible throughout most of the game. She rushed a lot, and turned the ball over constantly when there was no pressure on her. Granted she had a tough job controlling the center against Brazil. I was groaning hoping the coach would sub her out, but offense is the opposit of defense, one shining moment of glory erases 90+ minutes of horrible play. In the end the coach had faith in her talant, good players can get it done even when they aren't at their best.
The Wings:
I think Lindsey Tarpley is once of the best center Midfielders on the US women's team, but she and Lloyd have been switching back and forth. Tarpley in the best passer, ball handler on the team and has a good outside shot, which she has used in key, pressure moments. I think she finds the wings confining, this is true of Lloyd to a lesser extent. She did well against tough oponents, but didn't stand out.
O' Reilly....
I can't figure out why they are using her on the right wing. She is the fastest player on the ball, she looked great in the 2004 Olympics up front. Some coaches want speed on the wings for crosses, but neither of our forwards showed any speed. I thought Heather did an average job on the wing, She had good runs down the wing, but her defense wasn't good, which may have allowed the Brazilians to overload the wing when attacking Mitts.
Forward...
Hucles did a good job of holding the ball up front under pressure. She reminded me of Andy Cole for Man United years ago who was known as much for the great chances he missed as he was for great goals. Angela was always in the right place making the right play, but absolutely no break-away speed. I'd have rather seen her on right mid and O'Reilly up front. The announcers kept talking about Rodriguez' speed and how dangerous she was, but I failed to see any.
Against Brazil, the coach may have decided that holding the ball and waiting for support was more important than attack speed. A good decision, Hucles played surprisingly well against a team that obviously thinks that brutal tackles is substitute for good defensive marking.
Goal-Keeping
Solo is the best keeper we've ever had, been obvious for a long time. Scurry was solid and commanding, but never great at diving to the corners, Mullinics was terribly impatient and couldn't stay on line, announcers called it "aggressive." Good positioning, good reflexes, good athletic ability, good punts and goal kicks. Coach Ryan was a fool whne he punished the entire team for her outburst last year.
Improvement overall
Coaching: Thank goodness, some decent coaching after 9 years of "Huh, why's she/he doing that?" We all know that the USA has the largest collection of talented female soccer players in the world. I'd like to keep it that way. But the last two coches have simply tried to over-pwer opponents with superior power and athleticism. That'll work unitl you come up against Germany or Norway who can match us in those categories. Both have delivered embarrassing losses to us recently.
Our women need to keep learning how to play the game. A lot of women actually watch the champions league now, something very few even knew about 15 years ago. I am so glad we have a coach capable of learning from mistakes and not someone who blames players for not executing their "flawless strategy."
There is a tendency among American fans and especially American coaches to want to attack-attack-attack... I can't tell how many times I heard the utterly moronic statement, "Have one! You can't score unless you shoot!" pour out of the mouths on coaches in the USA. There is a time to be aggressive but in a game like this when you shoot often early when an opponent's defense is fresh you are really just handing the ball back over to them so they can attack.
