Things I Want To See Today

At 2:30 PM EST, the U.S. Men’s National Team is going to kick off in South Africa against the Spanish National Team. I still haven’t warmed up to the idea that the U.S. actually advanced out of group play after watching their first two games, but somehow they’re now in a position to redeem themselves. Spain’s an 11/50 favorite to win; the U.S. is paying out 10/1. If we’re making predictions, I’d imagine something along the lines of a 3-0 win for Spain.

That’s not a reflection on the U.S. team, mind you; that’s a reflection on Spain. Spain haven’t lost in fifteen games, and they’re unbeaten in 35. Those are both records in international competition. The U.S., meanwhile, have shipped at least three goals in every game against top ten teams in this tournament; the best team in the world should probably have similar success.

That’s not to say this game will be a complete waste, though. Even anticipating an ugly dismemberment, there are things that I want to see out of the U.S. team. Five things, in fact.

1) Pick an Intelligent Formation

As I’ve mentioned before, Bob Bradley has had a tendency to switch his formations around from game to game, regardless of the personnel he has available or of the team he’s facing. Against Spain, that’s simply not an acceptable tactic. Spain has lately taking to running a 4-3-1-2/4-1-3-2 hybrid that tends to ultimately play like a 4-3-3. The central defensive midfielder stays back, rarely moving forward, and distributes the ball, while one of the outside midfielders (typically Riera) makes runs up his flank. The other “outside” mid (either Xavi or Fabregas) doesn’t actually play outside, instead moving into the middle and distributing through balls to the strikers.

The easiest way I can think of to stop this is clogging up the midfield to prevent the short passing game between the centrally located midfielders; Bradley’s formation of late has been the 4-3-3, which doesn’t even come close to doing that. A 4-2-3-1 formation would make a ton of sense, and we coincidentally have the personnel to pull it off.

2) Personnel Needs To Compliment Personnel

If we’re running a 4-2-3-1, than we need to put the right people in. If I’m selecting the squad, I’d leave the back four alone; there’s not much that can be done to upgrade there with the squad we have anyways. I’d like the line-up to look something like this:

Howard

Spector-Onyewu-DeMerit-Bornstein

Clark-Bradley

Feilhaber-Donovan-Dempsey

Davies

This is a hard-working lineup, and it’s lacking some things; there’s not tons of speed, for example. What we do have is players who are all fit and who can work with each other to maintain possession; it may not generate a lot of shots, but it will have hustling players who can hassle the Spanish midfield for the ball. Torres and Villa don’t often get the ball and run with it; they like one-touch shots from good service when they’re playing for Spain. Cut off that service and make them work.

Special point: Altidore looks exhausted, and can’t make the runs needed; he needs to take this game off.

3) Concentrate on Technical Execution

Too often, the U.S. team is hampered by poor concentration. This is most evidenced in their trapping (Altidore’s a big offender here); when the ball comes to feet, it needs to stay there. Instead, it’s more often bouncing five or six feet away, which is more than enough space for a crafty midfielder to intercept. Good passes, right ideas, but poor execution; that needs to be brought under control.

4) Avoid Stupid Red Cards

Outside of the massive defeats, the Italy and Brazil games both shared another common trait: red cards. To be fair, both cards (particularly Clark’s) were harsh; however, if you know that referees are grading you harshly than you need to keep your head. Playing respectably against Spain will be hard enough with eleven men; doing it with ten will be next to impossible.

5) Landon Needs to Shoot

Landon Donovan isn’t scoring from open play all that often lately. Part of the reason for that is his tendency to lay the ball off or create opportunities for other players; we saw that twice in the Egypt game, where he laid the ball off to Altidore (who had stopped at the top of the box instead of completing his run) and where he assisted Michael Bradley. Donovan actually hasn’t scored for the U.S. from open play since October of last year, but I can’t remember him missing many shots. I think that he’s not shooting at all, preferring to get the assist. That’s noble, but on straight through balls it’s okay to take a crack sometimes; I want to see more of that from him, especially from distance.

Even if the U.S. dies all of these things, I don’t think we will win this game; the talent gulf between the two teams is huge. I do think we can play respectably, though, and keep the score down…and when the score’s close at the end, next to anything is possible.