Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Argentina! Argentina!

The U.S. Soccer conference call with Bob Bradley has just ended. The U.S., drawn into the same group as Argentina, Paraguay and Columbia, will face Argentina first.

That's awesome. I think the Copa America is a great tournament. I can't believe the U.S. missed it for so long.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

You think the draw is rigged? I certainly do, with the host Venezuela the main beneficiary. Look at Group A: Venezuela along with Uruguay, Bolivia, and Peru. That's 4 teams who did not qualify for the World Cup last year. If I remember correctly, other draws for Copa America have been similarly friendly to the hosts. In 1997, Bolivia got to the final largely because they had a weak group, which consisted of themselves along with Peru, Bolivia, and Venezuela (wait a second, that's the same group!). In 1999, hosts Peru were drawn with Bolivia, Paraguay, and Japan. In 2001, hosts Colombia were in a group with Chile, Ecuador, and Venezuela. Just makes me wonder.

A.C. said...

I honestly hate to expend energy on conspiracies. I think facing Argentina first off is great - it worked for the U.S. in the last U20 World Cup.

L.B. said...

I don't know about conspiracies. I think it takes too much time and effort to do something elaborate like that. But I do think that the federation makes it way too easy for the host nations. I suppose when you have two behemoths in the confederation, it makes it difficult for others to feel they have a legit shot of winning anything so they have to level out the playing field.

Anonymous said...

Luis - I agree with you wholeheartedly. I wouldn't go so far as to call it a conspiracy, but I do think the bigwigs at CONMEBOL (who have a well earned reputation for cronyism: see the 1978 World Cup game between Argentina and Peru) are kind to each other. I can't find it right now, but I remember reading an article on the topic of friendly draws for the Copa America hosts. If I find it, I'll post a link!