Chasing new goals

See, soccer players really do run a lot.

Mexico doesn't make it

Despite raucous home support, Mexico couldn't close the one-goal lead Canada staked out and now both men's and women's teams are shut out of the Olympics.
The article focuses on athleticism and fitness being a weak point of the female El Tri squad. They didn't care for the U.S. ref, either, but ultimately, the author admits Canada was stronger and tougher.

Tonight is the night

The U.S., Mexico, Canada and Costa Rica face off for two Olympic spots. Costa Rica vs the U.S. is first, then Mexico vs Canada.

For the title

The U.S. and Honduras are battling it out for the title in Olympics qualifying. It's mostly a prestige thing now, since both teams have qualified. Honduras hasn't gotten a shot on goal, but has held off the U.S. all game long. The match is now in overtime.
10th minute of overtime: Gaven is down in the box. It looks like it should be a PK, but nothing given.
13th: GOAL! Marvell Wynne gets called for a foul. Honduras sets up, gets the ball into Georgie Welcome, who gets a bit of space and smashes the ball past Dominic Cervi. It bounces off the crossbar and in. 1-0.
15th. I started blogging mostly because I expected this to go to penalties, and I wanted to analyze the U.S. strategy in such a situation, but Honduras now holds the lead. Michael Orozco and Pat Ianni were both beaten on the play that led to the goal.
2nd overtime period. CK for the U.S. comes to nothing. Kamani Hill was cramping, but he's back up now.
19th - CK for U.S. comes to nothing. The Honduran fans are thrilled and noisy.
20 - The U.S. is no doubt frustrated, because they pushed the pace of the game and created the vast majority of chances, but that's no excuse for not executing.
22- Gaven helps earn another CK, but the U.S. does nothing with this one as well.
23 - Another CK for the U.S. Nothing working for the U.S. in that regard.
24- Jozy bike in the box - he misses the ball. The U.S. players are tired; their passes are going awry, but they keep pushing. That deserves credit.
25 - The U.S. is missing key players who were released once the team qualified. Freddy Adu, Sal Zizzo, Charlie Davies and Jonathan Spector have gone back to their teams in Europe.
28 - Honduras playing the same smart, not-pretty defense that simply works.
29 - Wynne gets booked for a yellow. He walks away from a writhing Welcome and snaps at his old UCLA teammate, Ianni, when Ianni says something to him after the card is given.
30 - Now Ianni gets called for the foul on Welcome, as he throws out all his limbs while going down.
Final whistle. The U.S. is resigned - the Honduran players celebrate with their fans. Honduras is the CONCACAF Olympic qualifying champ. This might be the beginning of a renaissance for Honduran soccer, which had slumped for a bit. The U.S., meanwhile, learns a lesson in wasted opportunities.

The Captains chat

The two U23 captains, Maurice and Sacha (representing Southern California here, I must point out) give their viewpoints on the U.S. mission to return to Olympic competition.

Who knew?

Eddie Gaven scored the winning goal to send the U.S. to the Olympics. I know they probably picked this story up on wire services, but did anyone at mediotiempo watch the game? At all?

It's about as accurate as the birthplace on the Jesus Padilla player profile.

Honduras is in

Honduras beat Guatemala in penalties to advance to the Summer Olympics. Honduras missed once in penalties but Guatemala missed twice, including one in the seventh round that sailed over the goal.

The game finished without any goals in 120 minutes of regulation and extra time.

US on verge of Olympics

The United States will try to get to Beijing via Nashville. If the US can beat Canada, they will have punched their ticket to the Olympic games and will have made up somewhat for missing out in 2004.

Of course, Canada will be no easy task. In fact, Canada is in an enviable position as all the pressure is on the United States and their offense has scored more than one goal from the run of play.

For the United States, the lack of offense is worrisome. The team just can't finish. Perhaps Jozy Altidore's injury concerns hampered him during the first round but other forwards, namely Chad Barrett and Robbie Findley, have struggled to put shots on goal, let alone in the back of the net.

Defensively there are no such concerns. The United States' defense has played solid since the start. The revelation has been Michael Orozco, but that's only because many American fans were unfamiliar with him. Prior to the tournament, Patrick Ianni was getting a lot of play and hype on the backline and Orozco was the unknown player. Still, Ianni was not a regular starter for Houston last season while Orozco starts for San Luis of the Mexican First Division, so the Orange native is seemingly talented and is proving as much.

Here are a couple of game previews from the Canadians' point-of-view: this one from Canada.com and this one from the National Post's Colin Smith (the picture accompanying this last one is not the best picture).

And here is a story from Ridge Mahoney for the USA Today.

Need Somebody to love

Hugo Sanchez had a leg up on any coach angling for the job of coaching Mexico. Not only was he Somebody, he was Mexico's most famous Somebody, the player who was the best ever from that country.
Admit it, there's a glamor attached to such people. They thrilled fans on the field, so people look to them to do it again from the sideline. Somehow, we imagine it to be part of the natural order of things - great player can equal great coach. Many times, it doesn't always work out that way, but what is clearly evident is that famous ex-players often get chance after chance that nobodies (who may be VERY good coaches) will never get.
Frankly, that's how Jurgen Klinsman got the job for Germany. It's not like Ruud Gullit has done a lot of coaching, either.
It may be that the admiration people have felt for so long for Hugo Sanchez may carry him through his latest tribulations. But no question, if he was Juan Sanchez, or basically any other Mexican coach, he'd probably be toast.

Not much funny

Pretty serious for a cartoon.

"Can I help you with your baggage, sir?" asks the porter.

"No, he can walk by himself," Little Tri answers, pointing to Hugo.

More on Sanchez

Though some would say "Moron Sanchez."

Anyway, here's my PE column on the matter. I wasn't able to sell any stories to them for the qualifying tournament so this was my chance to fill on my readers on the exciting week of action at Home Depot Center.

Eleven goals

None scored by the actual winner of the group. Nuts.

Anatomy of a fracaso

Mexico failing to get out of the group stage in this Olympic qualifying tournament is a failure. Not even the most positive approach could paint the picture any other differently.

But to understand the depths of this failure - and the depths of many Mexican supporters' animosity and possible hatred of coach Hugo Sanchez - you need only examine just how many resources were poured into the Under-23 national team.

Many called this the Golden Generation of Mexican soccer, since the current young generation (19-22 year-olds or so) were part of Mexico's Under-17 World Championship squad of 2005. Already, the groundwork for future successes was seemingly laid in Peru. Elements of that team participated in the 2007 U-20 World Cup but the team fell short of reaching the final.

Still, the Olympics were supposed to have been another crucial part of their development. Hugo Sanchez even went so far as to promise a medal in the Beijing games.

The task of identifying players and pieceing together the Under-23 roster began in Denver in August 2007. Mexico played Colombia and lost 1-0 but that match saw the inclusion of guys like Santiago Fernandez, Edgar Castillo, Cesar Villaluz and Julio Cesar Dominguez, players who would go on to play a key role in the final Under-23 squad.

On Oct. 17, 2007, Mexico played Guatemala in Los Angeles. Like the Colombia match, this game featured some senior roster players such as Jonny Magallon and Gonzalo Pineda but included mostly players from the Under-23 pool. Three players who many felt would have made a difference in Carson this last week played in that game as Carlos Vela, Giovani Dos Santos and Andres Guardado all played in that match. Still, Mexico ended up losing to Guatemala 3-2.

Mexico tried to secure the participation of the aforementioned trio from their respective Spanish clubs but were unsuccessful in doing so. But the talent that remained was seemingly sufficient. The team gathered for preparation in early February as several Mexican clubs had to do without their participating players for the tour. Thus clubs like America (Guillermo Ochoa, Enrique Esqueda, Juan Carlos Silva) and Cruz Azul (Julio Cesar Dominguez, Cesar Villaluz) had to make do without some key players for quite a long stretch of the season (and in some cases international tournament matches).

Mexico lined up five friendlies as preparation for the tournament; three in Mexico and two in the United States. Everything seemed fine as Mexico started off with a 2-0 win over Chile. But then Ecuador beat Mexico 1-0 and Paraguay held Mexico to a scoreless draw. While the results suddenly were drying up, the squad itself was getting valuable time with each other.

Mexico then played a pair of games here in the United States, but both games were draws - a 1-1 tie with Australia and a scoreless game against Finland.

Yet despite the lack of results, Sanchez and the players were presenting a confident demeanor entering the tournament and even up until the final game.

So, ultimately Mexico not only had a talented roster to draw from - its league is one of the strongest on this side of the world - but the team spent a great deal of time together with nothing but this qualifying tournament to prepare for.

Mexico could have gotten its squad together two days before the start of the tournament and many would have expected the team to advance nonetheless. But having spent more than one month together, playing games, training, etc., it makes it even more catastrophic that Mexico did not so much as get out of the group stage.

When you look at it that way and couple it with previous broken promises, then, it's no wonder why many are calling for Sanchez's head.

The goals and the misses

Second-half highlights from Sunday's Mexico-Haiti game.




At the end of the game, as soon as the final whistle blows, the commentator says: "Tomorrow, if Hugo Sanchez has any dignity, he will submit his resignation" and then goes on to criticize the coach some more on his failures and on the failures of this team in general.

The ones who will decide

So who recognizes them and can tell our readers what they are saying about Hugo Sanchez? Even if you don't understand Spanish, body language says a lot.

Tri torn up

The little Mexico soccer mascot is beaten up, and perhaps confused.

"One goal kept me from Beijing," he says to Hugo. (Actually, Mexico would still have needed to get past the U.S. to qualify.)

"But if it means you're gone, it's worth it!"

Cesar - the little emperor

Carlos Vela and Giovanni Dos Santos got most of the attention in Peru while winning the U17 World Cup with Mexico, but I was always impressed with Cesar Villaluz. I was happy when Cruz Azul, my favorite Mexican club team, signed him up. He's done pretty well on the field, even given Mexico's exit at the Olympic qualifying tournament, but I also admire how he handled himself after that fiasco. He's young, but he was honest and calm in admitting that he and his team fell short.

Grassy knoll soccer

Canada's coach, Nick Dasovic, was perhaps justified in acting like the possibility of collusion to affect the match outcome was beneath his consideration or response, but I remember plenty of Canadians (including Ante Jazic, who spoke to me about it) were convinced that CONCACAF had screwed them in last year’s Gold Cup. Jazic thought it was a CONCACAF conspiracy to put the U.S. and Mexico in the final.
In fact, a Canadian reporter here was talking to me about that, "Yes, everyone thinks that the Gold Cup semifinals were fixed, so the Federation could have its two marquee teams in the final for better ratings.”
I mentioned that ratings climb when Mexico plays, but the U.S. isn’t much of a difference-maker, as witnessed by the very small U.S. contingent in Soldier Field for the Gold Cup. “Mexico fans are very loyal – if their team was in a final versus anyone else from CONCACAF, they would watch.”
Anyway, the point is, it’s not as if the Canadians (and any nationality who ever has had trouble with a loss) haven’t ever wondered about conspiracies themselves, so any implication that only Mexicans think that way is wrong.

The way it is

Haiti's coach Wilner Etienne doesn't sugarcoat it.

"We have some players who can play at a high level, and there are some players who we can’t count on. Some players wouldn’t pass the ball. Some players have proven their quality and they’re the ones in the plans of the senior team."

Two new reps

If nothing else, CONCACAF will have two different representatives in Beijing from the last Olympic games. Costa Rica didn't even reach this qualifying tournament while Mexico were done in by Guatemala and terrible finishing.

The U.S. missed out on the 2004 games but were in Sydney for the 2000 Olympics - likewise for Honduras. Guatemala played in the 1988 Olympics in Korea while Canada last had a chance to play in the men's soccer in 1984.

Anyway, here's Jaime Cardenas' story for the LA Times on Sunday's matches.