The Irony Mexican Hypocrisy

For years Mexican football fans have attacked the United States success in the most negative way possible: accusing the Yanks of playing a cynical game that relied on rough play and counter attacking. Every loss to the United States was judged as a triumph of negative football over beautiful football. Well last night deep in the heart of Texas, Mexico’s U-20 team was once again shredded on set pieces by the US U-20s but they did something very American or at least from the Mexican perspective: they played rough and tumble and sat back waiting to hit the Americans on the break, and packing the back resembling a team with little confidence.

It did not work as Mexico was thrashed 3-0 by Coach Thomas Rongen’s US side. But is this the new Mexico that the reign of Sven Goran Eriksson will bring to CONCACAF qualifying? For years Mexico has had probably two or three times as much skill as the United States but lacks composure, ideas in the final third and the general football sense required to beat the U.S.

I find it ironic that any Mexican National side would resort to the same “negative” tactics that the Mexican press, players and coaches have bemoaned for years. The fact that they resorted to these tactics last night having a side with superior technical ability tells us where the Mexican program is currently. The crisis of confidence that Mexico’s senior national team has displayed lately has worked its way down to the normally solid youth national teams for El Tri.

The U.S. has used the so-called “negative” tactics in the past partly because it had to: Mexico had superior technique but also had a bad habit of sending defenders too far up the pitch and playing a high line. The U.S. tactics originally devised by Steve Sampson and essentially continued by Bruce Arena for facing Mexico were not cynical as the Mexican press claimed: they were how an aspiring football nation beats an established one.

Now that the United States is more attacking oriented and not waiting to hit Mexico on the break, El Tri seems to have resorted to the old American fall back tactic without having the understanding of how to execute it. Ah, the irony.

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American Soccer Show Midseason Awards

Best team: New England Revolution

Best DP signing: Macello Gallardo, DC United

Best non DP signing: Amado Guevara, Toronto FC

Best value international signing: Kheli Dube, New England

Best young player (under 20): Sueńo MLS winner Jorge Flores

Worst DP signing: Claudio Lopez, Kansas City

Worst international signing: Franco Carracio, Houston

Worst big name half season: Juan Toja, FC Dallas

Best overall player (best individual talent and ability): Landon Donovan, Los Angeles

Most Valuable Player (most valuable to team): Steve Ralson, NE Revolution

(runner up) Frankie Hedjuk, Columbus

Ranking the teams 1-14 (based on performance in the 1^st half of the season and potential for 2^nd half of the season with the current squad)

1- New England

2- Columbus

3- Toronto FC

4- LA Galaxy

5- DC United

6- Houston

7- Real Salt Lake

8- Chicago

9- Colorado

10- Chivas USA

11- NY Red Bulls

12- San Jose

13- Kansas City

14- FC Dallas

This list is based on the current squad not potential signings (ie Brian McBride, Francisco Lima, etc). Thursday we’ll break down each individual team and what they need to improve.

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MLS Sunday Review

Major League Soccer has provided us with little relief to the usual summer doldrums. As happens most MLS seasons the combination of high temperatures, half full stadiums and international call ups hurt the quality of football and make MLS in many ways a laughingstock of world football.

MLS’ midweek performances against USL sides have sent off alarm bells in the halls of football support in this nation. But to me the surprise is that USL teams only won three of eight matches versus MLS sides. The reality is thanks to the salary cap and squad restrictions in MLS, the league is not up the standard of an average first division relative to the football talent on American soil. Thanks to those very same rules, USL is not as bad as an average second division relative to the football talent on American soil.

The gap between the average MLS club and USL-1 or even the top USL-2 clubs isn’t very large. A misconception has developed that MLS is like the English Premier League while USL is like the Conference, among some fans. In fact, the opposite is the case even though MLS is improving while USL is not.

I will state that last week’s results for MLS were in my book impressive. Three years ago had eight MLS sides played eight USL sides with their reserves, six or seven MLS sides would have lost. As it stands six MLS sides played less than their typical Starting XI and four of them won.

I stated in 2003 on Big Soccer that if MLS and the then A-League had relegation/promotion with the bottom two MLS teams going down (when the league had ten teams) and the top two A-league teams going up and not having to apply MLS squad and cap rules, the two USL sides would never go back down and eventually only the LA Galaxy, NE Revs, Chicago Fire and DC United would be joined by six USL teams in the top flight.

MLS has obviously improved dramatically since 2003 while USL-1 is at the same level if not slightly lower in fact. However, the appauling lack of respect paid towards second division sides by MLS fans and commentators smacks of either complete ignorance or arrogance. Rumors are abound that USL-1 will have more money than ever in the upcoming years and if the display of team billboards at the Barbados home qualifier against the US is any indication, those rumors may be at least partially true. It would be wise for MLS fans instead of whining after perceived poor results versus USL clubs to understand the professional soccer structure in this country a little better and understand why USL/A League clubs have had so much success over the past ten years against MLS clubs. But this sustained run of success for USL clubs against MLS is coming to an end unless substantial changes take place within USL as has been speculated. But those who support MLS clubs need to spend more time understanding that this league cannot exist in a vacuum in the American soccer or world football structure. This isn’t a typical professional sports league in the United States and factors exist that make it important to understand the game from a complete perspective, not simply an MLS centric perspective going forward.

• MLS has been by just about any objective standard difficult to watch the last month. Not only the summer heat but the international call ups have stripped the league of much of its quality. The one side consistently worth watching is the Los Angeles Galaxy. First off David Beckham has shown in the past several matches that he has a skill, and a quality level that is possibly higher than any in the recent history of MLS. Also, wherever the Galaxy play, home or away an active vibrant crowd follows.
• Columbus is also a spunky side after going scoreless for almost 400 minutes in late May and early June. The Crew can feel hard done that they did not get the bounces to come away with three points last night versus Chicago.
• Was Tomasz Frankowski the worst MLS signing of the last transfer window? Sure some signings have theoretically been less effective, but what other MLS signing has actually signed a goal at Old Traftord. Perhaps Frankowski is being kept past the July 1st deadline simply to wangle in the eyes of the euro-centric Toronto FC management (A management team that has recently brought Paul Dickov and Darren Huckerby to BMO Field to discuss a move to MLS for both former Manchester City attacking players)
• Kenny Deuchar the much touted refugee from Gretna hasn’t been half the player for Real Salt Lake than Colorado’s Tam MacManus, a much less heralded SPL defector to MLS has been. The two are completely different types of players, and MacManus has fit his new club better.
• Real Salt Lake has left more points “on the table” than any other team in MLS and perhaps more than every other team combined. Every RSL match seems to fit the same script. Real’s talented, technical midfield dominates the match, Nat Borchers anchors a solid backline which controls the match until late when Nick Rimando either has to play Superman or Salt Lake either misses an easy chance or a questionable officiating call goes against them. Salt Lake should be based on their quality on the pitch and their squad one of the top teams in MLS. When I watch RSL they almost always appear to be better than their opposition, yet they sit in a position where they may miss the MLS Cup playoffs yet again.
• Chivas USA is currently tied with the LA Galaxy atop the Western Conference. But does anyone believe that without Maykel Galindo, the goats are in the same class as the Galaxy or even RSL? I have enjoyed watching Chivas the last two weeks and take some pride in the network as CSRN is now the exclusive worldwide English language carrier for Chivas home matches. Peter Brown and Graham Bell my CSRN collegues have been nothing short of outstanding on the call of the matches. The improvement in their quality from week one tow week two calling matches was striking as is the style which both bring. Peter’s intense knowledge of San Jose helped last night’s call, and as we’ve said before if it happens in American Soccer, we cover it from all perspectives at CSRN.
• Juan Carlos Osorio is in the process of making over the New York squad. It cannot come soon enough and Red Bull must be patient. When you’ve been a losing side for the better part of the league’s history, despite having some high profile managers like Carlos Queiroz and Carlos Alberto Parriera it’s time to start from square one. My hope is that new York fans and Red Bull management have the patience to see Osorio through on this mission without pulling a quick trigger.

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Superliga 2008 Coverage Plans

Pachuca Celebrate the 2007 Superliga Title/AP

CSRN is planning unprecedented coverage of the 2008 Superliga. We aim to be your one stop English language stop for all things Superliga. Tomorrow, a special two hour Superliga preview will air on the network and will be downloadable via Itunes tomorrow afternoon. Every match of the tournament will be covered by our daily headline show the 2 G’s, the American Soccer Show and Around the League.

In addition, this website will aim to provide the most extensive analysis and commentary of the competition available in English. The Superliga page, linked above will be developed in the next week to provide instant updates and commentary as the matches in the tournament unfold. Also check out CSRN’s the Third Half on match days for live match chats and analysis.

CSRN has unrivaled resources and contacts to cover this event as completely as possible. As the exclusive English language radio voice of Chivas USA’s home matches, as well our extensive network of correspondents and sources around North America we will provide you with the most thorough coverage of North America’s richest club competition.

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DC United Crushes Galaxy; Why ESPN Should Have Stayed InHouse for Euro Coverage

In front of over 35,000 fans at RFK Stadium an ABC national broadcast audience, Luciano Emilio and DC United crushed the LA Galaxy 4-1. The scoreline was if anything flattering to the Galaxy who benefited from the individual brilliance of the sometimes maligned Steve Cronin to keep United from pilling in goals. Emilio who scored twice actually had eight attempts at goal in the match. The match also marked the surprising return of Ben Olsen whose injury plagued career appeared to be over just a month or two ago.

Despite the scorching summer heat, United controlled the tempo and played at a rapid pace and quite frankly gave us more entertainment if not technical skill and drama than the Euro 2008 final afterwards.

Some other thoughts:

I am thrilled that Andy Gray won’t be seen on these shores until World Cup 2010 at the earliest. For all the accolades given him by a generally Premier League affected oriented soccer blogger community, I feel he was exceedingly biased, poorly prepared for matches that did not involve many players in the Premier League and condescending to boot. ESPN has plenty of good soccer commentators in its midst to not have to pull Gray from Sky Sports. Perhaps Shaka Hislop or Robbie Mustoe would have been better suited to cover the event if it was British accents the powers that be at ESPN were looking for as the New York Times Jack Bell feels in this piece. In fact Mustoe and Hislop both meet my litmus test for foreign commentators: they understand the American game and the American soccer audience. Hislop went to college in the US, and Mustoe now coaches college and runs coaching clinics in the U.S. Moreover, neither player has the obvious biases that Gray demonstrates.

Rece Davis was outstanding in the studio today on ABC as he always is on ESPN for Soccer and College Sports. I’d love to see him on more MLS telecasts, but that seems to be the exclusive domain of Rob Stone.

David Beckham looked totally gassed after 60 minutes today. I’m sure despite the heat, Ruud Gullit is going to have a few things to say to Becks about his conditioning.
Landon Donovan should have been sent off for shouting expletives at the official.

Marcello Gallardo showed his class today. He’s matched up with Beckham a few times in internationals, and twice in the Champions League. To my knowledge the only time Gallardo had previously beaten Beckham was in the 1998 World Cup. In that match Beckham was sent off, and Gallardo converted a pk in the shootout.

MLS Rumors is reporting that Jorge “Zurdo” Rojas has signed with the Red Bulls. This is the kind of signing MLS needs, and if RBNY has indeed signed Rojas without using a DP spot, that’s even better. For those that don’t know Rojas he is arguably the best Venezuelan footballer of the last fifteen years. At 31, he still has a few years left and can essentially do for the Red Bulls what Claudio Reyna seems incapable or unwilling to do for the club.

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Break Shea: Man U Bound?

In the last week speculation has increased that FC Dallas Attacking Midfielder Brek Shea, a standout of recent US Youth National teams and the 2008 MLS Combine has drawn the interest from Alex Ferguson of Manchester United. While this sounds glamorous, Shea would be just the latest youngster plucked from American shores by United in the last several years. The previous four, Jovan Kirovski, John Thorrington, Jonathan Spector and Kenny Cooper failed to develop the skill level and technical ability while in England that they needed to be as successful on the international level as they possibly could be given their perceived talent level. Shea’s performance at the Toulon Festival last month where he and Sammy Ochoa were the American standouts has United interested in him.

Should Shea move abroad, I would personally prefer he move to Holland or Germany during his development stage. Both leagues have better history with young American players than England whose notable flops include not only the players listed above, but Zac Whitebred who signed with Liverpool after the 2005 U-20 World Cup, Jemel Johnson who now plays League Two football after signing with Blackburn as a youngster, Johann Smith of Bolton whose two plus years in England have rendered him useless for the US setuPublish Postp, and Frank Simek now a Championship player after signing with Arsenal as a teen and not developing to Arsene Wenger’s satisfaction.

The English Premier League could be the best league in the world, but it is simply not the best league for developing young American talent. For whatever reason the Dutch and German leagues provide a more adaptable experience for young American starlets. If Shea does move to United let’s hope he can buck this trend.

Guzan Keep Clean Sheet: US Advances

Eddie Lewis’ goal was the lone strike in the US victory/AP Photo

Flattering headline you ask-What else would you expect? The reality of today’s match versus Barbados is complicated but before complaints about the performance get out of hand I want to state something very openly on the record: I have said for sometime that I felt the US program was slipping fairly quickly and that simply advancing to World Cup 2010 in an improved CONCACAF is the maximum expectation I have for this current group of American internationals. Would I like to see more? Of course, I would. Am I unhappy with the current state of the National Team? You bet, and next week I will be writing a post looking back at the vision Carlos Querioz outlined for US Soccer in the Q-Report ten years ago and evaluating why our national program produced better internationals early this decade than we are now. But lets focus on the reality of the current situation rather than lamenting the recent slippage in quality of the overall US program.

Today’s disappointing performance did not surprise me. When today’s team sheet was released I saw only three names of seasoned internationals and only two that I would consider professionals who will always give a top class performance: those two, Eddie Lewis today’s captain, and goal scorer and Heath Pearce were solid. (The third DaMarcus Beasley was as is so often the case with him completely useless) Freddy Adu was outstanding. The rest of the team needs work, but we knew that already. I see message board threads across the internet and have fielded phone calls tonight professing shock at today’s fortunate 1-0 US win, in a match where Barbados can feel hard done not to have gotten at a minimum a draw. With an eight goal cushion was it really necessary for the US to overwhelm again in what was a largely meaningless exercise?

CONCACAF isn’t the cupcake confederation many commentators simply assume it is. Playing on the road is difficult and if you come out determined to simply experiment and knock the ball around as the US did, you are going to get burned. Emmerson Boyce, a player of some stature in the recent history of Crystal Palace Football Club (the favorite club of one of my cousins and another my uncles who lived in the UK for many years) was the best player on the pitch. When you face professionals you must give a full effort which the US did not give. Content to knock the ball around for much of the early minutes of the match as the US was allowed Barbados to look dangerous and comfortable in the match from the get go. Meanwhile the young core of the US team looked very uncomfortable. Particularly poor were Sacha Kljestan a player I love typically and Danny Szetela, a player whose club performances with Columbus, Racing and Brescia have done little to justify his continued presence in the full national team. Kljestan improved later in the match but Szetela did not and needs to return to the U-23 setup before being called back to a full national team again.
John Thorrington looked to add some class to the US attack when he entered the match for Beasley and perhaps he should get another, longer look. Chris Rolfe also had some nice attacking play once he entered the match Barbados on the other hand must be lamenting having beat Brad Guzan twice in the second half and yet not scoring an official goal. The early second half shot that bounced off the crossbar showed Guzan’s limitations, and his other decisions on whether to catch or punch several balls were suspect. A reason exists that while Guzan is a great developing prospect, many US fans want to see Matt Reis or Kasey Keller back up Tim Howard.

Playing young kids in friendlies on US soil, or in a Copa America where the results do not matter is one thing, but playing them in qualifiers we learned tonight is downright cruel. Does Bob Bradley deserve the blame for tonight’s squad selection? No, that blame must be placed squarely on Major League Soccer and its clubs whose decision to play right through CONCACAF qualifiers and in the case of teams participating in Superliga accelerate their schedule. Work left to be done for the US, but thankfully another few months to prepare for the next round of qualifiers. Some highly rated CONCACAF nations such as Panama who the US has struggled to beat in the last two Gold Cups have been eliminated from qualifying so while the performance Sunday wasn’t at a high level, advancing with the US in a malaise is all that can be expected and quite frankly all that is required at this point in time.

Player Ratings:

Brad Guzan 4

Not his best day. Seemed half asleep at times.

Heath Pearce 7

Good match going forward and creating chances for the attacking players. A bad miss in front of goal but in fairness it was struck with his weaker foot.

Jay DeMerit 6

Solid, and as usual unspectacular.

Danny Califf 6

Didn’t make many mistakes and anchored a solid backline.

Drew Moor 7

Made some nice runs going forward and delivered some great balls forward

Michael Bradley 6

Solid bounce back game for Bradley who hasn’t been great lately, but still gave the ball away a few too many times.

Danny Szetela 3

Bad giveaways and poor positioning characterized a player who was simply put outclassed at this level.

Sacha Kljestan 4

So so match. Looked uncomfortable on the wing but settled down as the game wore on. Still a great prospect going forward to add depth to the pool.

Eddie Lewis 8

Steady Eddie gave yet another fine performance in a man of the match performance

DaMarcus Beasley 3

Is either still injured or has simply lost it. Five poor to below average performances in a row should get a player dropped from the starting XI, shouldn’t it?

Freddy Adu 7

A creative force in the midfield.

Chris Rolfe 6

Had some nice moments

John Thorrington 7

Good performance off the bench looking lively down the wing.

Chad Barrett NR

A cameo.

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US 8-0 Barbados and Other CONCACAF Thoughts

I trust we all watched the US match yesterday and if you did not see it, you didn’t need to. Barbados missing four of their five best players got rolled by a fired up US squad 8-0. While the scoreline was impressive, many concerns still persist for the U.S. like keeping proper spacing between attackers on the pitch and players knowing their respective roles while on the pitch. I’ll save these discussions and criticisms for another day because the US did what they had to do to avoid the pitfalls others faced in qualifying yesterday. The issues with the US remain today the same as they were last week. However, other nations that we compete with such as Mexico are showing themselves to be much weaker than anticipated. Player ratings are given at the bottom of this post.

Argentina and Brazil both struggled in their South American qualifiers. Argentina needed a stoppage time goal from Rodrigo Palacio to draw with Ecuador at home in Buenos Aires. Argentina looked unimpressive last weekend in a friendly against the United States after crushing Mexico 4-1 earlier in the week. This result is shocking as Ecuador has already changed coaches during qualifying and has been in the bottom three of the qualifying table throughout the tournament.

Argentina faces Brazil later this week in a qualifier. Roque Santa Cruz and Salvador Cabanas scored goals as Paraguay despite being a man down for much of the match crushed Brazil 2-0. Brazilian coach Dunga must be feeling the pressure despite winning Copa America last year. Brazil struggled to beat Canada in a friendly in Seattle last week and then got dumped by Venezuela 2-0 in Foxboro, MA.

Mexico’s performance yesterday against a team ranked 51 spots below Barbados in the FIFA world rankings made the rest of CONCACAF look like world beaters. Mexico used two controversial calls to notch late goals against the 172nd ranked team in the world, Belize 2-0. In what can only be described as a shocking display of football, Mexico was so bad that from minute thirty onward Belize was tempted go forward and attack. Particularly bad for Mexico from my eyes was Andres Guardado who was repeatedly dispossessed and repeatedly lost his composure.

Mexico’s two goals were controversial. A late foul call just outside the box in minute 67 led to a free kick which Carlos Vela cleaned up for a goal, and then deep into stoppage time after a Mexican shot went far wide, The referee stopped play and called a penalty because a Belize defender had clipped the Mexican shot taker on his follow through after the show was taken. Jared Borgetti, calmly booked the PK, and Mexico ran out a 2-0 victor. This performance paled in comparison to the impressive displays provided by Mexico’s likely second round group opponents: Honduras is already through to group stage with an aggregate 6-2 win over Puerto Rico, Canada crushed St Vincent 3-0 in the first leg even without injured Rob Friend, and Jamaica beat the Bahamas 7-0 in the first leg of their series. So in other words, Sven Goran Eriksson has a momentous task ahead of him, as Mexican football is suffering from a crisis of confidence and run of about two years of indifferent, if not simply poor results.

Trinidad and Tobago has been in a steady decline since thrilling the world in Germany 2006. Now T&T is in serious jeopardy of being dismissed from World Cup 2008 qualifying just two years after participating in the last tournament. Bermuda went to Port of Spain and won 2-1 yesterday. If Bermuda advances they will be grouped with the US, Guatemala and the Cuba/Antigua winner.

Player Ratings

Brad Guzan 6

Nothing to do most of the day

Steve Cherdundolo 6

Some nice crosses

Oguchi Onyewu 7

Was active on set pieces

Carlos Bocanegra 7

Great set up for Dempsey’s first goal

Heath Pearce 6

Had more difficulty marking than he should have but served a great ball to Eddie Johnson for a goal

Pablo Mastroeni 6

Injured, after a nice shot on goal which an apparently offside Brian Ching redirected into the net.

Landon Donovan 10

Pure quality and and off the ball

Michael Bradley 7

Nice bounce back match

DaMarcus Beasley 4

Beasley is perennially coming inside or pushing out of position causing the US to lose its shape in the attack. Should be dropped in favor of Eddie Lewis as long as Lewis can go. Beasley isn’t healthy and quite frankly is useless against better opposition when he is healthy.

Clint Dempsey 7

Two goals and some nice work on the ball in midfield.

Eddie Lewis 8

Has a quality and composure totally lacking in the other American wide players

Freddy Adu 8

Tried to get too cute at times, but his presence is always felt on a match.

Brian Ching 8

Two goals but some questions about positioning and work off the ball. I’d still prefer a healthy Taylor Twellman to Ching.

Eddie Johnson 7

As my CSRN colleague, Peter Brown texted me, why couldn’t EJ hit that header against Spain?

MLS Review: Focus on Internationals

Former Metro star and current Islander Peter Villegas scored a goal for Puerto Rico in Saturday’s 2-2 draw with Honduras

Every region with the exception of the Euro engaged UEFA confederation has begun qualifying for World Cup 2010. A number of players from Major League Soccer and USL-1 were in action Saturday, representing their countries, and flying the banner of both leagues. This is why it is all the more illogical for both leagues to play right through the international breaks, especially for World Cup qualifying. Sunday over twenty five players from MLS and USL will be engaged in World Cup qualifying.

Here is a rundown of Saturday’s best:

Carlos Ruiz (LA Galaxy)

Scored four goals in Guatemala’s 6-0 thrashing of St Lucia

Christopher Megaloudis (NY Red Bulls)

Scored a goal in Puerto Rico’s 2-2 draw with Honduras

Peter Villegas (Puerto Rico Islanders)

Scored a goal in Puerto Rico’s 2-2 draw with Honduras

Noah Delgado (Puerto Rico Islanders)

Played a full 90 minutes in Puerto Rico’s 2-2 draw with Honduras

Amado Guevara (Toronto FC)

Played 90 minutes in Honduras 2-2 draw with Puerto Rico. Honduras advances 6-2 on aggregate

Gonzalo Segaras (Chicago Fire)

Played 66 minutes in Costa Rica’s 2-2 draw with Grenada.

Shalrie Joseph (New England Revs)

Played 90 minutes in Grenada’s 2-2 draw with Costa Rica

Kenny Mansally (New England Revs)

Played the final 15 minutes of Gambia’s 1-0 victory over Algeria

Kei Kamara (San Jose Earthquakes)

Played 90 plus minutes in Sierra Leone’s 1-0 victory over South Africa. Kamara was subbed out in stoppage time.

Other Thoughts:

Given the massive crowd assembled the performance of the Earthquakes was disgraceful. But without Kei Kamara, and Ivan Guerrero (who didn’t play for Honduras despite being on the bench) The Quakes looked completely incapable of linking up from midfield to the attack. Edson Buddle is playing so well and seems finally to have his head screwed on straight that perhaps he should be looked at closely by Bob Bradley for a future US National Team call up.

How humiliated must David Beckham feel to be playing on a sodded up baseball diamond while his mates are competiting on the world’s biggest stage in the European Championships? Give him credit for not sulking and still giving his all in every match despite the poor quality of the pitches, the football and the seeming need of opposing MLS clubs to use Beckham to sell tickets.

DC United rolls at RFK Stadium. No surprise there. Now United needs to maintain its level away from home. Last week’s win at Chicago was a good start but just one game marred by red cards and poor officiating. Luciano Emilio thankfully has regained his scoring touch.

The extended road trip for Kansas City really dented the teams’ confidence and right now DP Claudio Lopez and Ivan Trujillo are simply not producing up front. I hate to say this but unless a player is from Argentina or Brazil signing someone who has never been capped by their nation is a risky proposition. MLS is not as poor a footballing league as it once was an signing players like Trujillo is no longer a sure fire way to success.

Don’t sleep on Toronto FC as a title contender. Without several players missing due to international duty, the Reds crushed a Colorado squad that was hardly missing anybody beyond Bouna Counduil. A very impressive performance for John Carver’s side, yet Jeff Cunningham is stuck on goal #99.

Houston was poor the other night, and with so many internationals missing you are reminded how influential Steve Ralston is on a match when healthy and the standard is dummied down. Ralston, an MLS original is still on his day among the league’s best.

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Sven: Mexico's Final Downfall?

Sven Goran Eriksson’s hiring by the FMF has been hailed as a dawn of a new era of Mexican dominance over CONCACAF. While this certainly may be the case, much evidence provides us with the possibility that this could be another step on the slippery slope of Mexico’s fall back to the pack in CONCACAF. The confederation seems to have caught up with Mexico lately, and its member nations no longer stand in fear of “El Tri.”

No question exists that Mexico has the best player pool in CONCACAF. Mexico, as has been the case since the mid 1980s, has the deepest player pool, most skilled players and most accomplished internationals of any CONCACAF member nation. Mexico has dominated the confederation winning four Gold Cups since 1993 and qualifying for every world cup the nation has been eligible for since missing hosting the World Cup in 1986. But Mexico has also had recent failures. Costa Rica ran away with the Hexagonal title in World Cup qualifying for Korea/Japan 2002, and that was followed up by an American triumph in the qualifying tournament for Germany 2006. More recently, Mexico has begun to lose as frequently to Central American nations as any time in its history. Panama defeated Mexico in the 2005 Gold Cup, Honduras in 2007 Gold Cup and Guatemala in a recent friendly as well as in the Olympic qualifying tournament.

Then their is the subject of the US National Team. Despite having far superior players, with better skill and technical ability, Mexico had repeatedly lost to the United States over the past ten years, most notably in the knock out stages of the 2002 World Cup. The US has contrary to belief of many American fans never had a more skilled team than Mexico (Well maybe the exception was in 1934 when the US beat Mexico in a qualifier held in Italy, and the ASL was at its height as one of the world’s best domestic leagues did the US have more skilled players but at no point since.) But what the Americans have had is a decided psychological edge over the Mexicans , an edge based on physical play and the ability of the best American player, Landon Donovan to almost individually dominate matches against the Mexicans.

Simply put, the Mexicans are soft and have been for many years now. Some of the very best Mexican coaches have tried and failed to stem the culture of falling short in Mexican Football. Manuel LaPuente, Enrique Meza, Javier Aguirre, and Ricardo LaVolpe have all failed despite being outstanding managers at just about every other stop in their careers. The flamboyant but unqualified Hugo Sanchez also failed but that was to be expected.

While Sven Goran Eriksson is an accomplished club manager, his stewardship of England’s National Team still creates serious questions. During Eriksson’s tenure, England’s player failed to tactically adjust to Eriksson’s preferred style of play, and also despite overwhelming talent England failed to get past the Quarterfinals of a major tournament. Much like Mexico, the Three Lions had a tendency to play down to opponents and psychologically allow some rival nations, as Mexico has with the USA, to psychologically affect them. Sven’s side with England was quite frankly, soft by the lofty standards of English footballing history.

Eriksson is no doubt a tactically flexible and sophisticated manager at the club level. But with England his tactics seemed to get simpler and easier to discern as his tenure wore on. With Mexico this is a grave danger as El Tri was handed easily the toughest group in CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying and then must navigate through the Hexagonal. Honduras, Canada and Jamacia loom at the group stage and each of these sides has the quality to create danger for a Mexican side in transition.

Mexico has some outstanding young players: perhaps among the best in the world following a U-17 World Cup title in 2005. Gio Dos Santos, Carlos Vela, Andreas Guardado and Guillermo Ochoa are all among the elite youngsters in CONCACAF. But player management was with England a major weakness of Eriksson’s tenure. No recent Mexican manager has had such a gifted group of youngsters to integrate in the national side, but at the same time no recent Mexican manager has ever faced a CONCACAF confederation filled with teams of high quality.

CONCACAF’s improvement overall as a confederation could not have come at a worse time for Mexico. Despite the hiring of Eriksson, confidence is at an all time low it appears at the FMF. Continued losses to the US and Argentina as well as failures in just about every major tournament entered has many Mexican supporters in near panic mode. Help may be on the way in the form of Eriksson or this may simply be a desperate hire of a foriegn manager who knows little about Mexican football or CONCACAF.

Eriksson may bring about a renaissance in Mexican Football. He may also be to Mexico as Berti Vogts was to Scotland: a foreign manager with an established reputation who has no clue about the domestic game in the nation he is about to lead and who is set in his ways. For Mexico’s sake let’s hope the former happens.

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