OT-23 Man WC Roster Announced
Bob Bradley just announced the 23 man roster for the World Cup.
Pretty expected and par for the course with the notable exception of no Brian Ching, which surprises me to almost no end.
Keepers: Brad Guzan, Marcus Hahnemann, Tim Howard
Defenders: Calos Bocanegra, Jonathan Bornstein, Steve Cherundolo, Jay DeMerit , Clarence Goodson, Oguchi Onyewu, Jonathan Spector.
Midfielders: DaMarcus Beasley, Michael Bradley, Ricardo Clark, Clint Dempsey, Landon Donovan, Maurice Edu, Benny Feilhaber, Stuart Holden, Jose Francisco Torres.
Forwards: Jozy Altidore, Edson Buddle, Robbie Findley, Herculez Gomez
Taking Findley over Ching is ridiculous. That is all.
I think in this case the choir on that consists of everyone on the planet outside of Bob Bradley. I don't salvate over Ching, but he is a proven quantity...Robbie Findlay..eh not to much.
Not to mention our egregious lack of a big lofing forward who can play in the air...Buddle...no, not really.
On a one-to-one comparison, absolutely. However, Findley plays a different type of game that is more akin to Charlie Davies half-step brother's dog's previous owner. Other than quality possession and good decision making, Ching doesn't really do much for the team and it would throw off the dynamic (or something).
Regardless, if Findley sees the field we have much bigger problems than Ching could have fixed.
Can't believe Ching got dissed. Why Findley? Why? Oh well. I hope they can pull together run. go USA!
Findlay wont see the fleid.
Findley and Buddle over Ching is pretty shocking, I thought he (Ching) was the best player on the field for us last night. I guess the thinking was Ching's playing style is too similar to Altidore's???
Oguchi Rules, or wait O'Doyle Rules!!!!!!!
He looked sloppy last night but I like the pick as he is our best back when healthy, hopefully he is closer to 100% on the 12th
wasn't he supposed to be the next Pele or was he just another over-hyped phenom ala Michele Wie?
The latter. I saw an exceedingly interesting article somewhere (maybe it was the MGoLeader @ TSB?) that suggested that Freddy Adu was was the soccer equivalent of baseball's Central American wunderkids. That is, he came to the US at '14' when he was more likely 16 or 17, and thus looked amazing because he was more developed than all of his competition. Fast forward a few years, and now he's no longer playing with a physical advantage and looks average to mediocre. The short version is that regardless of the explanation, Freddy Adu has turned into another overhyped phenom.
Adu never had a physical advantage over his peers. He actually was one of the smallest guys, if not the smallest at Bradenton. However, he was without a doubt the best technical player on the U-17 nat'l program. He was the best player and at the time the only other players who were close were Eddie Gaven, Guillermo Gonzales, and you could've made an argument for Danny Szetela.
Now Adu could've been a year, or even a few years, older than his listed age but that still would've put him on par with his nat'l teammates growing up (They were mostly 86's. Adu is listed as an '89). Some guys just don't pan out (see G. Gonzales who is arguably a bigger bust than Adu and Szetela. Geez, even Gaven). Adu just got way too much praise from the media at such a young age.
Maybe Bob Bradley thought Findley would get a big game-winner to take the championship, sending shockwaves that shake the very foundation of the sport for years to come.
Oh wait, that was Samantha Findlay.
There are many things about USMNT that we don't know since coverage is relatively sparse. The few reports from the camps were that Bob Bradley was concerned more on conditioning and the fitness of the players. Ching just came back from a hamstring injury, although he did look good in the limited time he got yesterday.
If I were BB, and based on the information available to us, I would have gone with Ching. I'm basing that on how ineffective Findley was in the game against the Netherlands. He has decent pace, but was pretty much a lame duck. Of the touches that he got, he did nothing to create opportunities for him or the team. I don't think he will see any playing time, but I would rather have a veteran like Ching on the bench.
I would say that is a strong pick.