World Cup: Arrggggh!!!

All the cliches of coaching came true in yesterday's World Cup final:

"That's why they roll the ball out there."

"Let a lesser team hang around long enough they believe they can beat you."

"You've got to put the ball in the back of the net to win."

The United States let Japan hang around too long in yesterday's World Cup final and it cost them the title they had dreamed of and had been favored to win. Japan may not have been the better side, but they clearly deserved to win.

In the early going it looked as though Team USA was merely adjusting its sights as it pressured a disorganized Japanese defense. Lauren Cheyney, Carli Lloyd and Megan Rapinoe all had near misses in the early going. As the half wore on, time and again fans were asking, "How did that not go in?"

After more chances in the early part of the second half, the first goal finally came in the 69th run on a perfectly executed pass by Megan Rapinoe, who had set up Abby Wambach's miraculous game-tying goal against Brazil, to Alex Morgan, who beat the defender, touched it with her right and fired into the goal with her left. At last USA were on the board and more goals would surely be coming momentarily. Not.

With the cup just nine minutes away, Rachel Buehler could not clear the ball and it went off Ali Krieger who likewise could not get it out of harms way before Ayi Miyami jammed it into the net to tie the game.

It looked like the U.S. would win when Abby Wambach scored on a header shortly before the end of the first OT to make it 2-1. But again Japan, to their credit, refused to let down. Homare Sawa, the leading scorer of the tournament, won a corner kick and deflected a ball off Wambach for the tying goal just three minutes from time.

You knew it wasn't going to be the American's day when keeper Ayumi Kaihori made an unbelievable kick save on Shannon Boxx's opening PK. Carli Lloyd shot high and Tobin Heath's kick was saved by Kaihori. Japan converted two of its first three, so Wambach's tally to start the fourth round was too little too late. (Had Wambach missed the game would have been over.) When Saki Kumagai scored on the next ball, Japan had the cup.

In my view, the U.S. did not play a bad game. They just couldn't score and Japan did not give up. Nothing for the Americans to be ashamed of for sure.

Walk Down Memory Lane #7 - Carli vs. Sweden

When I first met Carli Lloyd, she was in 8th grade, not much over five feet tall and playing for the U-15 Medford Strikers, New Jersey team I had just joined as an assistant to Joe Dadura.

Today Carli is playing for the World Cup. She’s grown to about 5’-8”, wears the USA logo instead of the Medford Strikers or Rutgers University.

We won the State Cup that first year I helped coach, in a shoot-out over defending champs Voorhees. Carli wasn’t the best player on the team, but was very good, with a magic touch on the ball. She did not take one of our five penalty kicks that day in the Spring of 1997, and in fact she was never one of our PK shooters, which went on to be a running joke among us for years. So I was happy to see her make one of the kicks in the dramatic shootout over Brazil.

We had a lot of good times on the Strikers team – two NJ State Cups, a Dallas Cup, a JAGS championship, and many other victories. I watched Carli play a number of games for Rutgers and also saw most of the other team members play at least once in college. Many of us have stayed in touch over the years, at least on Facebook, and had a reunion two years ago, which Carli attended. (See the post from 9/7/09.)

Which brings us to Memory Lane. I knew Carli had played many times for youth national teams and was hoping she’d get a crack at the full national team. She finally made her first appearance against Ukraine on July 10, 2005.

A year later Louise and I went out to Minnesota to visit our daughter, Kirsten. It just so happened the U.S. team had a friendly against Sweden in Blaine, Minnesota and Carli was kind enough to get four tickets for us – in the shade. It was in the mid-90s all day and still about 90 at game time at 5 p.m.

It was, as a good friend described it, a “lump in the throat” moment seeing Carli marching out on the field and standing there during the National Anthem representing her country and the dreams of who knows how many thousands of girls who want to be just like her. To anyone who knows her, she also represented what pure hard work will get you.

The United States won the game in dramatic fashion in the closing seconds and afterwards Carli told me it was the hottest she’d ever been on a field. Since then, Carli has been capped more than 100 times (the Sweden match was her 10th cap), has scored the winning goal in the Olympic gold medal game and played in two World Cups, with hopefully a championship today.

I’ve seen Carli play three other games for the national team and many times on TV. But the first time was the most memorable.

All's Well That Ends Well: U.S. downs Brazil

I thought I was going to write, “We wuz robbed!” by the absolutely atrocious officiating in today’s World Cup quarterfinal between Brazil and the United States. But Abby Wambach’s perfectly timed header off a Megan Rapinoe cross only seconds before what would have been an excruciatingly painful defeat for the U.S. made this a happy story after all.

Things got off to a spectacular start for the Americans when Brazilian defender Daiane misplayed a cross from Shannon Boxx on the left into her own goal.

Things turned ugly in the second half and when Australian referee Jacqui Melksham proved to the world that she should not be officiating a U-10 game in the park, let along a World Cup match. Rachel Buehler was called for a very questionable foul on Marta, the Brazilians extremely skilled and extremely whiny forward in the box in the 65th minute. I thought when I saw the play and when I saw the replays immediately after it that it was not a foul, and when I saw it again a few hours later I still feel that way.

Out came the red card and the U.S. faced the prospect of the tying goal then 25 minutes down a player. But Hope Solo made a brilliant diving save to her left of Cristiane’s PK to preserve the lead and give her team a huge morale boost. But wait. Melksham stepped in again and ordered the kick re-taken for reasons no one knows. Solo said afterwards she was never told where the ref thought she stepped off her line too soon or another U.S. player encroached. Replays showed Solo shuffled her feet on the line but did not appear to step all the way off it. An American player at the top of the screen may have stepped over the 18-yard line a split second before the shot, but at most this appeared to be a “trifling offense” that should never have been called. And Solo earned a yellow card for asking about the call. Marta stepped to the line for the re-take and tied the match.

Despite the player shortage, the Americans hung tough and regulation ended 1-1, although it should have been a 1-0 victory.

Early in the first overtime Marta scored, but replays showed there was a good possibility of offsides.

It seemed to be the end of the USA’s dream as time wound down until Wambach showed why she is one of the greatest women players ever. In the shoot-out, with the U.S. shooting first, Boxx, Lloyd, Wambach and Rapinoe all converted for the U.S., meaning that when Solo made a spectacular save on Daiane’s kick, the USA would win if Alex Krieger scored on her shot. She did and the Americans face France in the semi-final.

Now that the match is over, Jacqui Melsham should hang her head in shame. Or at least FIFA should make sure she never referees at this level again. One could argue that the U.S. lucked out when Lloyd was not given a second yellow card for a hand ball in the second half, or that they missed other chances and maybe Brazil would have tied the game anyway. Maybe – but had the referee made the right call, the U.S. would have had a 1-0 lead and 11 players and it’s a good bet they would have held that lead.

Another aside: many years ago, when Carli Lloyd played for the Medford Strikers team that Joe Dadura and I coached, she was never one of the girls we had shoot PKs in a shootout, including the U15 New Jersey State Cup final. It was a running joke for four years and at a college game Carli let me know that she had made a penalty kick in a game the week before. So it was good to see her not only play the entire 120 minutes in what will go down as one of the best games in American soccer history, but to see her make one of the PKs as well.

World Cup - How Did the Ref Miss This One?

Check this video for yourself and see if you don't think this play from yesterday's Women's World Cup match between Australia and Equatorial Guinea (who?) is not one of the worst non-calls ever:
After a shot by the Matildas' Leena Khamis hit the post in the 15th minute, Guinean defender Bruna (#2) caught the ball inside the 6, held it for a few seconds and casually dropped it. Amazingly there was no call from Hungarian referee Gyoengyi Gaal, who appeared to be about 30 yards away, or from the assistant referees. It boggles the mind to think that not one of three officials could see such a blatant hand ball.

The play was reminiscent of a game five years ago when I coached the U13 Medford Strikers Dynamyte. We were in the second half of a league game against CP United at Ark Road in Medford. The score was tied, 0-0, when one of our girls kicked a ball that bounced over the head of the keeper and towards the goal. One of their defenders, standing just behind the goalline, reached up and swatted the ball out with both hands. Some of our girls said the ball was already over the goalline when this happened. If not, it should have been a red card and a penalty kick.

Like yesterday's World Cup game, neither the referee nor the assistant referees made the call. No one taped the game, but a parent on our team took many still photos and one showed the opposing defender holding her hands to her face in horror, as if realizing what she had done. (I am guessing she thought she was well behind the line when she handled the ball, then realized she was not.)  Which turned out to be nothing in the eyes of the officials. After the game, which ended scoreless, a United parent came up to me and apologized. Why? He wasn't the ref. But it was a nice gesture.  And the opposing coach, showing he had a sense of humor, said to me, "You would have missed the PK."

Missing a call in a kids game is one thing. At the professional level, especially at the World Cup, it is inexcusable. Let's see if we hear from the refs on what they were thinking.