Gold Cup - USA vs. Grenada

Since I live in Seattle, I had to go see the US national team play when they were here - on the Fourth of July no less! Even if it was a "B" squad made up of players whom I hadn't heard of (for the majority of them, at least) coming into the game.

It shouldn't come as any surprise that the United States dominated Grenada, especially when you consider that the US has 300+ million people and Grenada has only 110,000 people. It was a complete mismatch, really. But still, I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and for any soccer nut in my position, how could I not go watch the national team as a way to celebrate our country's independence?

And for those of you who don't know, the United States won 4-0, with goals from Freddy Adu, Stuart Holden, Robbie Rogers and Charlie Davies.

Best US Player: Stuart Holden, Houston Dynamo (honorable mention goes to Robbie Rogers of the Crew). Holden has had experience playing on the U-20 team and more recently on the US Olympic Team in Beijing last summer, but in his first senior team appearance, he didn't make a single bad pass, dribble or move that I could see for the whole 90 minutes. He scored a goal and might've assisted another one if my memory serves me right. As a player who looked like he was playing some hybrid of central midfield and right winger, I think he could make the national team in the future (since I do not rate Ricardo Clark highly, but I don't like his chances of unseating Michael Bradley, Landon Donovan or Clint Dempsey in the first team). A real exciting, fundamentally strong, and most importantly, smart player on the ball.

Most Disappointing US Player : Freddy Adu. It's certainly not his fault that he was tagged as being the future of United States soccer at such a young age, but boy, did he look lazy for still being a fairly inexperienced player who hasn't earned any right to be lazy. He never seemed to hustle for a ball, electing instead to wait for the ball to reach his feet. Adu also seemed to have a really bad first touch. He had a very nice goal in the 6th minute of play, but all the credit should go to the assist man (Rogers it was I think?) for picking out an unmarked Adu in the box.

It's certainly a bit harsh to call Adu the "most disappointing player," but everyone else on the US squad (again, half of whom I hadn't heard of) all played very well. Adu didn't necessarily have a bad game, but he didn't seem to be taking advantage of his time on the field. Now I have a better idea why he hasn't been cracking the first team squad lately.

Overall, a good day out. There were drunk Honduran fans four rows behind me blowing horns the entire time that might've come straight from South Africa last week. I saw one of them funneling a beer down the horn. I'll bet he enjoyed that.