The Summer will see a lot of big matches. The top European national teams will try to take the quadrennial contental title at Euro2004 while most of the Western Hemisphere’s national teams will begin their 2006 World Cup qualification rounds (the US plays a home and home with Grenada in mid-June). So in a day for international friendlies, 21 in Europe, how did we do?
Well, for starters, I watched as the Americans pitched a 1-0 shutout over Poland, who beat them in the previous, more meaningful 2002 World Cup meeting. Brad Friedel made a decent showing in goal (where was Tim Howard?) though he was rarely challenged and did not handle a couple of late balls as well as one might desire and in a more important match would probably have led to problems. DaMarcus Beasley was really strong, scoring the only goal and showing nice maturity and width. Coach Bruce Arenas used most of the Americans playing in Europe in this game and is still trying to choose the best 18 or so for the qualifiers, with only an April 28 game against Mexico and a still to be settled opponent June 2 to prepare.
A lot of the Liverpool players were in action but did not fare as well. England lost 1-0 to Sweden and this put Jamie Carragher, Steven Gerard and Emile Heskey down in a game they really wanted to win. Jerzey Dudek was another loser, handling the goal for Poland, though except for Beasley’s shot through Dudek’s legs he answered what little power the US showed. Milan Baros scored a goal for the Czech Republic but his squad lost 2-1 to Ireland; this was the Czechs’ first loss in 20 games, so perhaps a good time to losen up a bit ahead of Euro2004. Bruno Cheyrou played the second half of a goalless draw for France at Netherlands. On the brighter side, Dietmar Hamann scored for Germany as they defeated Belgium 3-0 and Harry Kewell played for an hour in Australia’s 1-0 victory over South Africa.
BillSaysThis 