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One Guy. One Game. One Press Pass. Once in a lifetime.

Wanting for more US MNT? Yared wrote in about his experience at the recent U.S. – Brazil Friendly, and I’m happy to share his story as part of the Diary Project. Ya know, it could be you. Send in your stories and photos for the digital time capsule.

Yared with his first ever press pass is after the jump…
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I’m busy transcribing an interview you’ll see here tomorrow, but a few readers wanted to know why I had not posted any comments about the US MNT v Brazil game. I responded that there really isn’t much to say about a friendly game, so from the blog perspective, my time was better spent elsewhere. I told him that I thought the boys played pretty well all things considered, the big question in these games being ‘how hard did Brazil really try?’

That we will never know, which is why unless I go to the game, or there evolves some momentous event or dire need to comment, I usually don’t write too much about it, save a few words for the weekly Barometer. There are enough blogs, I continued, that catering to the games and players, and moreover do a fine job at it. Those most obviously written by the professional soccer beat writers. Ives Galarcep does the best job overall with his blog, while Steve Goff is the best reporier with a blog. Goff gives almost no commentary, holding true to the objective reporter; Ives lets it fly a bit more. There is great worth in both methods.

I went on to then write a bit about what I took from the game, and figured, well, as several people asked for it, I might as well throw this up while I wait for a few queries to come back to me. I try to look down the road in these circumstances, not relishing in or rehashing game notes. What’s left is after the jump…
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photo from fulhamfc.com

It wasn’t virtuosic, but that’s not Clint Dempsey’s game. Not yet anyhow, but it might not be too far down the road, because hard nose to the highway is this kid’s manner, and it showed on Saturday as he had a head (or foot) in each of Fulham’s 3 goals to tie Tottenham, one of the stronger teams (on paper) in the English Premier League. I can’t think of a more apt weekend for his production, as Clint is the definition of work, effort, labor.

It begs the question, as we celebrate the nation’s hard workers - most productive in the world they say - which American has had the best single-game perfomance?

The MNT Player Pool is grab bag of who-knows-what. ISI photos for ussoccer.com caught this player pool in Venezuela during Copa America.

GOALKEEPERS- Tim Howard, Marcus Hahnemann. DEFENDERS- Oguchi Onyewu, Steve Cherundolo, Carlos Bocanegra, Jonathan Spector, Jay DeMerit, Jonathan Bornstein. MIDFIELDERS- DaMarcus Beasley, Clint Dempsey, Benny Feilhaber, Michael Bradley, Pablo Mastroeni, Bobby Convey. FORWARDS- Landon Donovan, Josh Wolff, Charlie Davies, Kamani Hill, Sal Zizzo.

There are very few MLS inclusions for the August 22nd friendly against Sweden in Sweden. It’s not at all surprising given the European location, but the fact that our best players are over there in increasing numbers is only going to continue to create rosters like this one. The usually split down the middle squad will continue down this path of a weighty European ratio.

Bradley’s two cents, my pennies, and whatever you want to chip in are after the jump…
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GRANDPA JOE: You’re a crook! You’re a cheat and a swindler! That’s what you are. How can you do a thing like this? Build up a little boy’s hopes and then smash all his dreams to pieces. You’re an inhuman monster!

WILLY WONKA: Well, Instead, Brazil will come to play the US MNT at Chicago’s Soldier Field that same day.

GRANDPA JOE: Oh, OK. Charlie, give the man back his gobstopper. Ronaldinho will be there, right?

USSF has yet to officially announce it, but Steve Goff is reporting that the USA-Mexico match on September 9th in Mexico City is cancelled, replaced by a friendly against Brazil. Announcement coming soon, with the intriguing question: Was there a PR scramble by USSF to get Brazil to step in and save what little face USSF has left? Even though reports are blaming Mexican TV rights for much of the problem, let’s see if a reporter asks that question and how Sunil will answer it.

photograph explained: I was looking for a photo to illustrate this post. A search for Soldier Field turned up this ski-jumping insanity from the 1950’s that I just couldn’t resist. Midwesterners are really hard pressed for some hills.

fans square off at the 2005 World Cup qualifier in Columbus. Photo by Adam Spangler

About 7349 feet up. In what has to be one of the best decisions USSF has made in years, the US MNT will face off against Mexico on September 9 at the famed Estadio Azteca. Not since 1984 has US Soccer played a friendly on Mexican soil. That gap is inexcusable, but this often rumored - now official - game goes a long way in forcing a better future for an immature MNT. This is exactly the kind of challenge so many people (this guy included) have been clamoriing for.

More from the USSF press release after the jump…
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party # 1

What are we at? Is this the 3rd, 4th, or 5th coming out party for Freddy Adu? Now before you start throwing darts, let me preface all of this with… Freddy is a fine player who didn’t ask for a first surprise party, much less however many have since followed. But that isn’t a conversation killer. Plenty of questions exist, most of them unanswerable by anyone, anything, except for maybe the feet of Freddy. And they aren’t talking very often.

While there are no answers, we have - from the intelligent commenters on this website, to any number of articles that have been making it rain since his hat-trick performance - plenty of questions.

The short list after the jump…
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It’s the U20 world cup. Lets not get carried away.

But it’s a great salve for an um, unfortunate?, two weeks for the US MNT. We just beat Brazil!
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The boring Mexico-Chile 0-0 draw last night means Copa America is over for the US MNT, but no matter what roster was sent (or what conmebol thinks of it), accepting the invitation to the South American tournament was the best decision USSF has made in years. That needs to be said as we move forward and look to the future.

(note: Conmebol tempered their criticism by saying that they like having the U.S. included in the tournament even after knocking its roster, but if we continue to see the tournament as practice, we might not get automatic invites down the road. You got to love how they used Mexico as the proper example of how a guest team should prepare. Add in the fact that Brazil sent a B-team to their own confederation tournament, and makes it kind of hard to take any of the U.S. criticism too seriously).

As we head into the off-season, for lack of a better term, I’d like to focus some attention on our friendly schedule – those meaningless games I alluded to a couple of posts ago.

Lets play decider after the jump…
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Benny Feilhaber and the US MNT are only begining to come into focus

Ching, Dempsey, Beasley, Donovan, Clark, Feilhaber, Spector, DeMerit, Onyewu, Simek, Howard

That was the line-up I went with ten days ago, after watching the first round of the Gold Cup. It’s pretty close to the most successful line-up today. It’s all relative, however, it could be anybody in the context of a nervous team in a nervous game. But they came through, and it’s a chance to take stock before heading to South America.

Catch your breath after the jump…
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