USA v Spain
- these teams met in Santander a year ago with Spain coming away with 1-0 win after 79' goal from Xavi. Spain were much better than USA, especially in 2h, and hit the bar twice before the winning goal finally came. That was a pretty different USA team with only 4-5 players of the 16 that played, expected to see the field Wednesday. The USA are visibly intimidated when the play teams like Brazil, Argentina, Spain, and England but actually look comfortable playing Italy probably because of their previous WC result. Anyway, I expect Bradley to invoke the defense-first system that they attempted against Brazil and you'll see a similar result. This makeshift USA defense simply cannot hold up against Torres and Villa especially with Xavi and Fabregas running at them. The US loses their positioning when they sit back and defend and it'll happen today as well. This is a step up in competition for Spain after playing in that very weak group, but I'm sure they'll pass the test with a pretty straight forward 2 goal win. You'll probably know within 5' what attitude the US has taken for the match, or maybe it won't even take that long. If you see Davies and Altidore both starting in attack, perhaps the US will actually play a bit today but if Altidore is set as lone attacker in 4-5-1 this game is all but lost. If they run through the midfield and play balls to wide midfielders, perhaps they have a chance, but only if they play in 4-4-2. Unfortunately I expect they'll take a defensive approach and let Spain possess the ball, just trying to hit back on counters, and you'll see the horrible defense and midfield lunging at Spain attackers to produce a wealth of yellow cards. While this defensive approach is not at all their style yet it's the style they play against superior teams. Over the past year they've played some of the best teams in the world (Italy, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, and England) yet scored a grand total of 1 goal in those matches...Donovan's penalty against Italy last week. While normally there is no value in playing against the USA as a massive underdog this is much more of a David vs Goliath matchup than world rankings suggest. Man for man Spain is superior and while they've coasted into the semifinals, the US pulled off a miracle. That little fairy tale ends today when my team gets laughed off the pitch in a 2-0 or 3-0 loss.
Spain -1.5 +100
- these teams met in Santander a year ago with Spain coming away with 1-0 win after 79' goal from Xavi. Spain were much better than USA, especially in 2h, and hit the bar twice before the winning goal finally came. That was a pretty different USA team with only 4-5 players of the 16 that played, expected to see the field Wednesday. The USA are visibly intimidated when the play teams like Brazil, Argentina, Spain, and England but actually look comfortable playing Italy probably because of their previous WC result. Anyway, I expect Bradley to invoke the defense-first system that they attempted against Brazil and you'll see a similar result. This makeshift USA defense simply cannot hold up against Torres and Villa especially with Xavi and Fabregas running at them. The US loses their positioning when they sit back and defend and it'll happen today as well. This is a step up in competition for Spain after playing in that very weak group, but I'm sure they'll pass the test with a pretty straight forward 2 goal win. You'll probably know within 5' what attitude the US has taken for the match, or maybe it won't even take that long. If you see Davies and Altidore both starting in attack, perhaps the US will actually play a bit today but if Altidore is set as lone attacker in 4-5-1 this game is all but lost. If they run through the midfield and play balls to wide midfielders, perhaps they have a chance, but only if they play in 4-4-2. Unfortunately I expect they'll take a defensive approach and let Spain possess the ball, just trying to hit back on counters, and you'll see the horrible defense and midfield lunging at Spain attackers to produce a wealth of yellow cards. While this defensive approach is not at all their style yet it's the style they play against superior teams. Over the past year they've played some of the best teams in the world (Italy, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, and England) yet scored a grand total of 1 goal in those matches...Donovan's penalty against Italy last week. While normally there is no value in playing against the USA as a massive underdog this is much more of a David vs Goliath matchup than world rankings suggest. Man for man Spain is superior and while they've coasted into the semifinals, the US pulled off a miracle. That little fairy tale ends today when my team gets laughed off the pitch in a 2-0 or 3-0 loss.
Spain -1.5 +100
