William K. Wolfrum Chronicles

It’s never easy finding bright spots in a 4-1 loss, but the U.S.’s defeat at the hands of Argentina in their first Copa America match was by no means crushing.

After a slow start, Argentina got two goals from Hernan Crespo, and goals by Pablo Aimar and Carlos Tevez to handily beat the the Americans at José Pachencho Romero Stadium in Venezuela.

The U.S. held the lead, albeit briefly after striker Eddie Johnson converted a penalty kick after getting fouled from behind in the box at the eight-minute mark.

For the U.S., however, the result was to be expected. Coming into the game following their Sunday victory over Mexico in the Gold Cup final, the team came to South America sans top players like DeMarcus Beasley, Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey. Argentina, for its part, comes to Copa America fully loaded, with such international stars as Crespo, Tevez, Lionel Messi, Javier Mascherano and others.

Nonetheless, the U.S. played confidently, especially in the first half, when they frustrated Messi and team, forcing the Argentineans into attempting long ball after long ball to break the U.S. defense. U.S. fans who have been hearing for some time that the younger Americans weren’t intimidated by anyone, finally got to see that in action, as the U.S. played solidly, especially in the midfield.

Offensively was where the largest problem is for the U.S., and will be the likely reason that Copa America will be a three-games-and-out experience for them. Despite his early goal, Johnson played tentatively, and the Americans were not able to create anything whatsoever on the Argentineans’ side throughout the game, registering nary a shot in anger at keeper Roberto Abbondanzieri. Taylor Twellman, the talented U.S. attacker always looking to make his mark on the national side was virtually invisible before being substituted for by Herculez Gomez, who was also little noticed.

In the end, it was as expected to be - a learning experience. The U.S. will need more offense to advance, though it seems unlikely. Nonetheless, as overmatched as the team was, the Red, White and Blue have little to be ashamed of for their efforts.

The U.S. will play again on Monday, in a must-win game against Paraguay, which punished Colombia 5-0 in the early game.

Copa America Note: Brazil, already reeling from its 2-0 loss to Mexico on Wednesday, suffered another loss when striker Fred (Lyon) went down in practice and was found to have a fractured foot. Brazil will not be able to replace the talented striker from Belo Horizonte. According to the Offsides Lyon Web site, Fred will be out of action at least two months.

–WKW

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 28th, 2007 at 7:35 pm and is filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.